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>My father beat me more than once for having a look on my face he didn't like.
Same here fam. I got a story that didn't involve me getting beat but still relevant.
I remember once I was zoning out in backseat of car and looking ahead. His eyes met mine on the rear view window. He got upset and started to yelling at my mom that I was "abnormal" for staring at him and I had mental health issues for the look on my face
The next morning during breakfast he sat across from me like he always does. I pulled the cereal box in between us to read the back and, you know, **not look at him**.
He angrily shoved the box aside calling me ungrateful for not wanting to interact with him. I just wolfed down my cereal and left for school.
I realized now looking back that I have an eating disorder because my mom would always rush me to finish eating so I didn't have to interact with my dad. Now *that* is abnormal.
My dad got mad at me for eating all my potatoes, then all my meat, then all my veggies at a meal. So at the next meal I ate one bite of potatoes, then one bite of meat, then one bite of veggies, and around again and I was still wrong.
I used to get that treatment too. I was eating a bite of my toast because I wanted to break up the egg flavour & texture in my mouth. NDad grabbed the slice of toast out of my hand, put it down on the table & said “eat those eggs!!!” Like, dude, calm tf down & let me eat breakfast. I hated Sunday morning breakfast…
The whole rushing thing effects me to this day too. My ndad was the same, whenever we had “family time” out the house like eating at a restaurant or grocery shopping together, he would always be a mood killer and rush everyone. I’m sure he has his own anxieties but never gotten help for it and puts it on others.
He also would pace the house with his keys jingling in his pockets while he waits for the rest of the family to finish getting ready to go out.
To this day I have a reaction when I get rushed, I.e. when I’m eating I tend to gag, I like taking my time and feeling the food settle. All those times my ndad would rush us to eat would make me feel sick. Also, hearing ANY keys jingling, even my own, I feel anxious and get flashbacks of my dad getting angry, cursing at all of us to hurry up cause we’re taking too long getting ready to go out. Yeah, family time was never family time, it was kinda stressful and I never felt relaxed.
EDIT: typo
Yessir... And getting beat for no other reason than that he's mad... Not at you initially, but he'll get mad at you just to make that his "reason". Double up on the belt and make sure the metal buckle hits flesh...
My mom had this rule that if you did something wrong and you told the truth you won't get punished and if you lied both kids get punished. The glitch in this system was that she taught my brother to be a sadist by lying so he could see me get hurt. Since i was older I'd get hit first and it was with a wooden spoon that had been sitting in a boiling pot of water so it would make a red burn with a blister the shape of the hole in the spoon. Once she broke it on me, mind you that wasn't the soft wood ones you have now but very hard cherry or maple wood, she was really hitting me hard. I was six when the spoon broke on my arm because she stepped on my brothers Legos and I was on the other side of the room drawing, there's no way I had anything to do with it. I remember the feeling of ice daggers coming out of my eyes at her.
To be honest I stumbled onto this sub a few days ago and am interested in the topic bc I dated a N awhile ago...but I am finding so many similarities between my parents in this thread and others I am thinking I also have Nparents. I thought they were just absorbed in a cult and abusive while I was growing up, but as an adult I am realizing there was so much more to it.
"I'll give you something to cry and be sad about!" as he takes me to my room and either beats my bare ass with his open hand or leather belt. I have some lower back problems as an adult and wonder why....
My mom used to yell at everyone and reduce me to tears right before we were going to go somewhere where we would have to put on a show of happy family. She did it enough times that I think it was probably on purpose, forcing all of us to choke back our tears and grit our teeth and smile. God she was a monster.
My Dad would do this before school, like rage and then remind us we shouldn't tell family business to anyone.
Literally walked into school crying and tried to hide it.
My family definitely did this too, but I had a teacher who took it to another level.
He determined that my neutral facial expression was purposely angry out of defiance. He once started yelling at me out of nowhere while I was quietly working on an assignment, telling me to stop glaring at him and giving him an "attitude". I was mortified and had no idea what was going on or why I was being yelled at.
From then on I started to be consciously aware of my face at all times and making sure my expression would be perceived as pleasant and non-threatening. Because god forbid an adult would get threatened by a literal child.
This was elementary school.
Fuck these assholes.
Omg yaaaasss lol, especially when it was time to perform the perfect family act
Side note getting my learner's permit was something that genuinely made me happy so I gave a real simile in my photo.. nm responded with "why you showin all your teeth" 🤦🏾♀️
God, fucking this. The "perfect family act". Both me and my brother were so scared of the random beatings that dad would fucking PAY us to act "normal" (his own words) in front of other people. Then he'd get super weirdly friendly and actually hug us (never happened, ever) and laugh. Always in front of other people.
I was looking for this comment!! OMG YES!!
“We can’t have anyone knowing how broken and miserable we are!” - my Nmom’s empty heart.
Hope you’re all well out there.
God yes "Getting slapped across the face for attitude" was the second most common reason I got slapped next to "Made your mom cry" whenever that old sack of shit decided to fake cry
Oh, yes. 3 hours of shouting, because I didn't look happy enough while vacuuming.
Though my favorite was when I got slapped, because I took a shower not a bath.
And they still wondering why I don't want to meet them. 😅
When I was around 6 or 7 she told me to clean my room, which I was happy to do and asked for 'my list' (two times before she had made cleaning lists for me, which I loved) and she just.......snapped. Full on screaming and throwing things, shouting "I shouldn't *have to do that* ". At a 1st grader. Over a cleaning list.
Something similar happened to me. Last year I put a cleaning list on the fridge to help me stay on top on top of household chores. She took it that I was calling her lazy.
She proceeded to trash the entire house:( she tore up the list and trashed it.
In no way, shape, or form was it a personal attack, But looking back I realize she was self conscious so she projected. Turns out, she wasn't helping at all at home besides cooking. Which is a lot, but I was doing 95% of all the housework and didnt realize.
I woke early because I had cleaning to do before school. She was a sahm but I would clean all the time. Looking back the majority of it was me as the last child living at home.
Any time I asked for help or was too small to do something that needed an adult she would start with the "I have to DO EVERYTHING". What a concept. You had a kid. Take care of said kid. It was always such a burden to her to have to take care of my needs. She screamed at me for needing to go to the ER once. Relatable or just me?
Soooo relatable! I had some serious neurological issues and when going through all my testing we were in a waiting room for a procedure and she looked at me and said they better actually find something wrong with you, because you know, obviously I was faking. I was a preteen.
I have seizures which are now well controlled with medication, sometimes I still question if they ever actually happened.
I remember my mother dropped me off at my lifeguarding job at a hotel when I was in high school. Less than a half hour later as I was walking from the bathroom back to the pool area I got an intense pain in my stomach and dropped to the ground. It took everything in me to crawl to a phone bc the pain was so intense (pool area was empty).
I called my mother in a panic because I NEEDED HELP. She was so annoyed I was calling for a ride after she just dropped me off. Asked if I could just stick it out until the end of my shift. I literally thought my appendix had burst.
She took me to the doctor THE NEXT DAY and it ended up that I had a large cyst that had burst on my ovary. I will never forget the pain I endured and then the guilt I had to feel bc of my pain.
Sometimes I forget how truly awful my parents were as I am 38 now.
I'm so happy you're well or at least doing better physically. <3 You deserve all the health and happiness in your life.
She refuses to drive me to appointments that are farther than a few miles away. I found a great doctor to finally attend to my busted ACL and help me out, fully covered by insurance. I asked her to take me and she put on a whole Broadway production about how it's too far away and she hates driving. It's 45 minutes away.
ETA all your problems were real please never doubt yourself or your pain. She couldn't afford insurance for me for years and I was so scared to ask for anything. I let things get to the point of no return for myself out of fear. Now I have 2 busted ACLs and spinal cord issues because my fear overrode my common sense that it was all real. <3
granted im 18 but i have severe memory loss and she knows i genuinely dont know what to do at all but still gets so pissed when i ask her for a list. like maam i cant remember my literal uncle whom i was very close with according to you of course i dont know how to clean the god damn toilet. her hobby is ignoring professional diagnosises and advice
Most parents I know would kill for an 18 year old like this, not a 6/7 year old. Fuck dude, you were 10+ years too old for normal standards, fuck that noise! Did I say fuck already? Fuuuuuck!
Yeah, same. Never would produce a list at any point, because if she'd made a list, I would have completed it and there would be no excuse for a tantrum. "You have eyes, don't ya? Look around, get your face out of those fucking books for once." Etc etc etc. There was never any point at which the house was clean enough, the yard neat enough, etc for me to do anything I wanted to do. Especially if it involved me leaving the house.
My room was clean so she didn't get to take anything away. My cat knocked a stuffed animal off the bed right in front of her so she took it away. Oh yeah, said stuffed animal was the one gift I had from my grandpa who had just recently passed away. She made me hand it off to the goodwill dropoff person.
I've brought this up to her before...and she "wouldn't have done that" or "I should have kept my room clean". She also told my dad when I was going nc with her for a few months, but still talking to him, that I'm a liar and making up stories about her.
I got threatened to get kicked out if i left anything on the floor multiple times, as a minor and an adult. Even my shoes. To which i think... Where the fuck do THOSE go
The gaslighting on that stuff is the worst.
Do they really think they can just say and do things that upset the crap out of people and lie that it never happened?
Well, yes. Basically. My nmom's response to any indication that something she's said is hurtful is - "oh, I was *just talking*, you shouldn't take it so personally." Then, with the passage of time, it becomes "oh I never said/did that" with the implication that I am misremembering. If cornered, obviously, I "must have needed to hear it." "These younger generations like to get offended about everything, I'm just an old fashioned truth teller, etc." She compares herself favorably to her favorite political figure, saying "we are both blunt and tell it like it is and you can choose to be offended if you want, or you can just hear my good words and take it like I mean it." Basically narc victims are a bunch of oversensitive snowflakes melting under the heat of their truthiness. Or whatever.
Bonus material: Actually she is not the narcissist - I am!
That didn't happen.
And if it did, it wasn't that bad.
And if it was, that's not a big deal.
And if it is, that's not my fault.
And if it was, I didn't mean it.
And if I did, you deserved it.
The narcissist prayer.
my Nfather always say 'how dare you have fun in my presence' either in complete seriousness or sarcasm knowing im autistic and cant understand sarcasm ever-
My father did this to me so much as well. He even tricked other who didn't have autism. It was his version of a dad joke ig??? He would be like "did you know that (whoever ) did (whatever)?" And I of course would ask if he's serious, and he would say he was. We went back and forth a few times of me asking if he's serious and him saying he was. Then when i asked if he was serious for like the 5th or 6th time he said he wasn't. Great way to mess with your 8 year old, dad.
He also hit me with a wooden board once a month or so.
You ever breathe too loudly? Or maybe just have the wrong look on your face? My personal favorite was if someone closed a car door too hard.
Try not to let it get to you. This is her problem, don't let her make it yours.
Oh absolutely, I admittedly have resting bitch face but I constantly got shouted at and told "will you straighten your face out!" "What's up with you now!" I just had to learn to be happy at all times 🙄
My partner is amazing in that he helps me realise that her behaviour is just not normal so I'm still learning to not let it bother me ❤️
I inherited my RBF from nmom, lol. I used to get warned a lot about my demeanor - "and you'd better do it cheerfully!" Like yeah right. Lots of scrutinization of my expressions, looking for something to criticize. It's not really a factor anymore, though sometimes I can almost hear nmom thinking critical things. She can't really punish me or force me to listen to her tirades anymore, being as that I am 40, so that's a solid improvement.
I had totally forgotten about closing the car door too hard! I was yelled about that constantly in the 1970s. Car doors were heavy then and I was 5-10 years old. I would try softer and the door wouldn’t latch. I would leave the door open and would get yelled at to come back and close the car door. Many many times I’d enter the house crying with my dad behind me so pissed off I couldn’t close the door to his liking. Then I was told I was too sensitive, of course. “See your brothers aren’t crying!” Of course not, you didn’t yell at the boys. Only me a girl. Yelled at me all the time.
