Dealing with A Narcissist

For years, I’ve blamed myself. I thought I was the issue, and that she was right about everything. I didn’t understand all of the manipulative behavior and issue within the relationship, even though people constantly told me and reminded me of this. I just couldn’t even fathom the idea that the things she was doing was wrong. I mean she was my best friend and my mother, so why would she do anything to hurt me? Even when she would say certain things, I would make myself believe that she was saying it for my own good, but it wasn’t until I really started looking at the situation and realized that she was doing this to control me, and hope that I wouldn’t leave her side.

Especially, when she went out of her way to ruin my romantic relationship and made it seem like I was in the wrong for doing things for the person I was with or even spending time with them. She felt like she was no longer first in my life and that bothered her. At the moment, I didn’t realize how narcissist that sounded. She was my mother and was jealous of my boyfriend because I was spending my free time with him, and not her. Even though I lived with her and worked with her. The fact that the main reason we broke up is because of her, and I still didn’t get it. I remember him saying the way she acts isn’t normal, especially when she threw a fit because he didn’t want to speak with her or be friends with her. She looked at it as him being disrespectful, and at the time I agreed with her. She made me believe that if he doesn’t want to deal with her, then he’s a terrible person and it didn’t hit me until much later that he didn’t have to talk nor explain himself to her. He didn’t have a relationship with her and if he chooses not to want to be bothered with her, it was okay. However, she didn’t see It that way and when we decided to rekindle, she did everything in her power to make him leave and try to force him to talk to her until he decided to just leave the situation. I was really confused but stuck in the middle. At the time, she was still my best friend, but I didn’t realize how toxic it was. It brought me to the conclusion that I didn’t need her to be a part of my relationships and that maybe she shouldn’t be able to meet my significant others, and that also made her mad because she felt like she was no longer a part of my life. Even though in reality my romantic life is my romantic life and not hers as well. I realized that this wasn’t behavior that started with just her, but this a pattern with my family members on that side in general. Everyone tried to control their youngest child, and stop them for venturing out just to turn around and speak down on them about everything. I think that was my biggest turning point when I started to look at her different, but I just couldn’t truly cut her off at that moment. I knew she had her flaws but she was my mother, and I still tried to believe she had my best interest at heart. Even though all of my friends and even my ex-boyfriend constantly told me that she really needed to be out of my life.

However, after she got into a relationship that went terribly wrong. Things started to get worse. She was no longer even trying to hide her manipulative ways or the fact that she wasn’t empathetic for anything but herself. Just like when I was hurting about something and she literally told me ‘I have my own problems, I don’t care to hear that.’ Or when she told me ‘I don’t know how to deal with you. I never know how you going to react to anything’ (She said this because I started crying after she made fun of me because of my huge swollen lips) , and that’s anytime I have any kind of emotion that she doesn’t want to deal with. After that, I realize that I had to take a big step and go No Contact. Partially, because she literally told me that she wanted to be left alone and just a lot of other hurtful stuff because I was trying to help her regarding her mental health, since she has been struggling a lot since her break up. I thought I was going crazy when I read her messages as she turned it all on me and basically said I was the problem and that she was just having human emotions. However, once I showed my friends and just had everyone else read the messages, they all agreed that it was time to let go.

I have to say that this was the hardest thing I’ve ever have to do in my life, and it was a big decision since my mother has always been the closest person to me. However, I just feel so defeated by her, and I need to get myself to a better place, and I know that I can’t do that with her around.

Overall, I’ve said all of this to say I’m starting a Narcissistic Mother series, as I speak about just overall dealing with it, and how I personally got passed it and what I’m trying to do to get myself to a better state. Even though I pray that one day me and her can have contact and she can be a part of my life. I will do anything to remain mentally stable.

Also, a parent saying that ‘Kids don’t come with handbooks’ and ‘I just did what my parents did’ doesn’t make the toxic behavior okay.