The Narcissistic Abuse Community

I have been listening to people talking about narc abuse again today.  It strikes me that there is a theme of adults not willing to be adults running through it.

Many of the problems associated with a relationship with a narcissist are really about expectations.  Many of the issues raised are about how things should be with a ‘normal’ relationship.  There is no such thing as a normal relationship.

Let us go through a few of the problems you are likely to face as a partner of a narcissist.

The idealisation phase:

Love bombing:  Personally, as someone who has had a narc around since birth, (sister)  I am well used to being the focus of attention from an empty vessel.  Even when they are flattering you, it is to establish the importance of their opinion, so it is wise to ignore everything.  When I am on the receiving end of gushing, I tend to cut through it very quickly, so that it is impossible to achieve the ‘perfection’ that the narcissist craves with these interactions.  Dominance is dominance, whether it is sweet or sour.

Alarm bells ought to ring the minute you hear how awful their exs were – non-narcs grow out of this by the time they are thirty or so, usually earlier.  In rare cases the exs actually were awful, but with practice you will learn to tell the difference and find ways of exploring the issue by asking what the nice exs were like.  When your narc tells you that they are kind and giving, they are referring to this early phase of the relationship, in which they actually are kind and giving.  They aren’t lying to you, they are just trying to forget the bad bits where they did not get what they wanted, which was an unreasonable level of perfection.

The devaluation phase: 

If you have established that love bombing has no effect, then devaluing is likely to fall on fallow ground as well.  The only other way to get around this is to be better than expectations, and if you look on it this way then your relationship with your narcissist is likely to be more of a personal challenge than a burden.

If they are talking trash about you to other people, it is the typically immature ‘love me’ plea of a teenager, so you find something else to do.  Obviously in some situations it is quite extreme – I will not allow my sister anywhere near me following a false police report, for example – but this is just an extreme example of the same behaviour that these people have adopted since puberty, so I am not sure why all these victims are unaware that they have been dealing with a child rather than a person.

Some people are just promiscuous, whether they are narcs or not.  Jealousy, whilst perfectly natural, is a choice.  You can decide that you are more important than a casual fling, and then make a further decision as to whether fidelity is a priority or not, in which case you are with the wrong person.  You are then free to terminate the relationship and move on.  It is either that or a lot of tiresome negotiation to see if your partner wants to try and be faithful or not. Speaking as someone who is faithful – other people just aren’t that important to me – I have tried official forgiveness and it is largely futile – so either you don’t mind them spreading it around or you leave.  Official forgiveness tends to lead to violence because your narc will not understand that it is a sign of strength rather than weakness.

Discard:

Assuming that by now you have figured out that you are dealing with a selfish, abnormally young and carefree person who is too busy to bother with what you want, you ought to know that this relationship is not permanent.  It does not mean that the narc is evil, controlling or a bad person.  It just means that you made a poor decision in the first place in tolerating what has been a rather extreme training for the rest of your life.

Finally, a lot of people displaying narcissistic behaviour do not actually have NPD.  Being at the wrong end of a narc makes you extremely tough and extremely intolerant of mistakes.  If you wish to investigate futher, I recommend reading some books on CPTSD.  You will find the answers there.  Even if you are a narc, you will benefit from doing this, so I recommend you take this step into filling up that void where the emotional sharing should be. Narcissists tend to be insecure, frightened and lonely as a rule.  They focus on other people to avoid themselves.  Instead of feeling victimised, try taking an adult role in your own choices.

 

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Bad Dream

It is funny how your bad dreams change over time.

I just had a horrible dream that I was asking for permission to propose to some thin, grey man and ended up in a group hug with him and his mother.  It was not fun at all.  I didn’t even like him that much.

I woke up thinking how frightening the prospect of old age alone is, and immediately went to check on my mother.

It isn’t as if I have seriously wanted to marry anybody.  I have never worried terribly much about it, since the weak feelings of the men in my life were returned with equal lack of interest in most cases.

On the rare occasion when I have had strong feelings for somebody, I have either run away or they have not been interested at all, in which case I have done something else with it.  I am not particularly persistent in reality.  I like distance, and I do not have much of a problem with my own company as a rule.

