Tag: narcissism

The Problem With Spending

Bones

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I just bought something.  For myself.  I didn’t need it – it’ll make things easier, but I didn’t need it, and I didn’t need it now.  There was a sale on, it was a bit cheaper than it would normally be, and I could afford it.

But the conditioning from an early age – I was an anxious and empathetic middle child, and mother’s face got so pinchy when I needed new shoes or clothes and I hated it – and the decade of abuse from a narcissist obsessed with money and the perception of power, going straight into being an impoverished student with too many animals, has meant that I cannot spend money.  If I spend money on myself bad things will happen and I won’t be able to afford to pay for the things I have to pay for.

Because that’s what would happen.  I would budget, make sure we could afford everything, give myself nothing to spend, and he would spend it all and fuck the budget.  My mind damn near exploded when I had a problem that would require financial input this year … and I realised that I could pay for it and no one would fuck up my budget so I couldn’t.  But I still couldn’t spend money on myself.

So I, understandably, panicked.  I felt guilty.  I felt awful!  I’d just spent money that didn’t need to be spent!

A friend of mine, who experiences these same issues, suggested that I budget in ‘my money’, the money I’m allowed to put aside and spend on whatever I want and is separate from my savings.  I will definitely start doing that, because I have difficulty with the ‘savings’ distinction.  I have difficulty identifying what it’s there for, but now I will have two ‘savings’.  One is for emergencies.  The other is for me to spend on myself.  On whatever I want.

The Abuser Returns

Bones

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I am quite fortunate in that my abuser now lives in a completely different country.  This means I don’t have to worry about It (I’ve decided to call my abuser It from here-on-in) ‘being in the area’.  I don’t have to worry about It bumping into any of my friends in our city of birth.  I don’t have to worry about bumping into It when I’m in the city, either.  This keeps my stress levels relatively low.  I can have my own life, and feed It very select bits of my life.

It’s going to be in the country.  It’s returning for a brief period of time.  Even though It will be half a country away, I’m in a state of dissociated panic.  I am under no illusions that It can find where I live with only a cursory look, were It so minded, and I am not so far away that It could not “visit”, despite It only being in the country for a few days.

I am really hoping Its narcissistic arrogance, and the fact that in order to find my address, It would have to access a website that has more negative implications for It than for me, will prevent It from looking me up.

I do not want It coming near me or the life I’ve made for myself.  I still have to ‘make nice’ with It, and I don’t think I could face-to-face.  I think I would just start screaming, and I’m pretty sure that’s not considered a ‘suitable greeting’ for someone you are supposedly ‘amicable’ with.  I had nightmares last night about It.  For the first time in months It was in my dreams again, tormenting me.

I will need to be very careful to get a lot of sleep over the next week or so, and do nice things that involve staying inside and basically hiding.  Whenever I’m outside I’m going to be on extreme high-alert for It, so distraction is going to be key to surviving the coming week.

Narcissistic Abuse And Money

Bones

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Budgets inspire a meltdown.  Unexpected expenses have me panicking and shaking for days.

This is the result of nearly a decade of abuse around money and budgeting.  I would budget.  He would blow it.  I would budget around that, He would blow it.  He wouldn’t allow any surplus in the budget, He had to get the next thing, He had to get another big expense, He had to buy more things.  I distinctly remember a discussion where he wanted a new car and I said if we got the large purchase he wanted on finance, we would have no wriggle room in the budget at all, and he replied with “that’s fine, we don’t need it anyway!”.

I’m talking no savings, no ability to go anywhere or do anything other than survive.  Literally living paycheck to paycheck.  In the end, when it had gotten really bad, we were on a combined income of nearly $200,000.  He spent every cent and more.  He would bully me to get a credit card, and put things on it.  I had to, to make ends meet, and then, despite budgeting to put it back on the card, he would spend it.

He would spend it.  He would spend it.  He would spend it.  He spent it all.  Because he wanted to Keep Up With The Joneses.  He was obsessed with the idea of wealth, of having it, and the approval he would receive from it.

