Post by kaleidoscope on Dec 5, 2018 9:57:15 GMT -8
Hi! First off, I’m really grateful to have found this forum. I’ve been lurking around children of narcissists threads but never feel like they quite fit my situation. I think this does.
I’m 25 now, and the oldest of 2 children, both girls. Always thought I grew up in your pretty standard suburban dysfunctional household until I started realizing that I was constantly angry with or uncomfortable around my mother for “no reason”. After some soul searching, I unearthed the memories of being her confidante and emotional partner.
In talking with my dad (who I am close to as an adult, but despised as a child), he says he felt like she withdrew from their relationship when I was born. Their relationship was utter crap for the past 25 years and they are finally in process of getting divorced. Throughout my childhood, my mom would tell me about her sexual relationship with my dad (mostly about how he wanted sex and she didn’t), would tell me about our family’s financial issues (asking me not to tell my dad about purchases “we” made because he would be upset with “us”), and telling me constantly how “special” I was (which sounds awesome, but was actually an awfully big standard to live up to and made it very hard for me to relate to other children).
Now, apparently strangely, I don’t seem to have issues with intimacy/commitment. In fact, I want it very much. I do seem to have an unhealthy attraction to authority figures, and generally have feelings for people who are emotionally unavailable. I have a huge amount of anxiety around money (and most things?) and am still struggling with social normalcy, I think because I missed out on basically all opportunities to practice throughout childhood.
Questions: how have you guys found therapists who understand how to help you through these issues? How have you worked through your trauma as adults in order to be healthy people and be able to be in healthy relationships? How have you repaired your relationships with your parent/s? I haven’t spoken to my mother in close to a year, and don’t really know if I want to change that.
Thanks for reading!
I’m 25 now, and the oldest of 2 children, both girls. Always thought I grew up in your pretty standard suburban dysfunctional household until I started realizing that I was constantly angry with or uncomfortable around my mother for “no reason”. After some soul searching, I unearthed the memories of being her confidante and emotional partner.
In talking with my dad (who I am close to as an adult, but despised as a child), he says he felt like she withdrew from their relationship when I was born. Their relationship was utter crap for the past 25 years and they are finally in process of getting divorced. Throughout my childhood, my mom would tell me about her sexual relationship with my dad (mostly about how he wanted sex and she didn’t), would tell me about our family’s financial issues (asking me not to tell my dad about purchases “we” made because he would be upset with “us”), and telling me constantly how “special” I was (which sounds awesome, but was actually an awfully big standard to live up to and made it very hard for me to relate to other children).
Now, apparently strangely, I don’t seem to have issues with intimacy/commitment. In fact, I want it very much. I do seem to have an unhealthy attraction to authority figures, and generally have feelings for people who are emotionally unavailable. I have a huge amount of anxiety around money (and most things?) and am still struggling with social normalcy, I think because I missed out on basically all opportunities to practice throughout childhood.
Questions: how have you guys found therapists who understand how to help you through these issues? How have you worked through your trauma as adults in order to be healthy people and be able to be in healthy relationships? How have you repaired your relationships with your parent/s? I haven’t spoken to my mother in close to a year, and don’t really know if I want to change that.
Thanks for reading!