Childhood trauma victims of narcissistic parent abuse are trapped in an inescapable haunted house

Hello my friends. Today on the road to childhood trauma recovery, I'll show how life for victims of narcissistic parent abuse are trapped in an inescapable haunted house. To the world, the houses looked normal. And the monstrous parents wore masks but they don't hide the viciousness underneath. 

Bespoke Spook House of parent abuse

Malignant narcissists turn homes into purpose built haunted houses. They are frightening fraught spaces, where fear, insecurity and destabilization are normal and safety, peace and nurturing are fairytales. The monster that jumps out and scare them isn't just a man in a mask. They are parents who are purposely terrorizing their child. The mask they wear is one of loving parent which hides the monster. To the outside world, these houses look like any other house on the block. What folks didn't see were the emotional bars on the windows. The locked rooms with kids' held hostage to devastation demands, coercive control and debilitating expectations. But then we had to live this double life of cognitive dissonance. Especially us scapegoats who were deprived of anything resembling normalcy. 

The "Normal" Double Bind

Our trap was made more difficult because we had to leave our tailor-made hell and go to normal places like grandma's and school. Places normal people had no inkling of the terror we were living in. So we  had to somehow act like everything was fine to sort of fit in. And our abusers made sure to preserve the illusion with family trauma special effects:

• gaslighting (you're making it up for attention, showing off, oversensitive, overreacting)
• hypocritical double standards (feigning the good Christian at church while living in basement with boyfriend but keeping one room reserved for CPS calls, to look like she was sleeping upstairs with foster care kids when it was me). 
• pre-emptive smear campaigns (painting a false version of the child as an untrustworthy liar before the child says anything so that anything she might report will be disregarded as untrue.)
  
  
  
• bonds of secrecy (whatever is said in the "family" stays here)
• triangulation (pitting people against the child with character defamation) 
• mythical flying monkeys (telling the child no one will believe them) 
• manipulation of facts and timelines
• DARVO and blame-shifting
• threats and intimidation 
• overreaction and minimization (innocent things the child does are blown out of proportion while truly awful parent behavior is down-played)

Oh what a tangled web they weave

Narcissistic and enmeshed parents entangle their children in sticky dirty webs of deceit. Because enmeshed parents see children as possessions to use and abuse as they wish. And we don't know this is wrong because it's all we know. Our entire existence is built on fabrications, lies, double standards, evasions, flipped scripts and revisionist history. Nothing is straight-forward or clean. Nothing is predictable except unpredictability. All we know is service to them, walking on eggshells, placating and humoring them. They do this specifically to wear us down, deplete our resources, undermine and sabotage our selves.

Role reversal and reversed again

They force us into all sorts of inappropriate roles and expectations. Then they change the rules again, w without telling us and expect we'll just know and dance to the next tune. Not one of the things they command of us, is appropriate or even moral or legal most of the time. This keeps us constantly off balance, hypervigilant and insecure. It destroys our health, coping skills and self-care abilities. It causes trauma bonding which causes betrayal blindness in us, which causes a completely broken down functioning. It took me till almost 60 years old to understand that any of this was wrong. 

The Shell Game of Isolation 

Malignant narcissist parents use an arsenal of dirty tricks to keep the child away from eyes who might help her. They play a devious two- handed game of double gaslighting, telling one false story to the child the opposite to authorities, extended family, neighbors, friends, schools. They tell pit the child against loved ones telling malicious lies about the other to both parties. They play both ends off each other for the middle. And because they are the child's parents they have special access to her that they can revoke. They move the child far ways to keep her destabilized with no support (mine moved me to Alaska from Michigan, for shits and giggles).  They also get in a kid's head and mess up her mind. They poison relationships with their pot-stirring and rumor-mongering. My mother told me my beloved grandfather, who was one of my few allies, had sexually molested her, so I'd feel sorry for her and turn on him. She sicced her bat guano boyfriend on these two elderly people and boyfriend terrorized them so badly that my grandfather had a heart attack. 

Chaos and confusion 

So actually when I say that traumatized kids' homes appear normal, many of mine didn't. Because that's another tactic they use. They make normal needs inaccessible. I was shuffled in and out of 40 different places before graduation. We were homeless for parts of my life. I slept in tents, on the floor, on unheated porches, with their babies' rooms, alone with four under-5 special needs foster kids, upstairs in the next room to a convicted child molester, squatted in other people's homes and with strangers. There was no scary, dangerous or chaotic that was too terrifying, unsafe or chaotic to dump me in.  

Singled out for austerity 

My parents subjected me to major deprivations no one else was. Not themselves, their new partners, their new children or anyone I knew, was. I'm talking things like stealing and withholding confidence, proper clothing, food, a bed, privacy, personal boundaries, respect, comfort, a stable home, a bedroom, time for myself. I was worked double shifts at two jobs before I was 12. I was yanked out of schools with no warning or say. I was shunted between them like shared car seat. I was waiting on four narcissistic parents all with their own unique forms of abuse. This left me drained, exhausted and used up. Kids like me are no more able to care for ourselves or navigate life, than tattered rag dolls.  

Where do we go from here? 

Well, the only place to go is up. I've been about as low as it can get. Right now, I'm working to de-gaslight myself and replace confusion with clarity and purpose. I'm working to reorient my disoriented sense of self. I'm calling the house of horrors what it was. I'm unmasking the "good Christian" people who called themselves my parents as the malignant narcissists they are. 

Healing childhood trauma by outing gaslighting hypocritical BS of narcissistic parents

Hello my friends. Today on the road to childhood trauma recovery, I am angry. And I'm going to sit and stay with that anger awhile. I am frustrated not just by the hell my narcissistic parents put me through but the hellish aftermath of that abuse that has destroyed so much of me. I'm mad that it took me so long to realize that what they did was abuse because they were so deceptive. And that it took me 60 years to give myself permission to be able to express this anger. And to be able to admit without guilt that it is righteous, justifiable anger I'm feeling. And I realized that one reason it took me so long were the gaslighting hypocritical accusations made against me by my malignant narcissist parents. 

