05 Friday Oct 2018
I was the happy girl.
The unconditional love girl.
The forgive anything girl.
The bounce-back no matter how hard the punch girl.
The live and let live girl.
The this will not define me girl.
The lover of books girl.
The hug everyone girl.
The cry it out and this too shall pass girl.
The at least my daddy always loved me girl.
And now, I’m the none of those things at all woman.
20 Thursday Sep 2018
Posted in Abuse, Narcissists suck, Parental Alienation Syndrome
16 Thursday Aug 2018
Head spinning
like a little girl twirling to lose her balance
In an empty world built of
lies and broken trust.
Wise words from long ago
slice through brain cells
both dead and alive
with a razor’s heartless precision.
Uncertain which weighs more true,
the scale shakes and
shivers like memories built on sand castles of betrayal
scattering… like dust in the wind…
What to do with a fully wasted life of
false love and true lies?
A life so riddled with bullets
it’s unrecognizable as a life at all.
It doesn’t pulsate with life.
Where nothing was real
not even hope
or faith
or trust
or friendship
or family
and especially not love…
Love was the ultimate lie
-a clever, cunning weapon of mass destruction.
Dust collecting rapidly on the
senseless scrambles of
memories that never were….
13 Monday Aug 2018
Perhaps a big part of the reason malignant narcissists are so successful in their abuse is that it’s extraordinarily difficult to tell the story of these monsters’ insidious tactics.
Stories of bloody noses, broken bones, overt verbal abuse, and harsh sexual violence are obvious and easy to tell.
Stories of looks that inspire terror, 55 tiny little “harmless” digs a day, subtle financial abuse slowly over time, seemingly innocent manipulations, etc, these are far more difficult to tell and explain the damage they do. And particularly difficult when the average attention span exceeds about 2 inches from any person’s self-involvement.
Who has the care or time to sit and listen to someone explain such subtle and clever intricacies of abuse with multiple layers of impact that build upon one another over time like millions of tiny glass shards. One little glass shard in your skin seems harmless and such a ridiculous thing to cry over. 5 tiny glass shards? Really? Just pull em out, clean the area, and get on with it. 25 tiny glass shards? Well, that’s unfortunate, but again, pull them out, clean the wounds, and get on with it. Shit happens. There’s still just no need to go to a doctor and explain the story of each and every shard, how each individual shard got embedded into your skin, and how painful each one was or wasn’t at the time of entry. A doctor wouldn’t need to hear those minute and lengthy details and it’s unlikely he’d have the time or patience to listen to it all even if each shard’s story was somehow relevant.
You’re not a whiner. You’re not a pity whore or desperate for sympathy. Maybe you even deserved some of those shards? Maybe you even knowingly went back to the scene after the first 15 shards?
Do’t be ridiculous. You just pull them out as best you can, clean the area, and get on with it, obviously determinedly hoping to avoid the shard infested area in the future. You’re not stupid. You’ll simply choose to stay far away from that danger zone. If you can’t clean them all up, you’ll walk around it, even if it takes incredible cautious and care.
You’ll just tip-toe around the shards from now on. And get on with it.
But what happens when you get 10,000 tiny glass shards in your skin? Still, the damage is relatively minimal. Just get to the time consuming task of pulling them out, clean the wound, and get on with it.
You might need to see a doctor at this point, but still you aren’t going to load the doctor down with how each and every shard got in there. It’s senseless. You just say you had an accident, get the care your wounds need, and get on with trying to clean or tip-toe around the avoid the danger zone again. Surely, you’re not stupid enough to intentionally walk carelessly in that same area? Right? Why bother anyone with the boring story of each and every stab, every piercing of your flesh that subtly pinched or stung? It’s irrelevant and it’s just dull.
Take care of it and get on with it.
So, what happens when you get 25,000 tiny slivers of glass embedded in your skin? You dismissed the 5, then the 25, then the 10,000. Now you have 25,000 and more keep coming even as you’re still pulling the last batch out. You don’t understand where they’re even coming from at this point. They just keep coming and now with more speed than you can pull them out. Confusion settles in. You doubt yourself because who could be clumsy or stupid enough to keep inadvertently hitting that danger zone of shattered glass? It seems like a moving target, but you just can’t understand what, how, or why. You just know they sting and they seem to be gaining momentum the harder you try to avoid them.
