Healing childhood trauma I caused my kids by healing my own

Hello my friends. Today in my healing journey, I'm exploring how I can help my children heal the childhood trauma I caused them by healing my own. Here are some ways that I have found to come to terms with narcissistic parent abuse, so that I can hopefully rectify some of the damage I  have done to my children with my own trauma responses. I have found that healing trauma responses was part of how I lost 100 pounds, as well. 

I sought treatment for what I thought it was depression in beginning in 1999. But it wasn't so much depression as anxiety, hypervigilance, chronic shame and low self-esteem from narcissistic parent abuse. Therapy and self-help reading showed I was experiencing panic attacks triggered by trauma responses to these. I had also suffered actual brain damage from cortisol and adrenaline bursts, due the chaos and stress my family of origin put on m . I realized I've struggled with anxiety and fear all my life. I've made every mistake (and invented some) dealing with it. Here's what I found helps. 

* Identify the source. My fears weren't irrational or based on phobias. It was the FOG--fear, obligation and guilt put on me by self-centered parents. It stemmed from chronic stress and constant abuse, neglect, exploitation, endangerment, abandonment, scapegoating, invalidation, shaming and gaslighting by abusive malignant narcissist parents. I had to work to source my pain. I found that unresolved childhood trauma, illness (emotional or physical), dysfunctional family relationships, unmet needs, fear of abandonment and toxic shame were all mixed up in my dangerous trauma responses. 

* Name and claim. I learned early on to hide anxiety and fake happiness from enmeshed narcissistic parents. Feelings weren't safe to express, so I didn't. But they found their own form of expression. They leaked out in depression and exploded out in rage and self-abuse.  They manifested as complex childhood post-traumatic stress disorder (CPTSD) symptoms. They crippled me with fatigue and illness. Stress caused dangerous weight gain and weight loss. Feelings need a safe voice. The more unpleasant they are the more they need to be heard and acknowledged. So I'm owning them now and giving them a platform on this blog. 

* Expel and purge. Contained feelings clog like debris in pipes and the pressure builds. I felt intensely overwhelmed by the mental load my parents made me carry. All the time. I needed to find a vent and if a safe one couldn't be found, I had to resort to dangerous ones. Now I journal, blog, meditate, pray and talk to healthy people. I also I try to burn off negative emotional energy with exercise, yoga, walks and cuddling. 

* Own my own power. My biggest fears center on people's disapproval and anger. There was a lot of gaslighting about all that I owed them. I was told that I needed them to tell me what to do or I'd screw up. I thought I had to let them control and hurt me because it's all I deserved. I'm learning that I don't need them. I control me. I have good judgment and common sense. If they don't agree with how I live my life, well, that's on them. Maybe they need to clean up their own messes and stop micromanaging mine. Either way, I'm not letting it stop me. 

* Listen and trust myself. If something feels wrong, it probably is for you. If someone's hurting you, detach. You owe them nothing and yourself safety and care. Don't let bullies intimidate or panic you. Trust that still, small voice. She has your best interests at heart. If someone doesn't like it, move on. People who love you want you to care for yourself. Those that don't, don't. If you acting healthy creates problems between you, good. It means you're coming unstuck from their toxic behavior. 

* Practice Rational Emotive Behavior Therapy.  REBT Network advises that we "think our way out of panic.
 How do  we do that? Talk to yourself (lovingly). Explore fear-causing thoughts. Sometimes triggers seem irrational.  I had a panic attack at a church. Then I remembered hurtful experiences there that caused shame-based anxiety. Be honest with yourself about what is working and what isn't. Trauma responses, especially fawning and people pleasing, don't work. We had to trauma respond as children to survive narcissistic parents. But we don't have to now. . 

* Get support. I talked to loved ones, friends, a therapist and priest who helped me unpack my fear. Don't go it alone. But choose who you share with. Unhealthy people like the blind guides and flying monkeys I've spoken about before, make anxiety worse. How do you know if they are toxic? Here's my guide to red flags that invalidators put up. 

Beware of Blind Guides

Types of Blind Guides

Detoxing from Blind Guides

* Visualize. Put a face on fear. Talk back to it (I yelled at mine). Denounce the shame. Change your self-image. Instead of cowering and worthless, I imagined myself strong, capable and deserving of good. Slowly I have been moving past FOG and insecurity to a safer, more confident place. Visualize yourself as more confident and less triggered into trauma responses. 

* Avoid unhealthy habits and people. The rules of physical wellness apply to mental health too. Eat right. Sleep enough. Heal addictions. Stay away from things and people that hurt you. Enmeshed narcissistic parents are not good for you. They caused much of your trauma in the first place with their demanding, selfish, remorseless cruel exploitation. They keep re-traumatizing the more time you spend with them. Narcissists rarely change. They only get better at the hurtful games and more petulant and antagonistic as they age out of their grandiosity and into a permanently aggrieved DARVO (deny hurt they caused, attack, reverse victim offender) place. 

* Catch yourself.  Start noticing when you first begin feeling the old trauma responses kicking in. Look for cues like clenched jaw, stomachache, racing thoughts, increased heart rate, holding yourself in tense positions. 

* Formulate a response plan. Some people are always going to say something nasty and invalidating sooner or later. That's their M.O. And malignant narcissists prefer surprise attacks best. They love what they perceive as "gotcha" moments in which they've been able to humiliate you, preferably without calling themselves out in the process. They want to hurt you and they want you to know that they hurst you. But they don't want others to know. My response is to avoid them if I can, and if I can't just beware that they will do this. However, if you give them enough rope, without your usual trauma responding, they'll hang themselves. 

* Don't rise to their bait. Don't show anger, fear or any emotion. Don't share any data. They will find a way to use it against you. Be like dad, keep mum. Act uninterested and uninteresting. If they ask you a leading question, pretend you didn't hear. Be distracted by your phone or someone else. When/ if you do answer, be glib. Or say, "sorry, what was that?" This will force them to repeat their nasty comment or question and will give others a chance to hear what they said. Then give vague unemotional responses.  This is the grey rock method. 

