A narc ghost of the past

I have run into my EXNB's photos by accident. We have been living together for years, and I was madly, insanely in love with him, and I was completely addicted to him. For me, he was my personal drug. He was THE love of my life. It was me, who ended the relationship, while I was still deeply in love with him. It took all my strength, it took my sanity, and it almost took my life.

(I slept at my FOO's place after he left, since I thought I would find support and family and the like there. All I got was teaching NM that no boyfriend meant me living with her again (I could bang my head in the wall all day long for this). And all I got as 'comfort' was getting told a few days later by her to 'get over it already' because my sadness annoyed her)

And back then, I didn't even know that he was a narc (or that NM was a narc).

After a few days he left, I begged on my knees for him to come back to me. It lasted for a few months more.

When I found out that he was a full-blown narc, who consciously hunted me down and made me his brainless, dribbling slave, who gaslighted the living cr*p out of me and who almost drove me insane, we were already separated, because he has kicked my ass out with some vague lie of 'needing some time apart'. (yeah, he already had a new victim to pursue, and I was in his way).

I spent my days and nights with reading about narcissism, and the whole puzzle just got solved. And I decided to run like hell and never to look back and never ever to see him or talk to him or even think about him. I knew that if I ever did that, I would be on my knees before him again without thinking, and that I would be the happiest person in the world to sacrifice myself for someone who didn't even exist in the first place. He just replicated me and wore my personality as a Scatha-coat to make me believe that he was just like me. That we were like twins in heart and soul. (I realized that when he started wearing the skin of his new victim who was nothing like me, and he turned into her in an instant. It was horrifying to watch).

So I made my vows of abstinence, which he sensed (he always did) and called in the first second I was sober from my delirium with him. He told me the exact words I ever wanted to hear in my life. I didn't have the strength to say no, but I told him that I would contact him when I had the time. I never did.

Last week, I accidentally bumped into some photos of him circling around his newest prey (it was completely by accident, I expected puppy photos in the puppy photo album of this woman on FB, and ended up seeing his face). It completely threw me off balance. He still has this unique otherworldly beauty that no woman can resist (not even NM, but that's another story, she always loved to try to take my boyfriends away from me). I guess the reason why he looks so handsome and forever young is that he sucks the living soul out of everyone he lays his eyes on, like a real life vampire.

It hurt like hell. And I needed all my strength to resist contacting him or at least stalking him. I miss him madly. Well, not him, he never was and never will be. I miss the image that he wore around me. I miss the feverish love, the addiction, the high, the infatuation, the madness, that neverending thirst, and the knowledge that the love of the most perfect being on Earth is mine. And then I realized that these were not my own feelings, but automatic reactions to the trigger of seeing him, and echoes of memories. I am not like this anymore.

And this whole sh*t has never ever existed.

What I've realized now are the following:

• I am done with illusions and lies. I am not interested in having any relationship with projected images. I want someone who is real and human
• I am a f*cking superhero for getting out of this sh*t on my own and staying out of it.
• I never ever ever want to be back in that situation again. I choose love over addiction. I choose honesty over gaslighting and mind-tricks. I choose healthy over crazy. I choose me over abuse.
• I'm proud of myself, and it feels SO F*CKING GOOD to be me.

No to abuse

I've talked to EF. Told him that me and DB would not be attending his birthday if NM was there. I offered to invite him to dinner with us to a restaurant of his choice, and give presents to him there. I told him that the abuse I had to endure from NM during every single 'family celebration' was now coming to an end, and that I won't participate in that anymore.

He claimed he did not know about any abuse and that he didn't care about presents anyway, and that he would not celebrate without NM because he didn't want to 'have problems because of that'.

I told him that if that was the truth, I was happy that at least he did not feel as awful as I did for my whole life. And also that whether or not it is true, but what is true is that he never protected me. He didn't refute that.

I said I accepted that and asked if he had any suggestion for celebrating, if not on that day but any other day, but without NM.

