Telling others of autism spectrum?
 

My luv has autism and has learned to hide it in some ways. Has learned of this later in life.

There is this suspicion that the autism, genetic, is in his family in the older and younger generation. Nobody has said anything about this. I don't think anyone knows.

I have felt so far it is a good idea to not say anything, but I don't know if it is because there is a person in his family that's famous for creating all sorts of bad stuff, and I Know if this person learns he has it it is all going to become some kind of circus, instead of something good coming out of it. After everything my family been through I can't stand the thought of drama and basically want us to be to ourselves.

Still I feel a sort of responsibility that other family members have the right to know, as it is genetic, in case it can help in some way.

I have told him I will not say anything unless he would request that I do. That I respect his wishes. I will do what he wants me to do.

He himself has not taken it as a bad thing at all, instead he has felt at home and finally understood why he has been, is the way he is sometimes.

Even if several family members goes around without the diagnose he has told me as if he wants to explain that when this person says, does that and when that person says, does this - that it is because he think they are like him, and he understands them.

He wants to explain to me that it is not because they are rude or don't like me. I have told him several times that it's fine, that I understand. I know that the trouble-maker in his first family has done all sort of sick things to deliberately make me feel as if I am not wanted there and I leave it at that.

I think that will the trouble maker find out it will try to use it so that my luv looks stupid and so will then the others we suspect and he is not stupid nor is the others. I know from experience this trouble-maker will use what ever it can get it's hand on and turn it into something bad.

I don't want him to be stressed out in any way, and as we have one clear trouble maker from his first family I just know there is a high risk of that happening.

I have had just this urge, instinct to keep our little family to ourselves, but also the responsibility to at least share this with our own generation so we can help the younger, if need be.

My luv does not have all the answers yet, is waiting for that, further progress. Is it better perhaps to not say anything until all that is done with?

My friends son has Autism badly he is now 33 but he cant be left alone he has got no road sense. and his speech is fading he stammers a lot now.
I could see that he was different from a baby he wasn't progressing as other babies were.it took until he was 7 years old for him to be diagnosed after he was hit by a car,
My friends cousins son had Autism so i asked if there was Genetic link between them she said no. because it had been no where else in the family.
her cousin is totally dependent on his mother.

Her uncles daughter became pregnant they did tests and said the baby is fine.
she didn't want anyone to know so they kept it quiet. the baby was born he has Autism also
her other cousin had a little girl she has Autism but the doctor has only now admitted that their is a Genetic link.

Some people are happy for others to know but others are not you have got to take it on a one to one case



Namaste

Be positive and overcome obstacles with love in your hearts. Negativity will never overcome the positive, be aware of that, turn a blind eye to the hate and continue to love no matter what, in the end love shall prevail.

Much love
utopia

In my opinion, you are doing the right thing by respecting his wishes

However I could see why you would feel internally conflicted about it

As Native Spirit has rightfully said, must take it on a one to one case

Someone outed me a few years ago and it felt pretty terrible at the time. Actually two people outed me, one on this forum and the other was my old boss.

I'm embracing of my autist label now, a few years later and those around me have come to terms with it also.


I remember the I'm feeling of being quite hurt and shocked by someone else's outing of me before I was ready though.

It's been a few years for me as an adult, female autist and I still struggle with acceptance because I've been masking for my entire life and passing as "nuero typical" for a very long time.

I think it's important to be sensitive of the needs and desires of the person you're in connection with.
Talk to them and ask them how they feel.


I felt quite hurt when my old boss outed me because she also seemed to use it against me as well and I felt quite vulnerable and manipulated in the workplace in the aftermath.

It can be quite traumatic to out a person in front of others, especially if they are still coming to terms with it themselves and also because we do still get discriminated against alot, especially in the workplace in my experience.

Thank you both very much, Native Spirit and utopiandreamchild, I agree with you both, and thanking you also for letting me have an insight in how it can be in other families. Love is the key, but so is understanding, when we don't understand/ignorance things can go wrong very fast, and it is a good reminder that to not think the worst then, but think positive despite :) I know I have some work to do on my self to at least if I can be neutral (I mean neutral is better than negative, and in time maybe, just maybe, I can move on to being positive, hopefully).

As for me I realized as a child that something was different with someone else in my family and that this someone could not help that. Perhaps because I was a child I could see things differently than the adults. I remember the adults being so frustrated, angry, not understanding, pushing and the grim effects from that. Now looking back it is so clear to me.

I could agree in silence that some of the things that someone did could appear to be wrong but I could also see that that was not the intention at all why it did it like the grown ups thought.

That someone has had, has still such mental problems but the real diagnose was for years missed. I think had the grown ups understood early on what this really was I think it could have been helpful indeed even to prevent or to make the other conditions weaker.

I have understood that I like everyone else go "where home is". What is familiar. Why I found my luv to be "home" to me.

