There are many people who we will encounter within our lives and not all of them will have our best interests at heart. But it can often be those people who we naturally assume would have our best interests, (parents, siblings and partners), who are capable of doing the most severe damage to our emotions and mental health. The problem comes from us struggling to accept that abuse has come from someone so close and in some cases may still be continuing.
We can be realistic and acknowledge and accept that Narcissists and Narcissistic abuse exists within the world and as adults, we can learn how to spot this and avoid it. But what if the abuse has already taken place when we were much younger, or may still be going on today? Those invisible wounds can run very deep as the impact is often greater when inflicted by a family member. Narcissistic family members will always need to ensure that you were constantly put down time and time again in order to feed their fragile egos. For Narcissists, these fragile egos are a monster that needs to be fed constantly. In order to feed it they will always need to keep the attention away from their own shortcomings and at the same time put themselves in a positive light by default. This, unfortunately, is where you play your role in their dark drama as they repeatedly use any and every excuse to make you look and feel inferior. As I explained to someone who had come to see me after suffering in an abusive relationship with their sister, “Narcissists cannot build their own towers very high, so they have to bring everyone else’s tower down around them, so by default they have the tallest tower”. Now if we are abused by someone who we spend limited time with, then we have a choice to move away from them and can heal and recover. But if we have been repeatedly exposed to Narcissistic abuse from a family member, then that daily constant impact is going to cause us real problems later in life, as it will erode our trust in others and our ability to form bonds. We are often creatures of habit and we learn not to touch things that are hot as they burn us, now if we have learnt in life that family relationships are painful, we are going to be reluctant to ever become involved again for fear that those old wounds become open again. This will bring up trust issues and make it so much harder for us to fully open up to another person and can eventually drive them away. We then get stuck in this cycle and can even end up forming attachments with Narcissists as it is a relationship we are more familiar with. This impact will have been made all the worse by our family Narcissist abuser reinforcing that the abuse never happened that way, almost acting like “Retrospective Gaslighting”. They will fall back on such lines as “Don’t be stupid, you were never harmed, you were always taken care of”. Or even worse deny that the abuse ever happened and convince us that we are the crazy one, or the horrible one in the family, who was always making up problems and accusing others of behaving badly.
We can be realistic and acknowledge and accept that Narcissists and Narcissistic abuse exists within the world and as adults, we can learn how to spot this and avoid it. But what if the abuse has already taken place when we were much younger, or may still be going on today? Those invisible wounds can run very deep as the impact is often greater when inflicted by a family member. Narcissistic family members will always need to ensure that you were constantly put down time and time again in order to feed their fragile egos. For Narcissists, these fragile egos are a monster that needs to be fed constantly. In order to feed it they will always need to keep the attention away from their own shortcomings and at the same time put themselves in a positive light by default. This, unfortunately, is where you play your role in their dark drama as they repeatedly use any and every excuse to make you look and feel inferior. As I explained to someone who had come to see me after suffering in an abusive relationship with their sister, “Narcissists cannot build their own towers very high, so they have to bring everyone else’s tower down around them, so by default they have the tallest tower”. Now if we are abused by someone who we spend limited time with, then we have a choice to move away from them and can heal and recover. But if we have been repeatedly exposed to Narcissistic abuse from a family member, then that daily constant impact is going to cause us real problems later in life, as it will erode our trust in others and our ability to form bonds. We are often creatures of habit and we learn not to touch things that are hot as they burn us, now if we have learnt in life that family relationships are painful, we are going to be reluctant to ever become involved again for fear that those old wounds become open again. This will bring up trust issues and make it so much harder for us to fully open up to another person and can eventually drive them away. We then get stuck in this cycle and can even end up forming attachments with Narcissists as it is a relationship we are more familiar with. This impact will have been made all the worse by our family Narcissist abuser reinforcing that the abuse never happened that way, almost acting like “Retrospective Gaslighting”. They will fall back on such lines as “Don’t be stupid, you were never harmed, you were always taken care of”. Or even worse deny that the abuse ever happened and convince us that we are the crazy one, or the horrible one in the family, who was always making up problems and accusing others of behaving badly.
The simple matter is that we do not always want to accept that narcissistic abuse may have come from family members, as it is a hard thing to believe that a parent or sibling may be a Narcissist. However, it is so important that we accept and acknowledge our abuser and the harm they have done, especially when they have been a family member as this can often be our first step to healing and recovering. At that same time as we call them out, we also have to pretty much wipe out anything they have ever said to us or told us. I know that sounds extreme, but when dealing with family Narcissistic abuse, you have to go right back to the start and disacknowledge the impact of their words on you. So many people often benefit from help with regression and reframing when they have suffered long term abuse, as it gives you the opportunity to view the reality of your past and not the distortion handed to you by a Narcissist. I have seen people change their whole world view of themselves simply by acknowledging that the words used against them, were nothing more than the Narcissist reality distortion field.
When we start to wake up to family member’s behaviour towards us and the falsehoods they have delivered to keep us down, we start to allow ourselves to disentangle from the blame and low self-worth that we are often left with due to the abuse. We need to take this brave first step and call out our abusers to stop ourselves internalising the abuse and thinking that we are to blame, we are not!
It is often a big step to take, however when we do we will realise that we were not the ones who are to blame for feeling a lack of trust and connection. We are however the ones who can start to make those changes within ourselves and start to build up those inner resources of strength and courage.
Remember always start by building that relationship with yourself first. If you are looking for a light at the end of the tunnel you may never find it, but you can be your own light every day.