* Practice the raised eyebrow cool appraisal look. This is not the narcissistic smirk. It's not smug or self-satisfied, just slightly skeptical. It's used when someone says or does something purposely to scorn, embarrass or humiliate you. This behavior is usually attention-seeking and underhanded. You're showing the person that you're on to them but that you aren't going to dignify their pathetic goading with any response. I did this with my mom who is always making rude, condescending comments to me in public. When she asked in her snotty voice "what did you do to your hair???" I pretended not to hear her. But other people did and kind sneered and gave her the cold shoulder. She doubled down, trying to rally support by continuing to poke fun and only dug herself in deeper. Finally, I turned from the person I was talking to and said sorry didn't hear you. She repeated it and I had the satisfaction of the other person hearing and us both giving her a the raised eyebrow and turning back to our conversation. If I had responded with hurt or anger, I would have given her exactly what she wanted. She would have preened or pouted that she was "just kidding. My how sensitive you are." Yes, it's too bad you have to do this. It would be nice if narcissists weren't so awful to be with. But they are. You just have to expect it and stay detached till they tire of their silly games and move on. 

* Keep on keeping on. You're healing. Great. But it's not a once-and-for-all experience. You have to practice self-care every day. Don't get lazy or anxiety will come back with a vengeance. 

All of these things are ways I'm cleansing myself from toxicity. I'm doing it to heal me, my little inner child and the pain I caused my children before I understood a lot of this. 

 

Healing childhood trauma from narcissistic parent enmeshment

Hello my friends. Today in my path to healing childhood trauma from narcissistic parent abuse, I'm exploring what is often an overlooked part of narcissistic abuse and that is parental enmeshment.

What is Enmeshment?

In a healthy family, there are clear "fences"—you know where you end and your parent begins. Enmeshment is a state where those fences have been torn down. It is a blurring of boundaries where the child is forced to become an emotional extension of the parent.

"It is not love; it is ownership. It is the weight of being a parent’s 'person' before you were ever allowed to be your own."

In this unhealthy family dynamic, parents overstep their children's innate boundaries with selfish demands, coercive control, dependency or "neediness." There's a lot of parentification in which the parent both fails to meet the child's needs while also relying on the child to meet hers. In my case, my parents were both enmeshed and narcissistic which added another hellish layer. 

Malignant narcissistic parents (such as mine) abuse kids in many ways with their entitlement, arrogance, remorseless, cruelty and Machiavellian exploitation. They enmesh with the child by literally taking her over. The child's "self" is absorbed by the parents so that she doesn't know where they end and she begins. In the parents' minds, the child never does begin. She is property. She has no life, nor feelings as they are all wrapped up in what father and mother want, need, feel, expect. Parent enmeshment is the ultimate form of childhood identity crisis. 

Here are some elements of that special combination of narcissistic parent enmeshment plus key dangers to the child, and some suggestions for healthier outcomes. 

Ride or Die

This might be the most disturbing aspect of narcissistic parent enmeshment so I'm going to hit it first. As the description above says, you are your parents' "person" before you were your own. Before they were ever YOUR person. Having/being a "ride or die", someone who loyal to a fault and will always stand by you no matter what, as an adult is good. Being your parents de facto, default, Plan A (B, C, D) support system is an endless, living nightmare. Seriously, I trauma nightmare every night about this. Children cannot take care of themselves let alone other children, let alone an adult, LET ALONE THEIR PARENTS. This is child abuse and exploitation in the first degree.  

Parentification, also called role reversal. 

In my experience with two narcissistic and enmeshed parents, I was the confidant of their intensely personal, uncomfortable and inappropriate over-sharing. I was my mother's sex therapist from age 6 or so. I was always their physical and emotional caregiver. They also abandoned and endangered me as it suited, then dragged me back when they wanted something from me. Because for all their demands and "needs" my narcissistic and enmeshed (talk about a Molotov cocktail) were equally uncaring, negligent, unsafe and even invalidating about my needs. 

Invasion of privacy coupled with inappropriate expectations. 

My narcissistic parents effectively deprived me of ANY privacy by forcing me to co-sleep with their babies over the years. My biological parents remarried and had new partners and new families. But the childcare and nightly supervision fell to me. So I had no access to anything like privacy. There was barely room for me to sleep let alone have a desk or belongings. Then factor in their boundary crashing which includes snooping, prying, eavesdropping, reading diaries, enter without knocking and even going through my purse. My mother blatantly walked into my husband's and my house and then bedroom one morning without knocking, just barged right in. My father used to enter the bathroom when I was in there. I didn't know it till my husband helped me see that this along with the sharing of sexually explicit detail by a parent, is emotional incest and sexual harassment. 

Demand emotional over-involvement while uninvolved in actual care. 

My enmeshed narcissistic parents made every little thing in their own lives into a major event or crisis. Any good thing they did for me, that any normal parent does automatically was convoluted into a major bequest that I should be eternally grateful for. AND which they said, obligated me to endless entailments. Like feeding me dinner or giving me a place to sleep. This sense of Invisible Debt will be familiar, sadly, to readers whose parents gaslit them they must always and endlessly repay parents for the privilege of existing. 

A Truth to Root In

"Children don't owe parents anything. We owe ourselves—and our little inner child—a healthier, happier life free from sick, twisted, self-serving, narcissistic parent enmeshment and gaslighting." -Marilisa

DARVO dynamics

Enmeshed narcissistic parents blame-shift and DARVO (deny, attack, reverse victim offender) and round on the child if confronted, by anyone. I was expected to nurture, soothe, placate, humor, smooth feathers and feel guilty for anything that happened to them, even problems of their own making. They'd exaggerate any wrong-doing any on my part, gaslight me with endless shame. Generally it wasn't wrong-doing but normal childhood stuff every kid did. They stuck their noses into every choice I made with shaming, judgement, censure, and fault-finding. Yet they  never lifted a finger to help me and actually created chaos which forced me into dilemmas.  

Coercive, guilt-driven control paired with remorseless, irresponsible, harmful actions. 

