NPD Mother

Dove91801 wrote:Do you have to ask her if she stole it? I would tell her that I lost it and have been going mad looking for it and just ask her if she has seen it.

It´s long ago, I don´t remember I talked about it with her. Probably I mentioned it. Now I have no contact anymore. But about this thing I am thinking about writing her.

One of the things that I find still "leftover" from the past is being hyperalert.

It's the antennae still watchful of how I should act around certain people, particular controlling and negative types. I find myself picking up the "vibes" and if I am not careful I react to that energy.

It's part of being highly sensitive I guess.

Does anyone else have any thoughts ?

Sappho wrote:One of the things that I find still "leftover" from the past is being hyperalert.

It's the antennae still watchful of how I should act around certain people, particular controlling and negative types. I find myself picking up the "vibes" and if I am not careful I react to that energy.

It's part of being highly sensitive I guess.

Does anyone else have any thoughts ?

What's wrong with that? I suppose you have your boundaries now, that's only good!

Sappho wrote:One of the things that I find still "leftover" from the past is being hyperalert.
It's the antennae still watchful of how I should act around certain people, particular controlling and negative types. I find myself picking up the "vibes" and if I am not careful I react to that energy.
It's part of being highly sensitive I guess.
Does anyone else have any thoughts ?

I understand the hypervigilence. I too was like that for most of my life. But some years ago, I decided that I wanted to change that automatic behavior in myself. It wasn't needed any more. It had been useful when I was a kid/young adult and was in danger... when I had to be always scanning the environment for danger, but, as a free adult, I wasn't in constant danger anymore.

The energy it was taking to remain in 'high-alert' was draining me from directing that energy to more productive things. It wasn't needed to be in a mild state of adreniline rush anymore.

This came at a time where I wanted to stop my lifelong practice of being such a multitasker, and develop my skills to focus on just one thing well, too. I wanted to have a more peaceful internal state than the go-go-go stuff I felt inside.

So the timing seemed right.

I began to put myself through exercises I devised to retrain my reflexes away from noticing every little thing. For instance, when someone made a noise in a room, or walked in the door, I consciously restrained myself from looking in that direction. When I was in a meeting or in a restaurant, I focused all my attention on the conversation I was engaged in, and refused to also monitor the conversation going on at the table behind me, or across from me at the meeting table, etc. I used to be able to track multiple conversations simultaneously, and I wanted to reduce my ability to do that - again, it had served me well when I was in danger, but it was fragmenting my life as a healthy adult. I developed many ways to stop diverting my attention away from what was immediately at hand. I knew I needed to do that over and over and over to retrain my brain/neural pathways away from firing off the stimulus all over the room, and instead calmly reside in just one place with full attention there.

I've got quite good at doing that now. In fact, I now teach mindfulness practices and meditation. Who in the world would have ever thought that someone like me, Type A to the max, and with my childhood background, could ever be doing that, and living the way I am?

Just goes to show you that most of us really can change many of the things that we think are 'hard-wired' into us, those deeply adaptive, defensive things, if we're willing to really work at it.

Lifesong

That's quite an achievement Lifesong. A lot of good work.

I find that mothering brought a lot of those old "habits" good or bad, back to me. I became a real wolf mother, fiercely protective but never invasive. NM experience taught me never to be enmeshed.

Yes, it was the danger alert for me too. As a parentified child I was always watching out for the least tipping point of when the environment would blow as NM projected her anger off onto family members. Being around controlling or tense people now I "pick up" their vibes as I am an intuitive and it seems also an HSP.

There is some evidence to suggest that the hyperalert status is part of the PTSD syndrome which I know lingers from the violence in my past. Yet I am under no threat now.

I find it is best dealt with through my creativity and of course that is best done on my own so I don't have that sensitivity at play then.

Lifesong.. Thank you for posting the original description of a narcissist mother. In the 13 years that I have been trying to make sense of what happened to our family I have never read something so telling and precise. I will slowly make my way through reading the rest of this topic but yeesh, it's going to take a while! Many posters and so many similar stories.

Thanks again. The original topic has helped me understand a LOT.

Goldenchild..
Longtimecoming