After a few years of this, with millions of “harmless” shards embedded as well as a few far less subtle, deeper daggers and stabs throughout that time that have done more significant damage. Suddenly, you’re actually damaged and the damage is confusingly extensive. Now, how does one go back to explaining those first 5 shards?
What about after 48 years of it?
How do you expect anyone at this point, even a doctor or friend or therapist, to bother with the time, effort, and extensive bother of listening to the details of every embedded shard, the maddening impossibility of avoiding the danger zone despite constant exhausting effort to locate, repair, and clean up the site? Really, it’s too far gone to repair or resolve now anyway, so why burden others with that weight?
Who would care enough to be burdened anyway?
You can tell the story of the first 5 shards or maybe the last 20 shards, or maybe you just selectively choose to explain only those random shards that were not so subtle in their damage? Only tell the worst of the billions?
No one can be burdened with the whole senseless lifelong story of every ridiculous shard you now have piercing your skin. But there’s too many to ever remove now. And a handful of 15 minute selective explanations could never even begin to adequately describe the depth of damage or the permanent pain of all the deeply embedded ancient shards still ripping your skin…underneath the surface. Stabbing you relentlessly, always ripping through your flesh, under the surface…. unseen to the naked eye.
And yet, how would you ever explain the amount of damage without that burden? How do you ever get to them all to remove them and clean and repair the wounds without that ridiculous burden?
28 Saturday Jul 2018
Posted in Abuse, Darlene Higgins, memories, Narcissists suck
I remember this day. I remember that little girl.
She was newly 4 and her grandma made these beautiful Easter dresses!
She could not wait to wear it, even though her sister’s dress seemed so much prettier and more grown up than hers… She knew she’d never be quite as big or smart or pretty as her older sister she adored, but she hoped someday when she got big she might be smart and pretty too.
She loved singing into the metal fan. The silly voice vibrations made her giggle so hard!
She was painfully conscious of being little…smaller and weaker than everyone else in her world. Always aware that she wasn’t really like the others in her little family. All she saw in the mirror was that ugly, unruly white hair and sickly pale skin. And she stared a lot: stared at her sister’s beautiful soft brown skin and shiny, sleek, well-behaved hair which was just like Mom’s except shorter, hoping when she got big, her hair and skin and eyes would look beautiful like theirs. Hoping she would fit in better when she grew up.
She felt so much smaller and less than the world around her. She tried hard to make up for this by being cute or silly or funny. It didn’t really work with her mom, but she could make her daddy laugh.
Laughing with Daddy was the best thing in the world!
Her beautiful mother, whom she thought of as a fairy tale goddess, never seemed pleased with her, but she’d never ever give up trying; telling herself, when I’m big and smart and pretty, she’ll love me so much! Then, she will love me for sure!
Not too long after this glorious day when she picked dandelions and wore the beautiful princess dress, mom had given she and her sister some money to walk to the store next door to buy ice cream for the 3 of them. Ice cream bars were 25 cents next door. It looked like her sister had a handful of shiny quarters Mom had given to them to spend. YAY!
She loved going to the store for her mom. It made her feel grown up and responsible. Mom wanted an Eskimo Pie and she and her sister could each choose an ice cream too.
It was so exciting to get to go to the store with her sister and get to pick her own treat! She had chosen an ice cream sandwich and her sister had chosen a treat and grabbed an Eskimo Pie for mom.
At the counter, she saw behind the clerk were Cracker Jacks. She didn’t like the taste of Cracker Jacks very much, but she knew there was a surprise inside the box and she thought how happy her mom would be if she could give her a present. What if it was a beautiful ring or necklace? Oh, Mom would be so happy!
So she told her sister, they should get the Cracker Jacks instead of the Eskimo Pie so that they could surprise Mom with a beautiful present. Her sister didn’t think this was a good idea at all. Dawn said, Okay, but Mom’s gonna be really mad…
She didn’t understand this. Dawn must be confused. How could Mom ever be mad when we would be giving her a surprise present? Probably a beautiful diamond ring or something better even. There was no way Mom could ever be mad at that! So, she begged and begged her sister to get the Cracker Jacks. She wished she could see the prize inside before buying it to know what it was, but she’d seen the commercials on TV, she felt positive it would be something just beautiful that would make Mommy so happy!
Dawn relented and bought the Cracker Jacks.
Ohhhh… she was so excited, she could barely wait to get home to open the Cracker Jacks in secret and then run out and surprise her Mom with something beautiful! She practically ran the few hundred feet home to her mom.