Enmeshed and narcissistic parents use FOG (fear, obligation and guilt), manipulation, threats and reprisals to keep children unnaturally close. My parents demanded all kinds of insane things of me while neglecting and depriving me of the most basic things (food, shelter, safety, inclusion). They are punitive, self-righteous, bossy and judgmental  towards their scapegoat children with hypocritical, feckless double standards in their own behavior. They are blind to their golden kids' faults and will blame the scapegoat for everyone else's wrongdoings. 

Limited Care and Autonomy

My enmeshed and narcissistic parents discouraged and actually shamed independent decision-making but were curiously unconcerned about my actual well-being. Their objective is to control thought, choices, mobility and capabilities not foster healthy ones. When I was 20, I was living home to finish school. I was doing everyone's housework and so paying more than my share. My dad told me he "had" to go out for coffee every night so I "had" to be home so he could. This impaired my studies and teaching work. My brother was older than I had been when I was expected to babysit them all. Since I was 11, he'd been curtailing me from any outside activities so I could be available for endless chores and childcare. It negatively impacted my homework as I was rarely able to start until bedtime. 

Impacts of narcissistic enmeshment on children

Scapegoat kids raised in enmeshed families often develop low self-esteem. Their sense of self is tied to their parents happiness and if the parent is upset, well, it's the child's fault. As an adult with childhood trauma from enmeshment, I have trouble setting boundaries. I feel intense shame and anxiety about saying no. I struggle to identify feelings, needs, or wishes. I'm a hypervigilant people pleaser with extreme fawning trauma response. In relationships, I give too much and expect too little. Or actually nothing. I carry everyone's mental load. 

🌱 Homework: Digging into the Soil

Take these questions at your own pace. There is no rush to "fix" what took years to build. Just notice.

• • The "No" Experiment: Practice saying "no" to one small, safe request today. Notice the physical sensation in your body when you do.
• • Identifying the "FOG": When you feel a pang of guilt, ask: "Is this my responsibility, or am I carrying a parent's heavy coat?"
• • Creating Space: What is one physical or digital "lock" you can put on your life this week to reclaim a sliver of privacy?

Some homework for us adult children of narcissistic enmeshed parents. 

Let's practice setting and maintaining solid boundaries. Let's not be so easily persuaded to capitulate, and give in on limitations. Here's an exercise for us. Say no to something just for the experience. Pick a safe person who will understand. But then move to the more difficult narcissist parent. 

Let's develop "spaces in our togetherness." This is good practice for all relationships. And thank you Kahlil Gibran for that sage advice. If we must live with the enmeshed parent, we can find outside groups, plan weekends away and put a lock on the bedroom door. 

Let's consider therapy. If that seems unattainable, we can watch those helpful YouTube videos of Patrick Teahan, Jerry Wise, Dr. Ramani and Danish Bashir.  

Let's journal or blog. I've found unexpectedly catharsis in having Google Gemini read through  my blog posts, not just for clarity or professionality. For camaraderie and support. 

Here are some more that The Prophet has to say on individuality. It reflects on marriage but applies to parents and children just as much, maybe more.  

Wisdom from The Prophet

Love one another, but make not a bond of love: Give your hearts, but not into each other’s keeping. For only the hand of Life can contain your hearts. And stand together yet not too near together: For the pillars of the temple stand apart, And the oak tree and the cypress grow not in each other’s shadow.

— Kahlil Gibran

  

 

    

Childhood trauma responses: people pleaser and mental load bearer

Hello my friends. In my mission to heal childhood trauma responses to narcissistic parent abuse, I'm going to look closer at the trauma response of fawning (people pleasing) and carrying the mental load alone. Narcissistic parents gaslight scapegoat kids into believing that we bear others' responsibilities that are far beyond our years or ken, that were never ours to carry. We were groomed to trauma respond with fawning and people pleasing, giving everyone what they demand and preserving nothing for ourselves. 

First, a word about the "mental load" term. This refers to responsibilities we take on ourselves or have unfairly put on us that should be evenly distributed. Children are never responsible for the mental load of a family. Here's a snapshot of how overwhelming it is for scapegoat children who are saddled with inappropriate mental load demands.  

What is the "Mental Load"?

In a healthy home, the "mental load" is the logistical effort of managing a household. And that is always the parents job. They may require the children to assist with age-appropriate tasks. But this should be as a way to teach children healthy responsibility. They should NOT be parentified or enslaved to serve the family. And chores should be equally shared between children, not unfairly dumped on one. 

In a home with narcissistic parents, this mental load is placed on the scapegoat child who becomes Overly-functioning so everyone else can under function. The child bears the invisible, exhausting weight of being the family’s "Internal Radar." It's more than just  people pleasing. It's catering to, jumping through ever-shifting hoops, humoring, waiting on, playing the fool, dancing like a performing little dog, anything and everything the narcissist demands at any given time. Scapegoat children become slot machines, always paying out. 

And if it's difficult for adults to over-function, imagine how impossible it is for children. Before they are barely speaking or walking, these scapegoat children are already tracking, anticipating, and managing the moods and needs of adults to prevent a derailment of peace. It is not just doing the chores; if only it were that simple. It's guessing what the narcissistic parents want and being punished no matter if you guess right or wrong. 

It is the soul-crushing responsibility of ensuring SINGLEHANDEDLY that the "trains run on time" (credit to YouTube psychologist Dr. Ramani for that apt description.) It's having to prevent narcissistic parents from derailing said trains. It's being housekeeper, butler, gardener, upstairs maid, nanny and whipping girl all it one. 

In the context of childhood trauma, the mental load is more than just a "to-do" list. It is more than just a mental load. It is emotional, mental and physical over-functioning and hypervigilance —not just to keep the family mask in place, not just to keep the narcissistic parents supplied. It becomes the child's invidious task to keep everyone in a semblance of safety.  FROM CHAOS CREATED BY THE NARCISSIST. It is burnout. It is exhaustion. And if it's not an adult's job to regulate everyone else, it certainly is not a child's job. 

As you can probably see, the people pleaser + mental load carrier trauma response is deadly for children. It enfeebles and cripples us. We have been made to sign away our common sense, individuality, sense of self and childhood, to cruel taskmasters. And it does NOT transition well into adulthood, making us vulnerable to predators, takers and narcissists. We are hypervigilant to others "needs" which are often just more demands. We were taught to serve everyone often by religious narcissist parents because God says to. But we give away far more than we can afford to lose. We strip our own resources and wear ourselves to nothing. 

