It Was An Act

Two videos of the same song.  I couldn't listen to it on here, the thing won't let me, to make sure its right, I put them both up. If you want to listen to one of them, its very good.

I totally get that no contact is a very good rule.  I've done it with my own FOO, telling them to get lost even.  But the difficulties of life can present another problem and I've been researching like crazy to try to solve the problem.  What if you have to be in contact with narcs?  But I keep reading that there is no such thing as "have to".  But I'll tell you my story here and I'm hoping that by writing it, I will get some idea of how to handle it.

I hope you were with me last summer when I posted over and over again about the nasty SIL of DH's. One is up in my popular posts section called, "Its so screwed up."   You can start there and just work backward.  There was discord over me being left out over a situation regarding a trip to visit the brother and his wife, or freak, or whatever you want to call it.  Well, another email, inviting DH from nasty to come and help build a garage with the brother.  Yes, she is the one who showed him her boobs.

We've been down to one vehicle lately and one is in the shop.  Our shop btw, for DH is his own mechanic.  It saves us money, but takes a very long time.  But it was ok.  It was all working out, no big deal.  Until now.  And when he got the email, I became completely authentic with my feelings of being left alone here with no vehicle.  Since I was in my feelings, my pitch went rather screechy and he said, "Well, you can come along with me then."  I had no other choice but to go.  This was terrible and I knew what I was in store for and I was not disappointed in that regard.

The pain shot through me.  Just before we went, I was commenting on other blogs, and I'm afraid I was very melancholy.  But it was ok, and I didn't want to tell anyone what was going on, for I feared I've beated that horse too many times last summer.  Basically, last summer she sent DH an email inviting him to go, with them, on a camping trip.  The email could have been implied that I was to go too.  I posted the email too many times last summer in my blog.  It hurt my feelings, and I was freaked out by it.

But I've learned a lot since last summer.  I got into my prayer closet.  So I went with him.  I went taking all my quilting with me.  I had 2 days of straight sewing with me.  Fortunately, SIL, had to work all weekend.  But in this email it was realized that I was not going on the trip for it was to build a garage it was not a holiday.  But I had to go with him.

So we went.  The trip is 4 hours away straight up north.  It was back to winter clothes for the weekend, which I didn't bring.  I did not know it would be that cold in May.  But it was terribly cold and I had only one set of clothes to wear that were warm enough.  But it was ok, I mean that wasn't the problem.

Its hard to talk about.  The words are pummelling in my head and I'm having a hard time getting it out.  So I learned a lot from last summer.  And in my prayer state I felt that it was no big deal, just sit there and quilt all day.  This I didn't mind to do at all.  But the SIL was there only a few hours in the evening when the guys came in, I did not think for a second that she would get a dig at me, but she surely did.

And it made me feel like I was the bad guy here.  That I'm just a sulking kid who did not get my way. That is what is making this thing so terribly hard.  I was completely in my relaxed authentic full self, and I had not felt emotionally needy.  I was doing great, God was leading me, I was sure I could do this, no problem.  And I did do what I had to do, I stood my ground, I was firm about boundaries and what not?  Want to know what happened that is making me feel so completely stupid?

She started telling DH that he could go for a shower.  He said, "later".  But she kept after him and said she needed him to do it now, for she was wanting to start the laundry.  He said, "ok" and he went for his shower.  I sat there dumbfounded.  I know he was doing some work and probably needed the shower but I was completely ignored.  And I was a guest in their home too.  So I didn't know if I was to say anything, but I felt like shit.  Then she went after the other brother for his shower too, and proceeded to do the laundry.  But these guys worked all day, and I felt like I didn't need a shower and I didn't take one.  It was ok, maybe I was just imagining being ignored.  Afterall, I didn't go on their camping trip last summer, even after it was "implied" that I was invited.

Then the next night she did the same thing.  She ushered all the guys for their shower, naming each by names.  Both brothers were there along with the brother that lived there.  At that point, I said, "Yoo, hoo, I'm here too, don't forget me,"  This came flying out of my mouth and I can't understand it. She got angry.  She said, "Oh, no one is leaving you out, Joan.  You want a goddam shower, go take a goddame shower."  I said it felt like I was being left out.  Then what came out of her mouth next would probably burn the computer up, it was so terrible.  Hurled a bunch of insults and screaming.  I just sat there.  Actually, I wasn't really listening to what she said, it was a freak fit.  She seemed to get offended by the yoo hoo part.  Or something.  No I'm just kidding.