My luv has said before that living with me was so easy and that I seemed to understand him and he could not understand what I saw as problems in the relationship was taking a real toll on me, as I guess he was used to a lot worse. He thought we had it "so good" when he began seeing a change in me. I know now his natural take to take distance from people could both be because of bad experiences in his past (that he now knows how to avoid like a ninja), but also that he relates differently. I've been one of the few he has brought in closer which I sort of took for granted. But when it has been about some other things I have completely failed to understand, as I could not go pass my own emotions, reaction and he did not exactly communicate. I know now that had I only known back then some of those things that I have had a very strong reaction to, caused insecurity in me, made me withdraw from him, was not at all his intent. Had someone without his diagnose done that, someone who for instance knew social codes, the message would then have been clear to me, and that was how i read him off then (but really again just feeling my own emotions, my own hurt). But that was not his intention, not his message. Not what he wanted me to experience, go through. He has told me he now gets why I changed.

I just don't want anyone else, especially the younger generation, to go through something similar, to be misunderstood.

That's terrible :icon_frown: Sorry to hear that, RedEmbers

Hi RedEmbers and Izz! I'm so sorry you were exposed to such horrid treatment by that boss RedEmberas, too the friend, and you make a very good point. That is too what I am afraid will happen, that the troublemaker/a narc will if get the news of this transform it into something bad, a tool to abuse. The troublemaker/the narc has done several times, exposing a child, to make others laugh at it, and point out it's vulnerability. Sometimes a vulnerability it did not even know was suppose to be a vulnerability for it to then later as it was seen as something bad, to be laughed at, then got to be a vulnerability, that I then and others had to work and work on making the child not see it as something wrong. This why today I will not allow any child in my home to have any unsupervised visits with the troublemaker/the narc.

you two must have written here while I replied before, did not see it til now:)
thank you so much

Well done asearcher - you are, for your luv too, the one who puts the wrench in to break a certain cycle of limiting beliefs from being passed down :hug2:

AW, thank you Izz :) I'm trying, or at least I am proud to write we are trying (my husband and I) these days.

It has been a matter for discussion though. I know that even other family members, adults, has fallen for the whole glitter show that the narc parent would somehow spare the grandchildren. No, that is not how it works. I would end up in a fight once with my luv after an incident where he had been so used to it, or been so focused on something else he had missed it. The truth is too ugly to realize. Everything is the opposite. that can be too much to take in, and one rather blame one self or think straight away "No, it can't be true", yes it can, and it is.

One thing i would do, I confess, is that I would tell my husband before us seeing them that this is what i want you to watch out for, this is what I see is one of your parent's tactics.

One is to favorite one grandchild and do it in such a way to scar the other one (emotionally).

Another is that as soon as the parents to a child leaves the room, during that short amount of time, the narc will do what it has set up to do al along, it is just waiting for that opportunity, and if given, grabs it.

That happened one time when I had to leave the table, the room, and I was back within some minutes. I did not need to be told. I saw the expression of a child. I knew then.

What had happened that time was that the narc begins something that sound nice and endearing, as if it is a protective grandparent. So it gets the rest of the adults on the train, right? Then you can tell that it then slides into something else, there is a sick twist. This has happened to me before.
The narc parent asks leading questions, I answer them. I know something is coming. Then I know I am in this tunnel, caught in the process, and the outline, the punch so to speak, comes right after you are out of the tunnel which is a pure insult, but if it was said at the beginning people would know it was an insult and react straight away.

But the narc is leading...so half way through I knew OK I am in this tunnel right now, but at least i know it.

There are those who don't know it, they can just feel that something is wrong, but they can't figure out what it is. And some think maybe 2-3 levels down, they don't go like me, I go like 10 levels deep down, I wrap things up and take a good look at them. (This has worked for my benefit work related btw). The "little things" are never the little things, they are the proof of what is really going on. The little breadcrumbs.

Same thing with couples. When one leave the room this is show time for the narc.

Anyways I began to prep my luv and said to him I want you to have your eyes and your ears ready and you can tell me then if I am wrong. What happened was that the narc would play right into my hands (yeah!) and the truth of its tactics was revealed even to my husband. About time. Before when he would tell me he was "shocked" I would tell him I don't know how he could be that considering he had always known this parent.

He agrees with me that no child of his will be watched unattended by the narc parent.

Already he has had to cut in and talk louder or remove a child with him. Now finally he is awake.

It is very obvious to him these days what his narc parent is trying to do to his own child.

He can also tell what happens when the narc parent don't get immediate attention, it then acts out like a wild criminal. As soon as this narc don't get attention, don't get to sit on the throne, then it is show time. The narc parent has nearly completely destroyed children's birthdays celebrations, and I don't know how many others events, and always somehow try to make it look like as the narc is not guilty. That somehow this just happened. So even envious of it's own grandchild getting like 3 minutes attention (for celebration).

If my child says something nice or even "thank you" to the other grandparent the narc-grandparent will then try to make my child feel ashamed because the child did not thank the narc-grandparent first etc and it says these things in such a manipulative way. It has to of course say thank you to the narc grandparent first. The narc grandparent has to come first, middle, and last. It is trying to teach the grandchildren this superior order.

The grandchildren that are favorites are the ones that are manipulated and the ones who let the grandparent shine, the ones that are taught this is the good thing to do, that is putting someone else's feelings before your own, that the grandchildren that has some sort of status that the grandparent can use to make the light shine back on the grandparent because of that.