We are overly empathetic, and yes, that is a thing. You can empathize too much. We traumatized kids prioritize everyone's feelings, wants, demands at our own expense. We are sensitized to everyone but ourselves. We are so exhausted, taking care of adults and parents, even as young children, that we have zero energy left for us. We experience burnout from lugging this adult mental load as little kids. We took the Bible command to "bear one another's burdens" waaaaaayyy to literally. And it wasn't even written to children but to adults and especially, to parents. 

And though the fawn trauma response doesn't transition well for us, it does benefit everyone else around us. The people pleasing mental load bearer makes everyone's life easier. We reduce their stress by being overly stressed out on their behalf. That's why the condition scapegoated children suffer from is called CPTSD (complex post-traumatic stress disorder). Although actually it's just Traumatic Stress Disorder because narcissistic parents continue to traumatize all our lives. And we become targets for other controlling, needy, demanding people. We absorb too much worry, anxiety, caution and trepidation through pervasive FOG (fear, obligation guilt).  

We tippy-toe around never feeling able to walk solidly on our own two feet. We don't take up our own space because we're afraid to maybe to step on others' toes. We're constantly bowed in fawning servitude. We carry that physical and mental load like overloaded donkeys. We can't see because we don't dare look up. We're forced into unnatural humility that is more humiliation (there's a difference). This groveling makes us awkward and ungainly. We stumble and fall and then we get yelled at for being in the way, a nuisance, clumsy. Which is inane because the people yelling at us are the ones who made us anxious people pleasers in the first place. 

Demanding parents weaponize incompetence. They "don't feel well" or have a "bad back" or doesn't feel like doing something. We scapegoat kids are made to do it for them when our own backs are screaming with pain. And we are too young and small to have to shoulder such heavy chores. Duties no one else is made to perform including the other parent who should be if anyone should. 

We remember all the details our irresponsible narcissistic parents won't. We raise their other children. We co-sleep with them, waking up and caring for them because their parents are too lazy to. We mop floors on hands and knees because parents won't buy a mop. We iron clothes before we are tall enough to reach properly. We lug heavy vacuums that are deforming our growing backs. We get ourselves places without transport. We are forced into unsafe situations because our parents don't care what happens to us as long as they can do what they want. We learn too young how to semi-navigate but we don't learn healthy self-care skills, only bare minimum survival. 

We are exhausted from having to do things many adult can't even do and our narcissistic parents won't do. And it is all normalized and everyone is fine with it because it keep arrogant, entitled parents fueled up on narcissistic supply. Nobody else has to deal with their crazy-making behavior. 

Other people might even shame us for complaining if we ever do because "your dad is so nice" or "your mom's such a sweetie." But they only look  that way because we are doing all their adulting for them. We keep their masks in place by carrying the mental load that is rightfully theirs. These blind guides and flying monkeys can say this because they don't have to live with them, humor them, soothe and placate them, suffer their venomous rage and live at their beck and call with no lives of our own. 

I'm still in a wide open prairie space of learning and healing from childhood trauma responses like fawning. But I think one big way to heal is to see the gaslighting blind guides and narcissists for what it is: nonsense. We never did and don't owe them subservience. We don't have to be people pleasers especially for arrogant demanding people who will never be pleased. We each only have a responsibility to  and for ourselves. We can set the mental load down. We can go no contact. 

If they don't like it, pfft, who cares? They were never going to like anything we did anyway. They were always going to exclude, invalidate, dehumanize, enslave and kick us around anyway. We are not human B.O.B punching bags. It will never be a fair fight because we can never hit back. We were only ever the ones getting sucker punched. 

If you've been on the receiving end of narcissistic abuse, I have some homework for us both. Ask yourself these questions. 

🌱 Reflection: Setting Down the Load

Take a moment to sit with these questions. You don't have to solve them today; just notice the weight. I find journaling or blogging in a format such as this helpful. I also use Google Gemini to bounce my reflections off from and have found this AI tool remarkably therapeutic. 

• • Where am I carrying the mental load? (Think of the things you track for others that they are capable of tracking themselves.) Who says I have to carry it? (Is it someone else demanding, "guilting" or "not so gently hinting"? Or is it me trauma responding with FOG--fear, obligation and guilt. These questions are so critical and you might be surprised at your answers. 
• • What "catastrophe" am I trying to prevent by over-functioning today?
• • What will happen if I set this burden down? Predict worst case scenarios. Will people actually suffer or just be inconvenienced? 

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Note on Sources:

The phrase "keeping the trains running on time" in the context of narcissistic family dynamics is a concept frequently explored by Dr. Ramani Durvasula, a clinical psychologist and leading expert on narcissistic abuse. Her work on CPTSD and the "fawn" response is a vital resource for those navigating the healing process.

Childhood trauma from narcissistic parent abuse: the most bewildering impact

 

Hello my friends. Today in my journey to heal childhood trauma from narcissistic parent abuse I'm going to explore the most bewildering impact of that. I've discussed this before but could write volumes more. And actually working to heal that is part of how I lost 100 pounds. So what is this bewildering effect of childhood trauma from narcissistic parent abuse?

The exhausted confusion of narcissistic parent abuse

I'm tired all the time and have been all of my life, including childhood. When every other kid was bouncing with energy, I just wanted to sit quietly or take a nap. Life has always felt very overwhelming because my parents were so chaotic and unpredictable to the point of betrayal. 

Hypocritical doublespeak confusion

Endless double standards, criticizing over inconsequential things, scolding for things I hadn't done, rules for me and no one else kept me in a baffled mental state not unlike delirium. I would dream they did some terrible thing to me and then wake confused about whether it had happened. 9 times  out of 10, a variation of it had happened. So it was more of a childhood trauma nightmare memory. 