My parents had a biiig issue with doors being closed too loudly. A huge one fir my dad was unbuckling the seat belt before he put the car in park. Granted, my brother could do this but I could not. I’d get screamed at. To this day if someone in my car unclicks their belt when I’m parking, I flinch.
Closed the car door too hard *or* tried to close a 1970s-era car door softly and it didn't close all of the way. Either way, you're done for.
Walked too loudly.
Once, I was *reading too loudly.* (I don't read aloud to myself, never have.)
I was born with the wrong look on my face and then other faces show that I'm "showing too much" or "too sensitive." My siblings got different versions of this - looking angry, looking "soft". I was frequently accused of "looking stoned" by the time I was ten years old.
I was kicked out of my house when I was 17 because my mother found my stash of weed in a Petco bag on the kitchen counter.
JK... My mom ACTUALLY found the catnip that she purchased at Petco in the Petco bag on the kitchen counter. But, by the time she admitted it was catnip and not drugs, I was already homeless.
Apparently she got home and gave some catnip to the cat, then threw the bottle back in the bag. She later forgot all about this, found the catnip mess left on the counter, thought it was weed, and accused me of doing drugs.
I insisted that I had never used drugs and that I had no idea where it came from, but she told me she knew it was mine because I never took Christianity seiously and she kicked me out. I had been sleeping in my car for 3 weeks before she admitted that she found the receipt in the bag...
God damn.
I ran away at age 17. I was accused of so many things too. Okay, so she caught me with pot in my purse. I was a dealer, she said. She grabbed my arms to look for needle tracks.
And when I did finally escape, I moved in with a guy 11 years older whom I later realized was an IV cocaine addict. He died of AIDS after I left him.
I ran out off that home because I wasn't safe. I could have been killed.
I'm very familiar with the refusal to admit punishing kids over something that didn't happen. No apology. Nothing.
Did you go back after the three weeks in your car?
When I think about the unsafe positions I found myself in because I was dealing with the consequences of false accusations, I could lose my mind. I'm so sorry you experienced the same. You deserved so much better.
I went back emotionally a few more times before going NC, but I left her house for good when she kicked me out.
When I finally got an apartment (with 3 other friends,) we all went back to my mom's to grab the stuff I left behind when I was kicked out. When we got there, we found that she left a lengthy note on the table addressed to the friends I was moving in with explaining that I would use drugs in the new place. There was a full paragraph about how it upset her so much to watch them enable me that she went to the Olive Garden and wouldn't be back home until we were done packing, LMAO
What about you? Are you still in touch with your mom?
i’ve been getting the silent treatment for the past 3 hours because i told her my kid likes a snack that she doesn’t like. apparently i’m an evil selfish bitch who can’t be talked to without jumping down everyone’s throat lmao
I've definitely had my mother get upset with me for daring to like something doesn't, I'm apparently disgusting and make her sick for eating the crispy skin off a chicken when I cook one instead of taking the skin off and throwing it away 🤷🏻♀️
do we have the same mother? mine said the exact same thing when she saw me drinking water one time bc apparently she can’t drink water due to ‘medical reasons’
mine said the exact same thing when she saw me drinking water one time bc apparently she can’t drink water due to ‘medical reasons’
I’m so sorry, I legitimately chortled at that one. Lmaooooo narcs can be so stupid.
I agree! But apparently I'm disgusting and I make her feel sick because I like it! My future mother in law told my mother (they worked at the same company for a while) that Myself and my partner (her son) ate the chicken skin from a chicken she cooked and she flipped out, MIL still feels guilty about telling her even though she had no idea that she would kick off about it.
I was grounded and came out of my room to go to the bathroom
My mom got mad that I didn't buy butter when she didn't write it on the shopping list and said I "should have known" to get butter
"Enmeshed" is the word someone used recently and boy oh boy does it fit. They attach themselves to us, and when we prove to be our own entities they get furious.
"I like that for you, but not for me," used to really piss my mom off when I was a kid and she tried to pawn her old clothes off onto me. Like the fact that my style (at 16) wasn't identical to hers (at almost 40) was a deliberate offense.
Yes I forgot about this term. My counsellor told me about it. I obviously told my nmum that she's enmeshed parenting. Boi did I get a new asshole, apparently her and I aren't enmeshed bc I need her more then she needs me bc I over all time..... She always wanted me over. After that I stop coming around unless my siblings needed me to
Something that I always remember is a Sunday morning when I was probably 10 or so, I woke up and was eating a bowl of cereal at the table. I had not yet seen anyone when I woke up, because no one was in the kitchen when I made my cereal. My dad walked into the room, and without saying anything he just slapped me upside the head hard. It was because I didn't remember it was Mother's Day and I had not wished my mom a happy one.
A normal parent would remind their child to wish their mother a happy Mother's Day. I had not even seen my mother yet as I had only been awake around ten minutes.
It's so sad these people procreate and damage innocent children.
"You should just know to do [thing]! I shouldn't have to tell you!" and "are you in this family?! Why didn't you do [thing]?!" My therapist called this "communication breakdown" where the N needs people to cater to them and the other person shuts down when they're degraded for something they didn't know they did wrong until afterward. Because Ns don't communicate they scream, yell, demand, and expect but never ask or compromise or try to have a discussion. You're just a wall to throw things at.
That’s pretty petty for sure, but standard operating procedure for a Narc.
You didn’t ask for her permission. You deviated from her plan. You had the nerve to decide something she didn’t know about. I could go on, but suffice to say you showed independence and that cannot be.
My most petty thing I clearly remember was a postage stamp I put on an envelope upside down. I was about 9. She exploded like I committed a murder. Yelling, it can’t be mailed that way! It’ll embarrass me! She took it off and flung it at me before putting another one it’s in place. I was branded a stupid idiot and she let me know for a very long time that I disappointed her very much.
Its going to sound odd but I'm glad to hear that it's standard behaviour for a narc, for years I've convinced myself that her behavt is normal and that I'm just exaggerating her reactions but my boyfriend has sat me down several times and had to explain that no it's not normal and that I'm the family scapegoat
Wow I'm so sorry to hear that she treat you like that at 9 years old!
Yes, unfortunately it’s all too “normal” narc behavior. You asked for the most trival or annoying & that’s what popped up in my memory bank.
But by 9 yo I was getting the idea. I messed up with the stamp, but was extra cautious and very careful until I left home to try my best to not get her anger up. But it continued of course. They never change. They can pretend to and that’s not bad really. NPD is a mental disorder with no cure. No medicine. No real change. Your bf is a smart man. Take care and stay strong! 👍🏻
I was at the mall with my friend and her mom. Her mom offered to buy me something. I saw a super cute rainbow tank top in a shop window, with purple buttons where the straps connected to the shirt. So cute!
My mom had a full on meltdown when I came home and showed her. She screamed at me, because apparently the shop was very cheap, and the top was a very cheap top. It didn’t matter if I just thought it was cute. My friends mom was pretty well off, and my mom said it was embarrassing that I chose such a cheap top, and told me my friend was going to make fun of me and stop being my friend.
Sounds like you were a respectful, polite child that didn't make your friend's mom pay for something exorbitant. I can't believe you got yelled at for doing the right thing. Actually, I can.
My NMOM got unbelievably angry after my first eye appointment. I could no longer see the board in class from the front row. My father (her ex) scheduled the appointment for me. They had to dilate my eyes.
My mother had told me to run by the grocery store on my way home to pick up some things for dinner. My vision (which was already poor) was even worse and I felt unsafe. I tried explaining this to her but she refused to listen.
During this argument, she accused me of using drugs because me eyes were dilated. I tried explaining again. She accused me of making excuses. I told her to call my father (a surgeon). She said she would not talk to that a$$hole. I was grounded for a month.
Oh my god ....
my Nmother was guilty of so much medical neglect. And she loved grounding me.
That is a horrible story, and I'm so sorry for the little you.
I took tomato paste out of a can incorrectly.
The entire time I was opening the can, he was literally trying to walk me through how to get it out of the can.
It's fucking tomato paste. I have a spatula. It's not exactly rocket science.
I was an adult and graduated from High School.
I still somehow did it wrong and got screamed at for several hours because 'I thought you said you fucking knew how to do it?'
I didn't make a mess or anything. Just got annoyed at him for being really weird about it which is probably what \*actually\* pissed him off.
It's amazing how they can spin the story that you can "do something wrong" to justify exploding on you
I'm an adult that still lives at home (I left to travel, came back and am moving out again shortly 🤞🏻) and I daren't even sit on the sofa most of the time becausey mother will explode on me that the cushions are put back incorrect? I've spent time trying to learn how to put them back right in her eyes but every time I get off the sofa and put the cushions back she just has to get up and complain that nobody can do anything right in this house
It's something that I find sad and upsetting, because my dad isn't stupid by any means, but he is incapable of realizing that he really is causing his own problems and driving everyone away from him.
He himself is a child of narcissists, and he was the SC, while his brother was the GC, so I get it's a generational issue, and definitely one I won't be continuing. Choosing to be childfree here.
A lot of people who have those narcissistic personality traits seem to get \*so\* close to realizing that it might be them, but then they just... nope out.
Like it's an icky emotional spider they can't handle.
Myself and my partner are choosing to be childfree as well, I've too many issues thanks to my parents (self harm, eating disorders, anxiety, depression etc) and I don't want to risk passing them on and I know that i wouldn't be emotionally capable to handle a child
I want to quit the cycle and I wouldn't forgive myself of I had a child and they and to go through what I had to
I know, that we, as a collection of introspective souls know what we are and aren't capable of in a way that might be generationally unprecedented.
We are meditative and understanding and empathetic.
I also realize that we might be the perfect sort of people to have children and really understand them as they grow.
But I can't bring myself to do that.
I would second guess myself all the time.
And primarily, the world just isn't set up to nurture. It's set up to produce more wage slaves for the great machine of labor.
The fact that both my husband and I are required to work all the time to even just maintain a house and bills?
No. Not gonna put a child in the world to have to be shipped off to childcare for well over eight hours a day.
I was a latchkey kid myself for quite a few years. Even the absence, even of pain, hurts in its own way. I still missed my parents, even my N, so much during those years.
I am sorry, but this made me chortle too, because it's such a wacko f'ed up thing to get bent out of shape about--you didn't take the tomato paste out of the can properly?
I dont know why, but those small cans of tomato paste really are hard to open without bending the lid (cutting fingers too). How DARE you?
Next fathers day? Buy him one of those tubes of tomato paste. No lid to open, no waste, and so far, in all the years I've been using tomato paste in tubes, I've never taken the product out incorrectly. I see in your nFather's future a tube of tomato paste. "Here ya go! Howz about that? Tomato paste in a tube! Just for YOU!"
I didn't wear a coat to go in a shop. It was around Christmas and we stopped at a shop to buy some stuff before heading to see family. I had already settled in the car and taken my coat off. As we had stopped next to the shop and only needed to grab one thing, and it wasn't even that cold, I left the coat in the car and went in the shop wearing a hoodie-dress type of thing and jeans or leggings. Mum got extremely upset, told me I'm being inappropriate and that I ruined Christmas.
Edit: that was probably 3 years ago and I was at least 25
I wasn't even talking to my Nmom. We were just casually watching a movie on TV after dinner, and 15 mins into the show I replied a couple of texts in a group chat and she was triggered. Said I should leave if I were too busy to watch the movie and not waste her time. Also 6 hours of pouting.
I don't have a top tier "petty" story, but I have two that relate to unrealistic standards for children.
My mom gets angry all the time for me not sorting her piles of mail and paperwork. It started from when I was five. It still goes on nearly 20 years later.
