The fact I have an “easier” time than normal with haters might be because of my trauma.
Speaking for myself here, but I’m willing to bet other victims of narcissistic abuse can relate.
If you survived narcissistic abuse, be it from family or romantic relationships or cults, feel free to comment here whether or not this article rings a bell for you. I’d like to informally gather some data.
Narcissists behave like haters. This is not to say all haters (especially online) are narcissistic or have any personality disorder at all. I’m sure a lot of them lead normal lives and just happen to be having a bad day or bad period in their lives [and are too immature to deal with it without lashing out at others] — just like, you know, school bullies. If you know a former bully from your school now in adulthood, and today they’re mature and nice, there ya go, that’s what I’m talking about. People [who aren’t narcissistic] grow up and learn. I’m not excusing bullying, just saying it’s not part of everyone’s permanent personality. The comparison I’m making to narcissists is because the behaviour, itself, can get really similar to what we endure with them. The thing is… Narcissists behave like haters 24/7 and for indefinite periods of time (so, worse than haters. Way worse. It goes past the point where it’s deliberate. It becomes automatic for them).
Today’s reflection was inspired by a funny phenomenon that kept happening until fairly recently: whenever someone I follow made a blog post, video, podcast, etc about “dealing with haters”, I would add them to an imaginary list of people who struggle with receiving hate — be it online or off. I wondered why it’s such a popular topic, why it’s a big deal at all. I mean, of course it’s not comfortable and nobody likes or deserves it, but it’s pretty common, isn’t it? So, why fixate on the topic?
I sort of viewed hateful criticism and bullying as an unpleasant part of life which is part and parcel of existing in this planet, because we share it with immature people. In all fairness, even today, I don’t think I was wrong; But I was ignoring the fact that just because something is common, it doesn’t mean everyone has learned how to brush it off or be truly unphased by it. And why was I unphased by it? Well, evidently, because I had already suffered worse at home.
Eventually, it dawned on me: most people have loving parents! Or, at least, non-narcissistic anyway. There’s no such thing as perfect parents, but I think we can all agree that the majority of parents are on the same team as their children and want what’s best for these children — instead of being always distrusting of their children without good reason and waging a silent war at home “just to make full sure everything will remain fine” (so they can feel in control) or just to keep their children forever dependent (so they can feel like useful parents with a purpose). It’s self-serving to be like that. It’s very yucky, no matter how you spin the narrative to justify it.
So… Yeah, I wasn’t one of the lucky majority. Unfortunately, I was born from a paranoid (possibly psychotic?) mother and a doormat dad. What can I say? There comes a point when paranoia breeds self-fulfilling prophecies, because one can only go so far trying to coddle and reassure someone who is paranoid. Eventually, it’s “okay. You WANT me to abandon you just so your mental narrative about me can be right? You would rather LOSE ME than admit you were wrong? You choose your ego and pride instead of our relationship? Well, then. Your wish is my command. Don’t come crying about it in the future. You made your bed, now lie on it”. But I digress.
OF COURSE people who didn’t have the kind of parenting I endured would be surprised at the existence of haters when they see the phenomenon in the outer world! They don’t have a history of enduring the same at home, day in, day out.
It’s not wise to envy my “superpower”. I’ll tell you exactly why:
(By which I’m referring to the “superpower” of always being unphased by bullying, regardless of how bad).
Maybe some people envy that, since it sounds like a pretty useful skill, doesn’t it? I bet a lot of people wish they had the ability to just tune out of it when things get bad, instead of letting the comments get to them, and their day be ruined. I totally get it.
However… Careful what you wish for.
I can only speak for myself here, so if I’m wrong about this bit, let me know: there seem to be many ways by which victims of persistent abuse (like narcissistic abuse) cope. I’ve heard stories where they dissociate to a fantasy world, for example, and that would be a different way of being unphased. (This seems to go beyond normal childhood imagination to fight boredom, because that’s ok and everybody does it; With dissociation, according to what I know, the person starts to genuinely LIVE in their fantasy world and REJECT the real world for long periods of time). I didn’t develop dissociation myself, but anyone who did will tell you it comes with the hidden price of struggling to stay grounded and attentive later in life. So, maybe it’s a superpower against bullying, but you pay a high price for it.
