Psychopath and Narcissist Survivors Support Group

Seachelle · Joined: 22 Apr 2008 Posts: 40

I've put off writing my personal story. Maybe to avoid facing it, but mostly because it's just so darn hard to write without making me seem like a whiny, crybaby, "I feel sorry for me" post. But basically because it's just so hard to write it! Here goes tho:

My mother, I believe, is an NP. She was an abuser who, when I was a child, beat me and locked me in my room (with a key) for days at a time. There were times I had to eat snow from the windowsill and urinate in a toy and throw it out the window. She only did this when my father was traveling for his job or was at work, telling me it was no use to tell him because he didn't care about me anyway. When I was locked up she had men in. She was also abusing alcohol and taking prescription drugs (Vallium, etc) which were available like candy back in those days.

When she left my dad for the second time, she "kidnapped" me, taking me to an Aunt who lived several states away. I was told my father was not looking for me and didn't want me. Then she left me with the Aunt and Uncle and went back to our home state. One day, out of the blue, she came and took me back home and dropped me off at my dad's house in the middle of the day. He didn't know I was there until he came home from work. I was ten years old.

I was an "only" child and I hid myself in books--golly, I don't think there was a book I didn't read back in those days. Books were my escape.

Time passed with little contact from my mother except for the occasional visit. I was alone most of the time, and used to cry and pray for a mother like everyone else had.

Unfortunately, I got my wish. My dad dated a bit and there were a couple women I absolutely adored. But the summer I was 14, my dad sent me to visit my mother (who by then was living in another state). He put me on a train and brought along a woman I had never met. She forced me to kiss her goodbye on the lips--and I felt so strange because I had never met her before.

A couple days after I got to my mother's, my dad phoned and told me he was marrying that woman. And when I returned, she had already packed up and moved most of our home's contents to her home. She had two children, both younger than me, and had already given them most of my things--my ice skates, dolls, bedroom set my grandmother had given me, etc. Needless to say, I was devastated.

Then the abuse started. I was "no good", just like my mother, a liar, etc. She hit me when my father was not around, but mostly bad-mouthed me to him. She'd berate me for not knowing how to do something around the house or cook, etc. when I'd never had a mother to teach me those things. And I sure didn't know how to do things "her way". And I was forced to call her "mom" and not allowed to tell anyone she was not my natural mother. I was not allowed to contact my own mother. Of course, her children were not allowed to contact their natural father either.

I thought I had escaped after I went away to college. And I was fortunate to have a boyfriend whose mother took me in as her own while he was in the service. I'd go visit her on weekends and one time I happened to be in town and phoned my dad at his office. He invited me to lunch and gave me a check for $5, which I cashed in town that day.
A while later, my father phoned me at my dorm and told me that his wife had found out he had met me "secretly" when she saw the cashed check and accused him of "sneaking around behind her back" to meet me. He told me he could never see me again.

I went into a deep depression and slept most of the time. A school psychologist told me that I had "classic avoidance syndrome". Well, I don't know about that but his "remedy" was to set me up on a date with another professor so that was the end of my seeking help, lol.

I didn't know what to do or where to go. So, I contacted my mother and she did come get me at the end of the term and took me back to her home.

I'd just stepped from the frying pan into the fire, so to speak. I got a job and met my husband, but in the meantime I was threatened and abused once more. The night my mother woke me holding a gun to my head in a drunken, drugged rage and told me "I gave you life and I can take it away", I moved to an apartment. At that time my husband and I were engaged anyway and our wedding was only a couple months away.

He encouraged me to contact my father, saying "If I had a daughter I'd certainly want to know she was getting married." So, I did. And he and his wife came for the wedding. In order to be accepted back into the family and maintain peace, I had to do whatever my stepmother wanted. That is, if I wanted to have any sort of relationship with my father. She ran my wedding (a small affair) and her kids were in it, of course.

Still, I did have contact once again with my father.

Years passed....the verbal abuse from my stepmother continued. My birth mother contacted me from time to time but if she'd visit she'd steal liquor and any prescription drugs we had on hand, no matter what they were. Her husband--the first and the second one--would call us form time to time to "come get your mother and dry her out" and we would.

By this time I had two children of my own and we had all, at one time or another, moved to a southern state. And one Christmas my mother, out of the blue, returned our gifts with a note that she was not celebrating that year. Now this was hurting my children, who certainly couldn't understand why "grandma" didn't send them gifts. In the meantime, the Aunt who had hidden me from my father contacted me telling me she was afraid of my mother, who had continually broken into her nearby home and physically abused her.

I broke off all contact with my mother, which lasted almost 20 years but had to maintain contact with my stepmother in order to see my father. Her abuse continued but mostly I took it. Every once in a while my husband would stand up to her and tell her to back off with the criticisms but she never did. She would abuse and criticize me in front of everyone, but the worst comments she made in private or over the phone. My hair was always awful (even tho people on the street would stop me to compliment me on it), I was too thin, I was too fat, I was a terrible mother (my boys grew up to be successfull and happy and very close to me), I was a terrible wife (heck, I was June Cleaver!), etc. And, I had "bad blood".

