When you are raised by a parent, or caregiver, on the narcissistic spectrum, you have 2 choices: Merge with them. Allow yourself to become an extension of their personality, their goals, their desires, and values. Do as they say. Put them first. Eradicate your own sense of "self", and become and extension of their "mask". This means you will have no boundaries. You will erase the word "no" from your vocabulary. You will most likely develop gut and or autoimmune "conditions", and systemic inflammation because your body will not be able to discern your energy from theirs after a time. You will become a copy. You may live, but you will not live as your "self".
You just summed up the "Greatest and Chiefest Calamity of Our Age!" (Tolkien), in what, couple hundred words? My 71 years of tracking, reading, ruminating, recoiling, redirecting, rejoicing, rejoining fighting, withdrawing, rejecting, being rejected and finally landing grounded, in the gruesome truth of this borg thing stalking humanity, and able to see without abject terror because the Ground is my Witness.
Wow Justice! I have listened and read lots of things on narcissism but this is the best I have seen on the subject! The perspective you bring in this article is just so right on and eye opening, and it says it all in just a few words, wow!
W O W W O W W O W!!!
You just summed up the "Greatest and Chiefest Calamity of Our Age!" (Tolkien), in what, couple hundred words? My 71 years of tracking, reading, ruminating, recoiling, redirecting, rejoicing, rejoining fighting, withdrawing, rejecting, being rejected and finally landing grounded, in the gruesome truth of this borg thing stalking humanity, and able to see without abject terror because the Ground is my Witness.
Wow Justice! I have listened and read lots of things on narcissism but this is the best I have seen on the subject! The perspective you bring in this article is just so right on and eye opening, and it says it all in just a few words, wow!
Thank you, Natalie! I've been working to understand and articulate it for years as I've healed from my own narcissistic abuse.
I'm glad it's helpful for you!