u/voidinvelvet

My narc mother is extremely controlling...and I'm almost 30. I do rebel and make my own choices, but there’s still this deeply ingrained guilt inside me that makes me question myself afterward.

Even when I know I’m not doing anything wrong, I start wondering, “Maybe she’s right. Maybe I’m being selfish. Maybe I should have listened to her.” The way she reacts to my decisions makes me doubt myself, even when I was completely confident before she got involved... I want to make my own decisions without feeling like I need her approval first. She expects me to include her in basically every decision I make and gets irritated or angry when I don’t.

I know intellectually that I’m an adult and that I’m allowed to make my own choices. I think the difficult part is actually feeling that way internally after years of being made to feel like my decisions are wrong.

How do I gain that trust in myself?

My mother is extremely controlling...and I'm almost 30. I do rebel and make my own choices, but there’s still this deeply ingrained guilt inside me that makes me question myself afterward.

Even when I know I’m not doing anything wrong, I start wondering, “Maybe she’s right. Maybe I’m being selfish. Maybe I should have listened to her.” The way she reacts to my decisions makes me doubt myself, even when I was completely confident before she got involved... I want to make my own decisions without feeling like I need her approval first. She expects me to include her in basically every decision I make and gets irritated or angry when I don’t.

I know intellectually that I’m an adult and that I’m allowed to make my own choices. I think the difficult part is actually feeling that way internally after years of being made to feel like my decisions are wrong.

How do I gain that trust in myself?

I’ve lived with my single mum my entire life. Growing up was extremely toxic. She had an alcoholic ex-boyfriend, and a lot of my childhood was spent in hypervigilance, fear, and constantly feeling like I had to manage the situation around me.

Now I’m starting to understand the patterns and how much they have affected me. My mom relies on me a lot emotionally and practically, but I’m realizing that I can’t keep living this way.

I recently got laid off, so we’re currently living off my savings while I look for another job. Since then, she has been taunting me day and night about not doing anything, even though I’m actively trying to find work. She has also always expected me to do things for her and treats basic things as though they are my responsibility. Even something as simple as preparing food for both of us becomes a huge issue. I usually cook twice, but lately I’ve only been doing it once because I’m already overwhelmed with everything else.

I feel like she is never genuinely happy for me. Whether it’s my relationship, my happiness, or anything I want for myself, there always seems to be criticism or negativity. But when she wants something from me, it becomes my duty to do it.

I’ve spent years keeping quiet and suppressing my feelings, and recently I’ve started having explosive anger outbursts. I’m also dealing with sleep problems and thyroid issues, and I feel like my body and mind are finally telling me that I cannot continue living in this environment.

I desperately want to move out. I genuinely feel like I cannot heal in this house. But the guilt is overwhelming because I keep thinking, “How can I leave my mum alone? She relies on me.”

At the same time, I’m realizing that staying here just because I feel guilty may mean sacrificing my own mental and emotional well-being indefinitely.

I don’t know what the right thing to do is. How do you deal with the guilt of leaving a parent who relies on you? Is it possible to love and care about your mum while still choosing to move out and build your own life? I’d really appreciate advice from anyone who has been through something similar.

I’ve lived with my single mum my entire life. Growing up was extremely toxic. She had an alcoholic ex-boyfriend, and a lot of my childhood was spent in hypervigilance, fear, and constantly feeling like I had to manage the situation around me.

Now I’m starting to understand the patterns and how much they have affected me. My mom relies on me a lot emotionally and practically, but I’m realizing that I can’t keep living this way.

I recently got laid off, so we’re currently living off my savings while I look for another job. Since then, she has been taunting me day and night about not doing anything, even though I’m actively trying to find work. She has also always expected me to do things for her and treats basic things as though they are my responsibility. Even something as simple as preparing food for both of us becomes a huge issue. I usually cook twice, but lately I’ve only been doing it once because I’m already overwhelmed with everything else.

I feel like she is never genuinely happy for me. Whether it’s my relationship, my happiness, or anything I want for myself, there always seems to be criticism or negativity. But when she wants something from me, it becomes my duty to do it.