The others - that are individuals with a strong intact and parents that protect them well, who sees this, are less favored. Still of course the narc grandparent make it all look as if always treating every grandchild the same. No, no, no. Empty words. Good words. Words everyone likes to hear. Makes the narc grandparent come off as this good person, right?

My luv has been quilt-tripped and he has had (still has) one or two of those status the parent could use to make the light shine back on itself. This why all the talk about being "shocked", how come this parent can do it to me then? I guess my luv thought I would be treated the same way just because I was his wife? No, not how it works.

I know that it is a common idea that parents don't think their child's partner will ever be good enough for it's child, but it has been pretty clear I have been one of them. I think the narc grandparent would for sure love to have for instance my husband's ex (she has a status) as my husband's current, instead of me, but this triangulation has worked to some extent, but not in another. It is also the same game the narc parent play with other in-laws to try to place them opposite each other, one favored, the other not.

I think it has made his parents hurt or rejecting or something in a way, as my luv had early on declared to me he lived his own life (before me even). He had set up some kind of wall. One can say he was half-asleep, half-awake.

I think the narc grandparent had wanted to continue to live through him, and would have wanted him to make other decisions, and had difficulty respecting the decisions my luv had been taken even before he met me, or how he was to handle some other situations in his life, regarding his work and love life.

One of the absolute best parts about this has been that the narc parent had actually made up a story (that it calls the truth) where I somehow had a role to play in my husband's life before I even had met my husband!

Somehow something had gone wrong in my husband's life before he met me for the very first time and that was my fault.

What it does is that it takes a little bit of truth and then juice it up with pure sick imagination for a completely different result than what was in the actual cook book. And then expect people to try to defend, explain themselves. Brilliant, I have to say. But also very cruel. I got upset. But what does the narc care about that? It's show time! A normal parent would be horrified, that one loves this, love drama, love to see someone cry, as long as it is about the narc grandparent, as long as it can come off with its manipulation tactic it feels just great.

One time someone was crying. Guess who had to fake-cry ever louder? Like loud-loud? The narc-grandparent of course. To me if not before the narc grandparent came off looking like a baby, and not a cute one. Nobody knew why the narc grandparent was "crying" in the first place. This was not suppose to be about the narc grandparent.

My husband has said that he has always thought that for some reason I have made his narc parent act somewhat nervous, that it never knows where it has me. Good. It shouldn't know.

I am trying to think that I will not ask leading questions to a child but let the child think for itself. i can also say things like if you don't want to say anything then don't its perfectly fine, and I try to also encourage a child to express its feelings, thoughts without me at all saying how I feel or think about a situation or what it now may be. That is in the opposite direction of how the narc grandparent works.

One other thing I noticed that this narc tried to do is that it would try to force down it's own opinion, feelings on to my child and not allow the child to have its own opinion and feelings about it even if that child had just as equal right to have that. When the narc tried to do that I cut in between and said what I wanted to say and I then after that removed the child from it's presence. It was just such a typical incident where I could tell this must have been done to my luv and to the others, so that only what the narc thought, felt was what was forced through manipulation to make the child ignore it's own thoughts and feelings. This why too I so many times have watched my husband in the same room as the narc and realize he is just like this ghost there, there is no him there, I can't feel him. In this fog. Numbed and I know what that is like as I used to get that way with an ex (psychopath).

:hug:

Yes I recognize those tactics. Favoritism = triangulation, putting you on guard = attempted confusion and distortion. Abusers like that know how to "work the system" and in this case it's structures. The sad thing is how this effects grandchildren too :icon_frown:

However you are above such things, you see through those layers and layers and layers of distortions -- thanks to your sensitivity, intuition and your protective nature over your children. And it's good that you and your luv are trying to put the holes in the cycle of the vicious dysfunctional system. "those limiting beliefs stop with me / us." You and your luv complement each other, and that complementary nature would put the hole in that dysfunctional system. Well done :hug3:

Do self care and absorb the present joys too :hug2:

Honestly, it sounds like y'all would be better off if you just cut those toxic people out of your life completely.

It's that tactic putting one on guard with unprovoked attacks and then blame shifting :icon_frown:

Glad you're there for your luv in the sense of you're not letting those tactics and restrictive beliefs get mentally spread for the next generation which will also be for the next, next generation

@asearcher - You do realize that this "battle" you have with your "narc-in-law" will never end, right? This person is rather toxic, and contact will negatively effect you and your family. Since having no contact with them isn't a viable option (family), minimizing contact is advisable.

The same applies to your original question I think. You should tell them as little as you can. Minimize what your "narc-in-law" knows about you and your family. Involve them in your life as little as possible. You can't remove your family from them entirely, but you can stay as separate from them as possible.

It seems like you're in close physical proximity to them as well. Perhaps you and your husband might consider relocating somewhere further away? Obviously I don't know if that's a viable option, but it might help if it is.

