Yea, I really know the feeling. I had a serious panic attack now - started to think about $'s. I have had full weeks when I could not leave the house.
Your mom should meet my dad! Are you living with her?
I don't like living either - but dieing is not as easy as it should be. I'm gutless, my last suicide attempt caused me a lot of pain.

Thank you so much for writing me, departureunknown! I was thinking I was such a loser, even here, noone would write or contact me.
I'm sorry you are having a panic attack - I've had them and they are not fun. Is the panic attack why you can not leave the house?
I read through the posts on "Daughters of Narcissistic Mothers" and realized that's what the deal was and is with my mother. I hope you're not living with your dad. I'm not living with my mother, but I just visited her - she's getting very old - and she said to someone that "I just dropped by" - when in fact I drove 16 hours over 2 days to see her. It's like I lived my whole life trying to make her happy and now, when she is old, I wanted to have more sympathy for her, but - after a couple of comments like that, I feel broken. I just don't have it in me to care for her the way I "should".
I have a suicide plan, and if everything goes well, it'll only be scary for a few seconds. I'm going to take my cat with me, because I have no one to take care of her when I'm gone. At least she and I will be together. I love her.

Email me again.
I understand your situation.
woftbo@suddenlink.net

Anne Droid, do you get anxious about leaving the house?

I know you are contemplating suicide, but you are not giving yourself the chance to get better or any room to improve your life if you were to commit suicide!

You are not alone. This may not mean much, but it is something -- I may not be somebody who you know personally, but I am here and I will help/support you however I can.

We only get one shot at life, so we have to make the most of it, the best we can.

Please hang in there!

Athena, thank you so much for writing me! When I first got online here today, I felt like a fool because there were no other posts. I really felt like even here no one cared. Hearing from you is so amazingly helpful to me. Thank you so much for caring enough about a stranger to write!

I do have things I know I need to do - plans for the future, stuff like that. But I feel overwhelmed and scared. Just scared. The fear paralyzes me. I know I need to get a job, but with how I feel inside (a piece of sh*t) - who would hire that??

That's what my ex made me feel like: a useless piece of sh*t. I was with him for 25 years. The scars are deep, deep, deep. From him and my freaking mother. As I read different topics here, I see that they are both nuts - narcissists. I got free of him, but my mother can still push all the right buttons and I feel suicidal.
I do the best I can, but it's never good enough. For her.

This last visit, I tried to be a good daughter and fulfill her list of things that she wanted to do with this last visit. We got the list done. When I tried to get some encouragement or thanks - nothing. Nothing, nothing, nothing. It's always about getting her list done, and mine - ? It's put aside until her list gets done, and then she's done with the interaction. I'd like to say it's because she's old, but she's been like this for decades. She just doesn't want to hear about my life. She didn't want me talking with her friends at her retirement home. She didn't invite me to a lunch at the retirement home which was for families. A volunteer mentioned it to me.

It's all too much. I will never get back those 25 years or my son who is 19 now (we are estranged because my ex lied and manipulated and got my son to totally hate me). I don't even know my son any more. The last time I talked to him was December 18 of 2010, and he hung up on me.

Guess I just have to suck it up and keep going.
I'm just having a hard time right now.
I don't think I'm really scared to go out of the house = it's more like I feel too drained to leave the house. It doesn't matter. Nothing matters. Except my cat.
The only caring or respect I get in my life is from people who don't know me. So thank you Athena, for writing me and treating me like a human being.
Anne

"I'd like to say it's because she's old, but she's been like this for decades" I understand. My dad has not changed in 50 years. He's still perfect - ask him and he will tell you! At 52 I am forced to live with him again.
I had a furry buddy "Sam" (dog) we lived for each other.

Anne, I hope you are feeling better today...I am still concerned about you.

Hi Athena,

Thank you for your concern and caring - I am feeling way better now.

A lot of what helped was hearing from you!

I hope you are doing better, too!

Take care,

(Hugs))
Anne

Nothing like the chill winds of an NPD mother's "love" to send us to the darkest depths of despair! See my "Goodbye Mother" post in
the Narcissist section here: I know the feeling!

