Healing from Your Narcissistic Mother
The narcissistic mother can remain in our consciousness like an indelible imprint. Whenever we make life choices mother is there making demands and threats that we do it her way. The child of the narcissistic mother is a psychological prisoner. When we are very young and helpless, we must do what is necessary to survive. The daughter or son of a narcissistic mother is faced with emotional coldness from the beginning. Mother may be capable of putting on a good act and feigns affection and caring. Beneath this facade, she is resentful of her maternal role. If she must play the part of mother, everyone must bend to her will. The husband is often treated like another child or a small pet who fearfully obeys his master's commands.
Children are thrown to the side or become the bit players in the narcissistic mother's large scale drama. They watch as she successfully manipulates everyone in her environment. When she can't do it smoothly, she uses her highly tuned verbal weapons and threats to tame those who could possibly get in her way.
After all of the years of mother abuse, her children feel psychologically pummeled and exhausted. To move beyond survival they have to find ways to recognize their value and uniqueness as individuals. They may be the biological issue or have been adopted by mother but are distinct people who are very different from her.
Psychological healing is a process, not a single event. There are no steps 1-10 that will get you swiftly to a destination on mapquest. The healing process takes place,one day at a time, one moment at a time. The first step is to know that healing is a natural part of being human. It is a gift of our humanity and of all of nature.
Learn to honor and acknowledge the baby and small child within you. Become acquainted once more or for the first time with your senses and natural life rhythms. Babies are very wise. They know how to sleep and rest. They are magnificently spontaneous. They laugh, cry, move, giggle, gesticulate and articulate their needs, wishes and knowings. They do not feel ashamed about being themselves; they celebrate it. Watch their dancing eyes and broad toothless smiles. Listen to their gurgles and gleeful responses to the moment. Tap into this part of yourself. It is closer than you think. Some people find it helpful to write down what they are discovering about themselves. Choose a quiet period each day for meditation, journaling, repose, quiet thought. This time belongs to you "to be". This is not a period for "doing." Become comfortable with yourself in the act of "being." Recognize the talents that your mother forced you to hide because they did not bring her the narcissistic supplies she was demanding from you and that she envied and dismissed. Use your inner voice in activating these talents. Respect your perceptions. High quality psychotherapy helps many children of narcissistic mothers at a time when they can be receptive to this process. Trust your intuition---a key to healing. Celebrate your freedom from your narcissistic mother. Embrace your life, expand and deepen it. Give back the richness and fullness of your gifts to others. What is given with the open hand of the heart is returned many fold. Visit my website: www.thenracissistinyourlife.com
Linda Martinez-Lewi, Ph.D.
Telephone Consultation
Email: lmlphd@thenarcissistinyourlife.com
Children are thrown to the side or become the bit players in the narcissistic mother's large scale drama. They watch as she successfully manipulates everyone in her environment. When she can't do it smoothly, she uses her highly tuned verbal weapons and threats to tame those who could possibly get in her way.
After all of the years of mother abuse, her children feel psychologically pummeled and exhausted. To move beyond survival they have to find ways to recognize their value and uniqueness as individuals. They may be the biological issue or have been adopted by mother but are distinct people who are very different from her.
Psychological healing is a process, not a single event. There are no steps 1-10 that will get you swiftly to a destination on mapquest. The healing process takes place,one day at a time, one moment at a time. The first step is to know that healing is a natural part of being human. It is a gift of our humanity and of all of nature.
Learn to honor and acknowledge the baby and small child within you. Become acquainted once more or for the first time with your senses and natural life rhythms. Babies are very wise. They know how to sleep and rest. They are magnificently spontaneous. They laugh, cry, move, giggle, gesticulate and articulate their needs, wishes and knowings. They do not feel ashamed about being themselves; they celebrate it. Watch their dancing eyes and broad toothless smiles. Listen to their gurgles and gleeful responses to the moment. Tap into this part of yourself. It is closer than you think. Some people find it helpful to write down what they are discovering about themselves. Choose a quiet period each day for meditation, journaling, repose, quiet thought. This time belongs to you "to be". This is not a period for "doing." Become comfortable with yourself in the act of "being." Recognize the talents that your mother forced you to hide because they did not bring her the narcissistic supplies she was demanding from you and that she envied and dismissed. Use your inner voice in activating these talents. Respect your perceptions. High quality psychotherapy helps many children of narcissistic mothers at a time when they can be receptive to this process. Trust your intuition---a key to healing. Celebrate your freedom from your narcissistic mother. Embrace your life, expand and deepen it. Give back the richness and fullness of your gifts to others. What is given with the open hand of the heart is returned many fold. Visit my website: www.thenracissistinyourlife.com
Linda Martinez-Lewi, Ph.D.
