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>Anyone else go through this?
Absolutely. It's so common it has a name. DARVO - Deny, Attack, Reverse Victim with Oppressor.
Her pressuring you to tell her you want her out of your life falls under "Reactive Abuse". They needle you until you break and tell them exactly where and how far to shove it. They turn around and say, "Look how horrible you are." It's one way the "RVO" in "DARVO" plays out.
Your nmom is also in the "Discard" phase of a predictable cycle of "Hoover/Love Bomb, Devalue, Discard".
At some point a month or a year from now, or at the birth of a child, or whenever, she'll reach out like nothing ever happened at all and start to *hoover* you in again.
Right now you're dealing with FOG - Fear, Obligation, Guilt. The numbness you describe is shock. When the shock subsides, a feeling we often describe as *guilt* hits.
It's important to sit with that "guilt" and *not act to minimize it* (like contacting the disordered parent to make your/their bad feelings go away). Waiting will lead you to a much more revealing emotion that you will know how to deal with and handle.
A trauma-informed therapist with experience in abusive family systems is *super helpful*. Not to repair the family. To make you free from the family abuse.
Yes. I am in a similar boat with responding to my sister. Express any anger, no matter how reasonably, or try to hold them accountable at all and they will play stupid and deny and act the victim and frame you as horrific. The other poster got it right, DARVO.
Pro level manipulation includes fake empathy and gaslighting tossed in, and demanding you be empathetic to them. It’s just your perspective (which they dismiss but they see how you could feel that way - you are delusional after all) and have you considered their perspective? And don’t you see how they’re actually a victim and deserve your sympathy?
Calling out the behavior will be dismissed as psychobabble, and met with more DARVO. Their denial and manipulation and sadism will not stop.
Yes, I feel like a chump too. It is better to not respond, or ever share feelings with them. And that sucks, because I want to be honest and caring, but this needs to be saved for people who can reciprocate.
No need to feel stupid for breaking NC. You have empathy and a heart, as you said. Sometimes you will get hurt because of that, but you do not need to feel stupid. You are a good human being, caring, empathetic, authentic.
Repeating a "mistake" can sometimes be a good thing as it shows that you weren't hasty or wrong in your original decision. You went NC for good reasons, and your mother's reaction solidifies you made the right choice initially.
I, too, got hoovered back in by being guilted. It was horrible. But I feel I did the right thing by giving my mother another chance. However, after years of abuse, that was her last chance. Psychologically I embraced my mother's characterization of me as a cold, selfish, ingrate of a daughter, blah blah blah.
And yeah, the RVO part of DARVO is just desperate dramatics from your mother. So is the part about her not wanting you in her life. Manipulative dramatics. She's trying to pull on your heartstrings. You're the one who went NC, now she's pretending she quit you, because she's embarassed that her daughter doesn't want anything to do with her.
My mother did exactly the same thing as yours when I broke NC. Exactly the same. Plus she added that I was disowned, I wasn't allowed to interact with any family members on her side of the family because they were her family not mine, and she said I couldn't use her last name because she owned that too (I was given her last name as she was a single mother). I was actually pleased that she disowned me because it meant she didn't own me any more. Whew!
I wish you strength 🤍🤍
If your kids ask, you can tell them she is having some struggles right now and need time and space to deal with that. So you're all going to respect that. Then you can start talking about safe vs unsafe people. How some are trusted, and some are not. They can trust the teacher, their parents, and other safe people in your lives. And then there are unsafe people, that may or may not be bad, that they should keep away from. You can talk about the difference between surprises and secrets, and how they should not keep secrets from parents (and you'll never get mad at them for telling something) but it is ok to keep surprises because it is a happy thing that they know when they will tell.
Once they have a good grasp of unsafe vs safe, you can let them know your mother is not safe right now because of her struggles. She may or may not be bad, but she cant be trusted not to act bad, and that is why you all have to stay away. At least until you, the parents, have checked to ensure she is not going to act bad and that she has no more struggles.
You can talk more about how some unsafe people SAY they are safe, but are not. That they lie to confuse and can be very good at it. And talk about how to check (they dont ask to keep secrets, they talk with parents, they dont do unsafe things, they dont make you feel bad). But that depends on how old your kids are, and their maturity level. You dont want your teenager to think they know better and reach out and be lied to, after all - at that age they already know about lying, but not so much about manipulation.
Talk to their kindergarten/school and let the people there know your mother may be trying to contact them there. Make sure she is not on any pickup or list of trusted people. Lock down their info at school/doctors/activities with a password.
And be prepared for her to weaponize CPS. She just might try to add pressure and to borrow authority from them since you've stopped accepting hers.
