She Was Like a Mother to Me

I have been a licensed therapist for 23 years. I was also married to a narcissist for 30 years, and in a relationship with him for 35, since I was 17 years old. I wrote a book about it, Groomed: Life Married to a Narcissist and How I Overcame Narcissistic Abuse. Most people know that part of my story.

Here is the part I don’t talk about as much.

His mother was a covert narcissist. And she was like a mother to me. My own mother lived a thousand miles away, so when I married into his family, his mother became my surrogate mom. For nine years, she lived with us, under our roof, in our home.

Most of what I write is about surviving a narcissistic partner. This one is different. Because sometimes it’s a package deal.

THE EARLY SIGNS

It was never one big blowup. That is what makes it so hard to name.

It was subtle. A little judgment here. A quiet criticism there. Comments about how I was raising my boys. That I didn’t bathe them enough. That I fed them chicken nuggets instead of vegetables. Always wrapped up as concern, and always leaving me feeling like I was doing it wrong.

I found myself walking on eggshells in my own home. I spent my days trying to live up to her expectations, trying to be the version of me that would finally be good enough for her. Why did it matter so much to me? Because she was an extension of my husband. To please her was pleasing him. It was the added responsibility I imposed on myself as what any good wife would do.

But as you can imagine, this began to weigh heavily on me. But when I brought it to my husband, there was no support to be found. Unfortunately, I wasn’t surprised. He would say things like, “Just ignore it. That’s just the way she is. Why are you making such a big deal out of it?”

When the one person who should stand beside you keeps handing you back to the very thing hurting you, you learn to stop asking.

So I turned it on myself. I told myself that I just had to try harder. Maybe I was taking it too personally, overreacting. Maybe I did give her too much credit for what she thought about me. But I considered her to be more than a mother-in-law, she was like a mother to me. But it takes two. And I was the only one doing the work in this relationship. Eerily similar to my marriage.

Denial was my best friend. It kept me comfortable. And it kept me stuck.

THE TURNING POINT

It was New Year’s Eve when I finally prayed for the strength to do something about it, to take my peace into my own hands.

The tipping point had come the night before. My husband and I were settling in for the night. Our room was across the hall from his mother’s room. Before he turned the light out, he called out to her, “Good night, Mom.” And I heard her call back, “Good night, son.” This is what I call the epitome of inappropriate, too close for comfort.

That was my rock bottom. The straw that broke the camel’s back.

Something in me finally surrendered. And surrender did not mean giving up. It meant I stopped trying to carry what was never mine to carry. I asked myself a different question. Not how do I fix this, not how do I change her, not how do I control this. I asked myself, what CAN I do?

So I immediately went into action. I made a plan. I decided that six months was more than enough time to make the transition for her to leave our home and find a place of her own. I told, not asked, my husband and mother-in-law that it was time for my family to live autonomously. I did all of the legwork to find her a new place to live, right down to making sure it was handicap accessible because of her two arthritic knees which made it difficult for her to do stairs. I stayed silent when I saw no effort on either of their parts to support my plan. But I was determined to stand up for myself, even if it meant that I was the only one committing to my expectation.

At the end of the six months, instead of showing any signs of moving out, she went on a trip to see a friend. Nothing had been packed. Nothing to indicate she had any intention of leaving. This infuriated me. I felt abandoned by my husband and completely insignificant to my “mother”.

My anger became my motivation. If I don’t respect myself, who will? (Sidebar: You may be asking, if I could stand up for myself to her, why couldn’t I do the same to my narcissist? And the answer is this: It is oftentimes safer to challenge someone else rather than the narcissist you married because our wounds are directly tied to them. Conditioning from narcissistic abuse can often present itself as reactive abuse.)

While my surrogate mother was vacationing with friends, I packed her suitcases. I folded everything neatly. I set them by the door. And I turned her room into my eldest son’s bedroom, who was sharing a room with his younger brother. Finally, for the first time all three of my boys each had a room of their own. The way it should have been from the very beginning.

When she returned, there was nowhere to stay. I purposely made sure that the space she had claimed for 9 years no longer existed. This secured my plan so that it couldn’t be undone.

My mother-in-law did not speak to me for a year and a half after that. And I was ok with it.

Her silent treatment was supposed to punish me. Instead, it was music to my ears.

For the first time in years, I had the freedom to be the mother and wife I had envisioned. I did what my husband should have done, chose me. And eventually, he was able to admit that when he said, “I knew it needed to be done. I just couldn’t do it.”

He couldn’t do it. So I did.

ON BOUNDARIES

Here is what I hear all the time. But she’s family. If I set a boundary, I’m the bad guy. I’ll feel so guilty.

I know that guilt. I lived in it. So let me tell you what I finally learned.

We are loved only as much as we love ourselves. Self-love is not the reward at the end of healing. It is the solution. And for most of us, that requires a complete shift in how we see one word.

Selfish.