The Anger Paradox

One of the things I'm angriest about now, is that I was always scolded, by my savagely angry parents (all four, bio and step) that I was the one with the anger problem. Yet I never recall ever doing anything in anger toward anyone. They did all kinds of things to humiliate, stress, upset, destabilize and frustrate me. Things that should have made me angry, but didn't. I recall placating, humoring and walking on eggshells around them. All I felt and showed was FOG (fear, obligation and guilt) to them. 

The scapegoat trap

Narcissistic enmeshed parents use their children to get what they want at no personal cost. Especially that scapegoat child. She is their human shield and the fall girl for all the consequences of their bad behavior. These enmeshed parent space invaders destroy the child's self defenses. They steal her identity. They punish her for being. They sabotage her self-care skills. They implant a false sense of self as servant to them. To them, the child does not exist as a separate person, only as a possession. And they drill her in being a good foot soldier in dad's and mom's army. They ensnare their child and keep her caged. The trauma bonded child has betrayal blindness and is unable to see anything clearly. 

Gaslighting lies 

Narcissistic parents are masters at gaslighting revisionist history. My parents had this uncanny ability to weave a tissue of nonsense in such a way that it seemed plausible, to me anyway. It seemed legit to others because I never heard anyone say anything against the outrageous neglect, abuse, exploitation, endangerment and child abandonment I experienced.  It didn't help that I was an empath and people pleaser so already set up to be the scapegoat. Personal boundaries were punished. Privacy was invaded. And being groomed toward service, trauma responding and fawning, I was an easy target for gaslighting. 

The DARVO Deception

Narcissistic parents lie all the time. Their lives are lies. They misrepresent themselves. So if someone criticized them, it was spun to make themselves out to be victims. So I both felt sorry for them but was also targeted by them. They used me as a therapist but also a dartboard. Because narcissists will launch malicious smear campaigns against anyone, especially helpless children. They twist and manipulate everything. But then they DARVO, denying reality, attacking, and reversing victim and offender roles. These crybullies play the innocent and injured parties and the scapegoat child as the big mean bully. And they are quick to get their fabricated version of events in first because they know that people have a bad habit of believing the first account they hear. Even against evidence of their own eyes or common sense. 

Pot meet kettle

So when it came to anger issues, they had them and I was blamed for them. All four of my parents were ragingly angry but would never admit it. Then they would say it was justified and I was both the cause of their anger. But also the only one who was angry when I had no right to be. Which is of course ludicrous. You can't have it both ways, either you're not angry or you are, for a reason. What they were is kind of hybrid of self-pitying and enraged over narcissistic injury not real hurts. And what should have angered me but didn't was real hurts they really did to me. But that's just another of malicious parents' dirty double dealing hypocrisies. 

Righteous Anger vs. Narcissistic rage

Real healthy justified anger is more frustration, sadness, stress, anxiety and confusion. All of which I felt. It might look like speaking up for yourself against attacks. Which I never did because it was too dangerous. My dad would fly into a rage and beat me because he said I was angry?! I never said anything let alone in anger. I just cried and begged to be forgiven. And this is one of the things I am angry about now. That my poor little loving heart got so broken by these vicious, vindictive, cruel people. That's what narcissistic rage is: petty, resentful, bitchy, sulky, jealous, petulant, pouty, passive-aggressive, aggressive, quick to anger slow to forgive, nasty, malignant and malicious. All the things my "Christian" parents preached against but were. 

Right for them, wrong for you

And they didn't tell me I had an anger problem in a caring, how can we help, way. Even that can be kind of judgmentally annoying when someone "points out" your problem, especially if it's one they had a hand in creating. Extra especially if they don't admit they had a hand in causing it. My parents said it in a completely scornful, insulting way, as if anger was a fault of mine not a normal emotion. BUT the cherry on top was that they were each and all very frequently overreactive angry with me in big loud and sullen passive-aggressive ways. I was always hearing about how I'd let one of the other of them down, whomever I happened to be living with at the time. But they felt completely justified in their rages. And they made me believed I deserved to be attacked. 

The one-sided story

Another thing that was never addressed was, if I was so angry, why that might be. Nobody ever talked about the endless, constant chaos they put me through. My parents moved to Alaska on a whim, were jobless and left me homeless and abandoned in various situations. I was left to play alone on the streets, from about age 4. Both parents cheated on the other.  I was shuffled between 40 different homes and 8 schools before age 18. They both brought in a string of strangers to live with us. Both opened foster care homes and made me work like an unpaid servant  in them. Both coerced me into dancing attendance on their boyfriends/girlfriends/spouses and new kids like a live-in maid. They used me as a surrogate spouse, parent and servant. But no one ever acknowledged any of these. They never admitted to doing anything that would have caused any normal person anger. 

Narcissistic Egomania 

Never once was I ever told HOW I was supposedly so angry or what I did that made them say this. No evidence was given. No facts. Because they couldn't because I didn't act angry. It was as if just accusing, made it true because they said so. That's a narcissist for you.  My dad actually said he just "knew" I was thinking nasty things because he could "read my mind" and he "knew me better than I knew myself." That's an enmeshed narcissist for you. Speak unmitigated bullshit but say it in such a way to make it convincing. And they are convincing. They had me believing I really did think things he said even when I knew for a fact I didn't. These kinds of people are brain pirates and they know how to eff with and eff up your mind.  Funny for being such a mind reader he never read the awful things I was thinking about myself. The many acts of self-harm I committed against myself, thanks to their gaslighting lies. No empathy there, just accusation. And he got narcissistic supply off terrorizing his child. Let's just let the bat guano crazy of that marinate. 

All the pain and no gain

And did I get angry when falsely accused of being angry? At them, no, but should have been. And you'd think being such an "angry" person I'd have immediately, well, gotten angry. But the only anger I felt was at myself, all the time. My mother would say "you should be ashamed of yourself." She never said why, but I sure was ashamed. Thanks, Nancy for putting the gun in my hand. I spent all my life believing I was the awful person they said I was, agonizing over my awfulness, having nightmares nightly about my awfulness. Fighting against demons of self-harm. Sometimes, the pain would well up and I'd explode and melt all over the place. But even then it wasn't anger like it should have been. It was shame and self-loathing. Now you might be tempted to say isn't that just what your parents did? No. Theirs was strategic and purpose built to shame me into all those trauma responses. It was to control, destabilize, manipulate and wear me down. 