Re: your teenage son who hung up on you and has been MIA for a bit: it is NOT unnatural or uncommon for a young person to separate from one or both parents for a few years, especially at that age. He's probably having his own issues about who to identify with, Dad or Mom, and, right now, for his own reasons, he is choosing either Dad or maybe neither of you. He does have his own path in life to figure out, and, he's probably going to get wise to his father's game. Just fyi, if a child has a powerful mean parent, and a less powerful, more supplicant parent, they may choose to identify for a while with the powerful parent, because, as you well know, it does not FEEL good to feel LESS powerful. Maybe your son just can't handle how he knows you have been hurt and put down by your ex (sorry if putting words in your mouth), and right now, for his growth, he needs to really look at his dad without the prism of you around to in any way alter it. I don't mean you as in your opinion, but just you being there in his life, influencing his feelings by your very presence.

Try to dream about your son as an explorer discovering new things, off around the world. He'll reappear when he is has found what he had to look for by himself... Send him love and trust that he knows what he needs to do for himself. And you take care of yourself: demonstrate (for posterity, if nothing else, for HIS children, perhaps?) how he will find HIS healing from things like how his dad is, by doing yours for yourself. It's work; it's journaling; reading self-helps, it's maybe 12 step groups, therapy, practicing meditation. It's honoring yourself for every thing that you have done to bring yourself to this moment, including having been willing to let yourself hit bottom...

I have a younger teen, and believe me, I do worry about my time for "letting go." It's hard to anticipate that time without feeling "I will not be able to handle it." It's a lot to deal with, and, btw: your mom = my mom. I totally agree: thank God she said no to living with you! Ecch! It used to be my biggest fear, that my mom would land on me, and steal more of my happiness. I'm glad, btw, that you're feeling so much better. I'm sure your kitty likes it better when you're happy, too. We have a dearly loved cat, also. She's mainly my daughter's, but I secretly have grown very attached to her myself! I surprise myself when I find that I'm looking for her in the house like she's my best friend... NEVER thought I'd say that about a cat!

Hi Mosaic,

Thank you for your kind and supportive and insightful feedback here! I got sidetracked earlier by your referenced post in Narcissistic Mothers, so I apologize for not responding to you here.

I am doing better. Your insightful thoughts about my son are very much appreciated. I know he has to find himself, and it is my hope that someday we'll be able to re-establish a good and loving relationship like we once had.

As you point out, I was the more powerful parent in the nuclear family. My ex was the "friend" parent. We had gone through the parenting issue when my son was a toddler, and for many years we were a parental "unit". But around middle school, my ex reverted back to the "friend" parent, and the result was a wholly dysfunctional household governed by the gonads of a 14.5 year old boy. My ex encouraged this alienation before, and especially during the divorce, and sabotaged my efforts to have a relationship with my son, even though we had joint custody.

Not wanting to make the divorce into a situation where my son had to be torn between two loyalties, I chose to leave him in the Midwest and move to where I live now, 2300 miles away from my son.

I just miss him, and being able to have a relationship with him. Of all the relationships that ended as a result of the divorce (which my ex encouraged), I miss him the most. Losing the ex was a good thing, something that dawned on me about a year ago, btw!

I thank you for the encouragement and support in finding my way up from the bottom and looking toward a brighter, more healthy future for myself. I do. It is rough to honor oneself while being dismissed by one's own mother, and I feel very alone.

I'm both sorry and glad that you've had the same kind of mother. I thank you for sharing your experiences and your growth with respect to your mother. It gives me hope in that department, and I thank you for that.

Part of what has helped me to feel better has been the support here on SG. I very much appreciate your input and the fact that you would take the time and energy to be supportive of a total stranger. I feel really heard and understood by you, and that really helps.

So I'm not feeling as alone and hopeless as I did when I first posted. And yes, my kitty does like it better when I am happy! We play and talk and cuddle, and she acts like a kitten, even though she's 11 years old!

I thank you for listening and caring enough to share. It means a lot to me.

((Big Hugs)),
Anne

Hugs back, Anne...

More later, I want to put some time into composing a message to you. Have a nice few days or week... I've got a busy few days now. I'll be reading and thinking about all of us here. Momfree for now. I am the mother this Mother's Day--ooh, when I claimed that as MY day in my life, not HER day, she did not like that! And boy, did it and does it feel right, and she had no answer but a snort that says a thousand guilt-lobbing words. And Mother's Day is mine.