When they got home, Mom was sitting in the baby blue crushed velvet chair in the living room. She ran straight up to her and thought she was clever to very nonchalantly say, Mommy, these Cracker Jacks are for you, but I’m going to take them upstairs for a minute and I’ll be right back down, okay?
Before the whole sentence was even out of her mouth, Mommy backhanded her across the face, screaming furious words she didn’t understand.
She was stunned and shocked. Maybe a surprise wasn’t a good idea after all. So she explained, Mommy, please don’t be mad at me!? I got you a surprise. I bet it’s a beautiful diamond ring or necklace. There’s a surprise in the box for you! I got you a surprise!
Mommy backhanded her face again, even harder…or maybe it wasn’t harder than the first. Her cheek was just still stinging hot from the first one and her nose still smarted a bit before the second one hit so maybe that’s why the second backhand felt harder even after she’d explained there was a beautiful surprise, she wasn’t sure.
She was utterly confused at the ferocity of this sudden and unexpected anger! Why was Mommy mad? She just wanted to surprise her with something beautiful.
Maybe Mommy still didn’t understand that the Cracker Jack’s had a beautiful surprise for her? Maybe that’s why she was still mad? She just didn’t know what I meant when I said we got it to give her a surprise? Maybe she’s too mad to hear me over her screaming? I’d better be quiet and go to my room for now like Mommy says.
I’ll try again to explain it later. Mommy will be so happy!
12 Thursday Jul 2018
Since this nightmare began in 2012, I’m plagued with flashbacks of memories I’d long ago forced back into hidden places in my naive and desperate attempts to believe the best of people I loved.
Many of these flashbacks seem so silly and superficially innocuous. Hindsight with research and education of malignant narcissists, make it clear how easily this method of abuse was inflicted and how many years it went on, slowly, quietly, chipping away at my sense of self, my faith in my own perception, even my belief that I was intelligent and sensible enough to comprehend reality itself.
Much of it was never as clear as a punch in the face (although there were a few of these, but I typically blamed myself as deserving of those too) and thus, was so simple for me to deny even to myself and explaining it to others just made me look nit-picky, so I took those little vague but incessant yukky feelings as more evidence that I was just imagining they hurt. It had to be my over-sensitivity. Surely, no one intentionally did and said these things to a daughter or a lover! Surely….?!?
Being alone in a state far away from home, sick with pregnancy complications, starving for days, begging your mother to send a few dollars for groceries, does something strange to someone’s mind as your mother refuses to help and instead insults you, all the while saying, I love you. It’s difficult to describe the mind-fuck of this level and impossible to accurately define how it seems to actually erase your humanity itself. Obliterating those little pieces inside that believe you deserve even the basics to live, food, water, shelter; twisting one’s understanding of love into something less even than the very basic necessities. Which leaves a person with the understanding that love and compassion, kindness, and consideration are massive luxuries you could never have, much less deserve, as a human being.
Somewhere among going so long without food while carrying my firstborn, Lexi in the midst of narcissistic abuse from my boyfriend after spending my childhood with the exact same treatment from my mother, I stopped believing I deserved anything good at all and my highest hopes of relationship transformed into nothing beyond wishing for merely the lack of bad. There was no such thing as hoping for happiness or joy or love or kindness, I literally only wished not to have pain intentionally inflicted on me.
After the period of starving was over and my mother had helped me understand that I was too disgustingly pathetic to deserve even food for my gestating baby, my boyfriend and I had moved again to another state where I had no friends or family at all. I still called my mom regularly, lonely and abused in a strange place and utterly dependent on my narcissist. I desperately wanted a mother- not to save me from the daily abuse for she had taught me well that I deserved that infinitely- but for comfort in my loneliness and general fears of a first pregnancy.
I lived in fear and loneliness, but I was grateful when my mother took a few minutes to talk to me at all. I was grateful when I had food to eat. I was grateful my boyfriend provided a roof over my head, utilities, and those occasional pathetic long distance phone calls still begging for my mother’s love. I craved two foods while pregnant: Caesar salad and a childhood favorite-Skyline Chili which was only available back in Ohio. I would wake in the night with a longing so fierce for Skyline Chili it seemed almost tangible.