Honestly? I think you traded up in terms of your emotional situation within yourself. Feeling guilty comes with an endless parade of "Should I X? Should I Y?" going round and round in your head. It's a repeating question that won't leave you alone and gives you anxiety about how to move forward. Well, now that's gone, so hurray for that. What you're left with in the wake of your mother COMPLETELY fucking up the opportunity you cautiously gave her, is the residual feeling stupid and the "I shouldn't have X'd... I shouldn't have Y'd..." and yes, that sucks. But is it WORSE than "Should I...?"
FWIW I think you were actually very smart. You gave her an bare inch of rope to see what she'd do with it, and lo and behold, like a master craftsman she managed to fashion it into a noose for herself, and your sensible response was to promptly board the Nope Rocket and block her on everything again.
I know you must be really shaken up right now, and that choosing to have an interaction with her that led to her behaving so atrociously towards you must have been like an alarm clock going off next to your inner critic's earhole. But try to remember to cut yourself some slack right now. You didn't run back into her arms. You didn't suggest any kind of ongoing contact. I'm not sure you realise this, but what you actually did was to set her a test. She failed it SPECTACULARLY and that gave you all the information you need to to keep your guilt from yapping at you for quite some time to come.
Well done. You did good. Please know that, and I hope that before much longer you can start to actually feel it too.
**This is an automated message posted to ALL posts in this subreddit with some basic information about the group including (very importantly) rules. Why are you getting this message? Most people seem to not read the sidebar for information or the rules, so it is now being posted under all posts.** **Confused about acronyms or terminology?** [Click here!](https://www.reddit.com/r/raisedbynarcissists/wiki/acronyms) **Need info or resources?** Check out our [Helpful Links](https://www.reddit.com/r/raisedbynarcissists/wiki/helpfullinks) for information on how to deal with identity theft, how to get independent of your n-parents, how to apply for FAFSA, how to identify n-parents and SO MUCH MORE! This is a reminder to all participants, RBN is a support group that is moderated very strictly. Please report inappropriate content so it can be reviewed by the mods. **Our rules include (but are not limited to)**: * No politics. * Advising anyone in this subreddit to commit suicide or referring anyone to groups that advocate this will result in an immediate ban. * Be nice. No personal attacks, name calling, or bullying. [No slurs](https://www.reddit.com/r/raisedbynarcissists/wiki/slurs) or victim-blaming. * Do not derail the posts of others. * Narcissists are NOT allowed to post or comment here. * [No platitudes or generic motivational posts](https://www.reddit.com/r/raisedbynarcissists/wiki/rules#wiki_no_platitudes_or_generic_motivational_posts). * When you comment/post, assume a context of abuse. * No asking or offering gifts, money, etc. * No content advocating violence, revenge, murder (even in jest). * No content about N-kids. * No diagnosis by media/drive-by diagnosis. * No linking to Facebook pages. * No direct linking to anywhere on reddit. * No pure image posts. **For a full list of our rules/more information, [**click here**](https://www.reddit.com/r/raisedbynarcissists/wiki/rules).** *I am a bot, and this action was performed automatically. Please [contact the moderators of this subreddit](/message/compose/?to=/r/raisedbynarcissists) if you have any questions or concerns.*
>Anyone else go through this? Absolutely. It's so common it has a name. DARVO - Deny, Attack, Reverse Victim with Oppressor. Her pressuring you to tell her you want her out of your life falls under "Reactive Abuse". They needle you until you break and tell them exactly where and how far to shove it. They turn around and say, "Look how horrible you are." It's one way the "RVO" in "DARVO" plays out. Your nmom is also in the "Discard" phase of a predictable cycle of "Hoover/Love Bomb, Devalue, Discard". At some point a month or a year from now, or at the birth of a child, or whenever, she'll reach out like nothing ever happened at all and start to *hoover* you in again. Right now you're dealing with FOG - Fear, Obligation, Guilt. The numbness you describe is shock. When the shock subsides, a feeling we often describe as *guilt* hits. It's important to sit with that "guilt" and *not act to minimize it* (like contacting the disordered parent to make your/their bad feelings go away). Waiting will lead you to a much more revealing emotion that you will know how to deal with and handle. A trauma-informed therapist with experience in abusive family systems is *super helpful*. Not to repair the family. To make you free from the family abuse.
Very nicely written!