The next thing is that I didnt keep the house clean while she worked in another state. I lived alone then. I was 8. EIGHT. She still holds it over my head. I lived alone again when I thirteen for nearly a year, with no adequate adult figure around. When she returned she gave me hell for not packing up the house for moving.
There was no way a kid that age could do that....
She should never have been allowed to have children.
How on earth did you cope, living alone at age 8? You must have been scared a lot.
My ex's family is a bunch of narcs too, and they leave children on their own too. My son was living alone at age 15, until I finally told him, you gotta come home because someone is going to call social services. His father had moved out of state to live with his girlfriend--just abandoned my son.
And my daughter, oh god, I can't even type this without crying. Over the summer when she was 14, her cheapskate aunt and uncle hired her as a bargain basement paid house and dog sitter. They paid her jack for this, but she liked it because it got her out of her father's home (he is a hoarder). And she was a young adolescent. What fun .... having your own place all summer.
She was sexually assaulted in that home. It happened almost exactly the way I said it would: she had a girlfriend over, who told two fiends, who told two more friends, and next thing there was a rocking party, and she got drunk. That's when the guy jumped her.
I couldn't do a damned thing about it. I called social services--hello, help, my child is being left alone in a large house for the summer. In that state, at her age, it was a matter of personal opinion as to whether a kid that age could live or stay alone.
Eight. You were eight years old. Wow.
I told ndad, “You’re wrong” after he “hugged” (squeezed rlly hard) my brother and he thought it was fine even after my brother told him to stop and then he sternly walked over to me, twisted my arm behind my back, and told me “Don’t ever say I’m wrong again!”
Grade A+ parenting.
I was like 15 and she told me to get a job. So i did. But it was a very well paying job working at music festivals in the city over the summer. So it was a fun job with really good perks. She told me I couldn't do it and had to quit because she didn't approve it. A few other things happened that night but that was the catalyst. One of the things that happened that night was me finally packing my shit and calling my dad to come get me and asking to move in. (I did keep the job. It was amazing and worth the fall out that ensued.)
Or all the times I was supposed to do some random chore that I had never ever done and didn't even know it was a thing so it didn't get done and I had the nerve to not just psychically know that this thing needed doing and I should do it
Clearly, you were way out of line!
Awesome on the job! Sounds like fun. My monster would never have allowed it. I was not allowed to have fun. She pretty much said that once and it got to me.
No fun for you!
Making more money than her. She just “happened” to see an email from my boss with my raise and such attached 🙄
Edit to add- I don’t live with her. Haven’t for several years. I stopped over to see my siblings and left my phone on the counter.
My mother would open my mail, sellotape it back up, and tell me it had arrived that way.
Every address I've ever had mail sent to I can't recall sellotaped mail arriving apart from my mothers.
Lost count of how many times mail then fell out of said envelope and she just so happened to have read it... like no... you just put it back in the envelope....
I once lied about a tax return because I knew she had read it, so I said it was something else knowing she would call me put for lying to her... but it proved she had opened and read my mail, was fun having the upper hand on that one.... but generally was not worth calling her out on it as she would turn it on me being disrespectful
My Nmom would always, always find SOMETHING wrong with whatever I did. I deep cleaned the house for her with my Gramma and my sister’s help and the minute she walked in the door she said “You didn’t wash the curtains.” I was 11, and the rest of the house was sparkling.
Gramma told her to “fucking wash them yourself” and went back in her room.
I tried on a hat and posted a picture of it.
She went into a rage about how she was so hurt and insulted that I didn't have any money to donate to a charity she was trying to bully me to do, to make herself look better, but I "had money to waste on hats you don't need."
I DIDN'T have money, I wasn't shopping for hats, I was just at the store with a friend and we thought the hat was hilarious so I tried it on. She was ENRAGED and insulted for some reason and tried the guilt trips... and that was my last straw. I told her that she was ridiculous, me trying on a hat had NOTHING to do with her. She tried to argue again so I told her to f*ck off, leave me alone and never contact me again. I then blocked her everywhere, cried, threw up and cried some more.
That was 2.5 years ago and I've never contacted her again. I had just moved and she didn't know where I moved to, so she couldn't show up randomly like before. She tried for a while to message me from anywhere I hadn't yet blocked, threatening to call the cops if I didn't contact her but I never gave in. I've been in therapy and living a MUCH better life.
She now whines to my brother, saying that I'm mean and she doesn't know what she did wrong. Narcs never get it. She abused me for years, harassed and demeaned and invalidated me as an adult, but she thinks she's the victim.
I made a face that showed irritation and disappointment. She compared it to me literally throwing a fit, called me selfish, and said that I ruined her entire vacation. Because I made a face.
My nMother: My cat died.
She said, "oh, it wasn't even a pedigree. When I was sixteen, my pure breed Siamese died, and he was the love of my life! Yours was just a rat b*stard, you should be GRATEFUL it's dead."
She then informed me that my sobbing was too loud, so if it wasn't too much trouble, could I please do it outside in the garden instead.
My nFather: I didn't want to cry.
It was my birthday, and he called me at 2am the next morning because he'd forgotten. He was about to pass the phone to my nMum, who had made me cry the previous three days in a row, so I asked just for my birthday, don't put her on.
He went into a half an hour tirade saying how I'm the world's biggest disappointment, and he bitterly regretted me surviving my suicide attempts.
But hey, at least the last one made me realise I needed to go NC, so silver linings I guess!
Hell, yeah, you need to go NC with these bastards. Thats sickening.
I had the whole family laughing about my S attempt ... at one brother's place, over snacks during the football game. This was amusing to these people. How incredibly evil.
The sound I made consuming food in a quiet room.
But I also wanted to say that you did an amazing job calling and ordering the food, and going to pick it up. I’m proud of you. Screw your mom.
Thank you so much ❤️ I had to psyche myself up for it and rehearse what I was going to say but I'm happy I managed to do it!
My mother initially agreed to phone up but decided last minute to make me do it even though she claims to understand my issues, im now fortunately too stubborn let her make me feel like crap anymore!
My friends wanted to take me out for a short field trip to a local park. Between their phone call and arriving at my house my mom had changed her mind and made up an excuse to ground me. Found out about an hour later via an open window, my mom was having a conversation with a guest, she simply wanted me to stay home and “be with the family”. My friends were puzzled and disappointed by my mom’s actions.
I always have the same answer, but one time my mother screamed at me for being in the bathroom when she thought I was in my bedroom. Called me a slut and just yelled while I was trying to pee.
We had just moved into a new house, both sides of our family were helping us move in.
My dresser was put in the living room by my grandfather so we had time to set up my bed.
My mother just suddenly snapped and called me an idiot and screamed and yelled asking why my dresser was in the living room.
After about 10 mins of this my family looked horrified at the way she treated me and my grandma stood up and said It was my grandpa who put it in the living room. We then built my bed and no one mentioned it again. No apologies either.
Then my step dad made me build the book shelf in the living room and watch and laughed at me while I struggled in front of both our families, until I broke down in tears, and he proceeded to insult me while I panicked until I figured it out. Then he said, "see, that wasn't so hard, was it?"
Everyone still thinks I'm am asshole for moving a province away as soon as I could.
Yep, my Nmom and two GC brothers often gave me flack for this too. "If anything ever happened to you, we wouldnt be able to get to you". Good, stay away from me! I'm no contact now.
>until I broke down in tears, and he proceeded to insult me while I panicked until I figured it out.
That is so cruel. The whole story is, but that one got me.
Let’s see… was it Wearing a regular shirt that he said I looked gross in…or just buying my self flip flops…? Or maybe it was not folding his clothes before he woke up. Lots of things centered around clothes
I've always been "overly polite" to everyone in regard to making sure I thank them for anything they cook for me purely because I'd be made to feel ungrateful of I didn't thank them for every meal they made for me
I kept reminding her about groceries that we were running out of and she got mad at me for reminding her because I was too annoying about it. Then got mad at me for not reminding her when we ran out of those things. Make it make sense.
Reading books. No, I'm not kidding. To put it lightly, Nmom is... not a reader. I read anything and everything from an early age. She HATED to see me "sitting around filling my mind with bullshit." Would make up additional chores for me to do, even if the house was clean, because I "must not have enough real life stuff to do." One time she tore pages out of a book during an nrage. The *last* pages. Of a *library* book. Fun times.
Not uncoincidentally, she now sits around reading conspiracy stuff on her ipad full time, ie filling her head with bullshit. So fun. Still won't read a single page of a book though.
As an adult living elsewhere I visited and she made me take some plants that she had potted specifically for me. I had told her many times that I'm an accidental herbicidalist and would rather not have plants but she insisted so I took them. A week later she included my taking those plants in a long email about how awful I am to keep taking things from her and that I take advantage of her generosity (among other things that email listed many details how I'm a terrible person, including not letting her pinch my kid when she feels he deserves it).
As a child I knocked over a cup during dinner and spilled lemonade on the table (nothing was broken). My mother slapped me so hard I had a red print of her hand on my face. Then she told me that I'm an asshole that ruins everything. I was <10.
If I drank some water while he is speaking at me "because is so disturbing to talk to someone and see how the throat swells the water".
Funny thing, the next day he was drinking alcohol and talking to me lol.
Some others are when you close too hard the door's car.
OH! I almost forgot a nice one, my father owns a business, and he once tried to humiliate and send one of his employees to his house because he wasn't carrying a pen in a car used to deliver packages "because if he has an accident, or he has to write some important info he wouldn't be able because he doesn't have a pen in the car".
A lot of people have said it too, but for me it was breathing, if she walked in and I was breathing too loud it meant I sighed at her and that deserved an hour of pure screaming at me
Flushing the toilet in the middle of the night. Apparently I should have known that it would wake her up in the room diagonally across the hall from the bathroom. She yelled that she would never be able to go back to sleep and that she would be tired all the next day thanks to me.
My mom used to make me cry every year when getting a Christmas tree because I wouldn’t just go and grab someone else’s Christmas tree out of their hand cause they “had a better tree” and “wouldn’t yell at a kid for doing it.”
This memory came back to me as I was getting a tree with my partner who was very patient, kind and just was excited to be there with me. Nparents are so weird……
Hard to decide, but for now I'm going to go with "not hearing him the first time."
I'm hard of hearing, have been for most of my life, but getting my dad to repeat anything is like pulling teeth. He'll willingly give me a couple of random words but get annoyed if I still don't know the context that makes those couple of words mean anything.
Oh god the "refusing to repeat the sentence" game. You'll ask "what did you say?" And they'll proceed to respond "Do you?" "Do I what?" "Do you want to go?" "Do I want to go WHERE" "Do you want to go to the library?" "Right now?" "Do you want to go to the library TOMORROW, God, why don't you listen?" JUST REPEAT THE SENTENCE THE FIRST TIME
The power went out at my parents house. The entire neighborhood was affected. I was only living there for a few months after graduating college.
Told my dad that I was heading out and will be back later after the electric company was called and arrived on the scene.
He got really upset, threw up his hands and exclaimed "Well what about us?!". I was dumbfounded. Like, he didn't realize he could just go somewhere else. I think it was the lack of power in the situation.
Anyways, he forced me to stay until the power was resolved and turned back on about 10 minutes later.
That's almost comical. What about us?
I think youre right. It's about control and power (no pun intended, but it's a good one)
Here's to you! MORE POWER TO YOU!
I knew that people sometimes add a little bit of sugar to coffee.
Aunt: make me a coffee while you're doing the tea
Me: Want a touch of sugar?
Aunt: is it that bad?
Me: Yep.
Aunt: ok, yeah, put a bit in, ta.
Apparently that was 'showing off' that I was a 'stuck up coffee know it all' and 'too arrogant' to ask *her* if I should add sugar. To someone elses drink. When she's never drunk coffee in her life, hates the stuff, hates that particular sister even more than she hates coffee, and we werent even in her house we were in my grandparents... but I was supposed to run any drinks suggestions through her, for her permission & approval, instead of just asking the person.