The light dawns

For the majority of my life, I've hated myself for being so "angry." Till one time, I woke up to the gaslighting fallacies they'd been spouting. I asked my stepmother, who never could find a good thing to say about me, an innocent question about my dad. How was he, or something. She said in this spiteful way, that "well, he doesn't want anything to do with you because you're so angry all the time." This about the man who had beaten me in front of everyone, just because. This after she had just dumped on me about how "mean" my dad was to her. Mind you, I'd seen them once in about 10 years and only because I made the effort. And all of a sudden, I realized she'd been blame-shifting and hateful to me all my life. There was never a time when they took my part. I couldn't remember one kind thing they'd said to or about me. And it all made sense. It was how they were. 

The real story

It was never about me being angry or not. It was about projecting both their anger and the splash back from it, onto me. It was about painting me as the villain to distract attention from their shitty treatment of me. And that does make me angry now. Angry that young me was so mistreated. Angry that I've hated myself all my life when I could have been happier and healthier. Angry that my kids got such a broken version of me. Am I blaming them for my problems? Yep, sure am. I was a child being used as a punching bag. I didn't know any better and thought this was what I deserved. Now I have to spend the precious time I have left trying to undo that brain damage. So yes, it's about time I put the responsibility where it belongs. 

The more I expose narcissistic parent abuse the more hypocrisies reveal themselves

Hello my friends. I'm almost 62 and I'm finally working to heal childhood trauma from narcissistic parent abuse. And the more  I expose narcissistic parent abuse, the more hypocrisies reveal themselves. Here are more crazy-making double standards that malignant narcissists preach but don't practice. Some I just realized a few days ago. 

Note: I didn't "go looking for" parent abuse as traumatized kids are often accused of doing. I didn't "twist" normal parent behavior into abuse because some therapist told me it was. That's another DARVO accusation abusive parents make, saying they're victimized by someone who has "poisoned our minds against them." Actually, I always thought the best of my parents, excusing every bad thing they did and taking the consequences on myself. I'm just now, in my 7th decade realizing it WAS abuse. Something other people knew all along took me a lifetime to see. 

Seen and not heard, except for...

I read a lot of boomers (of which I'm one) saying how back then, kids were seen and not heard. Like that's a good thing? Well, in my case, if only! I was silenced and shut down, AND expected to dance attendance. I had to read minds and jump to do it, without even being told what the hell they expected. Enmeshed parents use you as a cat's paw to get the goodies without burning their hands. They shelve you like a book when they don't need you, then are all up in your business whenever they want something. 

Narcissistic parents be like: "When we want to hear from you, we'll rattle your cage."

The Co-opted Child

Narcissistic and enmeshed parents are pirates and thieves. They smash any boundaries the child may set. They are Space Invaders, usurping the child's personal bubble. They steal our childhood, identity and selves. They pressgang us into endless service to them without ever giving us basic essentials like love and care. They indoctrinate us that we are human doings, not beings. That we exist to serve only them. My dad would prat the Bible (according to him, that is) about how I should always "jump" to joyfully serve others. Sounds good in theory but it's shit in real life. What he did was to co-opt my me and what I did was to lay it down for him to trample on. I never learned where my parents ended and I began. Or if I even did. 

Parentified and infantilized 

As a child, I raised their kids, cleaned their house, cooked their meals and waited table. I wasn't a child but unpaid staff.  I was made to give up my room for anyone they chose to move into it. I had to sleep on floors while they had king-sized waterbeds. They expected me to behave like an adult and their parent as a child and treated me like an incompetent child when I was an adult.  I pretzeled myself to meet their endless demands. I developed a backward crab shuffle, trying to both stay out of their way and be ready to serve. I wore a hypervigilant "self check-out smile" from being always on call. 

 

Horrible for me, normal for them

Reading a post on Reddit AITA, brought this one to mind. The poster explained how being asked to do something in front of the person she was being asked to do it for, made it more difficult to say no.  Makes perfect sense. I was once attacked, by both narcissistic dad and narcissistic stepmom, for asking in front of a friend, if she could stay to dinner. I never was allowed friends over, was excited and didn't think. My stepmom over-reacted, ripped me a new one, "how dare you, you're so rude and ignorant, that was so embarrassing, yada yada." Then my dad jumped into the ripping. He was always onboard for an ambush. Shocked at their intense anger, I began to cry. Then my dad said "you're too sensitive and can't take criticism. You're just showing off." Now the irony is that when my stepmom was upset (all the time) my dad would passive-aggressively suggest TO HER, that maybe I could fix it. He would then invite her to think of some other thing to add to my already endless list of expectations. He didn't even do me the courtesy of addressing me and asking me to do whatever it is he thought I could do to fix a grown woman. I'd go into this fawning childhood trauma response and grovel to please her. So not only was I not able to say no, I was made to feel ashamed for not guessing what she wanted. And nobody cared a hoot whether I was embarrassed or not. 

So when a kid does something, she's too young to know is "wrong", it's horrendous, when a parent does it, it's just a Tuesday.

Do as we say, not what we model

Narcissistic parents not only expect the child to mind read, they don't lead by example. They show the child how NOT to act. In the last example, you might say I asked in front of the friend because that's how they did it with me. If I was inconsiderate and rude it was because I was treated inconsiderately and rudely. The difference is that I was sorry, too much so, and they were just entitled and arrogant. I was emotionally blackmailed into people pleasing and hoop hopping. They gaslit me into thinking this was normal, ONLY FOR ME. No one else in the family was subjected to the coercive control because I was the scapegoat. I learned only FOG (fear, obligation and guilt) to them and that's why it took me decades to comprehend that it was wrong. 