We were taught that selfish is bad, that putting ourselves first is wrong. But choosing yourself, protecting your peace, honoring your own needs, that is not selfish in the way we were taught to fear. Selfish is healthy. That reframe alone changes everything. The challenge is to remove the negative connotation that society has placed on this word.

Now, don’t get me wrong. This is easier said than done. Your mind will fight you on this. Because the brain rejects information that is unfamiliar to it. When you start telling yourself a new truth, your brain says, that’s a lie. Not because it is a lie, but because it is new.

So you have to act before you believe. You have to lie to yourself with the truth until it stops feeling like a lie.

I had a client say to me once, “How many times will I have to say these positive affirmations without wanting to throw up?” And I told her the truth. Keep saying it until it no longer feels untrue.

That is the work. Not waiting to feel worthy before you act worthy. Acting first, and letting the belief catch up. This applies not just to family, but also to the narcissist you love.

IN CLOSE PROXIMITY

So many people ask me, how do I protect myself when I still have to live in the same house, sit at the same table, share the same holidays?

The first thing I tell them is this. Leaving is not the first step. It is a flight response to abuse.

I never tell a client to just leave. Anyone in this type of relationship knows that is the least helpful advise anyone can give. That is why I created my Women’s H.O.P.E. group, for women who are still in the relationship and not ready or able to just leave.

And the one tool I want you to carry out of this post is the simplest and the most powerful.

Listen to your body.

That anxiousness you feel when they walk in the room. The knot in the pit of your stomach. The hypervigilance. The way you find yourself scanning for danger before they have even said a word. That is not being dramatic or too sensitive as we are often told. That is your body telling you a need is not being met.

Your body knew you were unsafe long before your mind would let you say the word.

Here is something that surprises people and I love teaching on this. A boundary is not something you announce to them. Your boundary is YOURS to respect first and foremost. When you say, “I won’t let you do this,” to a narcissist, that is not a boundary. That is a green light. A challenge. Something for them to work around.

But when your boundary is yours, respected quietly inside you, they cannot argue with it. You can separate yourself mentally and emotionally from someone even while you are still under the same roof. Narcissists are textbook. Once you understand the patterns, you stop taking the bait.

Just know this. Healing is not linear. It happens moment by moment, in baby steps. Safety always comes first. And you should not do this alone.

THE SCIENCE

For years I treated my own anxiety like a character flaw. I thought if I could just stay calm around her, if I could just be the bigger person, everything would be fine. I was pathologizing myself for a body that was working exactly as it was designed to.

Your nervous system is always scanning. Beneath your awareness, it is reading the room for cues of safety and danger. Dr. Stephen Porges, the neuroscientist who developed Polyvagal Theory, gave this a name. He calls it neuroception.

“Neuroception is not a cognitive process; it is a neural process without a dependency on awareness.” — Dr. Stephen Porges, developer of Polyvagal Theory

In other words, your body decides you are unsafe before your mind gets the memo. That hypervigilance you feel around a narcissistic family member is information, not weakness. It is your body registering a need that is not being met, and sounding the alarm the only way it knows how.

This is also why the discomfort does not simply go away when the room goes quiet. Dr. Bessel van der Kolk, one of the world’s foremost trauma researchers and the author of The Body Keeps the Score, has spent decades documenting how the body carries what the mind tries to move past.

“After trauma the world is experienced with a different nervous system.” — Dr. Bessel van der Kolk, author of The Body Keeps the Score

So if you feel like you are reacting to more than what is happening in front of you, you probably are. Your body is responding with everything it has already survived.

And here is why the truth feels so foreign at first. For most of us, this started long before this relationship. Dr. Gabor Maté, physician and trauma expert, describes the impossible choice so many of us made as children, and kept making as adults.

“When authenticity threatens attachment, attachment wins. We suppress who we are to keep the connection we cannot afford to lose.” — Dr. Gabor Maté, physician and author of The Myth of Normal

That is what I did with my surrogate mother (and my narcissistic spouse). I traded my own voice for their approval, because keeping the connection felt safer than keeping myself. Your brain clings to that old bargain even when it is hurting you. That is why the new, healthier truth feels like a lie at first, and why the old story feels normal. It is not a sign you are wrong. It is a sign you are doing something new. If it feels uncomfortable, you are doing the right thing.

None of this was in your head. Your body knew. It always knew. Your job now is to listen to it, the way you would listen to someone you love.

I turned my pain into purpose. And I wouldn’t change a thing.

If my story resonates with you in any way, please know you do not have to figure this out alone. P2P Essentials is my 7-week program, built on the P.E.A.C.E. Method™ and the five stages of healing from narcissistic abuse. It is where we do this work together, in a small group of people who understand, guided by me.

And if you are still in the relationship and not ready for that step, start with my free gift. It walks you through the five stages of healing and shows you how to begin setting healthy boundaries while you are still in it. Reach out to me at info@thepassagetopeace.com or visit www.thepassagetopeace.com.