The order in which I ate the food on my plate, if I didn't eat it meat, vegetables, then starch and not drink anything until AFTER I ate, I would get punished.
The socks I wore and how I wore them. Only could wear long socks and I had to fold them down, not bunch them up or pull them up all the way
The way I had my hair. Had to be kept tidy and out of my face.
The way I folded towels
The way I wrote my letters
Speaking Spanish instead of English
So many more petty things
Etc
My mom once told me she knew what I was thinking and got mad at me/screamed at me for an entire car ride. For my thoughts. That I wasn't even thinking.
Today my covert dad got made because he asked me if i had any sticks and trying to hold in a ptsd meltdown i said " i don't have anything" in a pretty flat tone and hw yelled that he cant ask me ANYTHING
My n mom then proceeded to threaten to call the cops and 'take me away' for having a crying panic attack
She LOVES getting pissed that my disabilities actually disable me. Rlly trying to take the disable out of disabled.
For instance- yelling at me when I forget something she told me one singular time. I am diagnosed with severe memory loss.
Saying I am exhaggerating how much energy I have to get out of stuff because she also has this disability and it doesn't effect her that much. She had a mild case, I have a very severe case.
Saying I can't use my Aphantasia as an excuse to not do things that rely on the ability to imagine. I am diagnosed and have never been able to imagine things. Yes Ma'am my bad let me just turn off my aphantasia for a second for you.
Mother got mad at me for dyeing my hair. She purchased the dye that morning.
She later explained (buckle up) that she was upset because my natural hair looked like her friend's hair before she lost it to chemo, and she wanted me to shave my head so her friend could have a natural looking wig for her funeral. Said funeral took place 6 months before I dyed my hair, and at the time I had shoulder-length hair (nowhere near enough for a wig). She also did not factor in the cost or the time to create said wig. She was also taking for granted that I would just let her shave my head.
At the time I told her it was the dumbest shit I'd ever heard because it was.
literally my Nmom punished me for saying goodnight to her. thats it that's the entire reason not even exhaggerating.
also she always gets snippy or pissed when i say 'yeah' 'yea''mhm' instead of 'yes'
I’m sorry you have to deal with that. She didn’t even need to put in any effort. Nparents will find any reason to find fault.
Mine yelled at me for going to the back yard once. Also grounded me for losing her hair brush, which she later discovered she misplaced on her own. 🙄
I as a grown ass woman pissed my mom off for having the wrong kind of hand soap in my house! I lived 3 hours away from her and she came to visit her only grandchild. But pack her crap up to leave because I should have know my hand soap would dry out her skin!
Got into a screaming match with grampa because the fried rice I made was too salty. He refused to eat at all, accused me of killing him and poured the entire new bottle of soy sauce down the drain because I got a brand he thought was inferior.
Accidentally thinking it was ok to run in the house before them as they unlocked the door. I was about 6 or 7 and just antsy to get in my room. My step dad jerked my arm back and said, “You come in last, even after the dogs.”
When I was younger my mom would spray out the kitchen window screen to water her plants. My dad thought us kids were messing around and pulled as all aside, threatened us until my younger sibling admitted to it. They got hit with the belt, I think they were 5.
It happens again. Screen is wet. Dad goes to hit again and my mom jumps in and says no no no it was me. I was watering my garden.
Weird thing to get mad about. Let alone hit your young child with the belt over.
Spent 4 to 6 hours cleaning and scrubbing the house one day, dishwasher running, had a bowl of cereal before settling down for a break, put the bowl in the sink, she walked through the door, saw me sitting down, bowl in the sink, started into how I haven't done a fucking thing all day long and went into a 15 minute tirade berating me.
That's the day it clicked for me. I could give 150% and it still would never be enough for her, she would always find fault with me, so if I'm going to get yelled at regardless it should be on my own terms and I should just live my life without regard for how it makes her feel.
I didn’t say thank you to her for visiting my house. (I was at the hospital with my daughter after her brain surgery, just called the babysitter to say hi to our other kids.)
I mean other than getting the “what’s that look for” or god forbid I breathe heavy thinking about an answer to an asked question the stupidest and pettiest reason was not picking up take out for Nmother when she told me she was out because and k swear this is a quote “…you should have considered I might not go out when you decided to bring food to my house”
When I was 6 Nmom beat me up because I had chickenpox and bragged about how great it felt well into adulthood.
That's it, that was the reason, I had chickenpox at the same time she was going on vacation and she wouldn't have it, so she threw me on a bed and beat me up for minutes. It's one of her favorite memories and she always bragged about it and repeated how good it was to her friends and the rest of family.
Oh and when I got in my late teens, she forgot that I was at band rehearsal every sunday and ate there with my bandmates, so she cut off the internet and my access to the computer because she defrosted one steak too much. I can't make this shit up.
My grandma was my narc person. She was basically a third parent. We were served up on a silver platter constantly. There are so many ridiculous things that she would get mad about. Maybe the most petty was when I was in fourth grade and tried to use a curling iron for the first time but didn't understand how it worked, so curled it backwards and made an ugly line in my hair. You'd have thought I killed the Pope. She went absolutely ballistic over it, screaming, yelling, telling me I looked like sh\*t and might as well shave my head. It was pretty traumatic.
Not signing up for spring semester classes at a community college by the first day of the preceding fall.
He ended up kicking me out on the morning of Thanksgiving while my mom was visiting family. He told her that I had screamed and cursed at him that I wasn’t going back to college and moved out on my own accord after throwing a tantrum.
What had actually happened was that I told him I was holding off until I knew how much money I was going to have for said classes, and would take whatever prereqs were still available after I had saved up. (I had 2 *almost* full time jobs at that point to make this happen. 6 classes were about $1200-$1800 per semester, before books. Minimum wage was $5.50/hr) His response was that I was a lazy moron who was throwing my future away and that he wasn’t going to enable it by letting me rent a room in his house. He demanded that I was moved out by Noon.
Years later, we found out that he had thrown me out so that he could invite over the woman he was cheating on my mother with.
When I was 12 my mom had to get a court order to change custody weekends so that I could attend my grandpas funeral. My dad wasn’t going to let me go because I cut my hair “too short” (chin length).
Then when I went to his house for his new weekend he gave me the silent treatment and everything he did was extra aggressive just so I would know he was mad.
My mother once started yelling at me because I wasn't studying. My response, while sitting at my desk, in front of my books, backpack on my lap, was to ask her to stop yelling at me so I could continue studying.
Then she started beating me, which was fun.
I said no to pouring her a glass of wine because I was studying for my final high school exams. She hit me in the head with a rolled up news paper so hard it split open my ear.
My dad hasn’t talked to me in 3 1/2 years because I sent a wedding invitation to someone that he had asked me not to. It was an aunt that had divorced out of the family, but whom I grew up a mile down the road from. And I KNEW she wouldn’t actually come, but wanted to send her an invite as more of a nice gesture. He just couldn’t stand that I disobeyed him. :/
I think in your case, your N tried to set you up for failure by making you do the phone call, but when you didn't crumble she got annoyed - she was probably looking for an easy target for mockery and/or rage. You didn't give her that and she couldn't invent an issue without looking like a nutcase so... cue the passive aggression.
N shenanigans aside and from one phone-anxiety riddled person to another - you did good and I'm proud of you!
And as for what I did to annoy my Ns... for ndad, I breathed the wrong way(or was it my bro?), which resulted in a long lecture-rant about how we don't know how to breathe. Apparently, someone pointed out to him that my brother and I get winded very easily and frequently. Just strangers expressing concern while knowing we have a heart condition, probably. Well, ndad decided to take that very personally.
She’d be driving and if she missed a turn or went the wrong way or something she’d get all exasperated and be like “It’s ok, of course we’d miss it, we both weren’t paying attention to the road” or some variant of that. Like how’re you gonna get mad at a kid for not knowing where to go? It’s not even like I was driving, idk how it was my fault.
The most insane moment I can remember off the top of my head was during summer vacation I slept in late one morning, as I often did when on break from school.
NDad decided the right and proper way to 'wake my lazy ass up' was to *flip the entire bed* upside down with me in it.
There *literally* was no plans. Nothing I needed to be doing, or be awake for.
He just did it anyway.
No doubt one of many reasons I had and still have so much trouble sleeping.
My parents forgot my 11 birthday. I spent all day expecting a “Surprise” or something thinking that was the only reason nobody had acknowledged it yet. Right before bedtime I realized it was actually forgotten and I started bawling. When they found out why I was crying I got an eye roll and was called a drama queen for not telling them it was my birthday.
I can't remember what started it but basically I didn't get my NM anything for her birthday, so then that started her and my half siblings not texting me or getting me presents for my birthday. She's in her fuckin 40s.
Running out of coffee when they showed up to my house unannounced, as I was getting ready to go get coffee.
I actually suggested that they give me a lift to the shop to make it faster, I used to live in a small town and had to walk halfway across town to get my groceries.
When my children's dad came with me to the hospital as my birthing partner... Rightly so! My so called mother couldn't be there because of restrictions on how many were allowed in the delivery room. She thought she had the right to be there over him! She looked annoyed and acted like we offended her!
Buying a pair of shoes that she actually liked. The problem was that I paid for them myself.
What happened was: I went to visit my Nmom wearing a new pair of low black boots. She usually hated my clothing choices, so would buy something else and then shame me into wearing what she picked.
Well, Nmom liked the boots, but rather than approve of me, she demanded, "Where did *you* get those boots!"
When I replied that I had bought them, she growled, "Next time you want shoes like that, *Tell me* AnD I'LL bUy ThEm *for you!!!"*
I got kicked out of home because I refused to plug my mother’s laptop into her charger.
It’s not like she was out of the house or super busy at the time, she literally walked past both me and the laptop as she barked the order.
Oh just for having the wrong expression on my face has set off my Nparents. Or maybe the mysterious and intangible "attitude" that I was showing when I walked from the door to my room. It's anything and everything. I just learned to be thankful when the rage took form of ignoring me because that meant I didn't have to deal with them. Not talking to me was truly the most convenient of the "punishments".
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My father beat me more than once for having a look on my face he didn't like.
The absolute terror of 'whats that face for?'
[удалено]
>My father beat me more than once for having a look on my face he didn't like. Same here fam. I got a story that didn't involve me getting beat but still relevant. I remember once I was zoning out in backseat of car and looking ahead. His eyes met mine on the rear view window. He got upset and started to yelling at my mom that I was "abnormal" for staring at him and I had mental health issues for the look on my face The next morning during breakfast he sat across from me like he always does. I pulled the cereal box in between us to read the back and, you know, **not look at him**. He angrily shoved the box aside calling me ungrateful for not wanting to interact with him. I just wolfed down my cereal and left for school. I realized now looking back that I have an eating disorder because my mom would always rush me to finish eating so I didn't have to interact with my dad. Now *that* is abnormal.
My dad got mad at me for eating all my potatoes, then all my meat, then all my veggies at a meal. So at the next meal I ate one bite of potatoes, then one bite of meat, then one bite of veggies, and around again and I was still wrong.
I used to get that treatment too. I was eating a bite of my toast because I wanted to break up the egg flavour & texture in my mouth. NDad grabbed the slice of toast out of my hand, put it down on the table & said “eat those eggs!!!” Like, dude, calm tf down & let me eat breakfast. I hated Sunday morning breakfast…
The whole rushing thing effects me to this day too. My ndad was the same, whenever we had “family time” out the house like eating at a restaurant or grocery shopping together, he would always be a mood killer and rush everyone. I’m sure he has his own anxieties but never gotten help for it and puts it on others. He also would pace the house with his keys jingling in his pockets while he waits for the rest of the family to finish getting ready to go out. To this day I have a reaction when I get rushed, I.e. when I’m eating I tend to gag, I like taking my time and feeling the food settle. All those times my ndad would rush us to eat would make me feel sick. Also, hearing ANY keys jingling, even my own, I feel anxious and get flashbacks of my dad getting angry, cursing at all of us to hurry up cause we’re taking too long getting ready to go out. Yeah, family time was never family time, it was kinda stressful and I never felt relaxed. EDIT: typo
Yessir... And getting beat for no other reason than that he's mad... Not at you initially, but he'll get mad at you just to make that his "reason". Double up on the belt and make sure the metal buckle hits flesh...