It has taken me years to get a healthier relationship with money – I can actually put money aside and not compulsively spend it.  But I still want to vomit every time I work on my budget.  Unexpected expenses may always send me into a panic.  But the most difficult thing?

He is still doing it.  Through a series of decisions and a complex situation on both our parts, I am still somewhat reliant upon him to provide a small amount of money to pay off the debts I incurred at his behest.  And he’s not.  He was great for a while.  Now he’s not.  He’s spent it all, and I am once again scrabbling to make it work.  Except I no longer have any sway, I no longer have a way to cover for it.  So I become somewhat catatonic.

Which basically just involves me lying on the couch staring blankly at the TV while I’m at home, and spending minutes at a time staring blankly at the paper in front of me when I’m at work, and just generally wanting to not exist.

The day I no longer rely on him to pay off that debt will be the happiest day of my life.

Conflict Avoidance

Bones

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I have been conditioned to avoid conflict.  I have been punished, ignored, cold shouldered, berated, insulted and put down whenever I rose to a conflict instead of rolled over, whenever I voiced an opinion that was contrary to what was being said.  I didn’t realise it was happening – it started off small, and phrased like a concern for me “you shouldn’t argue with people on the internet”.  By the time it was blatantly “don’t do that, that’s rude” it was too late, I was hooked into the narcissist and I wasn’t getting out.

Despite the many years I’ve been away from Him, I am still not free.  I have identified an immediate aversion to conflict, to the point where I will go along with things that I do not like, things that I feel are unkind, because I cannot deal with the conflict.  If someone says something unkind about someone else towards me I’ll smile and play along – doesn’t matter who it is, I just shut down, go into conflict avoidance and people please mode, and my brain disconnects.

I never used to be like this.  Back in high school (a friend of mine reminded me of this) I was sitting at a group of desks and another girl came over and said she wanted it.  I politely said no, and when she persevered, I told her to fuck off.  In exactly those words.  I had no issues telling two girls who were harassing me at home to fuck off and never come back again.  I had no problems standing up to bullies.

I am now into my fourth week of fluoxetine, and I have discovered an amazing effect.  I’m getting my backbone back.

Today a colleague was rude about one of the people I provide support for.  This particular individual is Chinese.  The rest of the office is not.  This particular colleague asked me to tell the Chinese woman to see her “once she’s done with her jabbering”.  Instead of my usual response – a polite, mincing smile and a churning of discomfort in my gut – I felt immediately angry.  While I couldn’t vocalise it properly, I certainly let it be shown in my face and posture.  This colleague was being very rude and racist about another colleague, one who she works with, and one who works harder than damn near everyone else in the office.

And for once, my first response wasn’t conflict avoidance.  I was, and still am, intensely proud of myself for that.  I feel more like me than I have in a decade.

The Difference Of Intent

Bones

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Intent.  It’s something you can never directly see, and yet it impacts all actions.  It’s something I’ve been thinking on a lot these past few months.

Because the amazing human being in my life does some of the same things that He did – not many, but enough for me to have occasional flashbacks.  The difference between the two is as clear as night and day, but certainly not something I would ever have seen at the time.  It is a difference in intent.

Where He supported my interests because they reflected well on Him, this amazing human supports my interests because I’m interested in them.  Where He looked after my animals because it made Him look good, this amazing human looks after my animals because he loves them.  Where He would spend a lot of money on takeaway food because it was Living The Life, this amazing human spends money on takeaway food because it’s easy and tasty and it’s a nice treat (for both of us) after a hard day of work.

Where He would interact with my friends and, when they (very rarely) visited, suggest some things He thought they might like, it was all to reflect well on Him in some way, to make them like Him more.  This amazing human suggests things they might like because they might like it and because he cares.

And now, looking back, the difference of intent is so clear.  It has just taken seeing the behaviours expressed from a selfless intent to see the difference in the resulting behaviour expressed from a selfish intent.

And you can tell, you can really tell.  The words they use, the way they put them together, their tone of voice, and their body language.  The feeling left in your gut afterwards (never ignore your gut, it knows a lot more than your brain does).

I am intensely grateful to the amazing human being I now share my life with.  He is helping to heal a lifetime of trauma by simply being his incredible self.