We agreed that the three of us could go to a chocolate bar someday.

When I got home from talking to EF, I felt suicidal again, but now I have managed to recognize it as something that I was conditioned to feel whenever I said a firm no against letting NM abuse me. (I still think that it is disgusting and scary that someone could condition their child to this.)

Sometimes I feel like the worst daughter, sometimes I could cry like a baby 'I want my mommyyyyy', sometimes I feel that I'm making the worst mistake of my life, and sometimes I feel brave. I want to cling to the latter.

First step towards creating boundaries and protecting them.

Met NM today accidentally. DB was invited for a snack over at their place. She knew I had somewhere else to be so I was out of the question. He politely turned the invitation down and we went on with our business.

One more step.

Family celebrations and professions

First there was DB's birthday. I reminded my FOO beforehand so that they remember when it was, and I also told them what to buy so that they wouldn't give some crap to him. After we agreed on everything (and we even visited them on that day), they conveniently 'forgot' it, and asked me after several days have passed, about the date of DB's birthday. And of course, NM baked the cake that she knows I hate. What a surprise.

Then, I attended to a family celebration with my FOO. I was quite reluctant to participate at all, but it was supposed to be about me, and I arranged it with DB before, that we would only stay for a short time and then leave.

It was the usual narc get-together. I got presents that I would have never wanted for myself and that did not make me happy at all. NM even told me that she knew what I would have liked to get as a present, but she was not getting it for me, because she 'could not compete with DB in buying those kinds of presents for me anyway'.

The whole event was about NM talking (meaning spitting venom) about a certain subject that she knows nothing about and that she loathes (and that happens to be DB's profession and hobby as well). She kept flooding DB with 'information' and 'knowledge', while saying that well, she knew nothing about the subject, but anyway, she knew 'how these things worked' and that 'it is nothing else but conspiracy and money laundry'. She kept attacking DB and twisting every sentence he said, she kept confronting him with sentences like 'you said A about a subject before and now you say B about a completely different subject, so you have contradicted yourself' - waiting for DB to take the bait.

I'm extremely proud of DB, because he was all the while confident about his expertise and his knowledge, he did not get into meaningless fights with NM, and kept his emotional distance.

After this, he asked me 'what the hell was this all about?' and 'where did she even want to get with all this?', and we did not seem to find any answer. And then we realized: EF brought up the subject in the first place (I don't know his opinion on this field because it was one of the 'forbidden' topics that was never allowed to be talked about in the family, since NM loathed it). He showed interest in it, and it seemed that he was happy that he could finally talk to someone (DB) about it, especially because DB knew so much about it. They had a really great time talking to each other, for a few sentences - and this was when NM interrupted and stole the show for herself.

When we left, NM told us that she hoped that for the next event (EF's birthday is coming soon) we would not 'run away so fast', and that we could have a 'real family event' with spending lot of time together, eating lot of food, etc. (I told them that they should not prepare food for me because we had plans for having dinner at a restaurant afterwards). I was so enraged by this time that I couldn't even answer properly, but I felt like exploding. I walked out of the door, when she ran after me, jumped on me and force-kissed me, while cursing me because I left without kissing her. The whole thing was so disgusting.

So, while still being half-blind from rage, I told DB that I would not attend EF's birthday at all, because I'm not going through this shit again. He was trying to comfort me and telling me that NM did not harm him at all and that he did not take her attacks on his career choice and hobby personally, but I am still enraged. How dare she!

And now, I'm scared out of my mind, because somehow I would have to tell EF that I will not be visiting them on his birthday, nor his celebration of his professional successes that he was looking forward a lot (which would also be an evening with NM and him and nobody else). I know I could offer giving him his presents somewhere else in private (and he would refuse and be extremely offended). It has always been the most important thing in my FOO to attend family events and to act like as if we had any connection to each other whatsoever. Missing any of these is taboo, and postponing it by even one single day (even if it is my birthday) is close to blasphemy.

