Thread by @kefactors

#BubbleStory book notes:
The bubble is not about enclosure or safety, but about control. It's not a biodome but a mold, where control is exerted, and members are expected to conform or be excluded, even degraded.

2) Narcissistic family systems run largely on anger, so there's a lot of telling, not discussion. There's no love in the joyful sense: it's about dominance and control, manipulation, even bullying and humiliation. Members are frequently triangulated to afford control.

3) To make the triangulations run more effectively, certain members are favored while others are made 2nd class citizens—hence the favorite, the scapegoat, and the lost child who just can't master competence. But who would run their family this way?

4) The head of this dysfunctional system is a narcissist who needs an exorbitant amount of control over everyone, and it doesn't matter if they're children, adult children, or adults (partners, spouses). Boundaries are to be disregarded. Emotional incest is frequent, routine.

5) The key to understanding this is the need for control; the lack of remorse or empathy for what that control does to the spiritual development of the kids; and how justified the narcissist (the real head of household) feels to hold such unfair levels of power over others.

6) Under this paradigm, of course discipline is a fuzzy hellish mess. Power lines go from the head narcissist to the favored child, also poorly disciplined, into the next generation. Since discipline is regarded incorrectly as punishment, the kids most needing it are "spared."

7) But discipline is just a loving form of teaching. Most savvy teachers/educators get this. It's the draconian control freaks who don't see it that way, bc they must have absolute dominance. Love has been confused with power, control, not joy or joyful loving teaching.

8) The most failed versions of this system produces bullies. Why? Bc they haven't been disciplined, which also teaches a kid self-respect and self-regulation. All they know is that dominance and control are the more desirable ways to exist with others.

9) The child who can push through this emotional tangle just to live healthy as his own person is courageous and self-aware, to his immense credit. But bc he won't adapt to the dominance and craven needs of the head narcissist, he'll catch hell from all sides.

10) The head narcissist requires constant attn, to always be front and center in the spotlight. The kids suffer the most, as their own life experiences don't mean very much, not if the narcissist is jonesing for accolade or even just attention.

11) You gotta figure the bullying is a constant threat bc if the narcissist typically triangulates the kids against the other parent, or whining to the favored kid(s) about the scapegoat, they're practicing passive-aggressive emotional abuse on a routine basis.

12) The head narcissist is platitudinous: no real grasp of other humans' life experiences bc they cannot see beyond their own noses. Platitudes reinforce dominance. They're very image-conscious. They listen selectively and tend to offer bromides rather than insightful thinking.

13) When jonesing for attn or dominance, their needs are expressed via:
• Chronic hypochondria
• The copious sufferings of the martyr
• This is the worse: Some histrionic variations of Munchausen By Proxy.
Again, if they can't win by reason, they'll resort to manipulations.

14) The chronic self-absorption of hypochondria creates an environment of enhanced control, bc nobody can live or speak freely lest they upset the fragile balance of the narcissist's “condition.” Ironically, the narcissist will outlive everyone, especially their spouse.

15) It's not so cut and dry. You just feel so much pain, you'll do anything to end it. So that's what I did. I felt emotionally exhausted, asking for the little courtesies that would make me feel protected.

16) He didn't understand cause-and-effect: coldly, he said, “I can't protect you from your thoughts,” but those thoughts were triggered by what he said and did! As I mentioned before, that family had a weird sense of accountabilities.

17) His cousin didn't even know me but he immediately understood how certain situations would make me feel unsafe. After that I started thinking maybe the issue was a giant empathy deficit. He wanted all of it to run smoothly w/o any effort on his part, so I was just whinging.

18) And that put me right back into the marriage I'd left, where I was to blame for everything, and he could just refuse to be helpful. The last 24 hours were awful; I saw a very selfish person trying to regain control over others. He lied too: a deal breaker.

19) After that, I couldn't get away fast enough. I tried to be decent about it, to create some closure, but when the threats were made, I just steered clear. Sick unpleasant family.

20) When I tell my friends that I still worry and care about him, that's when Andy says, “That just proves your feelings were genuine and sincere. He was a putz to not see or appreciate that. Of course you needed safety, but everything he arranged was to serve his needs alone.”

21) One night Andy walked me home as I wondered, if I hadn't ended it as I did, would this man have been there for me when I lost Dad? Andy shook his head. “I doubt you'd have been any happier or safer. It would've been a disaster. He set up everything to suit himself.”

22) The words were chilling. He repeated it: “Everything about this was to serve his needs — every move, every lie. When you stood up for yourself, he took it as whining. That's why he lost you. He was selfish and inconsiderate.”

23) He added, “And now he's unforgiving. Fine: f**k him. He never deserved you to begin with. WTF was he to trash your ex and your old boyfriends for being chumps? He lost you faster than they did! Who is he to call the others chumps?!”

24) Andy: “Looking down his nose at you for fighting—JFC, you were trying to stand up for yourself in an unfair situation! He didn't know how to take care of you. He didn't know how to meet your needs, and suddenly it's all your fault? He can't protect you from your thoughts?!”

25) Then he made a point I'd intuited ever since last March: “They're spoiled people, Lucy. They're takers, consumers. All that other stuff is just performative bullsh*t—virtue signaling. These were never good people. He was predatory too. Probably still is.”

26) “Telling you to try and get into that area writing project. Who does that serve? Him!”

He was adamant abt this: “He couldn't answer a simple question abt that time he went AWOL—so is that selective amnesia? One lie unravels all other truths. No wonder you didn't trust him.”

27) “Do you think he's ever missed me?”

“No. Look at who he is, Lucy. He's selfish and self-serving, and predatory. He's learning to forget you so he can get back to doing his usual sh*t. Whatever he told you before abt being elderly & how he couldn't do this again was a lie.”

28) Andy: “I'm glad you got clear of his insanity. That business about having you rent a room in his house was absolutely nuts! What did you call that idea?”

“A Dateline episode.” 😆😂🤣

This was — is — the man I left, but I didn't see him in fully coalesced clarity until the last day. Ice-cold selfishness. It was like the inflection point from a horror movie. When I miss him, I tell myself I had loved an illusion and what I saw on the last day was the reality.

@threadreaderapp plz unroll? Merci, mes amis.