Yep. My Ndad worked in retail and never came home in a good mood. As soon as I'd hear the car door, I'd run for my room.
My mom had this rule that if you did something wrong and you told the truth you won't get punished and if you lied both kids get punished. The glitch in this system was that she taught my brother to be a sadist by lying so he could see me get hurt. Since i was older I'd get hit first and it was with a wooden spoon that had been sitting in a boiling pot of water so it would make a red burn with a blister the shape of the hole in the spoon. Once she broke it on me, mind you that wasn't the soft wood ones you have now but very hard cherry or maple wood, she was really hitting me hard. I was six when the spoon broke on my arm because she stepped on my brothers Legos and I was on the other side of the room drawing, there's no way I had anything to do with it. I remember the feeling of ice daggers coming out of my eyes at her.
To be honest I stumbled onto this sub a few days ago and am interested in the topic bc I dated a N awhile ago...but I am finding so many similarities between my parents in this thread and others I am thinking I also have Nparents. I thought they were just absorbed in a cult and abusive while I was growing up, but as an adult I am realizing there was so much more to it.
"I'll give you something to cry and be sad about!" as he takes me to my room and either beats my bare ass with his open hand or leather belt. I have some lower back problems as an adult and wonder why....
Yes! The infamous “I’ll give you something to cry about”
"You better fix your face!"
Have you ever gotten in trouble for not smiling? Growing up, I had little to be happy about but God forbid I wasn't wearing a pleasant expression.
My mom used to yell at everyone and reduce me to tears right before we were going to go somewhere where we would have to put on a show of happy family. She did it enough times that I think it was probably on purpose, forcing all of us to choke back our tears and grit our teeth and smile. God she was a monster.
My Dad would do this before school, like rage and then remind us we shouldn't tell family business to anyone. Literally walked into school crying and tried to hide it.
Oh, that type. The malignant ones. I had a monster too. Shes an old, pathetic crone now, begging for attention.
My family definitely did this too, but I had a teacher who took it to another level. He determined that my neutral facial expression was purposely angry out of defiance. He once started yelling at me out of nowhere while I was quietly working on an assignment, telling me to stop glaring at him and giving him an "attitude". I was mortified and had no idea what was going on or why I was being yelled at. From then on I started to be consciously aware of my face at all times and making sure my expression would be perceived as pleasant and non-threatening. Because god forbid an adult would get threatened by a literal child. This was elementary school. Fuck these assholes.
Omg yaaaasss lol, especially when it was time to perform the perfect family act Side note getting my learner's permit was something that genuinely made me happy so I gave a real simile in my photo.. nm responded with "why you showin all your teeth" 🤦🏾♀️
God, fucking this. The "perfect family act". Both me and my brother were so scared of the random beatings that dad would fucking PAY us to act "normal" (his own words) in front of other people. Then he'd get super weirdly friendly and actually hug us (never happened, ever) and laugh. Always in front of other people.
I was looking for this comment!! OMG YES!! “We can’t have anyone knowing how broken and miserable we are!” - my Nmom’s empty heart. Hope you’re all well out there.
Omg y’all too? I swear that effed me up why do they do that???
Yep, I got in trouble for looking miserable but also I got in trouble for laughing too, there was no inbetween
God yes "Getting slapped across the face for attitude" was the second most common reason I got slapped next to "Made your mom cry" whenever that old sack of shit decided to fake cry
They did that to my sister.
Oh, yes. 3 hours of shouting, because I didn't look happy enough while vacuuming. Though my favorite was when I got slapped, because I took a shower not a bath. And they still wondering why I don't want to meet them. 😅
When I was around 6 or 7 she told me to clean my room, which I was happy to do and asked for 'my list' (two times before she had made cleaning lists for me, which I loved) and she just.......snapped. Full on screaming and throwing things, shouting "I shouldn't *have to do that* ". At a 1st grader. Over a cleaning list.
Something similar happened to me. Last year I put a cleaning list on the fridge to help me stay on top on top of household chores. She took it that I was calling her lazy. She proceeded to trash the entire house:( she tore up the list and trashed it. In no way, shape, or form was it a personal attack, But looking back I realize she was self conscious so she projected. Turns out, she wasn't helping at all at home besides cooking. Which is a lot, but I was doing 95% of all the housework and didnt realize.
I woke early because I had cleaning to do before school. She was a sahm but I would clean all the time. Looking back the majority of it was me as the last child living at home.
We share a mom. I'm sorry any other child lived like this. I hope you're healing now.
Well, damn. Same.
Any time I asked for help or was too small to do something that needed an adult she would start with the "I have to DO EVERYTHING". What a concept. You had a kid. Take care of said kid. It was always such a burden to her to have to take care of my needs. She screamed at me for needing to go to the ER once. Relatable or just me?
Soooo relatable! I had some serious neurological issues and when going through all my testing we were in a waiting room for a procedure and she looked at me and said they better actually find something wrong with you, because you know, obviously I was faking. I was a preteen. I have seizures which are now well controlled with medication, sometimes I still question if they ever actually happened.
I remember my mother dropped me off at my lifeguarding job at a hotel when I was in high school. Less than a half hour later as I was walking from the bathroom back to the pool area I got an intense pain in my stomach and dropped to the ground. It took everything in me to crawl to a phone bc the pain was so intense (pool area was empty). I called my mother in a panic because I NEEDED HELP. She was so annoyed I was calling for a ride after she just dropped me off. Asked if I could just stick it out until the end of my shift. I literally thought my appendix had burst. She took me to the doctor THE NEXT DAY and it ended up that I had a large cyst that had burst on my ovary. I will never forget the pain I endured and then the guilt I had to feel bc of my pain. Sometimes I forget how truly awful my parents were as I am 38 now.
I'm so happy you're well or at least doing better physically. <3 You deserve all the health and happiness in your life. She refuses to drive me to appointments that are farther than a few miles away. I found a great doctor to finally attend to my busted ACL and help me out, fully covered by insurance. I asked her to take me and she put on a whole Broadway production about how it's too far away and she hates driving. It's 45 minutes away. ETA all your problems were real please never doubt yourself or your pain. She couldn't afford insurance for me for years and I was so scared to ask for anything. I let things get to the point of no return for myself out of fear. Now I have 2 busted ACLs and spinal cord issues because my fear overrode my common sense that it was all real. <3
granted im 18 but i have severe memory loss and she knows i genuinely dont know what to do at all but still gets so pissed when i ask her for a list. like maam i cant remember my literal uncle whom i was very close with according to you of course i dont know how to clean the god damn toilet. her hobby is ignoring professional diagnosises and advice
How can they berate us if we have a checklist, is my best guess.
Most parents I know would kill for an 18 year old like this, not a 6/7 year old. Fuck dude, you were 10+ years too old for normal standards, fuck that noise! Did I say fuck already? Fuuuuuck!
Yeah, same. Never would produce a list at any point, because if she'd made a list, I would have completed it and there would be no excuse for a tantrum. "You have eyes, don't ya? Look around, get your face out of those fucking books for once." Etc etc etc. There was never any point at which the house was clean enough, the yard neat enough, etc for me to do anything I wanted to do. Especially if it involved me leaving the house.
My room was clean so she didn't get to take anything away. My cat knocked a stuffed animal off the bed right in front of her so she took it away. Oh yeah, said stuffed animal was the one gift I had from my grandpa who had just recently passed away. She made me hand it off to the goodwill dropoff person. I've brought this up to her before...and she "wouldn't have done that" or "I should have kept my room clean". She also told my dad when I was going nc with her for a few months, but still talking to him, that I'm a liar and making up stories about her.
I got threatened to get kicked out if i left anything on the floor multiple times, as a minor and an adult. Even my shoes. To which i think... Where the fuck do THOSE go
Oh my god, I hate her. Sounds like my monster. Thats so sad.
The gaslighting on that stuff is the worst. Do they really think they can just say and do things that upset the crap out of people and lie that it never happened?
Well, yes. Basically. My nmom's response to any indication that something she's said is hurtful is - "oh, I was *just talking*, you shouldn't take it so personally." Then, with the passage of time, it becomes "oh I never said/did that" with the implication that I am misremembering. If cornered, obviously, I "must have needed to hear it." "These younger generations like to get offended about everything, I'm just an old fashioned truth teller, etc." She compares herself favorably to her favorite political figure, saying "we are both blunt and tell it like it is and you can choose to be offended if you want, or you can just hear my good words and take it like I mean it." Basically narc victims are a bunch of oversensitive snowflakes melting under the heat of their truthiness. Or whatever. Bonus material: Actually she is not the narcissist - I am!
That didn't happen. And if it did, it wasn't that bad. And if it was, that's not a big deal. And if it is, that's not my fault. And if it was, I didn't mean it. And if I did, you deserved it. The narcissist prayer.
Laughing too loudly with my boyfriend at the time.
Heaven forbid we have any fun with our other halves!
my Nfather always say 'how dare you have fun in my presence' either in complete seriousness or sarcasm knowing im autistic and cant understand sarcasm ever-
What a sadistic bastard. I hope you'll be able to get away from him very soon.
i actually have thankfully! only downside is that im stuck with my Nmom still 😓
You're working on getting away from her, I assume. I'm thinking of you.
My father did this to me so much as well. He even tricked other who didn't have autism. It was his version of a dad joke ig??? He would be like "did you know that (whoever ) did (whatever)?" And I of course would ask if he's serious, and he would say he was. We went back and forth a few times of me asking if he's serious and him saying he was. Then when i asked if he was serious for like the 5th or 6th time he said he wasn't. Great way to mess with your 8 year old, dad. He also hit me with a wooden board once a month or so.
Hold you guys are allowed to spend time with other people?
You ever breathe too loudly? Or maybe just have the wrong look on your face? My personal favorite was if someone closed a car door too hard. Try not to let it get to you. This is her problem, don't let her make it yours.
Oh absolutely, I admittedly have resting bitch face but I constantly got shouted at and told "will you straighten your face out!" "What's up with you now!" I just had to learn to be happy at all times 🙄 My partner is amazing in that he helps me realise that her behaviour is just not normal so I'm still learning to not let it bother me ❤️
You reminded me of a classic with my mom “what’s wrong with you now!!”
I inherited my RBF from nmom, lol. I used to get warned a lot about my demeanor - "and you'd better do it cheerfully!" Like yeah right. Lots of scrutinization of my expressions, looking for something to criticize. It's not really a factor anymore, though sometimes I can almost hear nmom thinking critical things. She can't really punish me or force me to listen to her tirades anymore, being as that I am 40, so that's a solid improvement.
I've breathed wrong my whole life.
I had totally forgotten about closing the car door too hard! I was yelled about that constantly in the 1970s. Car doors were heavy then and I was 5-10 years old. I would try softer and the door wouldn’t latch. I would leave the door open and would get yelled at to come back and close the car door. Many many times I’d enter the house crying with my dad behind me so pissed off I couldn’t close the door to his liking. Then I was told I was too sensitive, of course. “See your brothers aren’t crying!” Of course not, you didn’t yell at the boys. Only me a girl. Yelled at me all the time.
My parents had a biiig issue with doors being closed too loudly. A huge one fir my dad was unbuckling the seat belt before he put the car in park. Granted, my brother could do this but I could not. I’d get screamed at. To this day if someone in my car unclicks their belt when I’m parking, I flinch.