A few years ago my mother contacted me, writing a letter that I let sit for days without opening it. My husband opened it finally, and told me my mother said she was dying of cancer and wanted to put things right between us. It took me a long time to decide to let her back into my life but I thought that the Lord wouldn't turn his back on me so how could I do that to her? And the cycle of ups and downs occured again.

She had moved up north with her last husband and he had died so she was alone. She expected me to be online chatting all day long and phone calls, etc. One day she'd be up and cheerful, the next she'd be abusive. I never knew how she'd be. She'd tell me she couldn't walk from room to room, used a wheelchair, etc. Couldn't get to the store, had no friends (because she takes offense at the slightest thing and throws them out of her life, sometimes --I later found out--threatening them with a gun), couldn't get food or medicine.

About this time, we had hurricanes here and our home was pretty much destroyed. And my stepmother died of cancer, my best friend died of heart disease and two of my dogs died--all on one day.

And what did my mother have to say? That she would remarry my father---"Just watch me!"

LOL, not a chance.

Then....my dad started acting abusive toward me. It was very apparent even to my husband. He'd do it in public or in private, didn't matter. He was decent to my husband but it was as if the spirit of my stepmother had entered him. A close friend told me that my father was the real abuser but I hadn't believed her. She said, tho, that he had married and allowed two women to abuse me so he must have approved of it. Now I think she was right.

Last year, my father met a woman and married her. And, he did basically what he'd done before. He told everyone but me--he sent me an e-mail. He lives just a couple miles away but he told his dead wife's children first. When my stepmother was sick and dying, he gathered her kids to him--they both live up north, a thousand miles away-- and rejected me. And I live nearby. When he was alone, my husband and I included him in everything but soon he met another woman and sent me an e-mail telling me he was getting married and that "everyone" was coming for the wedding. He lied to me over and over, telling me they would maintain separate residences, etc (what??? lol) and yet he had already put this woman's name on the deed to his home. Sigh.

I refused to go to the wedding. It was deja vu all over again. And now I have no contact with my father. Sad

He bad-mouthed me to all the relatives because I did not wish to attend his wedding--I had relatives of my dead stepmother phoning me to tell me that she had always told them how horrible I was but they had accepted me "anyway" but that I was just as awful as she'd aways said, especially since I didn't want to attend the wedding.

In the end, I decided to go...but then my husband (who is not abusive but IS emotionally distant) told me while I was getting dressed an hour before the wedding that if I attended, he would not. And he was standing up for my father (yes, even knowing how I felt). So I stayed home. Yes, it was maybe emotional blackmail and I don't know why my husband did that. He did understand what was going on and that my stepmother's relatives would be there--the ones who had called me and told me my stepmother had told them how horrible I was since the day she and my father had married but had accepted me anyway. I think maybe my husband was afraid I would confront them--but the thing is, I am the least confrontational person in the world. Unless, of course, things go too far or I am protecting my children and then I will stand up for myself. But not generally. Ah, well.

My dad sent me a card the other day, saying he misses me. Yeah, right. Sigh.

A few weeks ago, my birth mother finally flew down to stay with us. She had told us she was unable to get food, meds, etc. (yet rejected any help I arranged for her) and was destitute. We had been paying her bills and pulled her out of foreclosure, paying her taxes, etc. We finally allowed her to move in with us but she only stayed a couple weeks when she started refusing to eat or take her meds, staying in her room with the door locked and only came out to smoke, then left in a rage because I insisted she eat. She told me to never contact her again.

After she left, I was looking for an old address and thought it might be in a box of letters and pictures she had sent me a couple years ago that I had never opened. And when I did, I found she had taken old letters I'd written to her as a child and written horrible comments all over them, such as "bitch", how much she'd always hated me, and worse. She had apparently done this in 2005, well after she had contacted us for help and intended to come down here eventually. I don't understand it. I suppose I never will.

There's a lot more to my story--there always is more than can be typed in one sitting. But I've been going through a deep depression over it all and have been having flashbacks to all the abuse and wondering if it really is just me. My husband says no (but he is himself somewhat abusive--he gives me everything but is distant emotionally and physically, we are close friends but have a brother-sister relationship, which amazingly I put up with because to me, security is everything.)

What is strange is that I have two wonderful children who grew up to be highly successful and happy and close to us. I am well-respected in my community. No one would ever guess I am a victim of N-parents. In fact, my father is a well-respected retired professional as is my husband.

But inside, I'm a mess. Sad

Well, thank you all for listening. I am trying to find a therapist to help me deal with all this but the thing is, I'm not sure I'm ready to face it all. Just writing this has taken a great deal of effort but I do need others to talk with. I am so grateful I found this website. Smile