I’ve spent years keeping quiet and suppressing my feelings, and recently I’ve started having explosive anger outbursts. I’m also dealing with sleep problems and thyroid issues, and I feel like my body and mind are finally telling me that I cannot continue living in this environment.

I desperately want to move out. I genuinely feel like I cannot heal in this house. But the guilt is overwhelming because I keep thinking, “How can I leave my mum alone? She relies on me.”

At the same time, I’m realizing that staying here just because I feel guilty may mean sacrificing my own mental and emotional well-being indefinitely.

I don’t know what the right thing to do is. How do you deal with the guilt of leaving a parent who relies on you? Is it possible to love and care about your mum while still choosing to move out and build your own life? I’d really appreciate advice from anyone who has been through something similar.

So as I've mentioned before about he fight he and I had a really bad conflict a few days ago where he said some very cruel and hurtful things (for eg; I'll break your ego, idc if you get hurt what about me) ...so I wasn’t able to just get over it and act completely normal afterward, so I became quiet and kept to myself. I just needed some time to process everything.

He got angry that I wasn’t immediately back to normal and became disrespectful toward me. When I called out the disrespect, he basically told me that he would speak to me however he wanted and that if I didn’t like it, I could leave. I was completely exhausted and didn’t argue. I just told him, essentially, “Okay, if that’s what you want.” he ended the call, and it’s now been 3 days and I haven’t contacted him, and he hasn’t contacted me either.

I’m honestly confused and scared. Part of me wants to reach out just to break the tension and stop this horrible uncertainty. Another part of me feels like I shouldn’t be the one chasing after him when he was the one who was disrespectful and told me to leave. And yeah, it's been a pattern, something happens, he either threatens me to breakup or tells me to leave ... I’ve spent so much time blaming myself for our conflicts and thinking that if I just changed my reactions, communicated better, or stayed calmer, things would be okay.

My boyfriend (32M) and I (30F) have been together for a while, and I’m starting to question whether I’m overreacting to a pattern in our relationship.

Whenever we have an argument, regardless of how serious or minor the issue is, he eventually resorts to threatening to end the relationship. It can happen when I’m expressing that something hurt me, disagreeing with him, setting a boundary, or simply taking up space and expecting my feelings to be acknowledged.

Any conversation where he feels challenged seems to turn into some variation of, “Then leave,” “I’ll leave you,” or “If you don’t like it, leave me.”

It has reached the point where I’m afraid to bring things up because I already anticipate the breakup threat. As a result, I often end up backing down, apologising, or suppressing what I actually wanted to say just to prevent the situation from escalating.

I don’t feel like I can communicate openly when I know that expressing disagreement may result in him threatening to leave.

I’m not expecting us to agree on everything. I just want to be able to have disagreements without the relationship itself constantly being used as leverage.

Am I overreacting by seeing this as a serious problem, or is repeatedly threatening to break up whenever your partner challenges you genuinely unhealthy behaviour?

My boyfriend (32M) and I (30F) have been together for some time, and I have noticed a pattern that is becoming increasingly difficult to deal with.

Whenever we have an argument..whether it is about something significant or something very minor—he resorts to threatening to end the relationship. It does not seem to matter whether I am simply expressing that something hurt me, disagreeing with him, setting a boundary, or asking him to take responsibility for something. If he feels challenged in any way, the conversation eventually turns into, “Then leave,” “I’ll leave you,” or some variation of a breakup threat.

It has reached the point where I am afraid to express myself because I know that bringing up an issue may result in him threatening to leave. I feel like I have to carefully regulate what I say and how I say it just to prevent the relationship from being put on the line.

The frustrating part is that I am not necessarily asking for anything unreasonable. I want to be able to have disagreements, express anger or hurt, and take up space in the relationship without feeling as though I am risking its existence every time.

Over time, this has made me increasingly anxious and emotionally dependent on keeping the peace. I find myself backing down even when I genuinely believe I have a valid reason to be upset, simply because I am scared of losing him.

I am beginning to wonder whether this is a normal but unhealthy conflict pattern, or whether repeatedly using the possibility of a breakup to shut down difficult conversations is a form of emotional manipulation.