Ferberized by neglect and deprivation

But there is no one there to help the child navigate it all. Those who were supposed to parent, only made it worse. Those who should have been allies either chose not to see, didn't care or were cowed into silence by my bullying parents who withheld access from me to my support system and moved me out of their reach. While themselves, neglecting me in the most shocking ways and situations. I learned from neglect and deprivation to quit asking for help that was never going to be forthcoming. They also conditioned me to expect shaming and punishment for basic needs. 

Adult-ified and parentified

Life in narcissistic parent abuse is constant flip-flopping demand, expectation and reality. My parents who really did owe me things, used FOG (fear, obligation and guilt) to distort reality to make it seem that I owed them. The rewire the child's brain that she is the parent and her parents are her responsibility. In my case, that included their new partners and children. I have never not felt responsible for enormous burdens that I can't even articulate. And my trauma nightmare bear this out. 

Gaslighting and gassing

These tandem weapons deserve a book all of their own. Narcissistic parents abuse kids not just with lies. They don't just gaslight the scapegoat child, they gas her with toxic and poisonous FOG of treachery and sabotage. They fabricate entire false worlds that they implant in the child's mind. They use not just untruths, but deception, manipulation, twisting, exploitation of vulnerability, distortions and other devious, conniving and cunning machinations to rewire the child to think with a damaged trauma brain. The "gassing affect" of gaslighting leaves permanent scars in the actual cerebral cortex from the countless cortisol bursts of childhood trauma and chaos. 

Pain and illness from narcissistic parent abuse 

My CPTSD and exhaustion caused actual physical pain in joints, ear-nose-throat, skin rashes like hives and psoriasis, poor vision, sleep apnea, learning and processing difficulties and other conditions directly attributable to childhood trauma. My parents did nothing about them, despite being perfectly capable to doing so. As I got sicker and more exhausted, my parents became more demanding and bullying, kicking me when I was at my weakest because they were on malignant narcissistic supply highs. 

Nightmares  

Even when I can sleep, I'm plagued with these horrific nightmares that beggar description. I have literally terrified people with my screams. It got so bad that as a child, I could not sleep over at anyone's house because the dreams were so frightening that I frightened others. My nightmares make me look insane. And what did my narcissistic parents do about them? Jeered and made fun of me. While forcing me into even more traumatic neglectful situations. I co-slept with their children, got up at night with them, dealt with constant fears of fire, home invasion and injury to the children. I slept in cold, cramped corners, on old damaged mattresses, with used, dirty pillows with needles in them, in airless rooms, on WW2 army cots, on the floor, on an unheated porch, never in a proper bed. While everyone else had new beds, WATERBEDS, air conditioning, everything to their comfort. My dad even bought himself and his wife a fountain, because he liked the sound, while I had garbage the thrift store wouldn't take. 

And that's just one aspect of the abuse that narcissistic parents are capable of. 

So the most bewildering impact of narcissistic parent abuse was overwhelming confusion. Not just about why they would do this to me. Just confusion, like delirium, or brain damage, or shell shock, that leaves you unable to breathe and feeling like you are drowning. It makes you feel blind, sluggish, lost, dazed like you have a concussion. Nothing is clear. You feel helpless like you are carrying a giant boulder on your shoulders. It makes you see everything cloudy. It zaps your good judgement, self-care skills and decision making ability. Confusion that renders all reality a big baffling mess. 

And, the most sick and disgusting part is that after creating this brain damage, your narcissistic parents weaponize  your confusion against you, with blame-shifting, shaming, and leveraging your vulnerability to their advantage. So I have forgiven them in that I accept  it happened and I'm not seeking revenge. But their day is coming. You cannot be this evil to a little child entrusted to your care and not face some consequences. 

I mentioned that part of how I lost 100 pounds was in addressing this soul confusion. It has to do with realizing that I can set down this boulder of shame and responsibility I was never meant to carry. And it turns out that releasing burdens that aren't yours allows your body to release the protective armor of weight it thinks it needs to carry the load. I'll explore more on what this has to do with how I lost 100 pounds in future posts. I'm not there yet. But each day moving forward, away from these toxic parents and toward healing is a little triumph of my self over enslavement. 

Healing childhood trauma means dropping the mental load

Hello my friends. In my quest to heal childhood trauma responses from narcissistic parent abuse, I just had some forgotten memories surface recently. That has been happening much more frequently since I began unpacking childhood trauma from narcissistic parent abuse. What I recalled is my kneejerk fawn, or people pleaser trauma response, to pick up the entire mental load and carry it alone. The fawn response if you're new to it, means the instinct to appease others to avoid conflict or stay safe. It means soothing sullen, fractious people, smoothing feathers we didn't ruffle, humoring chaotic and damaging behavior as if it were just peccadillos, catering to unreasonable demands, bowing down to people like gods, all at our own expense. 

The specific incidence which lead to my revelations, was remembering, how at weddings my husband would get drunk and become the life of the party. Which was fine. He was funny and never hurtful or nasty, per se. I laughed at his antics too, and even my uptight family cut him too much slack because he was so entertaining. But all his free-spirited frat boy shenanigans came at an enormous price to me. I had to carry the mental load. I got the gifts, pressed suits, cleaned up, was designated driver, and worst of all, the straight man, the schlimazel. An invidious role, which props up the charming drunk with her own shoulders. There's a lot that goes on behind the scenes. 

When we had children, it was so much worse. I'd drive home with him singing drunkenly the entire way. By the time we arrived he was sobering up and starting to get cranky. One time, he got out of the car, fell in our kiddie pool and screamed at me for putting it there. He went in, crashed for four hours, while I did all the parenting, cleanup, supper, bedtime ritual, etc. The designated drunk gets a free pass for sure, with us trauma first responders. 

And it wasn't just weddings where I had to drive home that were the problem. Some receptions were held at hotels. And that was so much worse. He'd leave me alone in hotels rooms to continue partying. I was always exhausted and in a lot of pain from back trouble. So I would head to bed at around midnight, and he'd promise to be "right up." I would be tired but unable to sleep in a strange place. He'd stagger in a 4 am and I'd be livid, mostly from weariness and grief at being ditched, AGAIN. 

