house of bonsai: Duty Calls

June 25, 2008

Duty Calls

The NPR radio show This American Life has probably been my favorite radio show of all time. Given that I'm a total radio fan, that's saying a lot. Episode #334 of TAL is entitled "Duty Calls". Rather than the show being comprised of several shorter acts of 15-20 minutes each (which is typical for the show), "Duty Calls" is one 60-minute act.

It's about an adult son of a very disturbed woman. The mom in this story doesn't sound narcissistic, specifically; rather, more along the lines of severely alcoholic, with a generous side helping mental illness.

But the son's story of the constant impossibility of improving her life, and the hopelessness he encounters, seem pretty familiar to me. Her "bait and switch" techniques seem particularly familiar (i.e., when circumstances line up such that Issue A can be improved, she only wants to talk about Issue B or Issue C; shuffle and then shuffle again).

UPDATE, 12/2017: This American Life posted a sequel to the story.

6 comments:

Anonymous said...: Hi Elise,

I am not kidding when I say...."your blog could have been written by me" ( with the exception that you are,by far,a more eloquant writer)! but the content! The content is so akin to what my life is/has been. I am an only child, in my early 40's with a mother who has NPD...Taxes, outbursts, tantrums, blame...all part of my daily life. I wonder if I can cut and copy yur letters to your Mom and send them to mine? They say so much of what I want to say....I am not sure what to do with her as I am still teetering between my guilt for not being able to make her happy and my need to be a parent to my own two young children. Thank you for your Blog!; 8:31 AM
bonsai said...: Anonymous,

Thanks for your kind words.

The fact that you're an only child must make things all that much more difficult. Reality checks were few and far between when I was a young child, but at least I got some, occasionally, from my brothers. I really feel for you.

Please --- cut, paste, and go for it!!!

I never dreamt when I started this blog that it would get a readership beyond my own friends (and myself...going back and reading my own stuff has been so very, very helpful for me). But people have picked up on it, and some have even found it helpful; the blog now gets, on average, over 10 visitors a day. It's a comforting thing, as well as a humbling thing, to hear from everyone!

Thank you so much for writing. Every time I hear a dispatch from afar saying "that's similar to what I've been through", it is a big help to me, because as I'm sure you understand, A., I've been asked to believe that all of her problems had their root in some failing of mine.

Not so.

Congrats to you for working on figuring out how to "take the needle of the record"...the messages aren't worth listening to. It's great for you, and for your children.; 10:25 AM
Issendai said...: Thanks for the link to the radio program. It was chilling. I'm going to save it to send to people who blame children for not doing enough for families that are stuck in the same trap--sometimes, even the most well-intentioned people don't believe how bad it gets until they can hear it for themselves.

My own family brushed close to a situation similar to yours recently. My father's father, a lifelong bastard who abused his children, has been in a downward spiral for a while now. His health is bad enough that he should be in a nursing home, but for a long, long time he didn't want to go. He'd sit in front of the TV all day, watching sports, dozing, eating ice cream straight out of the tub, getting weaker and weaker but refusing to call a doctor until his condition was so severe that he had to go to the emergency room. He stopped taking care of the house but fired any maid his children hired within a few visits; refused to let visiting nurses in; canceled doctors' appointments; wouldn't let his children change the layout of the house, even though he usually couldn't get upstairs to where the bathroom and his bed were. When he landed in rehab, he refused to do any of the exercises. His children couldn't make him do a thing to help himself.

...Until insurance stepped in. Insurance would pay for rehab only if he was doing the exercises, and there was a cutoff date after which he would have to start paying over $200 a day if he didn't start treatment. Grandpa was up early the next morning for physical therapy. Because, you see, his great love is money.

His kids used money on him for a while. Do this or the house will depreciate X amount, do that or you'll have to get services that cost X per day.

Then he spiraled beyond that and stopped caring. His kids tried to figure out what was wrong with him, but he's not communicative. The sickness is in his soul, but he's going to keep it there.

That was when the state got involved. And his kids were glad. They couldn't be the heavy any more, and Grandpa doesn't have the money or energy to fight the state. The kids worked with the state to strongarm him into letting in nurses and cleaners, reorganizing the house and installing a downstairs bathroom, going to doctors' appointments, and getting onto the waiting list for a good nursing home. The threat was that if he didn't do what needed to be done, the state would move him into whichever nursing home opened up first--probably a snake pit. It hasn't been a perfect solution, but it's kept him in his own home and in better health than he would otherwise be.

My family had the, er, luxury of having enough money to get services, but not enough that Grandpa could do whatever he damn well pleased. I've been reading your blog for a while now, and I'm sorry that your mother has gotten herself into such a bind. Her money is working against her. I hope your family can find some way to unstick her.

Thanks for all you've written. It's been a real help to me in dealing with my own family.; 1:27 PM
bonsai said...: Thank you Issendai!

It's bizarre to think there are other people out there with similar situations...

Best to you!; 9:16 AM
Anonymous said...: I love your blog. My therapist believe that my mom has NPD, and my dad might have it as well (he for sure has narcissistic tendencies).