Tl;dr My boyfriend threatens to break up with me during almost every disagreement, big or small, especially when I challenge him or express that something has hurt me. I’ve become afraid to speak up because I feel like any conflict could result in him leaving. Is this emotional manipulation, and how do I deal with it?

a fight happened between me and the narc two or three days ago, and during the argument he said a lot of extremely hurtful things to me. One thing that particularly stayed with me was when he told me, “You deserve it. That’s why everyone does this to you...

That same night, I eventually acted normal again, as I usually do after our fights. I tend to suppress what happened and move on because I am afraid that if I continue expressing my anger or hurt, he will threaten to leave me.

However, over the past two days, I haven't been able to interact with him normally. Somewhere deep down, despite being afraid to confront him, I genuinely feel disrespected and hurt. I have mostly been responding with short answers like “hmm,” “yeah,” and “okay,” rather than engaging in normal conversation.

Today, he became angry about this. He said that for the past two days he had been asking me what was wrong and why I wasn't telling him. The truth is that I have stopped discussing my problems with him because I don't feel that doing so leads to any resolution. I feel that my concerns will either be dismissed, turned into another argument, or somehow used against me, so I didn't feel emotionally safe enough to explain what was bothering me.

Then he said something along the lines of, “Fine, you're not telling me.” He proceeded to hang up on me repeatedly. When I called him back and told him that repeatedly hanging up on me was disrespectful, he responded, “Yeah, I'll be disrespectful to you. That's what I'll do. If you don't like it, leave me.” He then hung up again.

Now I'm sitting here wondering whether I did something wrong. I'm also aware that I have a tendency to eventually become “normal” after these incidents and pretend everything is fine, even when it isn't. This time I couldn't completely do that, and I think my withdrawal made him angry.

So it’s that time again, and I’m feeling incredibly depressed. I hate everything and everyone, I feel like I have no life of my own, and nothing seems to make me genuinely happy anymore.

Funnily enough, the only thing I actually look forward to right now is eating..snacks, chocolates, basically anything comforting. And even that has become complicated because I end up restricting myself because I’m afraid of ruining my diet.

I feel so emotionally exhausted and empty, and I honestly don’t know what to do with myself. I know these feelings eventually pass, but when I’m in the middle of them, everything feels so hopeless and meaningless.

have been increasingly frustrated with this relationship because I feel that even when I have a legitimate reason to be angry, I am never allowed to actually express that anger. Instead, he becomes angry because I am angry, escalates the situation further, and somehow I end up being the one who has to back down and apologise or acquiesce just to end the conflict.

This has been bothering me for the past few days, so I have naturally become quieter around him. I have mostly been responding with things like “hm,” “yeah,” and “okay,” rather than engaging in normal conversation.

Today, he asked me why I was being so quiet and what had happened. I told him “nothing,” partly because I don't feel safe or comfortable explaining my feelings when I know it could turn into another argument.

Now he seems to be mirroring my behaviour...being distant and giving me the same minimal responses.

I genuinely don't know how to handle this. I don't want to engage in a cycle of silent treatment or emotional games, but I also don't want to keep suppressing my anger just because expressing it causes him to become even angrier.

From time to time, usually in the evening when I am alone in my room, I experience a strange and difficult-to-describe state of mind. I find myself imagining entire scenarios of my life playing out in my head, and then I suddenly get this overwhelming sense that I have already lived this life before...not necessarily this exact life, but as though I have existed and lived through everything before.

Along with this comes a brief but intense realisation that life itself is somehow meaningless or futile. I start thinking that whatever we do ultimately serves no purpose, and this leaves me feeling extremely nihilistic about the future. It is not necessarily that I consciously want to die; rather, I experience this unsettling feeling that living itself is pointless. When the feeling passes, I can return to my normal state, but the experience is deeply distressing when it happens.

I have also been living in a toxic environment for a long time and have struggled with recurring periods of depression. I do manage to come out of those periods, but this particular feeling seems to remain in the background and occasionally comes over me in waves.