A few times in those desperate calls to my mother, I laughed with her about my cravings. I was excited that three times while pregnant, my dad had sent me money and I was able to use it to go to Perkins for their lemon chicken Caesar salad, which I shared all three times with my boyfriend of course. I wouldn’t want to be selfish and think I deserved to spend that money all on myself or that I deserved an entire salad for just myself. And I laughed with my mother about how silly it was for me to crave Skyline Chili so badly – a food I knew was utterly unobtainable from this state, even if I’d had the money to spend. I laughed at myself with her for being that pregnant woman who had to crave something impossible! Of course, I’d be that ridiculous kind who’d have craving for something hundreds of miles away…
A few days before Christmas when my mother actually called me (yes, she called ME for once!) and my baby girl was due early January to discuss her Christmas shopping, family gatherings, and general holiday stuff, I was beyond delighted to have received a call from her. My fears for a healthy baby and giving birth grew exponentially each day her due date gained momentum and I felt like maybe mother did care about me. After all, the day was getting closer and she called me! She had actually picked up the phone to dial my phone number and talk to me about her holiday stuff.
I floated with joy just to be on the phone with her as she discussed how impossible it was to shop for my step-dad-what DO you buy the man who has everything?! and her various thoughts on her struggles choosing for my sister and her husband in Florida-Dawn has such eclectic tastes, you know?…
I was giddy to think of family and to be included just to get to hear about these things, not to mention it was a welcome distraction from the impending delivery day fears I battled every day alone in my head because my boyfriend’s work stuff and his fears over the upcoming birth were far greater and more important than mine, so I didn’t dare try to tell him of my silly pregnancy fears, or my loneliness, or how I could never stop worrying that the time I went without food might have damaged her somehow.
So, this lovely conversation with my mother about these general holiday woes were a welcome distraction as well as a flattering gift of attention.
As our conversation came to a close, mother tells me that after all the inner debate and frustration, she finally had decided to get everyone the same thing for Christmas. She had found a way to order Skyline Chili for the entire family and have it shipped cross-country even to my sister and her husband.
Oh my gosh, I was deliriously excited… I WOULD ACTUALLY GET TO HAVE SOME SKYLINE CHILI! MY MOTHER HAD FOUND A WAY THAT EVEN LIVING OUT OF STATE, I COULD HAVE MY INSANELY IMPOSSIBLE PREGNANCY CRAVING FOR SKYLINE CHILI! AND I WOULD HAVE IT FINALLY JUST WEEKS BEFORE MY BABY WAS DUE EVEN!
I said, Oh mom, that is the best idea ever! After all that turmoil deciding, as usual, you thought of the most perfect gift idea of all! I’m so excited to have some Skyline Chili!
The line got quiet for just a moment. I thought perhaps the call had dropped. I said, Mom? Mom? Are you still there?
And I hear her. She’s still there. She says, Oh… I didn’t get any Skyline Chili for you and Mark. I thought I might, but then I remembered you’re a vegetarian, so I knew you wouldn’t want that for Christmas!
As massive as my disappointment was, my confusion actually overrode it. I said, What? A vegetarian? I’m not a vegetarian… I’ve been craving Skyline Chili my entire pregnancy, Mommy!! Were you maybe thinking of six years ago when I challenged myself to eat vegetarian for a month just to see if I could?
Oh, you’re not a vegetarian? Oh my, I’m so sorry! I thought you were! If I’d known you weren’t a vegetarian, I would have ordered some for you too! I ordered it for the entire family except you. I don’t know why I thought you were a vegetarian?! What a shame it’s too late to order any now.
That’s okay, Mommy. It’s the perfect gift idea, I’m sure everyone will love it.
I hung up the phone feeling sad I would miss out on the perfect gift and wondering how I’d been so impossibly crazy as to mislead my mother for six years into thinking I was a vegetarian.
What a silly misunderstanding! Hmmm…!? So very strange that she didn’t know I’m not a vegetarian! It’s my own fault, though. Somehow, I mislead her into thinking that month challenge six years ago was a permanent decision. My lack of clarity has now led to me not getting Skyline Chili, my most fervent 9 month craving, for Christmas.
I’ll have to work harder on being more clear in the future. If I weren’t so confusing, I’m sure this misunderstanding would never have been possible!
And I couldn’t help thinking of all the meals we’d shared in those six years; dinners where I’d ordered- and eaten- meat.