The stories you tell make me laugh in gleeful recognition. Maybe they're not meant to be funny, but when you've lived w/ people who are crazy making, it's so wonderful to talk to people who really get what it's like to live with a narcissist.

Your story of your mom's telling of the Day You Were Born and How It Is Really About Her was sooo familiar.

And I love that you said that somehow conversations become a brohure about your mom. That's it! You've nailed it.

I call my mom and she gives me a litt of things she's done: today I picked blueberries, dad and I are getting together with (insert name of people that I have never met and no connection with), next we'll take a walk to the orchard, and here's the details of my trip the doctor (doesn't leave ANYTHING out). ???

I could go on and on...and so can you, which is great. I'm glad that you have told all these stories. It's very comforting.; 4:30 PM
bonsai said...: Thanks, Anonymous!

I'm so glad that it's helpful to others. It's certainly helpful to me --- I don't have the world's greatest memory, so once I've got the details of story down in writing, I feel better. I can just let it go.

That's been an immense relief to me.; 5:20 PM

how to navigate this blog

Welcome!

First, please read the "first post, August 2006", further down in this column. It sets the context for everything that follows.

Then, please click on the labels section and go chronologically. Sometimes I'll write about a memory about something which happened a long time ago, so going by the dates the posts were written isn't the best way to read the blog. Occasionally, a given post that is relevant over time will have several labels applied to it (1970s, 1980s, 1990s). But overall: stick with the labels and it will be a lot clearer!

Thank you for being here, and for reading.

Note: some names have been changed to preserve privacy.

first post, August 2006

Recently, it's come to my attention that I have a challenge to meet, a life-altering decision to make: can I continue to have contact with my mother and still hold onto my integrity, my sanity, my serenity?

My mother (who at her best was at one time glamorous, brilliant, interesting, eclectic, and self-absorbed) has morphed over the past years and decades into an unrepentant, myopic, full-blown narcissist. She turns all conversations back to the topic of herself, thinks nothing of the true welfare of others (although she sometimes pretends to do so for short periods when it serves her), and can never take even partial responsibility for any of her actions or inactions. "I am sorry" is a phrase which never falls from her lips...never.

Everyone has bad times and bad luck, but in her eyes, her bad times and bad luck are always worse than anyone else's. She's been "going through a hard time" from the years of my earliest memories, at age 3 or 4, more or less non-stop up through today. Her reaction to others putting up healthy boundaries (in my case, very late in life) is to fly into one of her legendary rages. She also cannot take responsibility for the fact that her actions (and inactions) have been prime contributors to the very negative, sad, isolated place her life has now become.

Her friends, subjected increasingly to her incessant self-focus and self-pity, have been abandoning her in droves, finally tiring of the asymmetric nurturing she requires of all those around her. This trend has put even more pressure on me, in recent years, to be there for her, as one of her last remaining contacts. And now even I am throwing in the towel, going against every ounce of socialization I've received (as her only daughter) from her and from society at large.

Because one of the primary methods of a narcissist is be at the center of attention (whether positive or negative, sometimes it doesn't even matter to them) and to have others see life through their distorted point of view, it seems that children of narcissistic parents can really bear the brunt of this disorder.

It seems that it is only now --- after 40 years of life on this earth, a decade or more of escalating attempts to help her with her never-ending, chronic-by-design problems and issues, several recent severe crises due to my overextending my and my partner's energies to try to help even more --- that I am able to even look at the history, the issues, and for a sane path out of this dark thicket of her pathology. I attribute this growth to increasing self-esteem and resiliency, due in no small part to a wonderful partner and friends, as well as some therapy.

Merely telling my friends "she makes all conversations into brochures about herself" or "she can't apologize" doesn't even begin to illustrate the true depth of Narcissistic Personality Disorder. If I sit down to chat and tell these ridiculous stories over again with various friends, particularly in enough detail to give even a fraction of the full picture, it will take up too much of our potentially much more pleasant time together.

At the same time, I do want those who are close to me to understand what it is that I've experienced, on whatever level they're interested or have time for --- from skimming a post or two to reading more extensively. Much of it will come as a surprise, precisely because of the fact that the sheer oddness and inappropriateness of her behaviour leads me not to bring it up in polite company. It's all too weird, too complicated, and too unsavory to discuss within the context of an average dinner with friends...

Perhaps most importantly, these memories have been living in my head for years, and I've been holding onto them almost like a set of worry beads, a template to keep in mind in case other narcissistic people try to enter my life, so I can run in the other direction. Since, in her absence, I'm finally beginning to trust my judgment a bit more, I think I can safely begin to let these memories go, to let them fade a bit --- to the best extent possible. Writing them out, I'm hoping, will go a good way toward accomplishing that "letting go".

Whether you're an old friend, a treasured colleague, or someone whom I've met and bonded with through the online ACON community, I welcome your comments and cherish your ongoing support and friendship.

house of bonsai

June 25, 2008

Duty Calls

6 comments:

Followers

Search This Blog