🚩 The core hypocrisy of narcissistic family systems is that they care deeply about how things look to outsiders, but show zero regard for how things feel to the child who is actually living in the danger. 🚩

The "behind closed doors" dilemma

You might be tempted to say, about the invitation request, well, your stepmom was embarrassed because you asked in front of an outsider whereas they did it to you "in private." I hope if you are thinking that, you see what's wrong with it. They were embarrassed for an outsider to see how badly they treated me, that I couldn't even ask a friend to dinner. A dinner I cooked, served and cleaned up after, non gratis, in their adult foster care home (illegally, it turns out). Whereas in private family life, where I was supposed to be safe and loved, I was abused, neglected, endangered and exploited freely because there was no one watching. If I'd said it embarrassed me to be asked (pressured into) fixing whatever it was she supposedly needed, I'd have been  told "you can't be embarrassed. We're family." Trouble is, we only were when it suited them. 

The "Family" Double Standard

I was family when demands were being made of me. After all, "family does for family." Except they don't. I was excluded when anything good went around. I wasn't given basic necessities, let alone treats or privileges everyone else got. My mother was transactional with me like a business associate when she did the slightest thing for me as a child. Normal stuff parents do, she expected remuneration for. BUT I was endlessly obligated to her because she was family. Family for me meant family mobbing, smear campaigns, scapegoating, etc. While I was held to impossible standards in serving them. 

The stepparent twist

Just when you think their gaslighting and hypocritical double standards couldn't get any worse, they flip the script again. My two narcissistic parents got divorced and married two more narcissistic people. So now I had four people to dance attendance on. And four people to humiliate, invalidate, abuse, harass and exploit me. And a quadruple set of double standards to live by. And not one of these Machiavellian narcissists ever cared for me as parents are supposed to. I was shunted between homes on a whim. They moved on a whim. I lived in 40 places before 21, was kicked by my mom when I was 16. I slept on floors with their babies, paid my way for everything. I was left with my mom's boyfriend, alone with her four under-5 special needs foster kids for a week. He sexually harassed me and routinely terrorized me. I was parentified and infantilized by completely enmeshed parents who bullied me till I finally went no contact with them. 

The double life standard

I lived not as a person but as a series of roles I was made to play. All this gaslighting and trauma bonding caused betrayal blindness. It also caused me life-threatening cognitive dissonance and fracturing. I went into an endless loop of dissociative split and resplitting. I have multiple autoimmune diseases from the stress cortisol floods. I lived multiple lives, behind groomed to be whatever was expected of me with no thought for myself. Which translated to no self-care skills. Self-defense was selfish and disobedient, I learned. Turns out, that Bible command to "be all things to all people" is really hurtful to tell abused kids. We're already wearing far too many hats as it is. The image above, that AI made for me, is actually remarkably accurate to the mess of hypocrisies and double standards that lives in my brain. 

How to cope with narcissistic parents

I'll summarize with some thoughts on coping with narcissistic parents. 

• Don't. The more you "cope" the more they'll exploit. These are entitled, ruthless people who take all your good and give only bad. 
• Don't ignore or overlook it. That's what I did to my own suffering. Say what happened and is happening. Call it what it is. They won't like it and that's okay. 
• Recognize that you didn't estrange yourself from them. They cut you out. You're just not holding the door open so they can keep slamming it on your hand. 
• Know it's not your fault or your problem to fix. You don't owe them forgiveness, reconciliation, contact, etc. They will take advantage of every opportunity you give them. They will burn every bridge you build. Some things you can't come back from and childhood trauma is one of them. 
• Know that I care. I'll hold space for you. 

Childhood trauma from enmeshed narcissitic parent abuse puts a target on your back for CSA

 

Hello my friends. Today in my journey to heal childhood trauma from narcissistic parent abuse, I'll show how childhood trauma responses put a target on the child's back for further abuse, particularly CSA. And from the opener, you can probably see that this will be a fraught and probably triggering post. So proceed with caution. 

Enmeshed parents violate boundaries 

Enmeshed parents are like an invasive parasitic plant that winds itself around the child and feeds off her.

Enmeshed narcissistic parents teach her that setting boundaries is disobedient and wicked. They indoctrinate her that they have every right to do anything they want with and to her because they own her and she is endlessly obligated to them. They manipulate situations to make her feel ashamed for needing privacy. They arrogantly demand she "confess" to them and if she doesn't, they say she's being secretive. They shame her for showing any discomfort with their boundary crashing and coercive control. They portray her as the problem. But only in private because they know if they told any normal parent, that parent would see their abusive behavior. They're very cagey and sneaky in their attacks. So the child grows up never knowing that the parents end and she begins. That she has volition and should have autonomy. That they are hurtful not helpful. 

Enmeshed parents usurp and adultify a child

They pirate and steal identity and sense of self and embed themselves in the child. . They steal childhood and innocence. They pollute her mind with fear, gaslighting, toxic and nasty behavior. They "normalize" immoral and unethical behavior by blatantly engaging in it, in front of the child. They don't protect her from their debauchery and so make her suffer the consequences for their actions, in shame, humiliation, fear for them, worry over them and stress from the cognitive dissonance of having to live in this bizarre parallel reality. 

"The child carries the mental load so the entitled selfish parent can act irresponsible with no repercussions."

Enmeshed, Narcissistic parents punish self-care

Narcissistic enmeshed parents see their children, particularly the scapegoat or "broken vending machine child" as property. They use the child as an extension of self, a pawn or tool. They make her do their dirty work and take consequences of their bad actions on herself. They neglect and exploit her and punish the child for protecting herself. My parents gaslit and manipulated me by shaming me that "you're just being defensive" if I shielded my face from slaps or explained why I did something they accused me of doing. Like this was a bad thing. What I didn't understand till later was that whatever I supposedly had done was usually not that bad or bad at all. It was just me being a kid. But I was made to feel like it was horrendous disobedience.  And being very antagonistic and invalidating, they wanted to make me feel and look bad. So they told a skewed version and DARVO (deny, attack, reverse victim offender). 

Narcissistic parents twist self-care into selfishness and shame a child for healthy self-protection.