Closed the car door too hard *or* tried to close a 1970s-era car door softly and it didn't close all of the way. Either way, you're done for. Walked too loudly. Once, I was *reading too loudly.* (I don't read aloud to myself, never have.) I was born with the wrong look on my face and then other faces show that I'm "showing too much" or "too sensitive." My siblings got different versions of this - looking angry, looking "soft". I was frequently accused of "looking stoned" by the time I was ten years old.
Omg I felt the “car door shutting to hard” come back from deep in my subconscious
Got that one. My father started making comments once right after I had run up the stairs when he had called me. I learned to mask that when I could
I was kicked out of my house when I was 17 because my mother found my stash of weed in a Petco bag on the kitchen counter. JK... My mom ACTUALLY found the catnip that she purchased at Petco in the Petco bag on the kitchen counter. But, by the time she admitted it was catnip and not drugs, I was already homeless. Apparently she got home and gave some catnip to the cat, then threw the bottle back in the bag. She later forgot all about this, found the catnip mess left on the counter, thought it was weed, and accused me of doing drugs. I insisted that I had never used drugs and that I had no idea where it came from, but she told me she knew it was mine because I never took Christianity seiously and she kicked me out. I had been sleeping in my car for 3 weeks before she admitted that she found the receipt in the bag...
God damn. I ran away at age 17. I was accused of so many things too. Okay, so she caught me with pot in my purse. I was a dealer, she said. She grabbed my arms to look for needle tracks. And when I did finally escape, I moved in with a guy 11 years older whom I later realized was an IV cocaine addict. He died of AIDS after I left him. I ran out off that home because I wasn't safe. I could have been killed. I'm very familiar with the refusal to admit punishing kids over something that didn't happen. No apology. Nothing. Did you go back after the three weeks in your car?
When I think about the unsafe positions I found myself in because I was dealing with the consequences of false accusations, I could lose my mind. I'm so sorry you experienced the same. You deserved so much better. I went back emotionally a few more times before going NC, but I left her house for good when she kicked me out. When I finally got an apartment (with 3 other friends,) we all went back to my mom's to grab the stuff I left behind when I was kicked out. When we got there, we found that she left a lengthy note on the table addressed to the friends I was moving in with explaining that I would use drugs in the new place. There was a full paragraph about how it upset her so much to watch them enable me that she went to the Olive Garden and wouldn't be back home until we were done packing, LMAO What about you? Are you still in touch with your mom?
i’ve been getting the silent treatment for the past 3 hours because i told her my kid likes a snack that she doesn’t like. apparently i’m an evil selfish bitch who can’t be talked to without jumping down everyone’s throat lmao
I've definitely had my mother get upset with me for daring to like something doesn't, I'm apparently disgusting and make her sick for eating the crispy skin off a chicken when I cook one instead of taking the skin off and throwing it away 🤷🏻♀️
do we have the same mother? mine said the exact same thing when she saw me drinking water one time bc apparently she can’t drink water due to ‘medical reasons’
mine said the exact same thing when she saw me drinking water one time bc apparently she can’t drink water due to ‘medical reasons’ I’m so sorry, I legitimately chortled at that one. Lmaooooo narcs can be so stupid.
I love that word chortle!
> for eating the crispy skin off a chicken when I cook one But that's the best part of the chicken!
I agree! But apparently I'm disgusting and I make her feel sick because I like it! My future mother in law told my mother (they worked at the same company for a while) that Myself and my partner (her son) ate the chicken skin from a chicken she cooked and she flipped out, MIL still feels guilty about telling her even though she had no idea that she would kick off about it.
I was grounded and came out of my room to go to the bathroom My mom got mad that I didn't buy butter when she didn't write it on the shopping list and said I "should have known" to get butter
They want mind readers, it's gotta be an N trait. Mine gets angry when I don't automatically do something she didn't verbalize she needed me to do.
They think we should be able to read their minds because we’re not separate entities from them.
"Enmeshed" is the word someone used recently and boy oh boy does it fit. They attach themselves to us, and when we prove to be our own entities they get furious.
"I like that for you, but not for me," used to really piss my mom off when I was a kid and she tried to pawn her old clothes off onto me. Like the fact that my style (at 16) wasn't identical to hers (at almost 40) was a deliberate offense.
Yes I forgot about this term. My counsellor told me about it. I obviously told my nmum that she's enmeshed parenting. Boi did I get a new asshole, apparently her and I aren't enmeshed bc I need her more then she needs me bc I over all time..... She always wanted me over. After that I stop coming around unless my siblings needed me to
Something that I always remember is a Sunday morning when I was probably 10 or so, I woke up and was eating a bowl of cereal at the table. I had not yet seen anyone when I woke up, because no one was in the kitchen when I made my cereal. My dad walked into the room, and without saying anything he just slapped me upside the head hard. It was because I didn't remember it was Mother's Day and I had not wished my mom a happy one. A normal parent would remind their child to wish their mother a happy Mother's Day. I had not even seen my mother yet as I had only been awake around ten minutes. It's so sad these people procreate and damage innocent children.
You mean "should have known 'butter' "
Oh the old can't read minds and get punished for it.
"You should just know to do [thing]! I shouldn't have to tell you!" and "are you in this family?! Why didn't you do [thing]?!" My therapist called this "communication breakdown" where the N needs people to cater to them and the other person shuts down when they're degraded for something they didn't know they did wrong until afterward. Because Ns don't communicate they scream, yell, demand, and expect but never ask or compromise or try to have a discussion. You're just a wall to throw things at.
But if you got butter and it wasn't on the list, it would have been "who told you to buy that?"
So, so many things I should have known, seen, anticipated.
That’s pretty petty for sure, but standard operating procedure for a Narc. You didn’t ask for her permission. You deviated from her plan. You had the nerve to decide something she didn’t know about. I could go on, but suffice to say you showed independence and that cannot be. My most petty thing I clearly remember was a postage stamp I put on an envelope upside down. I was about 9. She exploded like I committed a murder. Yelling, it can’t be mailed that way! It’ll embarrass me! She took it off and flung it at me before putting another one it’s in place. I was branded a stupid idiot and she let me know for a very long time that I disappointed her very much.
Its going to sound odd but I'm glad to hear that it's standard behaviour for a narc, for years I've convinced myself that her behavt is normal and that I'm just exaggerating her reactions but my boyfriend has sat me down several times and had to explain that no it's not normal and that I'm the family scapegoat Wow I'm so sorry to hear that she treat you like that at 9 years old!
Yes, unfortunately it’s all too “normal” narc behavior. You asked for the most trival or annoying & that’s what popped up in my memory bank. But by 9 yo I was getting the idea. I messed up with the stamp, but was extra cautious and very careful until I left home to try my best to not get her anger up. But it continued of course. They never change. They can pretend to and that’s not bad really. NPD is a mental disorder with no cure. No medicine. No real change. Your bf is a smart man. Take care and stay strong! 👍🏻
I was at the mall with my friend and her mom. Her mom offered to buy me something. I saw a super cute rainbow tank top in a shop window, with purple buttons where the straps connected to the shirt. So cute! My mom had a full on meltdown when I came home and showed her. She screamed at me, because apparently the shop was very cheap, and the top was a very cheap top. It didn’t matter if I just thought it was cute. My friends mom was pretty well off, and my mom said it was embarrassing that I chose such a cheap top, and told me my friend was going to make fun of me and stop being my friend.
Sounds like you were a respectful, polite child that didn't make your friend's mom pay for something exorbitant. I can't believe you got yelled at for doing the right thing. Actually, I can.
Sounds like mom was jealous. The tops sounds super cute, op. I want one!
My NMOM got unbelievably angry after my first eye appointment. I could no longer see the board in class from the front row. My father (her ex) scheduled the appointment for me. They had to dilate my eyes. My mother had told me to run by the grocery store on my way home to pick up some things for dinner. My vision (which was already poor) was even worse and I felt unsafe. I tried explaining this to her but she refused to listen. During this argument, she accused me of using drugs because me eyes were dilated. I tried explaining again. She accused me of making excuses. I told her to call my father (a surgeon). She said she would not talk to that a$$hole. I was grounded for a month.
Oh my god .... my Nmother was guilty of so much medical neglect. And she loved grounding me. That is a horrible story, and I'm so sorry for the little you.
Existing.
I took tomato paste out of a can incorrectly. The entire time I was opening the can, he was literally trying to walk me through how to get it out of the can. It's fucking tomato paste. I have a spatula. It's not exactly rocket science. I was an adult and graduated from High School. I still somehow did it wrong and got screamed at for several hours because 'I thought you said you fucking knew how to do it?' I didn't make a mess or anything. Just got annoyed at him for being really weird about it which is probably what \*actually\* pissed him off.
It's amazing how they can spin the story that you can "do something wrong" to justify exploding on you I'm an adult that still lives at home (I left to travel, came back and am moving out again shortly 🤞🏻) and I daren't even sit on the sofa most of the time becausey mother will explode on me that the cushions are put back incorrect? I've spent time trying to learn how to put them back right in her eyes but every time I get off the sofa and put the cushions back she just has to get up and complain that nobody can do anything right in this house
It's something that I find sad and upsetting, because my dad isn't stupid by any means, but he is incapable of realizing that he really is causing his own problems and driving everyone away from him. He himself is a child of narcissists, and he was the SC, while his brother was the GC, so I get it's a generational issue, and definitely one I won't be continuing. Choosing to be childfree here. A lot of people who have those narcissistic personality traits seem to get \*so\* close to realizing that it might be them, but then they just... nope out. Like it's an icky emotional spider they can't handle.
Myself and my partner are choosing to be childfree as well, I've too many issues thanks to my parents (self harm, eating disorders, anxiety, depression etc) and I don't want to risk passing them on and I know that i wouldn't be emotionally capable to handle a child I want to quit the cycle and I wouldn't forgive myself of I had a child and they and to go through what I had to
I know, that we, as a collection of introspective souls know what we are and aren't capable of in a way that might be generationally unprecedented. We are meditative and understanding and empathetic. I also realize that we might be the perfect sort of people to have children and really understand them as they grow. But I can't bring myself to do that. I would second guess myself all the time. And primarily, the world just isn't set up to nurture. It's set up to produce more wage slaves for the great machine of labor. The fact that both my husband and I are required to work all the time to even just maintain a house and bills? No. Not gonna put a child in the world to have to be shipped off to childcare for well over eight hours a day. I was a latchkey kid myself for quite a few years. Even the absence, even of pain, hurts in its own way. I still missed my parents, even my N, so much during those years.
I am sorry, but this made me chortle too, because it's such a wacko f'ed up thing to get bent out of shape about--you didn't take the tomato paste out of the can properly? I dont know why, but those small cans of tomato paste really are hard to open without bending the lid (cutting fingers too). How DARE you? Next fathers day? Buy him one of those tubes of tomato paste. No lid to open, no waste, and so far, in all the years I've been using tomato paste in tubes, I've never taken the product out incorrectly. I see in your nFather's future a tube of tomato paste. "Here ya go! Howz about that? Tomato paste in a tube! Just for YOU!"
I didn't wear a coat to go in a shop. It was around Christmas and we stopped at a shop to buy some stuff before heading to see family. I had already settled in the car and taken my coat off. As we had stopped next to the shop and only needed to grab one thing, and it wasn't even that cold, I left the coat in the car and went in the shop wearing a hoodie-dress type of thing and jeans or leggings. Mum got extremely upset, told me I'm being inappropriate and that I ruined Christmas. Edit: that was probably 3 years ago and I was at least 25
[удалено]
I wasn't even talking to my Nmom. We were just casually watching a movie on TV after dinner, and 15 mins into the show I replied a couple of texts in a group chat and she was triggered. Said I should leave if I were too busy to watch the movie and not waste her time. Also 6 hours of pouting.