This wasn't routine behavior in our lives. If it had I think I'd have divorced him. It was just a kind of letting his hair down at social functions. But he was in no fit condition to "adult" or parent. What alarms me now is that I just anticipated and accommodated it. So he expected that weddings would be his time to howl. And I ended up doing all the childcare, navigating, being the designated adult. What also alarmed and now angers me, is that I never once had the opportunity to let my hair down. AT MY OWN FAMILY functions! He was the designated wasted frat boy and I was bitch keeping everything going. 

I shouldered the adult mental load so he could act irresponsibly. One time, it was a wedding reception he had refused to attend and I took our four kids alone. The youngest was only four. It was an overnighter at a hotel in our town and he should have attended but wouldn't. I called and invited him again so we could have a nice overnight together. Not, interestingly so I could have the help I needed. I never asked for that but should have. Another boundary/need fallen to the fawn response. 

He arrived and immediately was the life of the party. It was all about him. Everyone loved how much fun he was. One person just sent him a Facebook friend request 25 years later, on the strength of that one time. Meanwhile I who could have really used a night off from being the designated adult, continued to carry that mental load alone. I made sure the kids ate, had their sleeping arrangements, toothbrushes etc. I tucked the little one in, snuggled up with her and cried myself to sleep taking care not to wake her. 

While he whooped it up downstairs. He even let our teen sons get drunk with him. And they had a great time, I can't deny that. Though I felt intense guilt for somehow allowing it. I can't really formulate now how I did. But the shame remains.  I think they also felt they had to stand by dad because he was incapable of adult behavior. It wasn't that he was precisely dangerous. But more risk-taking than he should have been. And let's be honest, when drunk, say what you will about it being an inclusive fun thing, it's all about the drunk maintaining that drunk experience. 

Again, he staggered up at God knows when, and I'd not in fact, cried myself to sleep. Only into a series of trauma nightmares. Just recently we talked about it for the first time in 25 years and his response was that he should not have "let me go" to that function. And I heard and saw what has been the problem here all along. Starting with the should not have let me. 

So first let me just say that I know my husband and as control freaky mansplain-y as that sounded, I don't think he meant it as bad as it sounded. At least he better not have. What he meant was that he should have been more encouraging to help me avoid toxic situations' which that particular wedding was. It was my stepmother's family and she, my dad and her lot have been very nasty, condescending, demanding, controlling and shaming of me. I went out of good old guilt. 

But that was not to problem, as I identified. When he said that, I pointed out, "no what you should have done was to take over the adulting and give me a much-needed break so that I could relax and enjoy an adult event. I didn't need another adult baby in my life to babysit. I needed to have some drinks and unwind. And if I had too much, well, we were all safely contained in a hotel. You should have entertained the kids at an adults-only event for once, instead of being the evening's Foster Brooks entertainment for everyone." 

I added, that it wasn't entirely his being selfish, though that was part. It was my faulty people pleaser trauma responses telling me to let everyone walk all over me, do what they wanted and leave me to pick up the pieces, AGAIN. And that was indoctrinated in me by my narcissistic parents. He wasn't responsible for that but he was responsible for knowingly triggering my people pleaser trauma response by acting so irresponsibly. If you're not part of the solution, you're part of the problem. 

His shame trauma response at first, tried to shush me. He knows and is very remorseful about his past indiscretions. And they are just that. He struggles to recall without shame so intense that he just wants to silence it. And me, sometimes. Which of course triggers my people pleaser trauma response into shamed silence. But I did something different this time. I didn't let it go. I wrote this post, for the first time in 44 years, delineating how his selfish, immature behavior felt to me. 

And I shared it with him. He said how he's felt so ashamed of these immature behaviors, and I said that what I needed was for him to tell me when he does. He says he confesses it in our Catholic sacrament of reconciliation. Which, if I'm honest, does me absolutely no good if it is not confessed to me who was the injured party. Even him confessing to me after I've brought it up, how, does me no good. Confessing after being confronted, is not true repentance. It's just getting caught and being unable to deny the accusation. If I am truly sorry, I acknowledge it immediately to the person I hurt, without waiting for them, someday to maybe bring it up. And if they don't, just keeping quiet. 

Him pre-emptively admitting the error of his ways helps me validate that the problem isn't me just being too sensitive, as my narcissistic parents always said. It helps me learn to acknowledge frustration and not bury it till it boils over. It is impossible, by the way, to bury, of absorb endless amounts of toxicity. It will burst at some point so the trick is to not let it build to the explosive level.  

This has been the case with toxic narcissistic parents, all my life. None of my four parents ever admitted a single thing they did wrong. They always found a way to blame me. I will blog more on this in another post. Suffice it to say, for now, that this blame-shifting kept me confused, frustrated and ashamed. So I don't even see problems like this, let alone express them, till decades later, if ever. I was glad to have gotten that flash of clarity in the situation. And it helped me see countless other situations where my fawning people pleaser trauma response to carry the entire mental load, has gotten me into great pain. 

Just a note before concluding. I was going to delete the entire post after discussing with my husband and coming to some resolution. He completely articulated what was wrong with it all and I could see real contrition. And I have seen real change toward more consistent mature adulting over the years. So I wanted to protect his privacy. But I chose to publish, at his insistence, I might add. Because we both agreed that you all, my dear friends, may need to hear our experiences to heal some issues in your life, family or origin or relationships. 

When I have shared my fawning and people pleaser trauma responses and the weird things they make me do, the reaction is resounding agreement. Heads nod so hard it sets off sonar waves! Because anyone with childhood trauma from narcissistic abuse, GETS IT. If you have dealt with anything like this in your life, feel free to comment about it below. What mental load are you carrying that isn't yours to carry? Your stories help us all. 

Healing childhood trauma by calling out euphemisms for narcissistic abuse

Hello my friends. Today in my quest to heal childhood trauma from narcissistic parent abuse, I'm calling out euphemisms for narcissistic abuse for what they are. They are not "kind" or "impartial" or "balanced" or "enlightened." These people who say them do not have special insight that the person experiencing abuse lacks (thought these people sure act like they do). 

They are gaslighting, devaluing, dismissive, diminishment of the narcissistically abused person's experiences. They are excuses people make for rotten behavior of narcissists. It's funny because as I was considering this topic, I listened to a podcast on YouTube by psychologist and narcissism expert Dr. Ramani. And we were saying exactly the same thing. Which affirms that these euphemisms are pretty universal. 