My mom had a rather toxic sister. Pretty much anyone who had to deal with my aunt wanted to throw her in front of a bus within 30 minutes or so. Often it would take my mom at least a week to recover from one of her sister's visits. I told her she didn't have to put herself through that, and she did eventually end the visits, but continued to talk to her on the phone from time to time. Family's tough to deal with sometimes. Do what you have to do for yourself and your loved ones. :hug:

Sorry to hear that you went through that :icon_frown:

I also think it's important for her luv to have asearcher's influence in breaking that cycle of limiting, restrictive beliefs being passed down to next generation or next, next generation

I know based on observation and experience, even those who distanced physically can still be caught up in certain mental chains. Detachment and a look at those limiting beliefs, stopping their flow is essential too

Btw asearcher tried to reply your PM but inbox full hihihi

Thank you all so very much, I agree with you Traveler, Izz, Justin passing.

Sorry to hear about your mum, Justinpassing, but way to go for her to find that different road to take that works for her :)

This is too also about the whole perfect image.

This is where I feel as if my husband is cut in half, in the process.

For instance when we met and got to know each other I would be open, my family would be open, about some struggles we were having, some problems. He would be sympathetic. He would also be of help.

When he would describe his first family, it was perfect. He would tell me everything was fine. That was good, I thought. I didn't ask.

One time something was not working in his parents home and I said so because it altered a danger for children that were placed there and I wanted them removed from there.

My husband's immediate reaction was that he told me to apologize to his parents because I was rude.

Because of his old ways of just sort of "jumping at me" I was taken by surprise and would at first think oh had i said it in the wrong manner? maybe i sounded angry even if i wasn't, just worried? But I still thought i had a good point to make.

I told him I had no problem apologizing for how I sounded or how I expressed myself, but that the situation was still the same which was that the children needed to be removed, right now (from that area, not the entire home). And I thought that was more important to do first, than to actually apologize.

He was very irritated with me, very entitled, righteous. Everything happened so fast. I found myself apologizing to the parents then. They were sort of silent about it. I did not really feel as if I got a response of any kind.

I have later given this some thought. I know that had I or he expressed ourselves that way in my first family homes, nobody would have thought I or he was rude and that an apology was in place. They would have instead helped me remove the children from that area, it was of a practical manner. I was dumbfound by his attitude and theirs.

I think what had caused his reaction was not only that his family had to be perfect (as he had been taught), but that even the home itself could have no faults to it. :icon_eek:

Everything has to be perfect. There can be no "weaknesses". They don't get that their "perfection" and hunt for perfection is what is imperfect about them.

Yes, perhaps a way to point out to him - in breaking certain restrictive, limiting beliefs and its cycle, succession - is that even with these perceived "perfections" and "high standards", the dysfunctional family member practiced inconsistency and double standards. Inconsistency itself, in communication with others (being a poor, inflexible communicator - as fashioned by the dysfunctional family member) is by itself a form of imperfection. See what happens when you remind him of this alternative worldview

Another way - is to inform him that there be occasions in life when we are called to just lean back and "enjoy the fruits", rather than attempt to exclusively fix at the expense of all else. To have fun and joy, warmth as a family unit. That "leaning back, trusting, empathetic" energy can be necessary. It's not wrong to take in the joys in life, esp after you've put in the labor

Oh for sure. Patterns you adopt to protect yourself are often difficult to see and discard once they are no longer needed. But one of the keys is "no longer needed" - hence the distance from the toxic individuals and situations those protections were created for. You need to leave prison in order to be free once again, both physically and spiritually.

It is interesting to read what you write here Izz and Justin Passing.

Yes it is mental work too. Added: Studies show the further you are located/have your home far away from your parent in laws the better it is. So both physically and mentally.

And for me I think I have stayed in an unhealthy situation for too long and eventually it was starting to tear me down. And now because I still partly see a threat in front of me (as in seeing them again) I am on repeat on old feelings, and I think it stands in my way of healing. Us healing. At the same time I know he can not bring himself to cut off contact. Also how it works with narcs, apparently at least that one, is that when they have hit rock bottom (when you want nothing to do with them), they then "shape up" and start all over again, as if nothing has ever happened before, to then only repeat. I try not to judge because I know that had this individual not been a narc it would not be doing this, and it got to be a narc I believe from being deprived from love, empathy. From what I suspect this goes generations back, so this narc was not the first narc in the family.

I think I have 3 issues here regarding him and his first family (not everyone). There is the narcissism. And then there is the autism spectrum and the perfectionism.

It both touches and pains me at the same time that my husband does things for me, us, and he very often don't ask, he just does them. And it is so considerate of him, we are in his thoughts. He has arranged for everything. And he don't expect even a thank you. When he does does things it is not because he is thinking he is a perfectionist, by now I can tell those things apart. But the sad thing is that I don't think he knows his true value if he was to not do all these things for me, us.

I have been afraid if he is to feel depressed and not tell me and/or anxiety and not tell me. I have noticed that there is only one person in his first family who gets to be sick and that is of course the narc. The rest don't get sick, get it ;). I've never known him to complain when he is sick. I remember I reacted first time that happened. He is just to himself.