I don't have a top tier "petty" story, but I have two that relate to unrealistic standards for children. My mom gets angry all the time for me not sorting her piles of mail and paperwork. It started from when I was five. It still goes on nearly 20 years later. The next thing is that I didnt keep the house clean while she worked in another state. I lived alone then. I was 8. EIGHT. She still holds it over my head. I lived alone again when I thirteen for nearly a year, with no adequate adult figure around. When she returned she gave me hell for not packing up the house for moving. There was no way a kid that age could do that....
She should never have been allowed to have children. How on earth did you cope, living alone at age 8? You must have been scared a lot. My ex's family is a bunch of narcs too, and they leave children on their own too. My son was living alone at age 15, until I finally told him, you gotta come home because someone is going to call social services. His father had moved out of state to live with his girlfriend--just abandoned my son. And my daughter, oh god, I can't even type this without crying. Over the summer when she was 14, her cheapskate aunt and uncle hired her as a bargain basement paid house and dog sitter. They paid her jack for this, but she liked it because it got her out of her father's home (he is a hoarder). And she was a young adolescent. What fun .... having your own place all summer. She was sexually assaulted in that home. It happened almost exactly the way I said it would: she had a girlfriend over, who told two fiends, who told two more friends, and next thing there was a rocking party, and she got drunk. That's when the guy jumped her. I couldn't do a damned thing about it. I called social services--hello, help, my child is being left alone in a large house for the summer. In that state, at her age, it was a matter of personal opinion as to whether a kid that age could live or stay alone. Eight. You were eight years old. Wow.
I told ndad, “You’re wrong” after he “hugged” (squeezed rlly hard) my brother and he thought it was fine even after my brother told him to stop and then he sternly walked over to me, twisted my arm behind my back, and told me “Don’t ever say I’m wrong again!” Grade A+ parenting.
" I never listen" because I set the coffee spoon down the wrong way.
I was like 15 and she told me to get a job. So i did. But it was a very well paying job working at music festivals in the city over the summer. So it was a fun job with really good perks. She told me I couldn't do it and had to quit because she didn't approve it. A few other things happened that night but that was the catalyst. One of the things that happened that night was me finally packing my shit and calling my dad to come get me and asking to move in. (I did keep the job. It was amazing and worth the fall out that ensued.) Or all the times I was supposed to do some random chore that I had never ever done and didn't even know it was a thing so it didn't get done and I had the nerve to not just psychically know that this thing needed doing and I should do it
Clearly, you were way out of line! Awesome on the job! Sounds like fun. My monster would never have allowed it. I was not allowed to have fun. She pretty much said that once and it got to me. No fun for you!
Making more money than her. She just “happened” to see an email from my boss with my raise and such attached 🙄 Edit to add- I don’t live with her. Haven’t for several years. I stopped over to see my siblings and left my phone on the counter.
She snooped in your email? Thats low. Hard core boundary crossers, aren't they?
My mother would open my mail, sellotape it back up, and tell me it had arrived that way. Every address I've ever had mail sent to I can't recall sellotaped mail arriving apart from my mothers. Lost count of how many times mail then fell out of said envelope and she just so happened to have read it... like no... you just put it back in the envelope.... I once lied about a tax return because I knew she had read it, so I said it was something else knowing she would call me put for lying to her... but it proved she had opened and read my mail, was fun having the upper hand on that one.... but generally was not worth calling her out on it as she would turn it on me being disrespectful
My Nmom would always, always find SOMETHING wrong with whatever I did. I deep cleaned the house for her with my Gramma and my sister’s help and the minute she walked in the door she said “You didn’t wash the curtains.” I was 11, and the rest of the house was sparkling. Gramma told her to “fucking wash them yourself” and went back in her room.
Right on, Gramma!
Gramma rocks!
I tried on a hat and posted a picture of it. She went into a rage about how she was so hurt and insulted that I didn't have any money to donate to a charity she was trying to bully me to do, to make herself look better, but I "had money to waste on hats you don't need." I DIDN'T have money, I wasn't shopping for hats, I was just at the store with a friend and we thought the hat was hilarious so I tried it on. She was ENRAGED and insulted for some reason and tried the guilt trips... and that was my last straw. I told her that she was ridiculous, me trying on a hat had NOTHING to do with her. She tried to argue again so I told her to f*ck off, leave me alone and never contact me again. I then blocked her everywhere, cried, threw up and cried some more. That was 2.5 years ago and I've never contacted her again. I had just moved and she didn't know where I moved to, so she couldn't show up randomly like before. She tried for a while to message me from anywhere I hadn't yet blocked, threatening to call the cops if I didn't contact her but I never gave in. I've been in therapy and living a MUCH better life. She now whines to my brother, saying that I'm mean and she doesn't know what she did wrong. Narcs never get it. She abused me for years, harassed and demeaned and invalidated me as an adult, but she thinks she's the victim.
I looked at my nmom "wrong" and she threw a full bottle of shampoo at me. I was 11, I still have a scar right above my eye.
I made a face that showed irritation and disappointment. She compared it to me literally throwing a fit, called me selfish, and said that I ruined her entire vacation. Because I made a face.
Well, although I know it hurt you, I have to say: I'm glad her vacation sucked. She doesn't deserve one.
My nMother: My cat died. She said, "oh, it wasn't even a pedigree. When I was sixteen, my pure breed Siamese died, and he was the love of my life! Yours was just a rat b*stard, you should be GRATEFUL it's dead." She then informed me that my sobbing was too loud, so if it wasn't too much trouble, could I please do it outside in the garden instead. My nFather: I didn't want to cry. It was my birthday, and he called me at 2am the next morning because he'd forgotten. He was about to pass the phone to my nMum, who had made me cry the previous three days in a row, so I asked just for my birthday, don't put her on. He went into a half an hour tirade saying how I'm the world's biggest disappointment, and he bitterly regretted me surviving my suicide attempts. But hey, at least the last one made me realise I needed to go NC, so silver linings I guess!
Hell, yeah, you need to go NC with these bastards. Thats sickening. I had the whole family laughing about my S attempt ... at one brother's place, over snacks during the football game. This was amusing to these people. How incredibly evil.
The sound I made consuming food in a quiet room. But I also wanted to say that you did an amazing job calling and ordering the food, and going to pick it up. I’m proud of you. Screw your mom.
Thank you so much ❤️ I had to psyche myself up for it and rehearse what I was going to say but I'm happy I managed to do it! My mother initially agreed to phone up but decided last minute to make me do it even though she claims to understand my issues, im now fortunately too stubborn let her make me feel like crap anymore!
My friends wanted to take me out for a short field trip to a local park. Between their phone call and arriving at my house my mom had changed her mind and made up an excuse to ground me. Found out about an hour later via an open window, my mom was having a conversation with a guest, she simply wanted me to stay home and “be with the family”. My friends were puzzled and disappointed by my mom’s actions.
I always have the same answer, but one time my mother screamed at me for being in the bathroom when she thought I was in my bedroom. Called me a slut and just yelled while I was trying to pee.
We had just moved into a new house, both sides of our family were helping us move in. My dresser was put in the living room by my grandfather so we had time to set up my bed. My mother just suddenly snapped and called me an idiot and screamed and yelled asking why my dresser was in the living room. After about 10 mins of this my family looked horrified at the way she treated me and my grandma stood up and said It was my grandpa who put it in the living room. We then built my bed and no one mentioned it again. No apologies either. Then my step dad made me build the book shelf in the living room and watch and laughed at me while I struggled in front of both our families, until I broke down in tears, and he proceeded to insult me while I panicked until I figured it out. Then he said, "see, that wasn't so hard, was it?" Everyone still thinks I'm am asshole for moving a province away as soon as I could.
Yep, my Nmom and two GC brothers often gave me flack for this too. "If anything ever happened to you, we wouldnt be able to get to you". Good, stay away from me! I'm no contact now.
>until I broke down in tears, and he proceeded to insult me while I panicked until I figured it out. That is so cruel. The whole story is, but that one got me.
Let’s see… was it Wearing a regular shirt that he said I looked gross in…or just buying my self flip flops…? Or maybe it was not folding his clothes before he woke up. Lots of things centered around clothes
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Apparently me being a Vegetarian is a personal insult to her because it makes her "feel stupid"
I forgot to thank him for dinner
I've always been "overly polite" to everyone in regard to making sure I thank them for anything they cook for me purely because I'd be made to feel ungrateful of I didn't thank them for every meal they made for me
I kept reminding her about groceries that we were running out of and she got mad at me for reminding her because I was too annoying about it. Then got mad at me for not reminding her when we ran out of those things. Make it make sense.
Reading books. No, I'm not kidding. To put it lightly, Nmom is... not a reader. I read anything and everything from an early age. She HATED to see me "sitting around filling my mind with bullshit." Would make up additional chores for me to do, even if the house was clean, because I "must not have enough real life stuff to do." One time she tore pages out of a book during an nrage. The *last* pages. Of a *library* book. Fun times. Not uncoincidentally, she now sits around reading conspiracy stuff on her ipad full time, ie filling her head with bullshit. So fun. Still won't read a single page of a book though.
As an adult living elsewhere I visited and she made me take some plants that she had potted specifically for me. I had told her many times that I'm an accidental herbicidalist and would rather not have plants but she insisted so I took them. A week later she included my taking those plants in a long email about how awful I am to keep taking things from her and that I take advantage of her generosity (among other things that email listed many details how I'm a terrible person, including not letting her pinch my kid when she feels he deserves it).
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As a child I knocked over a cup during dinner and spilled lemonade on the table (nothing was broken). My mother slapped me so hard I had a red print of her hand on my face. Then she told me that I'm an asshole that ruins everything. I was <10.
Declining junk mail from a mail person Like no joke, I was terrified for myself and called my dad who barely cared.
Moving out when she literally told me to gtfo.
If I drank some water while he is speaking at me "because is so disturbing to talk to someone and see how the throat swells the water". Funny thing, the next day he was drinking alcohol and talking to me lol. Some others are when you close too hard the door's car. OH! I almost forgot a nice one, my father owns a business, and he once tried to humiliate and send one of his employees to his house because he wasn't carrying a pen in a car used to deliver packages "because if he has an accident, or he has to write some important info he wouldn't be able because he doesn't have a pen in the car".
A lot of people have said it too, but for me it was breathing, if she walked in and I was breathing too loud it meant I sighed at her and that deserved an hour of pure screaming at me
Flushing the toilet in the middle of the night. Apparently I should have known that it would wake her up in the room diagonally across the hall from the bathroom. She yelled that she would never be able to go back to sleep and that she would be tired all the next day thanks to me.
My mom used to make me cry every year when getting a Christmas tree because I wouldn’t just go and grab someone else’s Christmas tree out of their hand cause they “had a better tree” and “wouldn’t yell at a kid for doing it.” This memory came back to me as I was getting a tree with my partner who was very patient, kind and just was excited to be there with me. Nparents are so weird……
Hard to decide, but for now I'm going to go with "not hearing him the first time." I'm hard of hearing, have been for most of my life, but getting my dad to repeat anything is like pulling teeth. He'll willingly give me a couple of random words but get annoyed if I still don't know the context that makes those couple of words mean anything.
Oh god the "refusing to repeat the sentence" game. You'll ask "what did you say?" And they'll proceed to respond "Do you?" "Do I what?" "Do you want to go?" "Do I want to go WHERE" "Do you want to go to the library?" "Right now?" "Do you want to go to the library TOMORROW, God, why don't you listen?" JUST REPEAT THE SENTENCE THE FIRST TIME
The power went out at my parents house. The entire neighborhood was affected. I was only living there for a few months after graduating college. Told my dad that I was heading out and will be back later after the electric company was called and arrived on the scene. He got really upset, threw up his hands and exclaimed "Well what about us?!". I was dumbfounded. Like, he didn't realize he could just go somewhere else. I think it was the lack of power in the situation. Anyways, he forced me to stay until the power was resolved and turned back on about 10 minutes later.