What a strange and unfortunate misunderstanding, indeed…
19 Tuesday Jun 2018
My daughter, Lexi, called a few weeks ago. I knew why she was calling before I even spoke to her as I had dreamed she was pregnant only a few weeks earlier, but had convinced myself “it was only a dream”.
She said, “we’re not telling anyone yet”, so don’t tell anyone. Which of course meant everyone already knew, but that she didn’t want me to tell anyone since after a long discussion it turned out her dad, sister, friends, etc. all already knew…. not sure who else she feared I might “tell”, but oh well. Of course I’ll not tell anyone.
Who would I even tell anyway?
She cried because she felt her dad was ashamed of her. She cried really hard about that actually. I can’t know if that was a manipulative set-up or the truth… Regardless, I responded only that I was sure her dad was not ashamed, but was simply worried for her and not expressing that well because of his fears. I’m sure he is ashamed, but I’d never tell her that because he has no business or right to be ashamed of her for that! He’s a malignant narcissist, of course he’s ashamed of anything less than perfection as he fears it’ll reflect poorly on him. I wasn’t going to tell her he probably was ashamed though. As even if she’s sobbing over how much he’s hurting her, I still know that if I even hint of anything negative about him she’ll start screaming at me, tell me how horrible I am, how WONDERFUL HER DAD IS, and hang up and “shun” me again.
So I carefully encouraged her that her dad was just not expressing his feelings about this well and that he’d be fine once some time passed.
As this conversation was happening, I went into my kitchen to grab an iced tea and as I put ice cubes in my glass, I felt sick thinking she’d hear that I was getting something to drink, so I felt compelled to say, I’m just getting a glass of tea. I can’t know if she might hear me putting ice in a glass and later tell her dad, sister, boyfriend, friends, grandmother, coworkers, whoever, that she could “hear her mom was drinking” if I didn’t clarify that I was getting myself a glass of tea. And sadly enough, even as I told her I’m getting a glass of tea, I knew that it didn’t matter that I clarified it; she’d still go and say whatever she thought would be more interesting or ugly about me to tell anyone else anyway.
And I just felt sick…physically sick that I am frantically fearful of my own child, her temper tantrums, her lies, her false accusations, her eagerness to talk, think, and believe badly about me…
Being literally petrified of your own child is terrifying. Most people I’ve feared in my life, I just broke away from and eventually ceased all contact to protect myself from their physical, mental, and emotional abuse. I’ve still not figured out a way to tear my heart away from loving this child and thinking of her as the incredible, delightful, kind child she once was. I suppose my heart and my brain refuse to accept she’s what she is today in spite of 6 years of nonstop evidence that she’s in no way that child anymore. Even though she’s admitted to me she lied all the time to me growing up, I can’t force myself to accept that totally.
So, we had a nice talk because fortunately I walked the eggshells well enough and didn’t say the wrong thing the wrong way, I guess. I told her I supported her no matter what, whether she moved back here to “be by her boyfriend’s family” or stayed out there, I would do anything I could for her.
The next day I texted her some home remedies for the nausea she said she’d been having and that went okay.
Then the next day, after 2 days of being excited and scared to death to have her maybe back in my life, I decided to text her a very lengthy text saying she had my full support in everything in her life just as she’d always had, but that I was very scared to be hurt more because I really didn’t believe I could handle much more hurt. And I said that whatever she feared her dad felt didn’t matter because in my opinion the only shame we should ever carry in this world is how we treat other people – that things like having sex, experimenting with drugs drinking wine, not doing well in school, getting pregnant, whatever it may be – none of that was anything to be ashamed of as long as we treat people well.
She went off on me in an ugly reply text saying that she “just doesn’t text” and she “wouldn’t change that for me” (not sure what that was about?), that I was a “horrible manipulative passive aggressive person who needed to do some yoga and just forgive myself”, and that she’d “never say mean things to HER child like I do”, and then ended it with “no need to reply because I’m blocking you again”.
So, that was that. I guess telling your 21 year old daughter (who hasn’t acknowledged you exist in over 2 years) that you support her but you’re also afraid to be hurt any further and that getting pregnant isn’t something to be ashamed of, that the only actions in the world that should carry shame are treating people badly is all just too vile and passive aggressive to say to your pregnant child.
So incredibly interesting but sad that that’s exactly- and I mean exactly – how her father would respond to me saying, I’m afraid you’ll cheat, lie, be cruel, abuse, me again to him 21 years ago. Fury and flip it back on me for being afraid, but never ever taking responsibility or instead choosing to reassure that he wouldn’t hurt me; just beating me up with my fear until I apologized to him for saying I was afraid.