Narcissistic parents neglect the child which enables perpetrators

Not only do narcissistic parents teach us no self-care skills, they punish us for having any. They shame needs as showing off, attention-seeking, being too sensitive or over-dramatic. They groom us to care only about them and their selfish desires. They enslave us. They use gaslighting to create an atmosphere of FOG (fear, obligation and guilt) to them.  Our lack of ability to defend or meet our own needs, plus our sense of responsibility for them, makes us prime targets for abuse from others in our life. 

Enmeshed parents are not really parents, they are predators. 

Everything with narcissistic and enmeshed parents is bass-ackwards. They set hypocritical self-serving double standards. Wrong is right for them to do to us and right is wrong for us to do for ourselves. They aren't really parents at all, they are predatory takers who use us for what they can get from us. The people who are supposed to protect us, endanger and destabilize us. They suck our humanity. Being raised this way, aka "groomed to serve" we don't know that this is a horrible violation of our basic rights as humans. We don't understand that this is abusive of their power differential. For us it's just a Tuesday. 

Enmeshed parents feed us the wolves

With all the confused reality we live in, we have as much ability to navigate life as newborn babies. We were not only not taught to ignore the red flags dangerous people fly, but that not giving in to them is wrong. They literally pimp us out to abusers. And since all we've learned is compliance we give them what they want and let them do filthy, debilitating things to us. I've fallen into so many incredibly dangerous situations just because I had a target on my back. Predators know who has been made vulnerable by parents and who is protected. They can smell us a mile away. 

"I have been forced to see, do and experience such awful things that I wouldn't tell my beloved grandparents to protect them. But I couldn't protect me. The only way to survive it was to allow it."

The worst predators hide in plain sight

The places I've felt and been the least safe, have been in my parents' homes and in religious groups. Calling it Christian, somehow seems to imbue with immunity. Adults who should be protecting children often turn blind eyes in the name of  religion. Some even perpetuate the grooming and gaslighting our parents started. And calling themselves parents somehow blinds people to abuse taking place under their very noses, in neighborhoods, behind closed doors and in larger families. My parents subjected me to so many horribly hurtful people over the years. Literally, as in gave them power over me. The shock of that betrayal is brain-damaging. But childhood trauma responses and trauma bonding to what was supposed to be family, caused betrayal blindness. 

Homework for healing

That's why I write this blog to help me and you if you need it, to find childhood trauma recovery. By naming and claiming what happened as real and really bad, I'm giving myself permission to de-FOG and reverse my parents DARVO, putting them in the correct role. 

One creepy hypocritical demand enmeshed narcissistic dads bully daughters with

 

Hello my friends. Today in my quest to heal childhood trauma from narcissistic parent abuse, I'm looking at one very disturbing hypocritical demand that enmeshed narcissistic dads bully their daughters with. Trigger warning: this gets dark. 

Enmeshed dad and daughter dynamic

Actually that term "dynamic" is misleading when describing the relationship between narcissistic parents and scapegoat children. It implies reciprocity and a dual two-way street. But narcissistic parents see children as possessions not people. And while the relationship is one-sided (with all good things coming from the child to the parent and none coming back to the child), the parent mandates two Double Standard sets of rules that serve only himself and that shift according to his whims. And this power differential is at its worst with narcissistic fathers and scapegoat eldest daughters. 

Sociopathic dark tetrad meets daughter innocence

This frightening malignant narcissist father uses passive-aggressive and aggressive intimidation tactics and sneak attacks to terrify his child into compliance. He crashes any boundaries she may, have stooping even to bizarre privacy invasions that seem like sexual harassment (because they are). It really is that bad. He nags, belittles, scolds, insults, mocks, scorns and humiliates his daughter using ambushes and set-ups. But because he is her dad, biologically, she trusts him. Trauma bonding  causes betrayal blindness. 

Eldest Daughter Syndrome

Eldest daughter syndrome while not a DSM-5 classification is nevertheless a real problem experienced by oldest daughters even in healthy families. Girls in my generation and earlier were more often parentified and infantilized. Being the "weaker sex" we were often not given the respect our male counterparts got BUT also ironically were made to do the family's heavy lifting. We had to be mini adults and show emotional maturity too quickly, (often being more mature than our parents). We were scapegoated and given too many responsibilities that oldest boys who tended to be the golden child, didn't have. And eldest daughters in dysfunctional families are particularly at risk. My childhood trauma stems from being raised by four narcissistic parents, two bio, two stepparents. Being the oldest and only child and a girl, from the original marriage, carried many extra burdens. Burdens I'd likely not have had if I'd been a boy.

• Parentification to parents, their partners/spouses and their children. 
• Free nannying, sometimes for 
• Co-sleeping with babies (my brothers were not made to sleep with their biological brother while I was locked in a room with him)
• locked in room with the children
• bedroom taken and given to uncle and girlfriend
• made to share upstairs room with four special needs foster children under 5 while mom and boyfriend slept in basement
• being left alone with mother's boyfriend to care for foster children for days on end
• heavy disproportionate housework load
• Carry the mental load (I cared more about my siblings and the foster kids, than their parents did)
• handmaiden to mom, dad, stepmother and stepfather
• sex therapist to mother
• parents' confidante and support system
• scapegoat
• surrogate spouse

Quiet menace + terrifying rages 

My parents and their new spouses were all narcissistic bullies in their own ways. And they'd change methods randomly. My dad would speak in this calm carbon monoxide hiss with eyes glittering with rage and then BAM!! he'd explode and start hitting me. It was so horrifying I once wet my pants when he spanked me out of the blue when I was 13. The irony was that I was being made to work like an unpaid adult slave in his adult foster care home (illegally, turns out). I slept locked in a tiny room with the baby while he and his wife slept blissfully in the only AC room. AND YET I was infantilized and treated like a wayward child. 

