Some people experienced abuse that they knew from early on was abuse.
For others, part of the narcissistic abuse was being conditioned to think it was not abusive, but in fact normal parenting behavior.
Which one was it for you?
Some people experienced abuse that they knew from early on was abuse.
For others, part of the narcissistic abuse was being conditioned to think it was not abusive, but in fact normal parenting behavior.
Which one was it for you?
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Definitely being conditioned it wasn’t abuse and mostly my fault for being a bad child I guess. Felt I more so realized how much it affected me in my late 20s now.
I only just realized it was emotional abuse last year.
I grew up thinking it was normal parenting behavior, but as I went through my twenties I started to realize it wasn’t normal. My sibling and I just joked about it asking how we turned out so normal considering our childhood. Sadly, I only realized too late, he hadn’t, I believe he suffered from BPD and depression as a result of our upbringing. He passed away unexpectedly at 31.
Last year was when I realized I was not only psychologically and emotionally abused as a child, I’ve allowed it to continue well into adulthood.
It ended the beginning of December as I started taking the necessary steps to distance myself and seek therapy on my own.
It’s been a hard pill to swallow, but partly because I’m so angry and sad it’s gone on for 40 years before I could even call it what it is and started doing something about it.
But no more.
Definitely didn’t know I was emotionally abused until my early 20s when I started seeing a therapist. I knew I didn’t like or respect my parents and I knew I was the black sheep of the family, but they conditioned me that anything that wasn’t them putting their hands on me could never be categorized as abusive. Both my parents were physically abused so this was lorded over my head as proof of their “good parenting”. Took me til my late 20s to actually start to believe the therapists who told me I was abused and claim that for myself
I knew it was abuse, but I didn’t realize all of it was abuse. Some things were more obvious than others.
My parents definitely tried to make me think it was all normal, or that I deserved it, but my dad in particular was so bad that it was obvious that he was extremely abusive and very messed up. My mom was quite a bit more intelligent and wily than my dad, and she was a lot better at manipulating people, so it took longer for me to realize that she was abusive, too. She was good at playing the victim, and she definitely liked using my dad to make herself seem like the good parent. I started to figure out what she really was in elementary school, but she still seemed better than he did.
Then my parents divorced, and my mom stopped pretending to be a decent person. I think she figured that, as my dad was obviously to blame for the divorce, she didn’t need to pretend anymore. She thought she had a lifetime pass to be just as awful as she wanted to be, and boy did she ever take advantage of that!
So, I knew that my dad was a bad person when I was a small child. My first memories are all of him abusing me, or of dreading that he would notice me or come looking for me. My mom was awful, but in comparison she was so much better than him. Still, by the time I was in elementary school, I knew that she didn’t like me much, and by the end of elementary school, I knew that she was abusive and neglectful. They divorced when I was 12, and my mom became even more abusive and hateful to me. My dad got worse then, too.
My nparents normalized their abuse so effectively that I had no idea I was being abused. I went NC with my father at 19 and had no idea it was due to abuse. I just knew our relationship was terrible and I needed a break. It wasn’t until I was in my late twenties that I understood it was abuse. It took much longer for me to understand my nmother’s abuse.
It wasn’t until my ndad started doing some of the same crap to my daughter and I started getting vivid flashbacks to those phrases, rage eyes, holding grudges, the silent treatment (to a 2 year old!!).
He wanted me to punish her for not listening. She was 2 at the time. I slowly started to see that my opposition to his style of parenting was making him feel insecure, so he started to make really small things into a big deal– that I’m a terrible parent for calmly talking about emotions and apologizing when I get upset with my own kids. He wanted me to get into a rage, hit, slam doors. Nonsense.
I knew deep down it wasn’t right. But I still thought I could handle it without it causing long term damage. I thought I was above it causing long term damage to me. I was wrong
I realized in 4th grade after a speaker came it was abuse. I confronted my mom. She threatened that if I told anyone I would lose my grandmother (my primary carer) and sister (my only friend). I believed her 🙁
When I was 12 and got caught self harming, my parents finally sent me to a therapist. It took almost a year of sessions, because I was very reluctant to open up, but eventually I told her everything and she actually had to take a moment to compose herself after I detailed a few specific incidents of my mother’s behaviour towards me. I knew it was bad, but her reaction really drove home just how extremely bad it was.
Not until I was no contact for a decade did I realize my programming.
Years later, when I saw her again, I could see her little tells. She gets this little smug look and tilts her little fluffy head up and tries to slip the knife in.
I’m an old lady now, but I still have to get on my guard when I’m around that dear little 90 pound good good Christian lady.
I only use the word “abuse” only last year. This was decades of narcissitic abuse btw. What I endured was emotional, psychological and financial abuse…. and not really direct physical abuse although it does affected my physical health. I think the most common recurring thing was all of us have some sort of body dysmorphia issues projected on us by our abusers
And it was especially difficult because narcissists ALWAYS view themselves as the abused victim. We’re all here aren’t “victims” for them. They always had it worst and bad than all of us combined. That’s gaslighting.
I’ve always known my nparent was emotionally and verbally neglectful but it took becoming an adult to realize “I was abused throughout my entire childhood”. Being a kid in the middle of it is so different than being an adult reflecting back on it. But still, I knew my n wasn’t normal.
I had a feeling that we weren’t normal but I had no one to compare to or really talk to about things. Mostly I was embarrassed because there was no way to explain things without sounding like a brat. Or without getting unwanted attention and ruining my whole family. And I really thought I was the one ruining everything.
About a year and a half ago it all just made sense to grown up me. And I’ve been trying to deal ever since.