There are times when I feel so sorry for him, but he don't want me to. When it was clear he could not as we already knew tell faces apart, I got emotional, couldn't help it, when he said he could see my face and every emotion in it. I don't know how many photos there is of us when he is looking at me (instead of the camera) or wants to take my photo. Or when we are looking at a movie and I can sort of tell he is looking at me instead to then realize he is. It is as if he has a fascination with my face. And here all this time I have thought of the 2 of us he is the one that has the face :)

I'm hoping both he and I get stronger in time both individually and together. The only way is forward. I try to think that despite of everything we still have love for each other, it wasn't killed after all, but we can't subject it to more damage, not now, why I feel this need to be seclusive, and as you too mention to have fun too.

The mental part I see him take it step by step. But I also realize what a waste of time the counseling was before as we did not know he was on the autism spectrum and he could hide things even to himself, now knowing he had what he had. It felt like we had this mountain (with our problems, and his narc) to unravel and it took just so much energy and I hardly had any at the time.

And then I think it is sad to suspect a younger generation in the family having this and going through not being understood, or what it is, and how one think. I guess we have to give it some thought on how to proceed.

:hug3:

I recognize this tactic too

Yes, for dysfunctional energy vampires, only they are allowed to fall apart or blow up. For example one could spend time giving solace to the dysfunctional person, giving a form of unconditional understanding. And the next, the dysfunctional energy vampire could say something like "don't fall apart :rolleyes: mine was more serious, only my worldview is serious not yours" (encountered that from dysfunctional family member and also ex-friend)


Sounds like you would, as you both complement each other

Speaking of mental shackles - sorry, asearcher, I tried to PM you an example about it too, but your inbox is full :hug2: :hug2:

I'm sorry Izz, I've gone through it now, and deleted.:biggrin:

Thanks for telling me.:hug3:

God, yes it is one thing after another, so you have experienced that too, it never ends. Yes, that what they have is more important than what you have, they sort of sneak that right in there. Especially one time I remember how the narc tried to brainwash my daughter like that when I stood my ground. the narc parent can do things to her in such contempt I am beyond furious but it is as if my daughter don't care, as she knows somehow and I guess always known sort of, that there is something wrong. Even my husband who has been manipulated would react at what his parent said and acted out and cut in between and felt sorry for our daughter. he was also asking me later if I thought our daughter noticed what the narc parent was saying, doing (to mock her) and I don't think she did, and he went "God. Good". So maybe this is what it takes - that him, the golden child, gets to see both his wife and a child be treated badly to finally get it?

Even normal things that children get to be afraid of has been something the narc grandparent has been mocking. Imagine what it would do with an autism diagnose - even if it comes from them (the older generation) as it is genetic?

What is wonderful out of all this bad stuff is that he no longer uses the grey stone tactic, that worked for him alone, and now I feel we are no longer apart.

Yes that's why I said that he's no longer just the golden child surviving on grey rock method as the learned survival coping mechanism. He is the father, partner and thus the succession of restrictive, limiting beliefs need to be dissected, broken down, mentally eliminated so that they don't pass to next generation.The work is multi layered and thankfully you're there to stand your ground for your daughter

I'm glad your luv is breaking away from that old tactic :hug3: :hug3:

Thank you so very much Izz.

I hope in time my husband make a decision on what he wants to do next regarding the autism and how it is up to him who to mention it too and how to work that out.

Like me he has always been focusing on wanting to be a good parent. Even that is something that the narc parent has tried to mock him for, as if that would make him not man enough. So before "the audience", the people "out there" the narc parent tells people of how wonderful the son is, in private try to tear him down and has even tried to stand in his way of co parenting.

I have also sadly heard that the narc parent tells others too that it don't think my husband is man enough as it does "women things" like taking care of his own child. How can a man who knows how to take care of his own child not be man enough? How does that work? If he is man enough to make a child, he is man enough to care for it, IMO.

I don't like how this narc parent view men and what men should be about. Let each man decide that for himself. Let each family decide for themselves what works for them. Everyone do what they can do in the circumstances they are in. IMO the grandparents has had their run and I wish to keep them out of it. They have once made their family. Now it is our turn. That they do not have "rights", what we give to them of the generosity of our hearts is a "privilege". It is up to us to decide who gets to be in and who gets to be out. We're the one responsible for a child's well being.

I had to work on my husband for him to start to see it that way instead because he saw us all as one and that has been part of the problem. Because honestly that narc was crashing through our doors to destroy our family and my husband needed to wake the hell up.

He says it is no point bringing this up with the narc parent because he knows the narc parent always has to be right and only wants to fight, to bring more pain into the family. They all say this: the narc parent is only looking for a fight. I once told the narc that this was it's family it was doing this to, not strangers. It's family. Why? No answer of course. Now I know it is a narc (I did not know what narc meant even back in the days) so of course it sees us as objects, an entitlement to play with. Little as if we are in the narc's dollhouse and it is playing with us. It is so sick when I think of it. Then again it is a mental disorder.

It is the opposite of what any parent of authority in a family should be about. Who enabled this narc parent to sit on the throne? Who? They do. And the partner. The other parent is very secluded with the narc parent, as if they are a team in one way, not in another. When it comes down to it it will go with the narc parent. They are tangled up in one another in a way.