The hardest part is the sense of suffocation that accompanies it. It feels as though I am suddenly confronted with some profound truth about existence, and I cannot escape the thought. I desperately want to get out of this mindset because it does not feel peaceful or philosophical...it feels frightening, empty, and emotionally exhausting.

I genuinely struggle with extreme irritability and rage during PMDD. I can’t just “swallow the feeling” or calmly process it when I’m already overwhelmed. If someone keeps getting on my nerves, I can end up having a full-blown rage episode and feel completely out of control.

My environment is also quite toxic, so I think I’m constantly dealing with things that I normally manage to tolerate. During my normal phases, I’m somehow able to stay calm and keep everything together, but during PMDD, it feels like all that emotional control disappears. Everything I’ve been holding in suddenly comes to the surface, and I can completely break down over things I would normally be able to handle.

People often suggest things like “take a deep breath, step away, and think before you react,” but honestly, when I’m already in the middle of a rage episode, I cannot think rationally or even remember to do those things. It feels like the anger takes over before I have a chance to regulate myself.

I've been having some issues with my family, particularly with my mom, who I feel is quite toxic. I didn’t initially want to talk to the narc about what was happening because whenever I share personal problems with him, he tends to give me very logical explanations and sometimes ends up blaming me or making me feel like I’m the one at fault. Recently, though, I was really upset, and he kept asking me what was wrong and telling me to open up and tell him what happened. Eventually, I trusted him enough to share everything that had happened with my mom and some of the problems I’ve been having with my family.

Later, during an argument, he used the exact things I had told him against me. He said things like, “That’s why everyone hates you,” “That’s why everyone has problems with you,” and “You complain about everyone and everything. That’s why everyone has an issue with you.” I thought I was telling my partner something vulnerable because I trusted him, but later it felt like he had gathered that information and used it as ammunition against me.

After that, I started questioning myself and my own perception of things. I found myself thinking, “Maybe he’s right. Maybe I really am the problem. Maybe if I have issues with multiple people, then it must all be because of me.” It has affected my confidence a lot, and I’m struggling to understand whether I’m actually failing to see something about my own behavior or whether he is intentionally making me doubt myself.

I'm trying to make sense of this confusing behaviour of the narc which makes me forget how cruel he can get... when things are good, he can be extremely lovey-dovey. He’s affectionate, caring, sweet, and makes me feel like we’re very close.

But then we have a fight, and it’s like he becomes a completely different person. During arguments, he seems to have absolutely no empathy for me. He doesn’t seem to care if I’m crying or hurt, and sometimes he says some of the most hurtful things he could possibly say. He has even told me that he doesn’t care if I get hurt or sick and that he doesn’t care about me at all.

Once things calm down and the conflict is over, he gradually goes back to being normal..and then becomes very lovey-dovey again. Affectionate, sweet, wanting closeness, acting as though everything is fine.

How can someone go from “I don't care if you get hurt or sick” during a fight to being extremely affectionate and loving once things settle down? It makes it so hard to understand this person and if I'll ever be able to leave cos I blame myself for his outbursts...

My previous account got banned, and I started posting the exact same type of content on a different account that I had kept as a backup. On my old account, my posts would usually get decent views and likes, and a few even went viral.

But on this account, I’m barely reaching 200 views and getting around 5 likes, sometimes even less. The weird thing is that I’m posting basically the same content, and I honestly don’t think the quality is bad.

I’ve also seen accounts posting videos that are objectively lower quality (at least in terms of lighting/editing/etc.) getting thousands of views and way more likes, while mine barely gets shown to anyone.

I know Instagram reach can be unpredictable, but the difference between my old account and this one is so drastic that I’m wondering if there’s something wrong with the account itself.

My previous account got banned, and I started posting the exact same type of content on a different account that I had kept as a backup. On my old account, my posts would usually get decent views and likes, and a few even went viral.

But on this account, I’m barely reaching 200 views and getting around 5 likes, sometimes even less. The weird thing is that I’m posting basically the same content, and I honestly don’t think the quality is bad.

I’ve also seen accounts posting videos that are objectively lower quality (at least in terms of lighting/editing/etc.) getting thousands of views and way more likes, while mine barely gets shown to anyone.

