Hello, I am the adult daughter of a narcissistic mother.
I always knew that something was "wrong" with her, but I could never put my finger on what it was... until I learned about NPD. As the oldest of three children, I was always my mother's primary source of narcissistic supply.
At the age of 18 I moved to another country, and this has allowed me to keep my emotional distance from her. Now at the age of 26 I am engaged to be married, and I can sense that my mother is desperately trying to tighten her grip on me and get me under her influence again. When I was a child her usual tactic was to rage at me and constantly criticise me, and as an adult she usually tries to guilt-trip me. I have two brothers; one was hospitalised for acute psychosis about four years ago, though he is okay now. This event seems to have been an extreme blow to my mother's grandiose self-image, and her behaviour has gotten progressively worse since then. She has always relied on me for emotional support, which meant that I in practice had to parent her. I also believe that her own mother had NPD, and the early childhood trauma of being raised by my grandmother caused my mother's NPD.
I feel like she does not recognise my right to live my own life with my husband, and I think she is in denial about the fact that I am getting married. Whenever I see her she switches between acting cold and distant, and clingy and engulfing. At family events she will insist on sitting next to me, stroking my hair as I were a small child, and micromanage my conversations with other family members. In front of my fiance she puts on this big display of playing the doting mother. However, she has always expected me to cater to her every whim without question, whereas she belittles my emotions and my feelings. The fact that I live in a different country means that her opportunity to be cruel to me face-to-face is limited, but she tries to get supply from me by calling me and unloading her emotions on me, constantly telling me how sad she is that I don't live close to her. I know that when I moved, my dysfunctional family sort of fell apart, because it was always my given role to "fix" everything. My father was always emotionally distant; he was physically present, but he never wanted to deal with the drama and stand up to my mother. When things got really bad, he would simply leave the house and leave me to deal with my mother. As an adult I have a civil relationship with him, but I realised a very long time ago that he will never be able to provide me with any kind of emotional support.
I hope I can find some people here with similar experiences
I always knew that something was "wrong" with her, but I could never put my finger on what it was... until I learned about NPD. As the oldest of three children, I was always my mother's primary source of narcissistic supply.
At the age of 18 I moved to another country, and this has allowed me to keep my emotional distance from her. Now at the age of 26 I am engaged to be married, and I can sense that my mother is desperately trying to tighten her grip on me and get me under her influence again. When I was a child her usual tactic was to rage at me and constantly criticise me, and as an adult she usually tries to guilt-trip me. I have two brothers; one was hospitalised for acute psychosis about four years ago, though he is okay now. This event seems to have been an extreme blow to my mother's grandiose self-image, and her behaviour has gotten progressively worse since then. She has always relied on me for emotional support, which meant that I in practice had to parent her. I also believe that her own mother had NPD, and the early childhood trauma of being raised by my grandmother caused my mother's NPD.
I feel like she does not recognise my right to live my own life with my husband, and I think she is in denial about the fact that I am getting married. Whenever I see her she switches between acting cold and distant, and clingy and engulfing. At family events she will insist on sitting next to me, stroking my hair as I were a small child, and micromanage my conversations with other family members. In front of my fiance she puts on this big display of playing the doting mother. However, she has always expected me to cater to her every whim without question, whereas she belittles my emotions and my feelings. The fact that I live in a different country means that her opportunity to be cruel to me face-to-face is limited, but she tries to get supply from me by calling me and unloading her emotions on me, constantly telling me how sad she is that I don't live close to her. I know that when I moved, my dysfunctional family sort of fell apart, because it was always my given role to "fix" everything. My father was always emotionally distant; he was physically present, but he never wanted to deal with the drama and stand up to my mother. When things got really bad, he would simply leave the house and leave me to deal with my mother. As an adult I have a civil relationship with him, but I realised a very long time ago that he will never be able to provide me with any kind of emotional support.
I hope I can find some people here with similar experiences