I feel nothing but disgust. I want to celebrate EF, but I don't want NM anywhere near me. And he does not want to be celebrated without her. I feel stuck.

The lifelong secret

I don't even know what to say about it or how to phrase it. For some, it might mean nothing. For me, it meant the whole world and it has happened a very long time ago.

It is a mutual burden and blessing at the same time, that I share with a person whom I haven't seen for more than half of my life. NM knew about it because back then I didn't know I wasn't supposed to share deeply personal things with her. I was very sad at that time, and she, instead of showing empathy or compassion, was screaming at me.

I thought this person has forgot it a long time ago. I built my whole life (and my insecurities and walls and many of my dysfunctions) around this thought. I've learned recently that this person has cared about this as much as I did, if not more, and that it was never forgotten.

This new knowledge made my world turn completely upside down and it almost crashed me. I was extremely happy and extremely devastated at the same time. I have realized that all this time, while I was thinking that we were not communicating because of the sad parts, it was never forgotten. I was never forgotten. I was never alone. And someone cared about me all that time. And I did care, as well.

I thought that was it and I was to go on with my life, and I could build my new foundations on this newly received peace, forgiveness and redemption. I didn't know however, that NM would learn about it.

This person was as shocked and as happy and as puzzled and as relieved as I am, and really really needed to tell this to someone after years and years of silence: someone who can be trusted. And just happened to meet NM after a long time, and spend time together, without knowing that she could cause more harm than good to me. And as a result, NM now knows about this secret. She acted as a very understanding and empathic and loving woman when she heard it, and gave her promise not to ever mention this conversation to me.

I called her after learning that she knows, but she acted as nothing happened. She didn't even mention it. So she might have been honest, or she might have other plans.

Me and DB, we will meet NM soon in person. I wonder whether she is really capable of some empathy and spare me, just once in my lifetime, or...

...or whether she realized that now has the perfect weapon to ruin my life forever, including my relationship with DB. And for this, she only has to tell him what she learned.

The only thing I can protect myself with is that DB knows she cannot be trusted, so he trusts me more. And therefore, I can hope that she does tell him, and then I tell him that she was lying, he would believe.

This would be the last thing I would ever want to do. I have promised myself that he would know everything about me and that I would always want to be honest with him. And I never ever thought that this past event would come and haunt me. I can say that I could almost make myself believe that it never existed.

I can't tell you what the secret is, because it would reveal my identity. It is nothing illegal, nothing wrong, it was just a situation that is very personal and that I wanted to forget forever. And that now affects my present, even though I thought it never would.

I'll know in a few days, whether NM is capable of empathy towards me or whether she really wants to destroy me.

I'm trying to hope that NM will not talk about this, but deep inside, I'm scared sh*tless.

Drama opportunities

We travelled to the place where the funeral was to happen. It was quite a long trip. My FOO and I have stayed with DGM's husband for a few days, to help out and to keep him company. DB couldn't attend, but I knew this was the case.

So I was prepared to spend days locked up together with NM and EF. The only reason why I chose this because I was doing this for DGM, and because I wanted to test how firm my new boundaries were.

I also knew that these sad events would be like an amusement park for NM. All the sadness, all the drama, and all these grandiose events that she could twist and turn so that she would be the star.

I managed to watch her from an emotional distance, and from this angle, what she does is really pathetic and ridiculous. It was sometimes infuriating and disgusting too, but I just didn't care. All I cared about was DGM and her widowed husband.

And yes, NM has tried to stab through my boundaries, she tried everything that she could think of. And she failed.