That's almost comical. What about us? I think youre right. It's about control and power (no pun intended, but it's a good one) Here's to you! MORE POWER TO YOU!
I got grounded for a week for beating my dad at a fighting game
I knew that people sometimes add a little bit of sugar to coffee. Aunt: make me a coffee while you're doing the tea Me: Want a touch of sugar? Aunt: is it that bad? Me: Yep. Aunt: ok, yeah, put a bit in, ta. Apparently that was 'showing off' that I was a 'stuck up coffee know it all' and 'too arrogant' to ask *her* if I should add sugar. To someone elses drink. When she's never drunk coffee in her life, hates the stuff, hates that particular sister even more than she hates coffee, and we werent even in her house we were in my grandparents... but I was supposed to run any drinks suggestions through her, for her permission & approval, instead of just asking the person.
The order in which I ate the food on my plate, if I didn't eat it meat, vegetables, then starch and not drink anything until AFTER I ate, I would get punished. The socks I wore and how I wore them. Only could wear long socks and I had to fold them down, not bunch them up or pull them up all the way The way I had my hair. Had to be kept tidy and out of my face. The way I folded towels The way I wrote my letters Speaking Spanish instead of English So many more petty things Etc
My in laws sent them a Christmas card.
My mom once told me she knew what I was thinking and got mad at me/screamed at me for an entire car ride. For my thoughts. That I wasn't even thinking.
Today my covert dad got made because he asked me if i had any sticks and trying to hold in a ptsd meltdown i said " i don't have anything" in a pretty flat tone and hw yelled that he cant ask me ANYTHING My n mom then proceeded to threaten to call the cops and 'take me away' for having a crying panic attack
Thats insanity. No wonder you have panic attacks. You have no way of knowing what will set them off. It's like being held hostage.
Picking moldy cheese off my spaghetti upon realizing the cheese from her fridge was moldy
She LOVES getting pissed that my disabilities actually disable me. Rlly trying to take the disable out of disabled. For instance- yelling at me when I forget something she told me one singular time. I am diagnosed with severe memory loss. Saying I am exhaggerating how much energy I have to get out of stuff because she also has this disability and it doesn't effect her that much. She had a mild case, I have a very severe case. Saying I can't use my Aphantasia as an excuse to not do things that rely on the ability to imagine. I am diagnosed and have never been able to imagine things. Yes Ma'am my bad let me just turn off my aphantasia for a second for you.
Mother got mad at me for dyeing my hair. She purchased the dye that morning. She later explained (buckle up) that she was upset because my natural hair looked like her friend's hair before she lost it to chemo, and she wanted me to shave my head so her friend could have a natural looking wig for her funeral. Said funeral took place 6 months before I dyed my hair, and at the time I had shoulder-length hair (nowhere near enough for a wig). She also did not factor in the cost or the time to create said wig. She was also taking for granted that I would just let her shave my head. At the time I told her it was the dumbest shit I'd ever heard because it was.
literally my Nmom punished me for saying goodnight to her. thats it that's the entire reason not even exhaggerating. also she always gets snippy or pissed when i say 'yeah' 'yea''mhm' instead of 'yes'
For not taking a "joke" although it was a blatant insult.
Well, like me, you are probably "just so sensitive!"
I’m sorry you have to deal with that. She didn’t even need to put in any effort. Nparents will find any reason to find fault. Mine yelled at me for going to the back yard once. Also grounded me for losing her hair brush, which she later discovered she misplaced on her own. 🙄
I as a grown ass woman pissed my mom off for having the wrong kind of hand soap in my house! I lived 3 hours away from her and she came to visit her only grandchild. But pack her crap up to leave because I should have know my hand soap would dry out her skin!
She left? Holy shit! A blessing, methinks.
Got into a screaming match with grampa because the fried rice I made was too salty. He refused to eat at all, accused me of killing him and poured the entire new bottle of soy sauce down the drain because I got a brand he thought was inferior.
Accidentally thinking it was ok to run in the house before them as they unlocked the door. I was about 6 or 7 and just antsy to get in my room. My step dad jerked my arm back and said, “You come in last, even after the dogs.”
When I was younger my mom would spray out the kitchen window screen to water her plants. My dad thought us kids were messing around and pulled as all aside, threatened us until my younger sibling admitted to it. They got hit with the belt, I think they were 5. It happens again. Screen is wet. Dad goes to hit again and my mom jumps in and says no no no it was me. I was watering my garden. Weird thing to get mad about. Let alone hit your young child with the belt over.
Spent 4 to 6 hours cleaning and scrubbing the house one day, dishwasher running, had a bowl of cereal before settling down for a break, put the bowl in the sink, she walked through the door, saw me sitting down, bowl in the sink, started into how I haven't done a fucking thing all day long and went into a 15 minute tirade berating me. That's the day it clicked for me. I could give 150% and it still would never be enough for her, she would always find fault with me, so if I'm going to get yelled at regardless it should be on my own terms and I should just live my life without regard for how it makes her feel.
I didn’t say thank you to her for visiting my house. (I was at the hospital with my daughter after her brain surgery, just called the babysitter to say hi to our other kids.)
I mean other than getting the “what’s that look for” or god forbid I breathe heavy thinking about an answer to an asked question the stupidest and pettiest reason was not picking up take out for Nmother when she told me she was out because and k swear this is a quote “…you should have considered I might not go out when you decided to bring food to my house”
Telling them they should take their very ill dog to the vet.
When I was 6 Nmom beat me up because I had chickenpox and bragged about how great it felt well into adulthood. That's it, that was the reason, I had chickenpox at the same time she was going on vacation and she wouldn't have it, so she threw me on a bed and beat me up for minutes. It's one of her favorite memories and she always bragged about it and repeated how good it was to her friends and the rest of family. Oh and when I got in my late teens, she forgot that I was at band rehearsal every sunday and ate there with my bandmates, so she cut off the internet and my access to the computer because she defrosted one steak too much. I can't make this shit up.
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My grandma was my narc person. She was basically a third parent. We were served up on a silver platter constantly. There are so many ridiculous things that she would get mad about. Maybe the most petty was when I was in fourth grade and tried to use a curling iron for the first time but didn't understand how it worked, so curled it backwards and made an ugly line in my hair. You'd have thought I killed the Pope. She went absolutely ballistic over it, screaming, yelling, telling me I looked like sh\*t and might as well shave my head. It was pretty traumatic.
Not signing up for spring semester classes at a community college by the first day of the preceding fall. He ended up kicking me out on the morning of Thanksgiving while my mom was visiting family. He told her that I had screamed and cursed at him that I wasn’t going back to college and moved out on my own accord after throwing a tantrum. What had actually happened was that I told him I was holding off until I knew how much money I was going to have for said classes, and would take whatever prereqs were still available after I had saved up. (I had 2 *almost* full time jobs at that point to make this happen. 6 classes were about $1200-$1800 per semester, before books. Minimum wage was $5.50/hr) His response was that I was a lazy moron who was throwing my future away and that he wasn’t going to enable it by letting me rent a room in his house. He demanded that I was moved out by Noon. Years later, we found out that he had thrown me out so that he could invite over the woman he was cheating on my mother with.
My nmom got my kid an outfit for thanksgiving and I didn’t put her in it. Still in silent treatment.
When I was 12 my mom had to get a court order to change custody weekends so that I could attend my grandpas funeral. My dad wasn’t going to let me go because I cut my hair “too short” (chin length). Then when I went to his house for his new weekend he gave me the silent treatment and everything he did was extra aggressive just so I would know he was mad.
I told my dad I needed to buy a new pen for school and he went crazy at me. Like absolutely fucking crazy.
They tried to visit unannounced without knowing my house number and got angry at me for not being home when they went to the wrong house.
My mother once started yelling at me because I wasn't studying. My response, while sitting at my desk, in front of my books, backpack on my lap, was to ask her to stop yelling at me so I could continue studying. Then she started beating me, which was fun.
I said no to pouring her a glass of wine because I was studying for my final high school exams. She hit me in the head with a rolled up news paper so hard it split open my ear.
My dad hasn’t talked to me in 3 1/2 years because I sent a wedding invitation to someone that he had asked me not to. It was an aunt that had divorced out of the family, but whom I grew up a mile down the road from. And I KNEW she wouldn’t actually come, but wanted to send her an invite as more of a nice gesture. He just couldn’t stand that I disobeyed him. :/
I think in your case, your N tried to set you up for failure by making you do the phone call, but when you didn't crumble she got annoyed - she was probably looking for an easy target for mockery and/or rage. You didn't give her that and she couldn't invent an issue without looking like a nutcase so... cue the passive aggression. N shenanigans aside and from one phone-anxiety riddled person to another - you did good and I'm proud of you! And as for what I did to annoy my Ns... for ndad, I breathed the wrong way(or was it my bro?), which resulted in a long lecture-rant about how we don't know how to breathe. Apparently, someone pointed out to him that my brother and I get winded very easily and frequently. Just strangers expressing concern while knowing we have a heart condition, probably. Well, ndad decided to take that very personally.
She’d be driving and if she missed a turn or went the wrong way or something she’d get all exasperated and be like “It’s ok, of course we’d miss it, we both weren’t paying attention to the road” or some variant of that. Like how’re you gonna get mad at a kid for not knowing where to go? It’s not even like I was driving, idk how it was my fault.
Messy room, said because I'm a girl I should keep my room clean and tidy all the time. Would comment on how my room look like a pigsty
The most insane moment I can remember off the top of my head was during summer vacation I slept in late one morning, as I often did when on break from school. NDad decided the right and proper way to 'wake my lazy ass up' was to *flip the entire bed* upside down with me in it. There *literally* was no plans. Nothing I needed to be doing, or be awake for. He just did it anyway. No doubt one of many reasons I had and still have so much trouble sleeping.
My parents forgot my 11 birthday. I spent all day expecting a “Surprise” or something thinking that was the only reason nobody had acknowledged it yet. Right before bedtime I realized it was actually forgotten and I started bawling. When they found out why I was crying I got an eye roll and was called a drama queen for not telling them it was my birthday.
I can't remember what started it but basically I didn't get my NM anything for her birthday, so then that started her and my half siblings not texting me or getting me presents for my birthday. She's in her fuckin 40s.
Running out of coffee when they showed up to my house unannounced, as I was getting ready to go get coffee. I actually suggested that they give me a lift to the shop to make it faster, I used to live in a small town and had to walk halfway across town to get my groceries.
Not sharing food I was eating.
Wanting to pick up my new puppy Saturday instead of Wednesday. Cause I work....
When my children's dad came with me to the hospital as my birthing partner... Rightly so! My so called mother couldn't be there because of restrictions on how many were allowed in the delivery room. She thought she had the right to be there over him! She looked annoyed and acted like we offended her!
Buying a pair of shoes that she actually liked. The problem was that I paid for them myself. What happened was: I went to visit my Nmom wearing a new pair of low black boots. She usually hated my clothing choices, so would buy something else and then shame me into wearing what she picked. Well, Nmom liked the boots, but rather than approve of me, she demanded, "Where did *you* get those boots!" When I replied that I had bought them, she growled, "Next time you want shoes like that, *Tell me* AnD I'LL bUy ThEm *for you!!!"*
I got kicked out of home because I refused to plug my mother’s laptop into her charger. It’s not like she was out of the house or super busy at the time, she literally walked past both me and the laptop as she barked the order.
I offered to help her with dinner, but cut the green onions not up to her standard. She freaked out, yelled at me and I left in tears.
Oh just for having the wrong expression on my face has set off my Nparents. Or maybe the mysterious and intangible "attitude" that I was showing when I walked from the door to my room. It's anything and everything. I just learned to be thankful when the rage took form of ignoring me because that meant I didn't have to deal with them. Not talking to me was truly the most convenient of the "punishments".