My own coping mechanism has a price too. It’s called “mistaking microaggressions for friendship”. Or, in more trendy and buzzword-y terms, “passing as autistic when you’re in fact not autistic”. (Because the same EXACT thing happens to the autistic — here’s a person who experienced it and explains it in a wonderful way —but it’s because of how their brain is wired, instead of being because of an unconscious survival strategy to cope with parental abuse).
This is the root cause of my problem with friendships always ending up in disaster. Instead of actually making friends, I was often just trauma bonding with passive-aggressive folks who didn’t truly find me interesting but were too nice or too non-confrontational to tell me to my face that they didn’t wanna hang out with me.
Basically, my coping mechanism stunted my ability to discern. Instead of looking around me and seeing different “categories” of people (ie, “these are friendly”, “those are bitchy”, “that one is indifferent”, etc), I spent a good bit of my life so far seeing EVERYBODY through a rose-tinted lens. Or, well, nearly everybody. I could tell blatant hostility when I saw it; it’s the subtle kind that gave me a hard time.
…But instead of being because “I’m somehow wired differently”, my difficulty in identifying subtle hostility or indifference simply came from upbringing: I grew up genuinely thinking that my mother loved me. And if she behaved a certain way towards me in her good days (passive-aggressively, condescending, superior, scoffing, looking down on me, whatever you wanna call it — yes, when she WASN’T overtly abusing me, she was putting on that “I’m so much better than you and you’re so pathetic that I can’t help but laugh of your silly inferiority” facade. 24/7. I don’t think I’ve EVER seen her display genuine affection towards me or anyone)… therefore, I thought, other people who have a similar behaviour must be loving and safe to be around too.
I sort of had a glimpse of clarity once during a video call with her when I was normally talking about my job and other everyday adult activities, and she started out of nowhere using that kind of baby voice you do when you’re talking to a pet or to a really young toddler (?) and it was unnerving. I couldn’t help but cringe. Like, what kind of person reacts to someone who is rambling about grown-up topics with “awwww how cuuuuuute” or similar? It makes no sense. It’s disconcerting.
Well, in my specific case, here’s who does that: a person who feels threatened by the idea that her child grew up, and desperately falls back on her delusion that she can somehow reverse time or “command” people to stop growing and changing.
This. The below is what I’m describing (if you “translate” it into a less exaggerated and more realistic iteration).
Or this:
Ya know… It’s kind of difficult to see this behaviour for what it is (a “mean girls”, “Regina George style” subtle put down) when you grow up constantly hearing it and being brainwashed to believe it’s a form of affection.
THIS is the hidden reason why some survivors of narcissists have such a hard time with enforcing boundaries for themselves.
It’s not lack of self-esteem. It’s not that they need to love themselves more and feel more deserving of what’s good.
I mean… The above can ALSO be true at the same time. We often have self-esteem issues. But let’s not mistake apples with oranges. “Low self-esteem” is becoming a platitude at this point. Let’s go past the surface level, please? Thank you.
The REAL reason why some survivors of narcissists struggle with boundaries is, plain and simply, they never learned the “how to”, the “A-B-C” of boundaries. Chances are they grew up ignoring the whole concept of boundaries altogether, often without basic privacy, let alone the chance to learn how to signal to somebody that their behaviour or presence isn’t okay or welcome (although they KNOW and already have a gut feeling that it indeed isn’t okay or welcome — again, differentiating it from autism).
…And that doesn’t automatically mean this survivor “doesn’t know the importance” of boundaries. They probably really, really, really wish they could set boundaries — so, there you go, they know how important it is! — but they need be walked through the process like a toddler. Or alternatively, learn it the hard way through trial and error, WAYYYYY PAST the “proper” age for that, and leave a trail of failed friendships behind. (It’s what happened to me. Thanks for nothing, psychologists who didn’t wanna dive deep into anything. Who needs hard work when you can be lazy?).
TLDR (although, if you came this far, maybe you read the article lol) In summary, my central point is: most people let hate and bullying get to them to some extent; But maybe that’s still a good thing overall, because at least it prevents self-gaslighting or the stunting of one’s own growth from happening. Sure, let’s grow a thick skin; but never to the detriment of KNOWING evil when you see it.