For her, drama was everywhere, and she did everything she could to turn all eyes and all attention on here. (sarcastic remarks from me in brackets)

• The means of travel we used was too uncomfortable for her.
• She had to sit next to people. Whoah.
• She could not get free spirits or wine to drink, to calm her down (since this whole thing was soooo stressful for her)
• The bed DGM's husband provided was way too uncomfortable (but she did not want to pay for a hotel room of course).
• She had to listen to DGM's husband crying over his beloved wife's death. It was impolite, improper and upsetting of him. He was not being considerate of her enough, that she needed her sleep. She was genuinely surprised that he was mourning, he didn't even love DGM anyway, he was lying about loving her for decades. So why bother at all?
• That DGM's husband was mourning and crying, made her feel very uncomfortable. She wanted to go home. She could not take all this stress. How boring and upsetting it was to keep listening to him sobbing or talking about his recently deceased wife. How irritating this whole thing was to her, and she was such a hero to endure it.
• The funeral sounded so scary. She hates funerals, they remind her of death (guess her own demise, huh?)
• At the funeral, there were other relatives (what a surprise). And she couldn't chat with all of them. (wow... what a surprise again... what did you expect? a house party?)
• Some of the relatives didn't even want to chat with her (how rude that they were too busy mourning than to discuss her successes that she wanted to brag about)
• None of the children were enthusiastic (they haven't seen her for a decade or more and I doubt they even knew who she was) to being dragged through the funeral home by her, to me, while she bragged to me about how successful they were in their studies at high school or college and how they were so much better than me in choosing their future professions that must be paying more than mine does. When I told her that a funeral was probably not the best time to jump them and aggressively interrogate them about school and money, she was genuinely surprised.
• The coffee was way too hot, and not strong enough.
• Also, there was not enough quality food.
• She had to see images of DGM and how shocking that was, that she had to look at the images of someone who was deceased.
• She was genuinely disgusted by mourning people, or sad people. How uncomfortable that was, that she had to see sad and ugly red-eyed people.
• She was constantly worried about the way she looked. She wanted to look elegant and beautiful, so she wore a light dress.
• She then complained about being cold because of the AC, and how she was going to have kidney failure or lung problems. It was all the AC's fault, not her, being under-dressed.
• She forbade me to wear my (bit worn) sweater, because it was 'not appropriate enough for a funeral'. It was black, and it was warm. But no, I would have made her look bad, if I turned up wearing that cr*p, standing beside her.
• She hated everyone else's clothes. They were not appropriate, elegant, nice, decent, beautiful, or black enough. She was the only one apparently who knew how to dress.
• We knew that part of the funeral would be held at an open air place, with ground and grass. She nevertheless wore high heels than complained about the difficulty of walking in high heels in grass.
• She thought it was inappropriate that EF had to participate in the main parts of the funeral (being DGM's son, and closest relative). She considered it weird and unnecessary. Also us, being considered closest relatives (she never liked her).
• DGM's husband was so grief-stricken that he did not want to have dinner together with relatives and friends after the funeral. He just wanted to go home and be alone. NM considered this disrespectful and exclaimed that he was throwing temper tantrums like a 2-years-old.
• She offered to make breakfast for him. He refused. She was offended. (she wanted to act like a replacement wife for him, to prove that it didn't matter to him that DGM died, that he didn't love her at all and just needed her as a slave to cook for him, and as long as he got food, he wasn't even grieving... this didn't work)
• She cooked lunch for him, then complained that she constantly has to cook for him and do stuff for him, while he was doing useless stuff like crying.
• She was genuinely offended when he was talking about his deceased wife during lunch. How boring that was, constantly having to have DGM as a topic.
• He went to buy some groceries and he left his money at home (gosh, I wouldn't be able to find the store at all if I was in his shoes) so she had to pay for them. This must have been an evil plan to rip her off with money.
• I could go on, but you see the point.

I purposefully booked seats so that we would sit as far from each other as possible. So my travel was very pleasant.

NM attempted to freak out about this, and attempted to accuse me about not wanting to 'sit next to each other and chat pleasantly all the way long', but I shrugged her off.

I had meaningful and deep conversations with DGM's husband. We even hugged each other. I could console him a bit, and he said that it helped him a lot that I was with him during these difficult days. It was also good that we shared our love towards DGM and we could talk about our happy times together, and that she was a very good and loving person.

