May 2013
1 post
Tired Mule
Tired mule you need MORE exercise! More tired. You need MORE weight on your back! Exhausted. You need to eat EXACTLY the right foods. Requires extra work though! Dead. “Such a shame. She didn’t take care of her health!”
March 2013
1 post
September 2012
2 posts
July 2012
1 post
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Grieving the situation of a parent with NPD takes time. For me, the grieving has settled down significantly at the three-year mark. Recently it was kicked up again for a day after my dad’s accident, but it settled back down. And there was an interesting side effect: I was able to come up with some amusing ideas, which I am grateful to have written down. It seems that in times of grieving the...
June 2012
4 posts
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May 2012
5 posts
I have an Etsy shop, and I heard a great seminar on The Art of Pricing for Profit by Megan Auman and Tara Gentile. http://www.etsy.com/community/online-labs As a result I bumped my prices up to boutique retail prices. So much of my decision making in my life has been based on low self esteem. Employers got such a great deal with me when I was out in the workforce.
My Etsy product is unique,...
April 2012
8 posts
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The Forgiveness Formula
[This is a column I wrote several years ago when I wondered what the mechanics of forgiveness are. It worked for me at the time. Wish I’d remembered to use it the past few years. I don’t claim that this is the only way to forgive, just a conclusion that helped me.]
Learning how to forgive gave me a lot of freedom from past and present hurts. I have heard lots of admonitions to...
February 2012
9 posts
5 tags
I did a bunch more forgiving the day before yesterday. I had a really great day yesterday, the lightness of mood was so pleasant. And I noticed today that as I am praying for those that curse me, and pray for them which despitefully used me, As Luke 6:28 teaches. I was actually able to express gratitude towards God for the things that my parents did give me, like education, dance and piano...
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WatchAs most therapists think narcissistic personality disorder is incurable, this is the third optimistic source that I’ve come across, along with Kim and Steve Cooper and You Might be a Narcissist If by Meier, Charlebois and Munz.
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The Boss
Upon graduation, jobs were exceedingly scarce. I was unable to get onto my dad’s big company, even with my dad’s string-pulling to get me an interview. I’m sure he was greatly disappointed with that. Dad told me to go into the interview with “all kinds of confidence.” Really! But I thought everything I did required correction?! Through a friend, I scored a summer job...
4 tags
Not Heard.
My dad does not listen. He only pretends to listen, but actually he’s just waiting for a break in the conversation so he can say what he thinks, what is his correct take on the situation. I would see his lips moving into the shape of the word “But…” before I even got halfway through a sentence, and I thought, “What’s the use of even trying?” Dinnertime was...
Even if..
someone has dollar bills hanging out of all of their pockets, it is wrong to take advantage of that scenario and steal them.
Same thing with snarky comments. Still wrong, even when the hearer puts up with them.
But I say unto you, That every idle word that men shall speak, they shall give account thereof in the day of judgment. Matthew 12:36
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Why was my life...
full of the same types of people? Because when you are raised by narcissistic parents, you are conditioned to expect constant criticism and have no boundaries. The fact that the criticism might be unjust does not cross your mind. It’s not them, it’s you. Your “badness.”
So, instead of holding up your hand in the face of boorish behaviour like normal people do, you try to...
6 tags
What do I do now?
A wise and kind friend said the other day that she hopes I come to some conclusions at the end of all this. That’s the thing about those apples of gold in settings of silver, they get me pointed in a good direction, without a single, “You should….” So today I’m thinking, What is the point of this life that I’ve been given? What am I supposed to do now? In my...
6 tags
Narcissistic Parent Career Planning
My dad expected my brother to be a business man, and I was to be a teacher. That was the extent of the parental career counselling I received. What we had a flare for was dismissed as only to be considered amusing hobbies, best abandoned to free up time for more important pursuits. Most of the “unacceptable” career choices were berated in my family. we all laughed at the “basket...
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Narcissistic Parent Checklist
In “How to Rise Above Abuse, June Hunt presents a list of questions to ask sexual abuse victims, because they stay silent about it unless someone asks the right questions. In my town, seminars are available to help people learn the right questions to ask in such cases.
That got me thinking that if there were a similar checklist of questions for children of narcissistic parents, that could...
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In this book, June Hunt addresses the scriptures that deal with the topic of abuse, both from the standpoint of the suffering of the victim, and God’s viewpoint on the abusers themselves. I had been hoping to find something like this. I knew the verses were in the bible, but I was happening on them only once in a while in my daily readings.
The author warns that the book might be...
January 2012
11 posts
Years ago, my sister-in-law said, “I don’t know why you and your brother don’t like your dad. He’s great!” A few years later she said, “What did your dad DO to you?”
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Cons and Pro of an Etsy Shop
The song Bruises by Charlift summarizes how I feel about Etsy. I joined Etsy in 2008, hoping to cash in. They were going to provide me with a storefront, and handle the marketing for me. All I had to do was make my stuff. I had an interesting product, rather unique, made from recycled materials, that was useful and artistic. How could I not succeed?
Big mistake on my part for not doing the...
On Calling Out
For those who say that a good christian shouldn’t say anything about the wrongs done to them, “Let bygones be bygones!,” they proclaim. Here is an example from the Apostle Paul:
“Alexander the metalworker did me a great deal of harm. The Lord will repay him for what he has done.” -2 Tim 4:14.
Friendship Post Mortem
A friend had a gift certificate for a christian book store, so I went along. Out of curiosity I checked to see if my former friend S’s rosaries were still in stock; they weren’t. This friendship was a difficult span of time where she saw something in me that she wanted and came on very strong. We met at church, had chronic illness in common and an interest in arts and technology. ...
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Grieving a Narcissistic Parent
My father has Narcissistic Personality Disorder. I didn’t realize it until I was 48 years old. I was commenting that the crows in my neighbourhood were eating the baby birds. My dad said, “Oh, those might not be crows, you know!” I found it curious that even in this trivial matter that my dad had to be right, and I had to be wrong, and I started to wonder why that was so. After...
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WatchWhat Caregivers Go through. I can relate to this as my husband has Crohn’s disease, which was poorly controlled for many years. Every few months I was taking him to the ER to treat blockages. One time I had my small children with me and I was trying to keep them off the floor of the ER. My husband’s personality altered due to steroids, also. People kept asking me how my husband was,...
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My Fibromyalgia and the Guaifenesin Protocol Story
I’ve had Fibromyalgia/Chronic Fatigue Syndrome/ME for seven years now. It manifested during a period where I was regularly babysitting a friend’s kids, making me in charge of five small children many days while my divorced friend was in grad school. I was so exhausted by only 9 a.m., I wondered what was wrong. A battery of standard blood tests showed no abnormalities. My GP, who had...
Hi.
Hi I’m Marigold. I live in western Canada. I was born in 1961, which makes me either a Boomer or a Gen-Xer, depending on whose boundaries you are using. I was born in a small Canadian city then moved to a larger Canadian city in 1972. I attended public school and also studied piano and dance.
My parents grew up on farms during the Great Depression and moved to the city where they met and...