Telephone Consultation
Email: lmlphd@thenarcissistinyourlife.com
Posted by LindaMartinezLewi at 12/22/2009 10:55 AM 
Categories: self help, narcissism, mental health, interpersonal relationships, narcissists
Tags: quality psychotherapy your talents and gifts intuition journaling narcissistic mother spontaneous meditation
Categories: self help, narcissism, mental health, interpersonal relationships, narcissists
Tags: quality psychotherapy your talents and gifts intuition journaling narcissistic mother spontaneous meditation
It was helpful to read your articles about Narcissists. I found out at age 40, 11 years ago that my poor father had paranoid schizophrenia. He was taken to a VA hospital when I was 5 and existed there for about 13 years before he died. My mother's mother committed suicide when she was 5 during the Great Depression. My mother has always displayed narcissistic traits and has always despised me while she adores her son. I am "married" to a man quite similar to my mother. I have endured psychological abuse my entire life. My brother is an enabler and codependent and has shunned me because I walked away from my mother's abuse. He blames me for my mother's problems. I went to very beneficial counseling for a couple of years and read over and over about mental illness until I finally accepted the reality of the relationships I was in. I was in denial and shock for years that my husband is the worst possible person I should be with. His family and mine hate me for coming forward with "allegations' of abuse by my mother and husband toward me. I have been shunned by all of them for years. I am treated like the Village Idiot even though I am the only one with the courage to go to a Psychologist. I have been labeled sick and laughed at by my mother because I sought help. I decided to never have children because of the abuse and for fear I would be a terrible parent. I chose to stay married because I would not be safe living in poverty which would be the case after a divorce. I fear I will never have a normal relationship with anyone so I would never consider marrying again. I was raped when I was 18 and my mother blamed me for that so I will never live in an unsafe neighborhood again even if it means living in the same house with my current abuser. I can only hope people will seek professional help when necessary and remember that knowledge is power. Read everything you can get your hands on regarding mental illness. Don't take everything you read verbatim. Digest it and use your intelligence to make wise choices that will help you survive. It's OK to be angry, very angry but it's how you express it that matters. I am grateful I could express myself on this site.
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My sympathies to you, I have found that your story is very similar to mine. I am 32 and over the the last two days, after reading articles on the web that this has been what has happened to me also. I have just stubbled on this brilliant website and articles and they are the best I have come across. I'm really scared at the moment and confused that perhaps I have got it all wrong but I dont think I have. I feel like I have just woken up form a horror story. My Brother was used against me also growing up. I could never understand the problems within my relationship with my mum, nothing I did was right. I have always been looked at as different, when I was the only thinking/bright person (apart form my divorced father) and it has been her mental problem which has held me back the whole time, I am in disbelief. We aren't old, you must join with me in really making the best of yourself now, it's not too late for us x Like I have read from Dr. L words. It's like being re born (no doubt with the painful beginning!)
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I too just found this website about one week ago after googling the question, "Why do my parents always make me feel guilty?" After spending a couple of hours reading, I had tears in my eyes realizing I was reading my life. As one person wrote above, I'm scared...I also now understand it has been my mother who has held me back all along. And I, too, feel as if I just woke up from a nightmare! I finally have found the answer. I have never understood why my mother is manipulative with her words and seeks to downplay all of my achievements. My father is a textbook enabler, playing in to her drama and taking her side if I try to address how she disrespects me. Her house must be perfect and don't you dare sit on the wrong chair! I have always felt I am not good enough. Now I know why as a little girl of 3 years old, I looked in the mirror and said, "I hate you." I had already begun to learn if I can't win mom's approval, something must be wrong with me. I've suffered from severe anxiety-depression, and at one point, could barely leave my home for three, long years. I've had three broken marriages (all abusive) and have been so confused about relationships, I haven't dated in over four years. I returned to college 2 1/2 years ago and will graduate this year. It is the one thing that validates me as I over-achieve in one class after another. The pieces are starting to fit together and make sense...finally. For the first time, at age 48, I now have hope. Hope that I can finally heal and be free of the incessant psychological torture I've endured for years. I'm so greatful for finding this blog and associated websites. It's 2010...let the healing begin!
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That's the tragedy of narcissistic mothers. They cause immense damage to their children that carries on into adult life if you are not lucky enough to find information on this subject. True to narcissistic form, my mother was quite good at making you feel guilty. Good at belittling too. Lots of manipulative games to CONTROL family members. Lots of theatrics. My mother can cry on a dime if all other tactics fail. She pretends to be the victim when people get fed up with her garbage.
She delights in demeaning you and then complains how you can't achieve anything because you have no self esteem. It took me many years to realize I had no self esteem BECAUSE OF HER! Outsiders don't understand what you are going through because she is quite charming to OUTSIDERS. So they make you feel like YOU are the problem, just like she makes you feel like you are the problem!! You are absolutely right, it is psychological torture. I catch myself knuckling under to other manipulative people and letting the old guilt my mother infected me with knawing at me. Then I reconize the very same mean spirited games she played in the new manipulative person and don't allow the game to proceed. I finally figured out my mother is a very miserable person, who delights in making others just as miserable as she is. If you do the normal thing and feel sorry for her, then she has you right where she wants you, under her control and subject to her head games. I have to distance myself from normal compassion towards her because I know what she is. A danger to my sanity! In short she has the emotional mentality of a six year old, but the intellectual smarts to play extravagant manipulative games. Knowing what your mother is, is liberating, because then you can change the way you respond to her and end head games. You may even find that you have to cut her out of your life, as I have done. Because narcissists don't change.
They have no interest in changing because they think they are not the problem!
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I think your all extremly brave and strong. I broke up with my fiance because of his Narcisist mother&her abusive attitude. He had no self esteem and was not able to function in a normal adult world(unemployed,loner etc) I loved him and saw his potential. She offered help saying there were lots of jobs in her home town and that we could stay with her untill we got settled. It was like a trap. She critized everything from our appearance to our opinions. Her husband was a classic enabler and put up with her drinking,shopping,mood swings. My father is also an enabler he went from my mother who was abusive and unstable to my stepmum who is much the same. It's amazing you accept what you grow up with. Because we are in environments of abuse,critism,belittling and intimidation we think we have no worth!At the age of 38 i realized that i am a good person with simple needs. Peace and happiness is sacred. Since i have been going for long walks and soul searching i can feel my confidence growing knowing i can create a stable life for myself now. We can still do all the things we missed out on as a child. I feel blessed to have a great counciller and supportive friends. I have cut out all the toxic people and the emotional vampires who were feeding on my insecurities and fears. I hope you all find peace and believe you deserve the best
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