My daughter has one upped him though being 2000 miles away with new technology. She just analyzes my every word – twisting and turning what I said – then because of her own guilt and responsibility in it all, she flips that on me too, then refuses to communicate at all with me, much less allow me tell her that her hateful interpretations were way off the mark.
Fuck, she doesn’t even give me the chance to apologize for being scared.
I’m broken all over again, but seeing how she replied, I know my fears were valid and can safely assume the entire phone call was to manipulate me and just to see if she still could manipulate me and use me if she ever needed me. Maybe she was hoping I’d put her dad down or something while she sobbed how badly he was treating her and then she’d have another reason to say I’m a terrible mom. I didn’t though, so then she had to get mad because I’m afraid of being hurt.
It’s fairly clear her next tactic would be to manipulate, use, and terrorize me through my coming grandchild now.
Lovely. Just what I need, as if she and her sister haven’t ripped my heart and soul to pieces enough already.
23 Wednesday May 2018
I think often of my dad when I mow the grass. I remember him mowing it on Shuler Avenue when I was little.
I didn’t get to see him much but I remember hating when I was there and he’d have to go mow the grass . I was too little to help and I resented anything that took away even an hour of my precious time with him.
But that would pass the minute he was finished and he’d come back inside, smelling of freshly mown grass and the sticky heat of summer. I couldn’t wait to get him a glass of water or a cold beer from the fridge to help cool him down after the task. I felt so grown up to serve him. Sometimes I’d pretend I was a waitress and take his order when he came in. I couldn’t write yet, so I’d just scribble on paper pretending I could, thinking I was so clever to make my daddy believe I knew how to write!
Mowing grass makes me think of my beloved lawn on my house on Roosevelt. The yard was huge but it was so beautiful, I enjoyed getting it just perfect so my daughters and their friends and I could hang out barefoot in the grass playing or practicing cheerleading stunts. It smelled of lilacs and roses and fresh grass. I took great joy in completing it even though it was almost a full day’s job. I was so proud of our pretty little house, it’s good energy, and it beautiful yard… to finally provide my kids with our very own home we could decorate as we liked rather than all the rentals we’d lived in where I couldn’t paint or landscape the way we all wanted.
Their dad scammed that from us, although he didn’t pay a dime of his own money for that house. He scammed me with lies then later stole it with deceit, to hurt me and just to prove that “he could”. Just because I was trusting enough when my dad said, “you’re paying for that house with his name on the mortgage; make damn sure you get that agreement in writing”. So when I asked Mark for our agreement in writing saying my dad had suggested we just make sure there was never any confusion as to who was paying for this house and who it belonged to, Mark cried. He cried on the phone saying, “I’m so hurt you’d think I’d ever do something so dishonest to you or our girls like take your house!”
And true to narcissistic manipulation, sure enough, I ended up apologizing for even asking that our agreement be put in writing. I apologized for asking.
Three years later, he lied in court and said it was his, claiming he was buying this house 2000 miles away from where he lives as his “summer home” and he lied in court saying that with the sole intent of leaving his daughters and me homeless to “teach us a lesson” . And after threatening my dad that he’d never speak to him again if he let us stay with him after he’d stolen our house.
He rents it out now.
Sometimes I wonder if the people living in it know how many months my dad and children and I searched endlessly for the perfect home for me to buy for my daughters and I to live in forever. The house I pictured getting my children ready for their first prom in, or imagined when I’d watch them pull in the driveway the day they got their driver’s license, or how I’d imagined waiting for them in the front room to come home from their first date to tell me all about it, or how every time I mowed the grass I’d think of summer parties we could throw with all their friends and twinkle lights around the fence. Or how I’d scraped and saved money from nothing just to buy that little above ground pool for them and their friends to enjoy that first summer we lived there and how much fun we had playing in it and how proud I was to have afforded it even while paying for our home. Or how I couldn’t afford a lawnmower so my dad brought his over every weekend so I could keep the yard perfect. Every weekend he lugged that lawnmower over so I could make sure our yard was immaculate and beautiful so my daughters could be proud of our home
It wasn’t a mansion like Mark lived in when he lied and said it was his. It wasn’t some glorious expensive thing, but it was ours.
I’d scrimped and scraped just to have it; just so my children could have a permanent forever home of their own to be proud of.
