Hi friends. If you follow this blog, you know I've been working on healing the childhood trauma I experienced throughout my life with my "family." I'm deconstructing the abuse (physical, emotional, mental, social, sexual, religious, financial and medical), neglect, abandonment, endangerment, exploitation, parentification, family scapegoating, mocking, toxic shaming and gaslighting about it all.
And you may question why I always list each type of abuse that happened, separately. Or maybe you don't. But the shrieking harpies in my head do. My brain is full of flying monkeys telling me that I'm showing off and making it up. That's one result of narcissistic abuse. My brain gaslights itself with questioning, undermining, insulting and name-calling. And that's one reason why I have to catalog every bad thing that happened. It's one of seven reasons, actually. I'll get back to it so I can do them in order.
First, I need to fill you in on my very bizarre (for the time, I was born in 1964) family structure and dynamic. My parents were both very self-absorbed. They left me unattended from around age 4, for long periods of time. Neither one held consistent jobs and I have no memory of a bedroom, bed or toys. But they had money for expensive breed dogs, riding lessons, English saddles, etc. We moved around a lot and actually squatted at various times. When I was 5, they moved to Alaska to be missionaries (unsanctioned by any church). My dad left immediately to in his words "preach." He wasn't a preacher either, except in his mind. So this just meant that he wandered around Alaska on a kind of freebird gap year, family be damned.
My mom did her own thing and I wandered downtown Haines Alaska on my own. We lived with different people. Neither parent worked yet never had time for me. I walked to school alone. I was cared for by a native Tlingit couple in their 80s. Then she moved to an island up the inland passage. I had no idea where my dad was. She told me they were getting divorced which in 1970. She left me for a week with strangers. Then moved us back to Michigan.
My dad came back a year or so later. He got remarried almost immediately after a failed relationship with a 17-year-old (he was 34). I was bounced between homes. His wife did not want to include me in their new family until she realized how useful I could be around the house and with her kids. She and my dad bullied me into being their au pair, nanny, housekeeper and personal maid. My mother had affairs with various married men. Then opened a foster care home, met a guy whom she moved into our house. They didn't work and left me to care for the kids. Then they lost the foster care home, moved around a lot, got married. Her new husband was very abusive to me and she let him be so. He would later kick me out of the house when I was 16. Neither my mom nor my dad ever took my part against their very abusive spouses and would egg them on to further exploitation.
It's the abbreviated version but it gives you an idea of just how bizarre and foreign my life was compared to the kids around me. And it helps explain how the complex was the abuse, coming from four different "parents" each with his or her own spin. Among them all, my life became a messy mix of abuse (physical, mental, emotional, religious, sexual, social, financial, medical), neglect, abandonment, exploitation, cruelty, bullying, exploitation, parentification, shaming, scapegoating and gaslighting about it all. So on to the reasons
Reason 1 why I have to list each type of abuse: to begin to accept that it happened. I don't know who needs to hear this but if you have been the victim of narcissistic parental abuse, you have also been gaslit into thinking you're the problem. You are not. They are. It's them. They have catechized you on the Narcissist's prayer. (credit to Dayna Craig).
That didn't happen.
And if it did, it wasn't that bad.
And if it was, that's not a big deal.
And if it is, that's not my fault.
And if it was, I didn't mean it.
And if I did, you deserved it.
Reason 2 why I have to list each type of abuse. To begin to put it in perspective. All my life, I accepted whatever they dished out: the slapping, harassment, beating, name-calling, sexualizing, betrayal, mockery, ignoring. I worked like a dog to please them, doing pretty much all their work. Sleeping with their kids and getting up at night with babies from around age 11. I never realized how bizarre and abusive it was. Now that I have words for it, I'm using them to sort out what happened.
Reason 3 to list each separately: to sort out how they did it and how it was wrong. I always defended every weird, hurtful or traumatizing thing my four parents did. I never questioned. Worst of all, (here's the part of the parentification) I parented them while they exploited me. I was expected to be surrogate parent and spouse, while also being obedient, subservient and scapegoat. They wanted the perks of being parents with none of the work. I had to be both parent and child. Cataloging how they did this helps me begin to frame how it was wrong.
Reason 4 to list each abuse separately: to begin to see how each type of abuse affected me. Every thing I've listed are forms of abuse. But each affects me differently. Being hit makes me chronically flinch. Being emotionally abused makes me hate myself. Being neglected makes me feel worthless...a few examples.
Reason 5. to quit gaslighting myself. For so many years, they each made me feel like the problem. I was disobedient, angry, selfish, lazy, too sensitive, too critical, on and on. All that has culminate in my gaslighting myself. They don't even have to incant the Narcissist's prayer anymore. I do it for them. I still don't honestly believe that I'm not the problem. But hopefully I'll start to.
Reason 6 to unpick the Narc prayer, line by line:
That didn't happen. YES IT DID. YOU DID THOSE THINGS TO ME
And if it did, it wasn't that bad. YES THEY WERE. THEY WERE WORSE THAN BAD. THEY WERE AWFUL. THEY FELT AWFUL.
And if it was, that's not a big deal. IT IS A HUGE DEAL!!!! YOUR ABUSE HAS CRIPPLED ME.
And if it is, that's not my fault. IT IS ENTIRELY YOUR FAULT. YOU ARE THE PARENT. YOU HURT ME, ALLOWED AND ENCOURAGED OTHERS TO HURT ME.
And if it was, I didn't mean it. YES YOU DID. THESE THINGS WERE NOT ACCIDENTS. YOU HAD TO GO OUT OF YOUR WAY TO WREAK SUCH HAVOC. IT IS UNNATURAL, IMMORAL AND DEVASTATING.
And if I did, you deserved it. AHAHA. NOW WE COME TO IT. THIS WAS YOURGAME ALL ALONG. TO MAKE ME THE SCAPEGOAT FOR EVERYTHING. TO BLAME ME FOR IT ALL. TO SHAME ME FOR IT ALL. I DESERVED NONE OF IT. I DESERVED LOVE NOT ABUSE, CARE NOT NEGLECT! RESPECT NOT SHAME! SUPPORT NOT EXPLOITATION! NURTURE NOT ABANDONMENT! I DESERVED TO BE PART OF THE FAMILY NOT APART. INCLUDED NOT EXCLUDED. I DESERVED TO BE A CHILD, NOT AN OVERWORKED, UNPAID EMPLOYEE. I DESERVED TRUTH NOT GASLIGHTING AND LIES.
Reason 7. to find a way out of this effed up, screwed over, cluster-eff of misery and suffering that all this has caused. I don't want to write these posts anymore. I want joy, not a fake pasted on smile to keep others happy or at least not mad. I want to live my life not theirs. I wan to stop hating myself for things I was framed for doing but never did. I want to feel some satisfaction that I occasionally do something right. I want to restore the wounded kid in me to full health.
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