I got some really personal items from DGM's, that dated back to my early childhood. NM demanded that I show them to her. I firmly said no. She was furious, then accused, then demanded, then cried, so attempted the whole scale, to get what she wanted. I told her no again and said that it was too personal and painful for me to discuss, so no matter what she did, I would not be showing them to her. She then wanted to hug me. She literally chased me around the house, while I kept telling her that I would not hug her either. That I did not want to be hugged. By. Her. She went through her whole repertoire again. When she attempted to literally jump me, I stepped aside, and said NO in a very calm, but very firm and authoritative manner. She was shocked, started screaming and crying that I hated her and now she knew it. I left her there.

After this, she arrived a few minutes later as if nothing has happened. So that's how her 'I'm dying from desperation because my daughter does not love me' act was genuine.

I've managed to really experience how she was all about herself and nothing else, how she was a complete emotional illiterate, and how she had absolutely no clue about empathy or grief. I've also managed to keep my boundaries. I'm getting to know the new me.

Relief - guilt

EF has called me, sobbing, telling me that 'Mom has died'.

My first reaction was to rush to the place where he was, to be there, to comfort him.

My heart was thumping as fast as never before, and I've tried to search my soul as quickly as I could to find something inside myself. A feeling, a thought, anything that would have been appropriate. The only thing I've found was...

Relief. Safety. And happiness. And pity for EF.

It took minutes until I've realized that EF was babbling about DGM and not NM.

Suddenly I felt the deepest disappointment rushing through me.

All my thoughts and feelings are gone now. I feel nothing but guilt.

I am the worst person in the world.

Good to remember?

I have realized that it is really difficult for me to do anything ONLY for myself, when there is no 'useful' side-effect, or someone else's added joy, but only my own joy or happiness. It feels like going against everything I think is sane or healthy. It's like sticking your hand in fire, while all your body and mind is screaming inside at you, not to do it.

DB has been great at taking care of me while I was ill. The turning point came when I had to prepare medication and other things to help - for myself, on my own. I have somehow managed to do it, because I convinced myself that it is useful if I get better, because then I can continue my work, my projects, and moreover, help others better.

My therapist got me thinking about what would happen if I was to do something for me - that has no health benefits, or helping-others-benefits, that resulted in nothing else but me feeling happy for a moment or two.

To be honest, it feels repulsive. Or disgusting. I have the need, or the desire to feel good, to do things for myself, but I don't know how to forgive myself for that (if this makes any sense).

My therapist also asked me if I liked simple, easily available joys, like watching trees, or having a bubble bath. Now, the latter triggered the hell out of me. It brought back a memory when I tried to make a bubble bath for myself while I was still living with my FOO and was a teen. I put candles around the tub, made some tea and everything was really relaxing and cool. Until NM realized what I was doing. She told me it was like I was lying on my catafalque, and that it was not 'advisable' for me to do it ever again because I could have burned something anyway (note, it was a bathroom. The candles were next to the tub, the only thing they could burn was the water in the tub, or the tiles).

After this event (and also before it, anyway) my bath times were controlled and supervised, even when I was in my twenties. There was no lock on the door, and I had to call for her when I had a bath, to wash my back. If I didn't, she came anyway, but I could not predict when. Or whether she came at all. I had no chance to relax, or even to enjoy the water. I hated being touched. I had to listen to endless speeches about how ugly I looked, with detailed descriptions.

I feel disgusted of myself when I'm writing this.

My therapist referred to this invasion of my private space and my body as what any person would call it. I can't get myself to write down that word now. But that was when I felt the air freeze around me and I started sobbing, while pictures started to try to invade my conscious mind. Detached memory fragments that I can't really make anything out of, and I have tried my hardest not to let them surface. I feel panic and disgust.

Until now, I was confident that it was good for me to put together the bits and pieces. Now, I'm not so sure anymore. The last thing I want now is to remember anything in connection with those memory fragment flashes, I've experienced.