The narc parent believes it is at the throne and look down on all of us and is to decide. What my husband meant was we had to go around the narc parent. Perhaps that is a way to say in time what needs to be said, but I too fear in time it will get to the narc parent's ears anyhow and that is when the whole circus will begin. Maybe then each and every other parent's responsibility then to not let that happen. If it does it is on them, not on us. Can't then say we did not warn them what could happen.

Poor these children. It is so awful one has to feel one needs to protect a child from it's own grandparent. And of course "out there" my husband's parents have the most perfect image, one status after another. No problems. Everything perfect. The perfect family.

I can only hope that God is with us on this one and will somehow help us find a way.

:hug3:

I'm sorry again to hear this, asearcher. Remember too to honor your protective nature and your "radar" - your life purpose likely includes something of the nature of breaking these toxic karmic patterns from being embedded unto the next generation. Hope that was okay for me to share (intuitively) :hug2:

Yes absolutely thank you so. I needed that. I have felt and still feel this is getting strong and stronger voice,energy in me, not wanting a daughter of mine to grow up in that kind of atmosphere where there is this sick fixation and crossing boundaries on their bodies, as it is to my sorrow i have noticed a more fixation on the bodies of the females in the family than then males. Why, one might ask? because the narc feels entitled to somehow. my husband don't even react when i have told him i think the comment on his mother's body was out of hand and this mother just takes it, goes yes...just agree with the harsch criticm she is given when she in fact looks the same if not better than the partner, even if of course the partner make it out as if it looks better than her.

But that is not to say the rest of us will, agree and just take it. Why should we?. And what kind of message are they sending to the grandchildren? I don't want this around nobody. Had someone spoken that way to my mom that would have been the start of a war, I can tell you. It would be total lack of grace. She would not have stood for it. Either would any man from my side of the family. We don't talk about bodies that way and certainly not of each other's. I feel this is a legacy I want to give to the next generation instead of my husband's sick stuff. I did not notice any of this before I had my baby, then the masks came off. They know what they are doing. They can chose not to. But their sickness just has to be projected around to make us sick too. And they start doing it to you when you are trapped.

:hug: :hug:

Yes, part of your life purpose right there! :hug2:

This is what I like about 2022 - things being unraveled and unveiled. I also think I myself found more about my own life purpose

You have got good advice to cut ties with toxic people. As Justin Passing said you cannot cut them off completely when they are family members but you can limit them as much as you can. I no longer ring my sister in law or email her. I am polite to her but I keep my distance. When I need to contact her by email I keep it brief. If you can do that you will feel better.

Thank you Astralsuzy. I am contemplating on cutting them out entirely out of my life as it is still a trigger for me the way it is now. He has family members I have a good relationship with so that could work. My husband can work it out any way he likes. I am done pretending and putting up with being treated badly. But agree with you minimum and neutral contact is good if one now has to stay in touch.

Also, as I said, asearcher, your "radar" is actually the greatest gift - never let anyone shame you about it

Our "radar", inner voice and intuition - ultimately what liberates and saves us from the darkness of certain situations, even when it's a darkness that others can't detect or try to talk us back into

Thank you Izz, that is true. It has been important to me all my life to treat people good, strangers too, so I guess that is too when I notice these sort of actions, as subtly or blunt they may be, as offensive.

We do all have a responsibility, accountability on how we treat others. Mental abuse can and does cause victims of it not only mental scars but also physical from the stress.

As narcs and other abusers knows when to turn it on and off it is a deliberate decision to do so and I hope they will be accountable for it some day in a heaven even if they say nobody will judge you there. That karma will do its thing too. As long as they chose to be that way that they will start to pay instead of the victims.

Somehow something happened inside me after I wrote to Astralsuzy about me contemplating no contact. It is still too early to say, but I felt an inner peace. Before I have been on and on.

I realize this is the decision for me. All contact through my husband. If and when I will see them I will stay neutral and focus on other things. There will be an absolute minimum, if none at all. I will act accordingly what is best for me. There will be no triangulation. There will be no favorits of thinking they have any rights to the grandchild sort of thing. That game is over and out.

This has all been accumulating events over the years of mental abuse from really one stranger (the narc parent) and too in some cases the allowing/enabling parent, because when you do nothing you approve of the mental abuse going on.

This accumulating mental abuse over time has caused me to develop a worse mental state and for that I hold my share of accountability but mostly I do hold it against not just the narc, it's enabling partner but also very much my husband for allowing this all to take place. They will be i hope one day accountable. Then again I can see that the parent and my husband have been enablers because they too have been victims, manipulated, given up their own power, their own voice, and taken on an inferior position and therefor allowing the narc to do further abuse not just to them but to me and even the younger generation.

My daughter is funny. She has a way of saying suddenly to me as she passes me by (has happened 2-3 times now) "I forgive you". I have been dumbfound and asked her what does she mean? (We have not been fighting). Then it can be about me not having heard her or something else that really makes no difference. She has humor in her eyes when she says it. I end up saying "Thank you" and smile too. I think she is on to something. That she knows I don't know better, but she makes me aware of it, you know? And just goes "I forgive you". So this is what I contemplate doing to my husband and his other parent "I forgive you".