All of a sudden I can remember what mother used to say when someone was throwing a fit.  narc or not mother used to say that was just an act they were putting on, or they are just doing that.  This is a projection.  When mother used to throw fits, this is what was happening it was all a big act.

I knew the SIL was putting on a show for everyone who would listen, as I was not listening to her, really I wasn't, I was just aware there was a freak fest going on.  I saw the brothers scramble to leave the room, DH announced that he was going to bed, and I saw another brother, head to the kitchen for a drink to escape the freakshow that lasted for way too long.  And she didn't face me while doing it, she started to head outside during it, then went outside and shut the door and I could here here screaming and making accusations outside.

Wow, thanks mother, I think, for that fine bit of knowledge.  Mother used to freak out all the time, and this is not my first dance with a narc, and actually this SIL is pretty tame in comparison.  I just shrugged my shoulders and went on with my evening of quilting.  I felt better actually.  After awhile her husband approached me and talked to me for awhile about what I was making.  He looked tense, and I was just wanting to get to a good place in my quilting to stop for the night.  He talked about the quilting and that was it.  Then went and sat back down.  The other brother was sitting on the couch too, with a freaked out look on his face.  Eyes wide, ready to run.  And I was completely ok about the whole matter, but it worried me that the men felt alarmed, but I was fine.  DH was sleeping, I think.

Not too long after that, I went to iron a few pieces.  These pieces were getting too hard to iron, the pressing was difficult and I found myself procrastinating on them all day, and there were 48.  But after the freakshow, as I started to iron, I realized that it was very easy to do.  During the day, I had to stop for my shoulders would be aching.  But this time I powered through the rest of them.  And there was more than half left.  Was that seratonin?  Was I stressed over the weekend of being ignored like this that the tension got to me?  And now this thing relieved the stress?

I started to ask myself if I was enjoying this.  If I want to be the good guy here and didn't want to recompense evil for evil, why was I in a happy state of mind?  The "yoo hoo," was probably very inappropriate of me, for I knew I could have handled the situation much better.  It is a matter of opinion if I was inappropriate.  I even prayed about this when I went to bed and I asked for God to help me understand.  Suddenly I felt it in my heart that whether it was right or wrong, I did the best I could.  I didn't get it right.  But it wasn't confrontational, it was kinda in the middle.  This is so hard. I was faced with difficult circumstances and I did the best that I could.  I did the my best to not be passive aggressive, and it was all I could muster.

But at the end of it all, let's just switch a normal person with SIL.  Would a normal person have acted that way?  Even about the shower thing, since I was a guest in their home.  How would a normal person be in the same situation?  Would she have included me too?  Since she was naming off names, and that I felt was a bit of a covert tactic, one that was designed to set me off but escape the others notice.  And I always felt she was a narc, even way back in the beginning, when we first went to go visit them.  Did this time, the mask came off?  Was I going to look like the good guy now?  In my prayers that night it came into my heart that I am not to count on that.

Ok.  So the next night after her job was done, it was our last night stay there.  I was in the house doing my sewing, and she stayed outside after work, and I was wondering why she was not coming in.  I was alone in her house, and I felt uncomfortable.  I saw though the window that she was standing outside waiting for the guys to come in.  Wow, ever weird, here she had the perfect opportunity to go at me alone and she did not even take it.  Something was going on.  I went outside, in the clothes I wore for 3 days and never even a shower even.  I walked up to her and said "hi", and she said hi, then she went inside.  I was going to follow her inside, and I did not know, but I felt I was stalking her, so I stayed outside till the guys went in. It was weird.  We all had dinner leftovers, and I proceeded to walk to the couch beside her with the laptop.  I sat down and went into Anna V's site and immediately I went and read the part of "disproportionate responses of narcs".  I just happened upon it.  So I started to read.  This is all an act.  It was confirmed for me right there in Anna's articles, for I remember the SIL being fine and talking to everyone, but me, right after the hurling insults.  It was like she had taken a good shit, and now she felt better.