Sometimes, the people using these euphemisms are blind guides (ignorant, arrogant know-it-alls) or flying monkeys of the narcissist. Sometimes, they are used by people who are experiencing narcissistic abuse and are not able to call it what it is, so they downplay it. Invariably, however, those who "dumb down" narcissistic abuse with euphemisms, have not experienced the cruelty these folks are capable of. They just want to sound "nice" and understanding. (Often they are self-righteous and holier-than-thou hypocrites who would be furious if they had to endure what narcissist's victims endure). 

These blind guides aren't being "fair-minded" and "reasonable" as they would have you think. They are being incredibly unfair to the child suffering abuse by making her feel ashamed for "exaggerating it". They're being unreasonable in refusing to call abuse what it is. These blind guides are showing partiality toward the narcissistic parents by downplaying their actions. Their judgement is way out of balance against the victim by siding with the parent and justifying their behavior. 

I sound pretty P-O'd about this subject because I am. I've endured my narcissistic parents abuse, gaslighting, pooh-poohing, shaming, invalidating, twisting and deception all my life. And now when others make excuses for them, it just rubs salt in all those wounds. It reminds me how I made excuses for their mistreatment of me. It reminds me how alone I felt and how that was reiterated when other people in the family made excuses for my parents. 

So here are some of the euphemisms (defenses, watering down) people use for narcissists. Especially parents. 

You're just seeing their shadow self. What in the actual BS is that supposed to mean? So that's one I'd not heard often that Dr. Ramani mentioned. And it sounds about like the pseudo-psychobabble you hear so often. Frankly I think these folks who say this have played too many video games. What's hilarious is that if you've lived as long as me, you've heard many iterations on this bizarre theme. This is just another thing people say when they don't know what they are talking about but don't want to admit it. 

But for fun, let's deconcoct "shadow self" malarky. So let me get this straight. My narcissistic parents were not abusive, neglectful, manipulative, exploitative and cruel. They were just misunderstood? Oh, no, they WERE those things but only because their dark side was showing? Hmm, well problem is, that is pretty much all I saw. Soooo, it's moot point because their shadows selves were their real selves. And excuse me, but we all have a shadow side. We just don't give ourselves permission to torment other people with them. 

So one way and another, this is excusing bad behavior. WHICH people who say this would not be doing if they were suffering at the hands of the "shadow selves." Funny how the euphemisms only come out when it's someone else's experiences. That's one of my biggest problems with blind guides, flying monkeys, call them whatever. They only spread their judgmental toxic positivity about things THEY aren't dealing with. You might be surprised how "understanding" and "compassionate" toward my narcissistic parents people who didn't live with them, were. So I'm calling that out too, as hypocritical, self-righteous, double standard, smarmy-ass toxic shaming

Hurt people hurt people. This one goes along with my piece on gaslighting nonsense people say to excuse narcissistic parent child abuse. Yes, I said excuse. That's what all of this is. Enabling child abuse by defending the narcissist. Because NO NOT ALL HURT PEOPLE HURT OTHER PEOPLE!! If we did, the world would not be here anymore. Many truly wounded people with real emotional injuries, childhood trauma, abuse scars (not narcissistic injury) are more caring than they should be based on their past. They show fortitude, gentleness, peace, warmth, empathy. They do not repay evil with evil. They pay good forward. Which brings me to the next one...

She's just injured, wounded. Well cry me a friggin river. We have all been injured but we do not take it out on others. And I have to wonder how "wounded" she could be if she so callously and arrogantly inflicted pain. This wasn't because my parents didn't know better. They did because they were always preaching how I was supposed to live. They just didn't follow their own teachings. 

She's eccentric. That's just how she is. It may be how she is but it's not just how she is. She is also  abusive and cruel. I use "Divine Secrets of the Ya-Ya Sisterhood" for parallels. When Caro tells Sidda about Vivi (Sidda's mother) "she's (mom is) hurtin' too, Bebe." I know they are just trying to bring awareness. But it sounds a lot like victim shaming. That's how I'd have heard it. Vivianne was wounded and Sidda says this. But she was also neglectful, self-centered and self-pitying. She abandoned her children multiple times. Google Gemini and Dr. Ramani a good point about how society not only excuses hurtful behavior based on unresolved trauma, it romanticizes it. My mother loved her role of martyr/savior/heroine. But she was a nightmare to live with. The tragic mother figure of pathos, who we all feel sooo sorry for, is often a real Medea behind closed doors. And this romanticizing just makes it worse for the children. 

He's a victim. Oh gag me. So now I'm supposed to feel even sorrier for my abusive, narcissistic father than he already expected me to, because he's suffered?? That is the human condition. He'd be the first to tell me I was just showing off for attention or having a pity party if I was hurt. I'm going to write another post specifically on the victimizing victim. And just what are these cruel people supposed to be victims of? Yeah, people never have an answer for that. Because they do not really know the person or his background. They're just sententious. I will also say that I knew my narcissistic parents pretty well, because they loved to talk about themselves. And if they had been abused by their parents, you can be sure I'd have been the first one they dumped it on. 

She's just difficult, challenging, problematic. Okay first, there's a flaw in saying she's "just" difficult.  Like it's "only" or "simply" a little quirk. Using "just" creates a false bar. As if on their contrived scale of abuse, being "just difficult" is low and the victim is over-reacting. It spins abuse like a difference of opinion or or a clash of personalities. Saying the narcissistic parent is "just difficult" denies the child's much more serious experiences of abuse, neglect, abandonment, endangerment, exploitation, scapegoating, parentification, invalidation, cruelty.  It gives a false impression that narcissistic parents are challenges the child must accept and master. Like a puzzle or math problem. This puts all the responsibility for "fixing" or "just dealing with" the difficult parent on the child, while not even acknowledging that the parent is actually a problem. 

All these buy into the narcissistic parent's DARVO narrative. If anyone is going to "dumb down" what happened, it should be the person who experienced it. Not just some sanctimonious bystander. And to any victims of narcissists reading, please, DO NOT minimize or euphemize what they did to you. THAT is YOUR truth and, my dears, no one has the right to soften it.  