I think what my husband and his other parent has in common is that their radar to protect when someone "sticks up" is very different from mine. I go to verbal attack to the abuser, always has been. I see red. I was that way in school too. if someone was bullied I attacked the abuser/s. My dad was the same way.

Now finally my husband is more protective of me and reacts accordingly instead of in his own fear becoming angry with me for sticking up my head to get down. So process on him though.

I think karma and love goes hand in hand. As all the time my husband was allowing this mental abuse to take place on me it hurt me and changed me. Because he was in on it, it was mental abuse from him as well. What happened was that my love for him went down. I distanced myself from him. This he felt. This hurt him. But I told him before I think I loved him too much before and he regulated that love so I would love him accordingly to how he deserved feeling loved while doing what he did to me. So first he was hurting me. But then karma made it so it was hurting him instead. Perhaps it was the hurt he needed to feel to know there was a price to pay for not doing anything. Not doing anything and stand by when someone you love is being abused is an action as well. It is a decision. Often it is being portraid as if no decision is made but it is and it is a conscious one based on where they stand in their inner process.

So one day I believe if not already here on the earth years just like my once dear ex friend while I was in the relationship with a psychopath who said, did what she did to me to his fortune, they will pay too. There will be karma on them too. They will pay. Universe has a way of regulating and figuring that out. Even if they can claim they were in a fog, they didn't know better, had they truly known what was going on they would have taken action. This is all the laws of the Universe. I only felt it. I felt the laws of the Universe go through me and causing the right karma for these relationships. Ain't nothing I can do about it. I just felt it. It went through me.

I did give my ex friend one last chance but during so the psychopath still showed he had one foot in and made contact. That was not suppose to happen. I was not safe, still after several years of silence. And just like before, it was as if he thought he could just start the movie all over again. That must be part of their handicap, that their disorder don't let them know it does not work like that. That you see through that. To me that was scary.

So then on top of that I think "I forgive you", just like my daughter, for not knowing better, and then I feel better myself. It is released. I release it into the Universe and out of my body, and trust that energy will be taken cared off. No longer stay as a poison inside of me. It has to be released.

My earth-love for my husband will hopefully improve, get stronger over time with him making the right decisions, rebuilding himself on how I should view him. The old him made my earth-love go smaller, first I paid the price of that, the hurt, and then him, karma on him then. But I had not treated him the same way. This why maybe his love for me was stronger, why he did not want to let me go but asked for another chance, and said he was going to change. So now we have to rebuilt everything, and hopefully this rebuilt will be stronger and different, and not just me protecting him, but him being the husband and the father we need him to be. I am sure on a higher level my soul loves his eternally, but down here karma rules and there is no escape from karma. What bad they do to others will be done to them.

I hope our past will not stay in the way of our future and going forward, but I feel that the narc has not changed, but I refuse to have it stay in my way. I must place my energy into the relationships that works and the relationships that has hope. There is no hope as far as the narc is concerned. I see the relationship for what it is. And I don't care anymore. It is over as far as I am concerned. even if a narc think it can keep its game up, just start all over (I know that was how the psychopath also worked), just start the movie all over without having resolved anything or taking accountability for anything. Not how it works. I have been in that movie before. They can't fool me. And now I am not really in it. The narc can restart the movie all by itself. I won't be there to play against. I make my own rules this time. I won't bend to my husband if he ever comes up with something I don't want to do. I won't do it. I won't let myself be quilt tripped, manipulated to do it. I have told him this is your family, this is your ****. Don't place it on me. I will separate us if it comes down to that. Support him, that I will always do. But I wont let myself be dragged into something. There is and will be en ever firmer line. I understand that he will have to jump in between now and then as far as his obligation and his love goes to his parents, first family, and that's OK. That is his. His business. Not mine.

I think in time everyone in the family will see the narc and its enablers more or less for what this whole thing is anyways. It is not just me who sees. I know it takes longer for most, and I forgive them for that, but they will get there. One of the things why the narc has such a hold on them is because they do not want to think the unthinkable, that a person can be like that. Or that they can be manipulated like that. They can too be lost in the fog, unable to see straight and unable to have enough strength to fight their way out of the fog-grip. I know in all honesty what that was like. I was this way when my ex, the psychopath, asked for a time out which was only his way of pushing me down further, I know now the psychiatrist was right - he had no intention of letting me go. And it was a surprise to him how fast and how furious I got my strength and clarity back. But I did not do that alone. I had the psychiatrist. And I had the silent support of my family. The rest I rebuilt, stronger. But he could not believe it. That I would say goodbye to all that, that life, all those friends. His mistake. My fortune. He slipped up. He thought I was weaker than I was. The abuse also gets stronger as they feel they loose control over their partner. On the surface I was only there, but in my mind and heart I was not. He was loosing it. And it irritated him. It is all in our heads anyhow. We are as strong as we decide to be. I decided to be strong. I shift in my thinking. And I was already gone. Nothing kept me there. The power of the mind. That he could not have. He could only have what I gave to him. And now I gave him nothing. He would try to intimidate me back by doing crazy stuff, one time even a stranger came to say something to me in a store, sent by him I think, still today it is a blur, how that could have happened. He wanted me scared. He wanted me to think what ever he was involved with that all those people could be anywhere, anytime and report back to him about my whereabouts, and that he would work through other people, manipulate them to see me how he wanted them to view me. That he could make or break me, through them. Make my universe. Break my universe. Built me. Destroy me. Also all the subtle ways. Made him pass by gates. But he knew that I knew what he was really saying. It was like that in the relationship and it was like that afterwards. As long as he knew I knew the message got across. Had I told that to the police they would have gone this is not a threat enough. It was not like the movies where it is so blunt like "I will kill you!". The subtle ways was too to partly try to make it out as if I was crazy for interpreting it the way I did, when all along his eyes, his looks, everything told me I was not crazy. That that was exactly what was meant. To think he would even do this to his girlfriend/fiance during a time when he did not even know if I was pregnant or not with his child. All those stress hormones.