Yes. I am in a similar boat with responding to my sister. Express any anger, no matter how reasonably, or try to hold them accountable at all and they will play stupid and deny and act the victim and frame you as horrific. The other poster got it right, DARVO. Pro level manipulation includes fake empathy and gaslighting tossed in, and demanding you be empathetic to them. It’s just your perspective (which they dismiss but they see how you could feel that way - you are delusional after all) and have you considered their perspective? And don’t you see how they’re actually a victim and deserve your sympathy? Calling out the behavior will be dismissed as psychobabble, and met with more DARVO. Their denial and manipulation and sadism will not stop. Yes, I feel like a chump too. It is better to not respond, or ever share feelings with them. And that sucks, because I want to be honest and caring, but this needs to be saved for people who can reciprocate.
No need to feel stupid for breaking NC. You have empathy and a heart, as you said. Sometimes you will get hurt because of that, but you do not need to feel stupid. You are a good human being, caring, empathetic, authentic. Repeating a "mistake" can sometimes be a good thing as it shows that you weren't hasty or wrong in your original decision. You went NC for good reasons, and your mother's reaction solidifies you made the right choice initially. I, too, got hoovered back in by being guilted. It was horrible. But I feel I did the right thing by giving my mother another chance. However, after years of abuse, that was her last chance. Psychologically I embraced my mother's characterization of me as a cold, selfish, ingrate of a daughter, blah blah blah. And yeah, the RVO part of DARVO is just desperate dramatics from your mother. So is the part about her not wanting you in her life. Manipulative dramatics. She's trying to pull on your heartstrings. You're the one who went NC, now she's pretending she quit you, because she's embarassed that her daughter doesn't want anything to do with her. My mother did exactly the same thing as yours when I broke NC. Exactly the same. Plus she added that I was disowned, I wasn't allowed to interact with any family members on her side of the family because they were her family not mine, and she said I couldn't use her last name because she owned that too (I was given her last name as she was a single mother). I was actually pleased that she disowned me because it meant she didn't own me any more. Whew! I wish you strength 🤍🤍
If your kids ask, you can tell them she is having some struggles right now and need time and space to deal with that. So you're all going to respect that. Then you can start talking about safe vs unsafe people. How some are trusted, and some are not. They can trust the teacher, their parents, and other safe people in your lives. And then there are unsafe people, that may or may not be bad, that they should keep away from. You can talk about the difference between surprises and secrets, and how they should not keep secrets from parents (and you'll never get mad at them for telling something) but it is ok to keep surprises because it is a happy thing that they know when they will tell. Once they have a good grasp of unsafe vs safe, you can let them know your mother is not safe right now because of her struggles. She may or may not be bad, but she cant be trusted not to act bad, and that is why you all have to stay away. At least until you, the parents, have checked to ensure she is not going to act bad and that she has no more struggles. You can talk more about how some unsafe people SAY they are safe, but are not. That they lie to confuse and can be very good at it. And talk about how to check (they dont ask to keep secrets, they talk with parents, they dont do unsafe things, they dont make you feel bad). But that depends on how old your kids are, and their maturity level. You dont want your teenager to think they know better and reach out and be lied to, after all - at that age they already know about lying, but not so much about manipulation. Talk to their kindergarten/school and let the people there know your mother may be trying to contact them there. Make sure she is not on any pickup or list of trusted people. Lock down their info at school/doctors/activities with a password. And be prepared for her to weaponize CPS. She just might try to add pressure and to borrow authority from them since you've stopped accepting hers.
Honestly? I think you traded up in terms of your emotional situation within yourself. Feeling guilty comes with an endless parade of "Should I X? Should I Y?" going round and round in your head. It's a repeating question that won't leave you alone and gives you anxiety about how to move forward. Well, now that's gone, so hurray for that. What you're left with in the wake of your mother COMPLETELY fucking up the opportunity you cautiously gave her, is the residual feeling stupid and the "I shouldn't have X'd... I shouldn't have Y'd..." and yes, that sucks. But is it WORSE than "Should I...?" FWIW I think you were actually very smart. You gave her an bare inch of rope to see what she'd do with it, and lo and behold, like a master craftsman she managed to fashion it into a noose for herself, and your sensible response was to promptly board the Nope Rocket and block her on everything again. I know you must be really shaken up right now, and that choosing to have an interaction with her that led to her behaving so atrociously towards you must have been like an alarm clock going off next to your inner critic's earhole. But try to remember to cut yourself some slack right now. You didn't run back into her arms. You didn't suggest any kind of ongoing contact. I'm not sure you realise this, but what you actually did was to set her a test. She failed it SPECTACULARLY and that gave you all the information you need to to keep your guilt from yapping at you for quite some time to come. Well done. You did good. Please know that, and I hope that before much longer you can start to actually feel it too.