Sneering contempt + Mind reading + Set-ups = religious narcissist

• My dad had nothing but arrogant contempt for other people. He told off all the time.  But still maintained the injured victim role, too. "They" were wrong, out to get him, didn't understand him, were too critical of him. My mom was the same way, so no rest for weary me. 
• He was pouty, oversensitive and took narcissistic injury everywhere. 
• Yet he called me too sensitive when I'd cry when he humiliated me in front of others (screaming at me on Christmas Eve for trying on my new sweater.) 
• He'd say I "couldn't take criticism" (verbal harassment) but was also too critical of him. 
• He would undermine, second-guess and devalue everything I did or said. 
• I was always "showing off" and "attention-seeking" when all I did was sing in the bathroom. Why was he in the bathroom with me, was something I never thought about. And this was the same man who expected to be invited to sing and play his violin in any church he went. 
• All four parents would create situations to embarrass me, often with crude and lewd behavior. 
• But they also gaslit me (because it's so easy to do to a child) that they spoke ex cathedra on all things Christian. 
• They were God's mouthpiece, telling all the ways I failed, though they didn't obey his commands. 
• They would set me up to "expose" wicked things I supposedly did though I have no memory of doing.
• But I do remember them doing very immoral, unGodly, unbiblical things all the time. (living with boyfriend, dating a 17 y/o at 36, abandoning me for two years, leaving me in a strange city with strangers to go 1800 miles away). It took my husband identifying these are wrong for me to see they were. 
• I've since realized everything they accused me of were true of them. I don't know if they were true of me (my husband says not) because gaslighting causes confusing brain damage and cognitive dissonance. 

 

Enmeshment: The invasive species parent

Parental enmeshment isn't the parent who is trapped by the child. It's the child who is enmeshed as in caught up in, the parent's web. The parent is the spider and the child is the helpless victim. The parent weaves a sticky net around the child to cement her to the parent. Mother and father purposely entangle themselves in the child's identity, like an invasive species plant. The child doesn't know who she is separate from mother or father. She only thinks what they think, want, need and tell her to think. It's like they lobotomize the child and surgically remove all sense of self and imbed only FOG (fear, obligation and guilt) to them.  Enmeshment may be one of the most insidiously sadistic forms of child abuse. 

Endless autoloop of the blame-shame game

The enmeshed father sees his daughter as a tool do his bidding and she complies because he has indoctrinated her in his narcissistic cult fantasy. He uses her like a robotic arm or cat's paw to get what he wants without consequences and at his own daughter's expense. She is his fall girl, his shield which he hides behind. As his personal scapegoat, he blame shifts all his bad choices on her. She takes the brunt of all his dangerous, irresponsible, illegal and immoral actions. She only feels sorry for him, never for her own pain he causes. He so destabilizes, deprives, mistreats and neglects her that her resistance is worn down and she is vulnerable to abuse. And he weaponizes her empathy, people pleasing and fawning trauma responses. She plays the fool while he sits back and laughs at her because it makes him feel big to pick on smaller people. She is the Broken Vending Machine child, dispensing treats with no coins put in. 

The creepy hypocritical demand of the narcissistic dad

So back to the point of this article: one of the creepiest demands that enmeshed narcissistic fathers make on their scapegoat daughters. The daughter of such a person resembles more of a performing seal than a person. The dad uses her to do everything he doesn't want to do. And she has to know, without being told what his next command will be. And yet, through it all, no matter how much he hurts, he expects her to

Keep on smiling!  

My father would hit me, scream at me, humiliate me till I cried or just frowned. Then he'd sneer and say "go wash your face." Quit showing off. Quit making it about you. He'd maliciously accuse me of always being "too heavy." Of pouting, being "over dramatic" or faking depression. Said I needed to "lighten up" and "cheer up."  This was the same  man who'd routinely threaten me, since I was five,  to kill himself saying there was nothing I could do about it, in a "neener, neener" playground bully way.  So often, my tears weren't for me so much as him and how sad he must be and how I must  have let him down so badly that he wanted to end it all. 

He pressed me into service to his selfish, lazy obese wife and made me do all kinds of backbreaking (really) dehumanizing, unnecessarily difficult labor on hands and knees. Scrubbing toilets, being locked in with her babies, serving, mopping, ironing. I was a scullery maid at 12. Every time she got upset which was often, he'd blame me and make me do some new task for her. And I had to do it all with huge goofy smile on my face. I developed neck and jaw aches from the constant Permagrin. I still have that iconic "childhood trauma grimace" from having to be on call and happy about it, 24/7/365. 

The Trigger Part (stop reading here if you need to)

How people sabotage childhood trauma recovery from narcissistic parent abuse

 

Hello my friends. Today on my path to heal childhood trauma from narcissistic parent abuse, I'm exploring how people sabotage childhood trauma recovery. They retraumatize you with dismissive shaming. It's not just a few people, the narcissist's flying monkeys or blind guides (ignorant, arrogant know-it-alls). The underminers hide everywhere in plain sight--in society, among friends and family, religion, even in counseling. And worst of all, it often happens with people you trust. 

How people undermine trauma recovery

• By ignoring and excusing child abuse. 
• By belittling, shaming, patronizing, minimizing or scolding abuse sufferers. 
• By siding with and defending the narcissistically abusive parents (flying monkeys).
• By blaming the abused for saying it happened, thereby exonerating the abuser. 
• By suggesting there were reasons for the abuse or that the child caused it. 
• By stonewalling, blindsiding, undermining any attempts at recovery. 
• By believing narcissistic parents' lies over the child's truth. 
• By ignoring abuse that is right in front of their eyes.  
• By passing judgement on a child who names abuse or cut ties with abusive parents. 

How blind guides participated in the original abuse

• By leaving the child alone to face these persecutors. 
• By  making excuses for, overlooking or defending the abuse. 
• By confusing the child into believing she deserves this. 
• By grooming her to expect poor treatment. 
• By pretending abuse isn't happening and it's all happy-normal in the garden. 
• By discouraging the child from seeking help or even saying what's happening. 
• By being unapproachable. 
• By doing just what the child expects will happen, nothing. Or worse shaming her into silence. 
• By telling her to "cheer up" and "smile." 
• By reminding her that other kids have it worse. (minimizing, invalidation)
• By staying silent, for whatever reason, there's no good one. 
• By comforting yourself you're helping the child by staying quiet.
• By never addressing anything that the blind guide knows is wrong, with the child. 
• By making excuses that "times were different then." But abuse was always abuse. 
• By saying kids are resilient when they are wounded and vulnerable. 
• By acting like it's normal. 

