u/Justdroppingby2024

Hi all,

Content note: mention of sexual harassment

I’ve been really struggling with letting my no contact decision settle in my body. It’s caused me stress, tinnitus to increase, and restlessness/loss of sleep. And So much of it I recognize now as I continue on a healing journey involved talk therapy and somatic healing, has to do with never having the abuse acknowledged and even the way I ultimately went no contact had to be almost like I tricked my parents and relatives. And I find that so messed up and really unsettling and disturbing and what makes this process particularly difficult is often people don’t give those of us who cut off parents specifically the same grace as they do victims of abuse by others. When I review the process of going NC for me, it’s actually been very similar to experiences of escaping sexual harassers, which is so disturbing and yet it was the only way as a narcissist will not respect your decision to go NC, at times it’s actually a trigger for them that makes them harass u even more.

And please note I know it’s not the same, but I’m speaking of similarities in what it can often take to “leave” or “escape”.

I slowly cut off contact with the entire family and went low contact first with hard rock responses before eventually saying “I’m changing my number but u can text me here still and I’ll respond on weekends” then fading away. I’m a combination of the scapegoat/abandoned child of the family so I’m sure I am now just spoken of as the cold difficult one and they’re getting supply in that way. But they don’t know where I live, where I work, and even my extended family is cut off now.

And I’m realizing this process of becoming liberated is very similar to escaping a violent domestic abuser or sexual harasser, one where you might have to change your name and number and move away. I once actually already had to do that because of a man who married into the family and began sexually harassing me online. I was young and his online subtle threats + lack of police support since apparently I couldn’t file a restraining order and could only solve it in family court, which I knew is what he wanted (attention). I simply never responded, changed my number and moved away to be left only to deal with the mental health repercussions of it all. (Note: this incident also allowed me to recognize how abusive my nmother and nsister were because of their lack of support “it’s just part of being a woman, deal with it” and sister even laughing at me).

Reflecting on both of these experiences and finding the similarities has been eerie. But it has helped it settle in my body somehow, I guess it’s giving me deep validation in a society that often views “no contact” as us being petty or unforgiving.

Now I’m also just dealing with the anger and grief of having to experience all of that growing up, I’m 35f, and much of the abuse happened even after moving out and on my own since age 17.

Sharing all this in case the comparison helps, though I know they’re not exactly the same but certainly do have some places where they can be similar.

Also, has anyone found ways of processing the grief of it all? Grieving our younger self’s?

Hi all,

I’m 35f

I’ve been dealing with abusive narcissist mother and sister my entire life though I only became aware it was narcissism a few years ago like post pandemic through online videos + psychedelics + therapy and psychiatric support + somatic healing.

I went no contact with my mom a while back and ended up breaking it (which I’m so upset at myself about tbh) because of a combination of flying monkeys, new age spirituality which I got really into for some time, and just overall the ways our bodies betray us when conditioned by abuse.

But I did so with a caveat: we only talk once on Sunday. And normally we just text a “happy sunday” meme and that’s it. Sometimes she asks how I’m doing and I respond coldly.

Recently she got sick and will be having surgery and my family broke all my boundaries by telling me I had to talk to her outside of Sunday so I did. But somehow that pushed me over the edge. So I lied to them that I changed my number, and am keeping this one on computer just for texts once in a while. So now the Sunday texts ended too.

By lying that I was moving far away (I’m only a city away) which was a huge thing with therapy support as it meant no longer caring what they think, and now lying about changing my number, I’ve managed to get into a low contact and almost no contact situation with them without setting off the alarms that come from setting strict boundaries. They think I’m broke, inconsistent, weird, a loner, and more and more they occupy less space in my mind. I honestly dgaf about them except on days like today when the world reminds those of us with shitty moms that we have shitty moms.

The hardest part recently was realizing an entire family close and extended will paint me as this weirdo with no phone who moved far away, so I’ve had to stop caring about literally all of them, cousins included. Weirdly tho because of the toxic family dynamic and abandonment issues, none of us ever really got close to anyone. I’m also in a beautiful relationship and as my life grows with thinking of marriage, I am mourning knowing my parents or relatives won’t be there, but I have a thriving loving social circle who will be.

Of course they’ll likely come around again but at that point who knows how they’ll find me. If they call the police, as I’ve seen folks do here, I’m ready to accept it and get a lawyer. My life has turned around so much in so many different ways. I also have an uncle who cut connections with family as reference, u reached out to him and tho growing up he was described as this horrible person who abandoned my grandma, from his pov he was right and his kids always seem so kind so I knew I wasn’t getting the full story. To me knowing he did it, made it feel possible.

One thing I do still struggle with is my own compassion, if narcissism is a mental disease, should I not have compassion and forgive? This is where the Sunday texting reasoning came from. Then I realized 1. My own wellbeing matters most for myself. 2. Thinking of it as an addiction or substance abuse helps as unfortunately many families have to cut contact with relatives struggling with addiction because they cannot be trusted with themselves. Framing it that way has helped as it’s compassionate and acknowledges that it can be hard. I guess I’m not trying to lose my own humanity throughout this whole process.

Lastly. Another struggle now is also my mental health, I can’t stop ruminating or over planning for if they break my boundaries again. It really deregulates me and makes me feel like a hostage.

Has anyone else grey rocked their way into very low or almost no contact?

Tldr: grey rocking works tho I know it’ll only work for so long

Edit: added my age + tldr