It was kind of both for me. I knew it was abuse as a child.There was a very special episode of a sitcom where one of the main characters’ friends was being abused at home and it seemed less bad than what I was experiencing. At the end of the episode there was a number to call for help- I memorized the number. The next time my mother threatened me with violence I threatened her by yelling the number and telling her I was going to call it. Magically the physical abuse stopped for a while.
Somehow in the years that followed I forgot. I became a young adult and I was busy dating and living life. Then memories started coming back. It wasn’t until I was in my late 30s that I could say that I was abused as a child and not feel as if I was wildly exaggerating. I told someone I was strangled on the dining room table by my mother, and she only stopped when I kicked her as hard as I could in the stomach. They looked horrified and told me strangulation was extreme abuse. That’s when I started understanding the fact that I was abused.
It’s still difficult to accept though because they weren’t abusive 100% of the time, and I really still wanted them to love me. It’s a terrible mindfuck because on one hand they are feeding you and buying you clothes and on the other hand they are physically and emotionally torturing you. Stockholm syndrome I think it’s called.
Always knew
I asked my mom for help with dads yelling at 3 years old, I didn’t know the word then but I know now I asked for help and protection from verbal abuse. She told me to handle it myself, and I couldn’t bring myself to. 3.
There was a lot of spanking I definitely normalized, some teenage smacking less so.
40 years later I’m still peeling back layers, I think dad was the classic easy to spot narc but my mom was the emotionally codependent snake in the grass narc that played a protector role.
I figured it out in college. A friend at the time and I were sitting in a Cookout between classes talking about life and that’s when I learned the funny stories I had from growing up weren’t funny but incredibly traumatic.
I only realized once I started therapy at 21 and my therapist told me that every story I’ve told about my father is textbook narcissistic behavior… I would’ve just thought shit was toxic in my house but not abusive. It was a whole mindfuck and 2 years of rage before I could actually calm down enough to pretend I loved the fucker. I’m biding my time until I’m able to leave.
I’ve understood that my father (n) wasn’t kind to me, but it wasn’t until a few years ago it dawned on me that there was a term for what he did, which is abuse. Two years ago everything fell into place. I now understand my mother’s part in it – the fact that we have considered the family a normal family has kept me gaslighted which I now realise. The family narrative was that we were a normal middle class family, my brother got a good education and got himself a family and I was the troublesome kid who caused so much trouble by running away, being negative and depressed, suicidal, by drug abuse and numerous failed relationships and never had any children. My life was a battlefield and such a struggle. When I finally learned about narcissistic family systems and the roles assigned to family members it was mind blowing. I learned everything that goes on in a system like that and of the consequences of it. That’s when I understood and could put actual words to what happened to me; abuse and neglect. I was 58 when that fell into place. Talk about years wasted…..
I knew it was abuse but nobody ever acknowledged it or even listened to me. I didn’t even know what to call it or why it was happening until I was 37 and am 40 now. Cut contact last year.
I thought it was normal parenting, and didn’t really understand, and/or would not believe the extent of head fuckery that went on until I got validation in therapy in my 50’s.
growing up I didn’t have a clue. I thought it was normal for families. I did question small things based on my classmates experience like all the other 3rd graders took showers alone while I was still being bathed by my n mom,etc. I thought abuse was only physical and obvious like being beat like in movies, where physically they stopped doing things after I turned 8 and even then it wasn’t horrible. I watched a YouTube video at 18 by pysch to go about types of abuse, mental abuse and narcissistic parents and immediately realized every single thing was my life and my n mom to a T.
No, I learned only recently at 26. I never realized not being allowed to have friends, socialize, getting beaten, having no emotional support, needed to take care of bills since 15 was not normal. My mother manipulated me through lies to believe this. She kept me from getting a job, from living life. And she wanted to continue but at one point I understood.
I hope she burns in heal for the life she stole from me.
When I was young, I knew something wasn’t right but I was always gaslit into believing I deserved it/it wasn’t that bad/I was overreacting. It wasn’t until I was 31 and in therapy that I realized just how abusive my upbringing was
It was referred to as “Discipline “. The dictionary definition of discipline is “Loving Guidance “, I don’t think there’s anything loving about flogging your child with the buckle end of a leather belt. It wasn’t until I was in high school that I realised that not all mothers hit & belted their children, in fact, most Didn’t.
Figured it out as an adult, after / with therapy. Then have continued to read and learn.
Before that, spent my entire life wondering / feeling bad about whatever was wrong with me.
I was definitely an adult when figured out that it was abuse. I actually had to have someone else enlighten me. I was honestly shocked. But the more stories I opened up about the more the person was horrified.
But I do remember when I was VERY young…like elementary school age I vividly recall thinking “just make it to 18 then you can get away from her” I would have been too young for that to be common knowledge…but I somehow knew that I could legally get away from her at 18.
I did know but I gained more awareness gradually. I have been living alone for 5 years and every day I learn more of what is what.
I remember calling my dad verbally abusive when I was 11
When I was a kid I didn’t know it was abuse, even as a teen I didn’t really comprehend it as such. I knew something was different about our relationship and my peers/friends with their parents, but other than wishing I had what some of them had, I couldn’t put my finger on it. As a teen I had a couple good friends with similar parents so that really skewed my experience as well, it normalized a lot of things but, sadly, also made my mom not look that bad compared to one of my friends parents.
It wasn’t until adulthood I fully understood and comprehended the depth and breadth of what had been going on my whole life. My nmom was really good at pitching her abusive behaviors and actions as something else, also, blaming me for her having to be or respond a way.
I was 37
I was 37 when I realized it.
Better late than never.