Dead giveaways someone is victim shaming

There's actually a litany of gaslighting crap these blind guides say which gives them away. It sounds just like the gaslighting narcissistic parents do to their kids. 

• You're too sensitive. (this is the mantra of abusive parents)
• You can't take criticism. 
• They didn't mean it. You misunderstood. 
• That never happened. 
• You're lying. 
• You're showing off for attention. 
• They only did it because they cared (Beating, neglect, child abandonment, endangerment, coercive control, threats, bullying, slapping, humiliating, parentifying, enslavement, manipulation, exploitation, theft of childhood, set-ups, betrayal are NOT care. Just saying.)
• They didn't know any better. See above list. They knew and they went out of their way to hurt. Even when loving care would have been easier. 
• What did you do to cause it? See above list. A child NEVER causes these things. 
• You should forgive them. (Why would I do that when they're not sorry and they'll just keep doing it again?)
• They made mistakes. Everyone does. (Nope, they made strategic hurtful choices).
• They are your parents. No they are cruel, enmeshed, arrogant, Machiavellian bullies I had the misfortune to be born to. I am their child (in the owned and obligated to them sense) but they were never my parents in anything resembling healthy parental care. 
• Every family has problems. Not like this they don't. And if they did that would be no excuse for perpetuating it. 

  ⚠️ WARNING

  Trauma victim shamers say they are just being blunt or brutally honest or "telling it like it is" and that they are not "telling you what you want to hear, like everyone else does." What they are, are just brutes who wouldn't know truth if it bit them in the nose. They aren't telling anything like it is, they are shooting off their mouths to make themselves feel relevant and important at your expense. They are kryptonite to your super power healing.

Gaslighting tools of abuse defenders

• They DARVO (deny, attack, reverse victim offender) (You're hurting your parents by going no contact or naming what they did.) 
• They use FOG (fear, obligation and guilt) to trigger your trauma responses of fawning, people pleasing and letting people hurt you.
• They trample your boundaries by undermining, second-guessing and criticizing you for setting boundaries. Sound familiar? 
• They twist words like parents, honor, respect, duty, obligation, obedience and family. "They are your family. You owe them respect, obedience. It's your duty to honor your parents, blah, blah). When your parents didn't do their duty by you. They disrespected and didn't care for you. You were their possession when it suited their purpose but when you needed anything from them, they abandoned you. They groomed you to serve them and they served no one. They forced obedience to them and anyone else they dictated was in authority over you, like their equally selfish spouses. 
• They weaponize your childhood trauma responses against you to further enslave you to these people. They perpetuate your trauma bonding and cause betrayal blindness by deceiving you with all their lies and gaslighting. 
• They say they are just "translating" for you because you aren't thinking clearly or making sense. What they are doing is talking over you and talking you down. Because they think they know everything when they know nothing. 
• They don't listen to you. 
• They back-stab you. 
• They start smear campaigns against you. 
• They use family mobbing. 
• They tell you they are just helping you. They are not. They are hurting you and hindering your recovery.

Myths about childhood trauma shamers

• People don't victim shame because they don't understand. They know what they're doing, and strategically berate you. 
• Victim shamers aren't well-meaning. How could they mean well and still belittle an abused child?
• Victim shamers don't "accidently" shame. They go out of their way to stick their noses in with their stupid unsolicited advice on things they neither know nor care about. They intentionally make hurtful, demeaning and dehumanizing comments. Just like your parents did. 
• Victim shamers aren't nice people. They arrogantly and self-righteously tell you off without having a clue about what happened to you and/or not giving a damn. They just like the sound of their own pratting voice. 
• Victim shamers are hypocrites. If they or someone they loved, suffered anything like what you did, they'd be singing a different tune. 
• Victim shamers talk the talk but don't walk the walk. They preach but don't practice. 
• Victim shamers are arrogant and entitled. They think they are owed a say on your trauma, like they have a side of your story or a right to an opinion on it. They do not. No one has buy in on your trauma. 

How their shaming retraumatizes you

• You know those earworms you have of your parents' cruel voices in your head? Well, these 2.0 abusers create even more earworms in your head. You can't do anything without hearing their self-righteous, hypocritical mocking, attacking, fault-finding and trash-talking. 
• It destroys your already fragile self-worth and violates your trust. Because these people lurk everywhere, they often show up as "friends" and "loved ones." But anyone who devalues you is no friend. They are wolves in sheep's clothing and should be avoided. 
• Because you have been groomed to trust untrustworthy people and to believe their lies over your truth, you let your guard down. And they get in your head, just like your narcissistic parents did. They take up residence and pirate your defenses, trash your brain home, kick down your boundaries and stage a hostile takeover of your common sense. 
• They whittle away at your emotional resources till your resistance is non-existant
• They make you sick. Literally. Wearing down resistance leaves you open to infection. I actually have several auto-immune issues and structural damage from family of origin abuse. 

Why would anyone victim shame?

That's a good question. I can't see myself shaming anyone, let alone a childhood trauma sufferer. I think it's because more people are duplicitous than I would like to admit. They wear a caring or Godly mask. But when they talk, you can hear the judgmental disdain and holier-than-thou-ness. However childhood trauma survivors are betrayal blind to the original abuse and to anyone who calls themselves our friend or family. We are too trusting. We believe people when they say they have our best interests at heart even when the alarm bells are sounding that they don't. Our abusive parents conditioned us to trust dangerous people, to cater to bullies, and be grateful for crumbs and expect abuse as what we deserve. 

So where does that leave us?

You know what I'm going to say. That we have to stop driving past danger signs. We have acknowledge to ourselves when someone feels unsafe to be around. We have to take off the blinders and earplugs and see the wolf's teeth and hear the growl of danger. We don't owe them any loyalty, nor to let them hurt us. We deserve better than we got. We have a right and a responsibility to take care of ourselves. We have to stop believing people care and start expecting them to show it. We have to show up for ourselves. 

Radical Acceptance: Recognizing that those who hurt us do not have our best interests at heart is a powerful step. With that in mind, I am committed to limiting or cutting contact with anyone who sabotages my healing.