How I lost 100 pounds by learning that "No" is a full sentence

Hello my friends :-) today my journey to heal childhood trauma from narcissistic parent abuse and other forms of verbal harassment, I am exploring what it means to say that no is a full sentence. I'm also going to show how I lost 100 lb by learning that No is a full sentence. 

What do we mean when we say "no is a full sentence." Well, it has to do with setting boundaries around what I will and won't tolerate. It's about deciding for myself, without FOG (fear, obligation, guilt) what I will and won't do for people. It's about not complying with unrealistic demands, expectations or even requests unless I decide to. Actually, let me rephrase, it's about never complying with unreasonable demands or demands of any kind. And complying only with polite, reasonable requests if I choose to. 

Learning that "no is a full sentence" has to do with then policing those boundaries by setting consequences if they are violated. To take it back a step, it's about learning that I CAN say no and practicing that. It's about giving myself permission to set boundaries that I was never able to as a child, having boundary-crashing self-serving narcissistic parents. It's about unlearning old trauma responses of fawning, to develop healthier more self-advocating, self-confident, self-care responses. 

And then, after erecting healthier boundaries, learning that "no is a full sentence" means getting out of the trauma response habit of anxiously over-explaining and defending refusals. My tendency is to gaslight myself  that saying no is selfish.  Because my narcissistic parents gaslighted me that any refusal was unthinkably disobedient, disrespectful and dishonoring God. Even when it was an unsafe, unhealthy or immoral or illegal thing they demanded of  me. Which it always was. But I was so terrified of saying no that I complied with their very inappropriate demands. 

One way I'm learning that "no is a full sentence" is to allow myself to admit that other people say no all the time with no repercussions. My narcissistic parents and their golden children said no all the time. Often to things they should have said yes to. They refused to do things they should have done for me. Like stick around, not abandon me for weeks on end, get jobs, provide a house and a bedroom. Not make me do all the work. 

Those are extreme examples. But there are less extreme, normal examples all around. People say decline all the time: invitations, requests, tasks. It's perfectly acceptable to stand up for one's self. Some would say necessary and I would agree. AND, it is fine to say no without explaining why. It's essential if the person isn't asking but demanding and expecting you to go out of your way to do something that is in no one in your care's best interests. 

Example: mom demands her ex-husband's partner pick the mother's own child up from school. She does not ask. She doesn't check to see if it will work. She rudely TELLS the partner that she "has to" do this because the mother "can't." So picking a child up from school is one thing but it takes on a new dimension when it is expected. The partner in this case, may feel entirely comfortable to say, "no, I can't" offering no explanation or excuse. Just no. Even if the partner can actually do this, being bullied into doing it is good for no one. 

She may choose later to do the task because it is in the child's and the child's father's best interests. But it must be the partner's choice. She should not feel emotionally blackmailed into doing it. It is also not good for the mother because it sets up a dangerous precedent to let her think she can order others around and they will just comply. She has to learn that if you are not able to collect a child from school that you must make alternate arrangements which may be inconvenient, expensive or annoying. But that is life. It's what she chose when she had the child. Also, if she gets away with manipulating and exploiting everyone to do her bidding, she may manipulate, emotionally blackmail and guilt the child as he grows.

So what I'm advocating and trying to learn myself is that it is perfectly acceptable to say no and offer no justification. I got told a lot that when I would try to explain my side of things I was "just defending myself" (yeah, and? What you should asking is why I have to defend myself from loving parents?). It was also called "making excuses." Again, why do I have to give reasons why I do innocent, normal things, if my parents are so loving? But the result is that now whenever I legit have to say no, explanations feel to me like excuses. 

But what we need to learn is that excuses aren't necessarily bad things. They are reasons why you would exempt yourself from being held accountable TO OTHERS AND FOR THEIR CHOICES. It is not the partner's problem that the mother "can't" do something. She may choose to help but if the mother is weaponizing her "can't" to get people to cater to her, then that's  a different story. Even if she really is unable, it is HER problem to solve. And dumping it on someone else is not solving, it's playing DARVO. 

And generally people who demand, boss around, guilt, DARVO are arrogant, entitled narcissists to begin with. And that's why you're needing to set boundaries. You can say "I'm sorry I can't do it." But anything beyond that goes down the over-explaining path. And narcissists don't accept explanations. They just want their way, like my parents. All they wanted to hear from me when they said "jump" was "how high?" Well, that's where learning that no is a stand-alone sentence is helpful. All they want is yes, so all you give them is no. There's no argument for that. It is a done deal. 

And weirdly learning to say no relates to how I lost 100 pounds. I used to feel such overwhelming shame and guilt if I said no (because I was shamed and guilted by self-serving narcissistic parents) that I would give in and do it. Just today I had to do it when someone crossed a boundary being demanding with me. I just stopped what I was doing for them and said no. I won't finish this task because you were rude and bossy. And I will not allow myself to be treated this way. I received an apology but I decided that was not enough because talk is cheap and actions tell me that this happens all too frequently with this person. Furthermore "I'm sorry" "I'll do better" has been used to manipulate and future fake me into going back and finishing what I said no to. 

It did not feel genuine and so I did not go back and finish the tasks I'd begun for him. I didn't do this to shame him into ceasing the rude, bossy behavior. That is on him. And survey says he won't change because this has become ingrained pattern to snap, apologize, snap, apologize many times within a short time. He has gotten very complacent and even self-righteous about the nasty-nice, hypocrisy of his behavior. And that's in part down to me not policing boundaries in the 44 years we've been together. 

I have said no and then gone back on my word. And he knows how to trigger me into doing that  by pushing my FOG (fear, obligation, guilt), hypervigilant, people pleaser, fawn trauma response buttons. So that relates to how I lost 100 pounds because getting healthier in one area leads to better health overall. Being a pushover is exhausting and though standing up for yourself is too, it's less so that letting people walk on you. 

How I lost 100 pounds has a lot to do with taking charge of my own life. It's about saying what I mean and meaning what I say, without apology, explanation or backpedaling.