When I returned to the computer, a new page had appeared on my timeline in the advertising section.

I am now a member of ‘Banned by David Avocado Wolfe’ which has almost 100 likes in a very short space of time.  I imagine that if this person keeps advertising their page,  it will run into tens of thousands, since Wolfe is quite trigger happy when it comes to blocking people.  One lady that got in touch with me had just paid several hundred pounds for a trip to see him when she was blocked for no apparent reason.  I set her up on a date with some polite guy that was messaging me a lot at the time.  Apparently she had great legs and was an outstanding lay.  She rejected him, but she didn’t feel as bad about being blocked. He is now living with a morbidly obese nurse who pays his mortgage.

The page doesn’t look particularly pleasant, or as if it is likely to have any interesting posts, but I am intrigued that it appeared on my timeline at all, as I have blocked at least nine David Wolfes over the years to avoid the memes.  I have even messaged at least two offshoot pages to advise them to block me since it appeared that he had such a hysterical reaction.  (I was unaware at the time that it was in fact his wife that blocked me, since I was unaware that he had one in the first place.)

I have also blocked at least 6 hate groups, one of which I found Wolfe posting on.  Apparently trolls are more appealing for conversation than I was.  I would have thought by now that the mere mention of the name would preclude my being a member of any clubs. Evidently facebook’s algorithms need updating

So that is a rather depressing and extremely early start to the day.  I shall do some more work on the game, cats permitting.

Tomorrow I shall have to sit through a meeting in which somebody young enough to be my daughter repeatedly claims that I am a young woman who should let my mother be manhandled by strangers because she prefers dealing with them.  I cannot tell you how miserable the last six months has been, with the one exception of my taking the Wolfe by the throat, so to speak, at the event in Birmingham.

I am quite glad I did it, even though the ultimate outcome is likely to remain negative, for whatever his reasons.

Please tell me when things are going to get better?

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First of the Boris Johnson work

Here ya go.  This is the beginning of the outflow of work on the Boris Johnson project, which has been a very long time in development.  The book will take somewhat longer, so forgive the odd timings.  There is still a lot of artwork still to get off the ground, so it is a relief to get them out of the studio.

Bordello Rhetoric is an extremely heavy box, set on castors, with agate, fabric and glass seed beads; and Call me Al is a carpet for the wall, heavily inspired by Somerset, where I used to live.

Hope you like them!

Ina

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Best Adventure Ever update

I am not quite sure what Sam is supposed to be doing in this one, but I am sure I will find out.

I am usually very neat when it comes to things like this, even when it involves several hundred images.

I think I have covered just about every element of Wolfe’s work in the course of establishing the character.  I am not sure whether players will fall madly in love with him straight away, but I am sure that they will want to be him.

It is not easy to strike a balance with Wolfe, you always have to tread a line between comedy and stifled admiration for the level of achievement.  So far, we are covering more than two decades of work in a few sentences before commencing the adventures themselves, all of which have to be significantly different.

For fans of the series of free Best…Ever books, yes, Kira is also in the game, however she will probably not be meeting Sam as she is busy telling the other half of the story for people who are interested in improving their health.

Between Kira and Sam, the player will be handed quite an armoury of information with which to go forth and amplify.

The story is not just about health, however.  Because of the directly oppositional nature of Wolfe and I, I have incorporated commentary into social interaction, so for players, who I anticipate to be between 15 and 30, there is a lot of material to work through in the course of playing through the many threads.

It is quite mentally exhausting however, I had to think about something else for three days, so I have re-started Mood Machine for a bit of light relief.  It is set in Victorian London and is steampunk inspired.

I may also start the Boris book at this point, since I am now gagging to get back to the original book and have upwards of a year’s reading to do even to get a light coverage of background to build upon.  The Boris book should take me about four months of work, and I have artwork to finish, some of which will take a month or so for each piece.

So, effectively the very difficult jigsaw puzzle that has been the Wolfe saga is becoming clearer.  I do hope that people are willing to put the work into playing it, because I think it is a worthwhile piece of art.

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