Childhood trauma mythbuster: Holding a grudge is crucial when you go no contact with narcissistic parents

 Hello my friends. Today in my childhood trauma recovery work, I'm going to bust yet another myth that "blind guides" (enablers) perpetuate. And that is, that not only is holding a grudge not a bad thing, it's also crucial for adult children who have gone no contact with their narcissistic parents. Maintaining a realistic remembrance, even anger and refusing to just "get over" it, is part of radical acceptance. It is the beginning of healthy boundary setting.  

What holding a grudge is

Think of holding a grudge like a bookmark. Why do we bookmark a page? We hold it open so we don't forget where we are in the story. Holding a grudge is remembering what happened to get us to the point that we had to cut contact with our narcissistic parents. It recalling all the details of our backstory, all the times they hurt, abused, neglected, exploited, endangered, scapegoated, triangulated, manipulated, invalidated, dehumanized, stole from and abandoned us. Holding a grudge means keeping the page open to the real version. It's not letting them rewrite our history with gaslighting, lies, DARVO (deny, attack, reverse victim offender), smear campaigns, family mobbing, projection and other revisionist history tactics. It's holding space for our brain damaged inner child, to help her get safer and saner. 

📖🔖

Holding a grudge is simply remembering how they hurt you and refusing to forget or overlook it. 

What holding a grudge isn't

Grudge-holding isn't dysregulated rage, pouting, passive-aggressive attacks or vengeance seeking. It isn't trauma dumping on everyone who will listen. It isn't punishing the narcissist by seeking retribution. Though with their DARVO and blame-shifting, they will probably say you are. Just let them rave, but don't let them gaslight you with all their double standards and self-righteous mumbo-jumbo. You are just  holding them accountable for their own actions, instead of being the fall girl who takes the consequences on herself. But it isn't humiliating them or wishing them evil. They will get plenty of that, if karma and God have their say. Narcissist parents do so much harm that it will come back to bite them in time. 

Holding a grudge is silent resistance

You don't and probably shouldn't tell them you don't forgive them. It's isn't about proving anything to them. It's about proving that you care about yourself. It may mean having honest conversations with them, but it doesn't have to. I won't ever try to discuss this with my narcissistic parents because they'll just do what they always did, lying, backpedaling, gaslighting, minimizing and shame-shifting. For me, it's about drawing a firm between us, not backing down from facts and making it clear that what I won't let them get away with again. This works best for me by actions. It's me finally defying their hold over me. 

Holding a grudge is about fixing you, not them.  It's protecting and articulating your truth, so it can set you free. 

Wrong things narcissistically abused kids are taught

So often "blind guides" aka flying monkeys or enablers, (in religion, society, family, even psychology) tell abused kids, wrongly, that holding a grudge, or not forgiving is wicked.  They prat to get over it, forgive, rise above and be the bigger person. They make excuses galore for the selfish, arrogant, cruel ADULT parents and then expect children to be paragons of virtue. But they never stop to ask about the hell we actually endured. They just go into preacher mode because, and this is important, they never did care about us. Many of these same blind guides stood by and watched our parents abuse us and did nothing. 

A warning note on blind guides

If these would be helpers had really cared, they see that that's ALL WE HAVE EVER DONE (rising above, forgiving, etc.) Our our enmeshed parents trauma bonded us into their narcissistic cult fantasy which gave us betrayal blindness. This cognitive dissonance with reality and the stress they kept putting on us, damaged our brain, leaving us with no protective resources and only dangerous trauma responses like people pleasing. It's all we know. So this hypocritical pontificating about "rising above" just translates to our vulnerable minds, that we are STILL responsible for fixing what our narcissistic parents broke. That keeping peace at any price and at our own expense is the right thing to do. That going no contact is somehow betraying, disobeying, disrespecting our parents. But they were never parents to us. They were enmeshed slaveowners who groomed us to provide them with narcissistic supply. All this perpetuates our betrayal blindness and exacerbates our childhood trauma response of fawning and people pleasing. 

Forgiving narcissists makes them even more entitled

So the opposite of grudge-holding would be forgiving, as per blind guides. But people get forgiving wrong too. Forgiving, correctly understood, is radical acceptance that the past will never be anything other than what is was and that it HAPPENED. Which is the opposite of our parents

 gaslighting indoctrination which lied it away or blamed us. Because, here's the rub. Our narcissistic parent never apologize or even admit they were wrong. They DARVO and twist. They aren't sorry. So just how are we supposed to "forgive" that? They expect carte blanche tolerance for all their bad actions. They blame-shift and foist consequences on us. And then tell us we have to forgive them cuz God says so. So us just complying and erasing the past, just gives them more liberty to keep hurting us. 

What forgiveness isn't

But radical acceptance isn't what narcissists or their flying monkeys have in mind when they say forgive. What they preach is rolling over for and letting yourself be kicked. They want you to do the 7 deadly E's: excuse, exonerate, expunge, exclude (them from rules) exempt (them from consequences), enable and endure further abuse. They have this naive fairytale view of families that doesn't apply to us. The way they preach forgiveness like it's a ruby-slipper clicking birthday wish that magics away all the  past bad. Like it never happened and it's all good. It's did and it's not. Interestingly, when the narcissist hurts them, they aren't so quick to forgive, either with the fairy dust kind or the radical acceptance. 

Narcissists and blind guides never "get over" anything. 

Why it's important to hold a grudge

When you hold a grudge, you hold onto the memories and the pain and damage they caused. And yes there is an element of anger. It's about time we abused kids got angry with them. Anger helps us keep our edge so we don't fall for their wiles again. Grudge holding is putting in the bookmark and letting it stay there. It's not holding doors open that they keep slamming on your foot. It's about retaining a healthy distance from hurtful people because you remember what they did. You wouldn't pet a rattlesnake because you hoped this time he won't bite you. They always bite. That's why they make the warning rattle. Ignoring it is foolish, just as ignoring and overlooking past treachery on the part of narcissistic parents is dangerous. They hurt because that's what they do. Letting those memories speak their piece, and not quelling them is one of the tasks to healing. It's moving out of their sites and getting to a safer place out of their clutches.