I have a gorgeous, I mean, GORGEOUS pink flower that blooms annually right near mother's day... it was ON Mother's Day once; that's how I came to call it My Mother's Day flower. Can I send you a picture of it? Or post it here?

Mosaic

Hi Mosaic,

So good to hear from you! Re: Mother's Day in my situation: I think my mother gave me all of about two Mother's Day cards. My son is 19.5 years old. HA. Doesn't that pretty much define the extent of her narcissism?!! How did your mother respond to your siblings'/sibling's wives' M. Days?

It hurt at first, but now I don't care, and don't expect anything or any acknowledgement.

CONGRATULATIONS to YOU about your beautiful pink flower, and on your new way of truly celebrating Mother's Day for YOU. I would love to see a photo of it!!! Yes, please either send a photo or post it here if that is possible on this site! Hmmm - a thought: it could be your avatar - ? :)

I started early, celebrating my own Mother's Day (because my son does not acknowledge me on M. Day, either) by buying a hot CD that I've been wanting! :)

((HUGS)),
Anne

Anne. I'm glad u posted about Mothers day
My children aren't talking to me. So expect nothing
I think I will go buy myself something for me
That I would have bought them
Good post because we all have children
Issues. Thanks for posting
ScubaDiva

Hi Scuba,

How are you doing? I'm so sorry your adult children are not talking to you. I don't understand why!!
You had a totally miserable marriage! Didn't they GET that?

Hope you have found something good for yourself to do this Mother's Day. My mother sent me a letter around the first of the month, telling me not to buy or send her anything for Mother's Day. She has sent similar letters in the past. In the past, I always sent something anyway. It's a game she plays to make sure that I know that Mother's Day is coming up.

Of course, she doesn't - and didn't in this last letter (which I answered with a phone call) - even think to wish me a Happy M. Day.

So now I will wish YOU a Happy Mother's Day, Scuba!!

((HUGS)),
Anne

Hi Mosaic,

I hope everything is going well with you, and that you are enjoying your time with your wonderful daughter and your beautiful pink flower.

I'm looking forward to hearing from you again.

I had a phone conversation with my mother earlier this month. She is beginning to repeat herself, and I am thinking her cognitive grasp is loosening. As her only child, I need to hang in there with her. The conversation with her this time, evoked more empathy on my part than most other conversations with her. Now, she can't help it. Back over the decades, she could help it - I think.

Or maybe there was just something missing in her. Do you by any chance know/have an idea what is missing in Narcissistic people? I think my ex was one, too. Jeez - that relationship was all about him. I thought he was just emotionally stunted.

Have a great Mother's Day, and celebrate your growth!!! I'm celebrating mine. I feel really good this weekend. Better this Mother's Day than in several years. (My son ignores M.D. and my birthday losing him was part of the fall-out of my divorce). But I really do feel good this weekend!

((HUGS)),
Anne

Hi Anne Droid,

You know I've been feeling... gentler about my mother, but, it must be noted that I have not been in any contact lately. That makes it a lot easier to feel gentler about her.

Sometimes it really helps me to have my Mom's backing and support and know-how, but in the area of satisfying my personal ambitions, including my mom does not help me. It usually undermines me... and whether she intentionally does it or not, which of course she does (man it feels sacriligeous to bag on moms one day before MOTHER'S DAY!), I have to do what is best for me and my daughter, and that is to focus on me.

So, I've gotten a renewed ambition for improving my life, wouldn't you know, and have started to take action to do things I have had on back burners. Big steps and little steps.

I am walking through this part of the dread dance with narcissistic mothers (fathers too I guess), where I either keep the focus and the forward motion going FOR ME, or I wake up and have amnesia of this intoxicating growth and the joie de vivre it brings me and go back to being a whipping boy, or "narcissistic supply" for my mom.

Remembering Who I Am, on Mother's Day tomorrow, and remembering Who You Are: a friend and another Mother.

Happy Mother's Day Anne and everyone: Celebrate Who You Are.

Love,

Mosaic

Anne Droid- I'm so sorry for the way you are feeling. I totally understand how you are feeling though. I have no cousins here. They all live in different states and never see them. I'm always feeling alone. And its really hard. My parents are really hard on me with everything.
If you ever want to talk I'm here for you though. Feel free to message me.