It will always be our fault

 I’ve mentioned before on previous posts about playing the role of the scapegoat if you have grown up with narcissistic parents. But what happens when you have married a clone of your parents and then divorced them?

How does the non disordered parent bring up their children so they don’t end up feeling like that are being pulled in every direction especially when the toxic parent continues to play mind games with you and the children?

First of all if you have married a narcissist/borderline/sociopath and been lucky enough to gain custody of your children your name will be mud. You will continue to be constantly criticised for even the slightest thing going wrong with your children’s upbringing from them failing at school to them having the wrong kind of boyfriends and girlfriends when they get older. You’ll get criticised for your children going out with the wrong friends and even get criticised if they wear the wrong clothes. Nothing you do will ever be good enough and yet when your children succeed and do well at school or university they will be the first person to show them off and say how proud they are of THEIR children. The same children they probably haven’t seen for months or years at a time.

It will always be your fault whatever goes wrong and the toxic parent will never take any responsibility for their own part in the relationship dynamics. Even if your child is in therapy for anger management or self harming because they are so pissed and angry having not seen their toxic parent for months on end. It will be your fault. It wont be because they haven’t been to see them or spend any time with them. When it comes to paying for them and looking after them. If you are lucky enough to have got child maintenance you will have to grovel for any monies you get from them. When you complain that the payments are late because your bending over backwards trying to make end meet being a good parent whilst they have taken a months holiday away on their own but they will say “Well, your lucky enough to have them, so you should pay for them”. They might even offer to take the children away from you and suggest that if you don’t like the arrangements you can let them have them permanently. It will aways be very black and white.

You will constantly have to play the role of the mediator and the toxic parent will try everything they can in their power to get you sucked into making them as toxic as them. Don’t bite or  say things to your children about how disordered they are even when they are pushing all of your buttons. Let the children figure it out for themselves.Children aren’t stupid and eventually they will figure out how toxic their other parent is without you telling them.  If you try and tell them you’ll be the bad guy.

Saying things like your Father/mother is crazy wont earn your any brownie points. Besides which you can be pretty sure the toxic parent will have already been telling the children that the reason you broke up was because of you are the crazy one. They wont admit that the reason you broke up was because they were bossy and controlling or because they had affairs or fill in the blanks. It will always be your fault.

I teach voice dialogue which teaches you how to balance your negative beliefs. It’s an empowering technique that allows us to become our authentic selves and step out of toxic relationships. One of my own beliefs is that “Everything is all my fault”. Voice dialogue teaches that those voices in our head such as “Its all my fault” and “I am powerless, and I cannot say no” will never go away. And if we don’t listen to ourselves the universe will come and along and bring more and more people and situations into our lives to attract the very same that reinforce our beliefs that were never true in the first place.

If your toxic ex is making your feel it’s all your fault and you have grown up with narcissistic parents you will have had excellent training when it comes to playing the scapegoat . Children of narcissist parents will automatically assume its their fault and may often overcompensate to try to make up for the lack. This can cause problems because they may end up spoiling their children and in turn create narcissistic children starting the cycle all over again.

When you use voice dialogue it allows you to balance your belief with another more positive one. One the one hand you may feel like its your fault. You may have grown up with even even more negative thoughts such as “I am damaged goods” but then suddenly you will start to realise there’s another little voice in your head that says something along the lines of “even though my thinking is damaged, they are damaged goods” and you start to act in an adult way. You don’t get sucked into their silly games. You treat your yourself and your children with respect and boundaries. You love them but don’t spoil them rotten. You allow your children to make their own choices about their toxic parent and although it’s not perfect over time your children grow up with one healthy parent. You start to say No to your toxic ex partners demands without getting the children involved.

As you watch yourself grown in confidence so do your children. They thrive at school, there’s no more counselling and you don’t beat yourself up anymore when they do the odd thing wrong.

That little voice may never go away but it doesn’t run the show anymore. If you’d like a free Ebook on how to divorce a Toxic partner feel free to drop me an email at my website www.darksouls-thebook.com

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