To be our home base forever. It was always all ours.
Right up until the day their dad lied in court to say it wasn’t ours.
…Just because he “could”. Just because I had been stupid enough to trust a lying cheating, abusive pathological narcissist.
Trusted a pathetic excuse of a human being who had CRIED at the “insult” to his honor that I’d even ask for our agreement in writing. CRIED that I’d ever even imagine he’d do something so deceitful and hurtful as to take a home he knew wasn’t his… and never had been his…
our home.
18 Sunday Mar 2018
Nightmares by Raquel Kortizo
They’ve come for me again.
A prison camp by day
A torture chamber by night
hovering over my existence,
infiltrating my thoughts,
piercing my heart with raw fingers
clawing
tearing at the pieces of my brain
pulling and stretching the parameters of pain
infinite…endless…torture…
As if I’m not helpless enough to stop the pain and misery during waking hours.
As if I’m not worthy of any peace whatsoever..
ever.
They broaden the definition of relentless.
Even felons of horrible crimes can serve their time and be released. Yet, I who committed no crime nor have ever once inflicted any intentional or knowing injury upon any other creature. Any. Other. Creature. Ever.
I, whose only method of fighting back my entire life was to walk away. Incapable of actual battle, I walked away from every assault without raising a single fist. Jesus, I rarely even raised my arms to protect myself from the blows. My typical response to any type of assault was duck and cover-too scared to even lift my arms to ward off the blows, knowing if I didn’t just accept whatever came my way, it would only come back worse later.
Okay, so maybe the worst I ever did was run. Yes, a few times I didn’t walk away. I ran…. duck, cover, then walk or at worst, run…but I never fought back. I never engaged in the warfare or returned assault or injury. My worst return-fire was to run.
Regardless, I was sentenced to life. And I can’t help in hindsight but to suppose the sentence was the harshest because I never fought back. Perpetrators typically size up their victims first and choose the most defenseless – the one least likely to fight back- the most powerless of victims. They’re irresistibly easy to conquer then destroy.
And once they’ve assessed that you’re too weak, scared, naive, ignorant, or insecure to even fight back, their power is truly limitless. They know you’re too harmlessly pathetic to even defend yourself.
Yes, pathetic. Even most animals will attempt to fight back when backed in a corner and assaulted. Not me. Nope. I crouch down, hang my head, squeeze my eyes shut tight, and wait for the fury to cease long enough to maybe try to run. But still too stupid to run if they’ve first convinced me it’s my fault and my just dessert too. Then, I just crouch down, take all the blows, wait for my punishment to be over…then apologize, beg forgiveness, and try even harder to be earn their love and try to be better enough to deserve a lighter punishment next time…knowing I’ll never attain perfection enough for the punishments to ever stop altogether…knowing I’ll always make another mistake somehow, but hoping I learned my lesson enough that time to figure out a way to be better each time.
A sentence thrust upon me without cause, without law, without a judge or jury, save my perpetrators themselves. Hell, I didn’t even know I was on trial until after all was said and done.
Like a rapist being his own judge, witness, and jury of his own trial against his victim.
They sentenced me to life in hell, not even merciful enough to execute me outright, just a life term of endless, inescapable torture.
Betrayal from all angles, in every imaginable manner of betrayal.
They broaden the definition of betrayal.
Like shooting fish in a barrel.
Like hunting caged animals.
Like waging a war of morality and then bringing bombs and armies, knowing your opponent is only one person and will arrive armed only with words and truth…a clear conscience, an ignorance of the depth of your hatred, naive after everything to the extent of your evil. All while your chosen “opponent” is totally unaware there even is a war at all.
Like pretending to love a wounded animal and giving it just enough time and space to believe for a moment it’s safe, just to make skinning and devouring it easier.
I say they’ve returned.
Returned…
As if they ever left at all.
The nightmares never leave now. Hell is my life now.
Hope is the only thing that still returns briefly…
just to mock me, then leave again.
24 Friday Nov 2017
From my Book – From Charm to Harm and Everything else in Between with a Narcissist! @ https://www.amazon.com/Charm-Harm-Everything-Narcissist-Narcissistic/dp/1523820179/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1468595784&sr=1-1&keywords=from+charm+to+harm Every conversation or interaction you have with them seems to leave you confused and drained. You will be left with the burden of trying to figure out what they have said or basically what […]