I'm from the family that like to "tell you off".  It feels good and relieves that pressure.  That's what I was told by my FOO anyway.  But, and here is the crazy part, is that you don't have any right to tell anyone off.  But they do, and somehow they have formed it in their mind that it is ok.

You know, I've been in constant prayer this whole time, and my body is screaming at me that my "yoo hoo"  shouldn't have created such a stir.  For a normal person, it would have only shaken them out of their thoughtlessness, and they would have realized and felt terrible about leaving me out.

Another thing was confusing me, is that she offered me dinner and coffee a few times when necessary, and didn't leave me out of that.  But, listen, narcs do that.  The evil cannot exist on its own, it must have to exist with the good.  That is the only way it can survive.  I know this is the only way we will survive being slaughtered.  We must get it out of our heads that all they do is be mean.  

So all the guys are ok with what she did.  Even DH, and he even told me that "no, she did not need to hold your hand to have a shower."  That was apparently one of the insults she hurled at me, that I was not listening to.  Such an insulting thing to say to me.  Can you imagine?  But DH has come a very long way from when I first knew him, but he does not believe in judging people and he gives everyone the benefit of the doubt.  But he did manage to take hold of a neighbour that was being greedy with him, after I had told him about it.  After I spent 2 years going on about the man.  It came as no surprise in the end that the man using him to do the snowplowing was not paying him at all. That one was a rather serious problem in my life, and I wrote about it one time in an article I wrote called, An Evil Narcissist.  Well, that guy is gone from our lives.  Do I expect him to get rid of his brother the same way to get rid of the SIL?  No, I don't.  To tell the truth, authentically I just want the problem to go away.  I want him to acknowledge the fact that I wasn't complaining for she was not wanting to "hold my hand for a shower."  You know, she might not be that covert, but all this goes way over people's heads.  Or that my feelings got hurt, its no big deal Joan, get over it.  I mean its disgusting.  And I feel like I'm the bad guy too, how everything panned out.  I am not making this up, I am not the type of person that goes around stirring up trouble, I have very good associations with people.

So I prayed to God about the camping trip in a few months, and I wonder what shit she will stir up. But God only told me, "strength he will give me in season."  And this is hard to accept when something bad is about to happen.  I'm sure of it.

Overall, I think I handled everything very well.  My "yoo hoo" might not have gone over very well with the guys, and DH is rationalizing everything to a T.  It makes sense that she got "pissed off", but I'm sure that is not the way he would have been if he was her.  But he has completely put that out of his mind.  So this makes everything very hard, but I strengthened my boundaries in the whole mess, I did stick up for myself but everyone seems to want to take away my right to do that.  It looks like she is the one with all the rights, and I was not letting her have me for supply.

My connection to narcs in my world has been very good as of late.  But she is one that was there in the beginning, just at the beginning of my awakening, so she got a little snack and she is trying for more.  But she is not going to get anymore, I am making darn sure of it.  I was not affected at all the by freak fit.  I was just wondering why it startled everyone else.  But then I realized that they don't know, and they think she is pissed off for real.

But I felt really good till I learned that DH was making her behaviour ok with him.  Then I started to feel all dead again.  I looked like the bad guy.  On top of that, I feel like I've lost my emotional resources and now am now fighting to get them back.  I feel that my personality sucks and that was evident in the way the other guys treated me.  I'm rather dramatic at times, but not all the time, this is just one of my parts, and this is starting to bother me.  But as I have learning that parts of you that you are unwilling to express or be, these are the parts that must be expressed, for you can't be whole otherwise.  I am ashamed of my personality at times, but I mustn't be, for this takes away my value as a person, and I mustn't ever try to suppress or hide any my parts.  But its hard, you know, given such an environment I was in.  So what happened is that she was unable to tear me down, so she got her minions to do it for her.  This sucks.  So this is something I have to build up again.  It is definitely a challenge, this being enough.  But it is true, whether I feel like it or not, I am enough.

And DH and I haven't even fought in many months.  I talk to him openly, I don't hold anything in, and he has gotten used to my expressive self.  But not anymore.  We fought about it now.  I was worried that we never fought for a long time, so now we are, so its ok really, got to be my authentic self.  I'm not going to try to hide my feelings about this, it will just make it worse.  I just want him to acknowledge my feelings here, and he isn't.  I know I wasn't perfect, I don't need to apologize for what I did, so, I guess some people just want to go with the flow.