That too is alike how this narc parent works - tried to make others see me a certain way, not to allow them to make their own judgement of me, could not afford that they would actually like me. The psychopath would shift from this cold (scare tactics) to hot (great words about love, how much he loved me still etc but I knew they did not mean anything). The constant shift is something I have seen for the longest time in how the narc parent operates and keep it's victims "just there". Even if I had forgotten so much I think from day one what the narc portraid was subconsciously a reminder. I still don't know why I had to go through this, but hope that now it is finally over in a way.

I have noticed they too take actions to limit themselves, to protect their families. We are the next generation. We need to protect ourselves, our marriage, our children. They will wake up. All in it's time. it is just that I got to the finishing line before they. Maybe because of my past and/or my strong intuition. To be fair, my husband's scapegoat sibling was already there. Has been the protector, friend, the believer I needed instead of my husband. Today my husband says he feels ashamed about that. We just have to wait the others in.

I feel the peace. God, was that needed or what.

Im sorry to hear about those experiences, asearcher

About the scapegoat sibling being there for you, yes I thought as much. If you remember during the initial times you shared about this, I immediately picked up that your luv might've been the golden child based on certain behaviors and I was correct about it

As for the psychopath, yes you are right it's not like in the movies. The ways were subtle, and I had told folks that the ways of certain psychopaths / toxic abusers would be subtle - their social intelligence, their networks of enablers, their way of thinking "I would attack anyone who gets close to slipping off my mask" in an over estimated way


Yes I understand. Someone like that would try to filter and monopolize modes of communication to the point when gaslighted one wonders "why are you (energy vampire) making it look like as if its hard to believe others could actually like me?"

Also thank you for sharing asearcher because you made me re-realize again how, my "radar" itself is a gift, a liberation for me ultimately and I should never let anyone or anything shame me away from it ever again

Thank you Izz. You get it. You absolutely get it, being a victim of it yourself. All we can do is warn others or help others maybe with our words while they are caught in it. It is an unusual hell.

I try to think of it right now that the people I love, like, cherish in this world they are the ones who deserve my energy and my thoughts. I think because I have felt the threat for so long that my brain goes in stress-mode thinking on how to avoid further situations, also all the patterns I see in all the tactics, that I have to be one step ahead. It is stressful. And it is making my energy less and I'm becoming less happy.

I still think the absolute very best thing to do with people who are psychopaths, narcissists, sociopaths is to cut them out completely and cut anyone else out that is joined in with them. Shut all gates.

Only the relationships where someone show they want to change and they do change, that can be worth one's extra attention, energy throughout, but the hopeless relationships are not.

I think sadly too in a way in our culture it is unspoken rule that the females somehow will take over their males family in a way, I have noticed this pattern and this is where I rebel. My husband once remember when I sat at the sofa, he came back (after having had an outburst) and he said I pointed at him and said "This is YOUR fault/problem" and that it then hit him that I was right.

I will refuse to be quilt tripped and manipulated any more in what role they all think a wife and mother should have, just as a tool to get back in again. Anyone I see who is with the narc gets to have the door closed in it's face.

I know in the past they have tried out of the willingness of their heart, to make me come back in again but they too have been under the spell of the narc, and begging me one minute to come back to a traditional event, when I have just said no. It don't work that way with me. I can not be welcomed one minute and not welcomed the next and run to them when, if they feel that I am welcomed again. I am a person who deserves respect at all times. Just like everyone else. I have given them way too many chances in the past. And way too many opportunities to treat me badly. They can sit in their own **** for all I care. Hell, they made it. They should sit in it. Not me.

Big hug to you

Yes I have said to others that a psychopath abuser is able to abuse due to the enablers

Figures that my life purpose ties in with coming to terms with trusting my intuition and inner voice. More important than I thought before

Sent you PMs too. Thanks asearcher

Yes I def think you should trusting your intuition and inner voice, Izz. If you have the ability to read people far more than some than believe in yourself, follow your own path. :)

I have so far had of use that I now know all about narcs and the tactics in both my personal and professional life. That is as far as I am concerned the only good thing that has come out of it.