I know Instagram reach can be unpredictable, but the difference between my old account and this one is so drastic that I’m wondering if there’s something wrong with the account itself.

I’m really struggling with anger during PMDD right now. I live with my mom, and our relationship is already extremely toxic. Ever since I got laid off from my job, she constantly expects me to help with her chores and treats me like I have nothing else going on.

Yesterday I had a complete breakdown, and today I can still feel the anger physically. It feels like my blood is boiling over the smallest things. I’m trying really hard not to explode, and I’ve been literally holding my breath and forcing myself to control my anger.

What actually helps you calm down when you can't just leave the situation or get space?

I'’ve been realizing something heavy about my family lately, especially my mom and my brother. We live in a deeply unhappy household, and no matter what happens, it feels like nothing can fundamentally change them.

I’ve noticed this weird pattern with their happiness: even when something genuinely good happens, their excitement has an expiration date. It lasts for maybe a day, and then it’s right back to the exact same miserable baseline. Nothing actually changes

It’s like their unhappiness is an internal void, and no matter what external things anyone does, they will always find a way to ruin it and create a new grievance. For me...they constantly point fingers and say, "You're like this, you're like that, it's all your fault...and honestly? Sometimes I fall into the trap of believing them because of how I react. I'll admit, I get pushed so far past my limits, enduring the criticism and pressure for so long, that eventually I break. I snap. I start shouting.

And the second I do, they jump on it. "See? Look at you! Everyone else is fine, but you're the problem, it's all because of your aggressive behavior." They completely erase all the months of pressure, micro-criticisms, and unreasonable demands that drove me to that point in the exact second I lose my cool.

I’ve been working really hard on myself, trying to change my mindset, my ways, and how I handle things. But the pressure from them is so relentless that I inevitably snap again, and the cycle repeats.

I’ve been realizing something heavy about my family lately, especially my mom and my brother. We live in a deeply unhappy household, and no matter what happens, it feels like nothing can fundamentally change them.

I’ve noticed this weird pattern with their happiness: even when something genuinely good happens, their excitement has an expiration date. It lasts for maybe a day, and then it’s right back to the exact same miserable baseline. Nothing actually changes

It’s like their unhappiness is an internal void, and no matter what external things anyone does, they will always find a way to ruin it and create a new grievance. For me...they constantly point fingers and say, "You're like this, you're like that, it's all your fault...and honestly? Sometimes I fall into the trap of believing them because of how I react. I'll admit, I get pushed so far past my limits, enduring the criticism and pressure for so long, that eventually I break. I snap. I start shouting.

And the second I do, they jump on it. "See? Look at you! Everyone else is fine, but you're the problem, it's all because of your aggressive behavior." They completely erase all the months of pressure, micro-criticisms, and unreasonable demands that drove me to that point in the exact second I lose my cool.

I’ve been working really hard on myself, trying to change my mindset, my ways, and how I handle things. But the pressure from them is so relentless that I inevitably snap again, and the cycle repeats.

I've been realizing something heavy about my family lately, especially my mom and my brother. We live in a deeply unhappy household, and no matter what happens, it feels like nothing can fundamentally change them.

I’ve noticed this weird pattern with their happiness: even when something genuinely good happens, their excitement has an expiration date. It lasts for maybe a day, and then it’s right back to the exact same miserable baseline. Nothing actually changes

It’s like their unhappiness is an internal void, and no matter what external things anyone does, they will always find a way to ruin it and create a new grievance. For me...they constantly point fingers and say, "You're like this, you're like that, it's all your fault...and honestly? Sometimes I fall into the trap of believing them because of how I react. I'll admit, I get pushed so far past my limits, enduring the criticism and pressure for so long, that eventually I break. I snap. I start shouting.

And the second I do, they jump on it. "See? Look at you! Everyone else is fine, but you're the problem, it's all because of your aggressive behavior." They completely erase all the months of pressure, micro-criticisms, and unreasonable demands that drove me to that point in the exact second I lose my cool.

I’ve been working really hard on myself, trying to change my mindset, my ways, and how I handle things. But the pressure from them is so relentless that I inevitably snap again, and the cycle repeats.