Hi, my name is Unbecca and I’m the daughter of a narcissistic mother.

Hey, it works in AA. Maybe just announcing it is part of healing? Should I first try pouring her down the drain? Smash the bottle on the counter?

I went no contact two years ago. I removed the harmful substance from my life. But it lurks. It stalks. It continues to tell lies to people in my orbit. So… no, it’s not like recovering from an addiction. It’s like trying to heal from an amputated leg that still keeps kicking me in the ass.

I make jokes about everything. Most things have humor in them if you squeeze hard enough, except my mom. She laughs… it’s not that she doesn’t. She will be the first to laugh when she’s insulting you. If you return the favor, look out.

The irony… there was a morning back in high school I made my mom SO mad simply by ignoring her. She was on about something so insignificant, I don’t even remember the details, but she wanted a reaction. She wanted me to be mad and yell back or whatever. But I had not had coffee yet. Much like a car, without fuel, I’m not goin’ nowhere.

I’m at the counter, I’m pouring my coffee, and she starts punching me in the back of the head. She’d reached that point where she’d run out of words, so she escalated to violence.

That’s how I feel these days… She will be the first to tell you that I sent her a six-page letter. It’s been two years and it’s still her favorite subject when she throws her reverse, draw-four victim card on the table. She’s told so many people I’m surprised I don’t hear it being discussed between stalls in public restrooms.

The problem is, she didn’t hear a single word I wrote. She has completely ignored the content. She quotes the letter, so I know she’s read it, but she is fixated on refuting my claims by sabotaging my credibility. In the end, it is always about her and her image.

But who is she trying to impress? Who is this image maintained for? One of her great life mysteries is why she has no friends. She’s not out lunching or golfing, so who buys the ticket to her grand performance?

The whole thing makes me so mad, I can understand why throwing punches might feel good. Getting out some of that pent-up “why?!” rage that has been simmering under the surface for 50 years. I’m not looking for a reaction. I don’t want to fight. I don’t want to belabor all 6,487 examples of her abuse. I just want her to say, “Hey, I’m sorry.”

WITHOUT A BUT.

God, that’s worse than no apology, isn’t it? “I’m so sorry I punched you in the back of the head, but…” 
But what? You were mad that I didn’t engage, didn’t want to argue, didn’t want to have a fight over whatever perceived injustice before I’d even had my coffee?

I’ll tell ya, with complete conviction, it is always my fault. Sometimes it might be my dad’s fault. But it is never my mom’s fault. Ever.

A friend and I were talking; she has such a loving and healthy relationship with her mom, it’s so foreign to me, just as she can’t understand my insistence that I’ll never speak to my mom again. She asked, “Look, it’s none of my business and you can tell me to pound sand, but what would it take for you to reconcile with your mom?” Didn’t take me an instant to reply: “Yep, pound sand!” My mom is not sorry. The most important part of any road that could possibly run perpendicular to reconciliation, from a distance, two or three states away, would be an apology. And if she’s nothing else, she is not sorry.

That might be what sends me into an overstimulated loop more confusing than the Matrix. (Somebody give her the red pill already!) How do you say cruel, hateful things to your children? How can you repeatedly violate known, specific boundaries, hurt them, and have zero remorse? How do you triangulate strangers about the humans that you raised without a second thought?

Maybe that’s where I get so lost. I don’t never not lie, it would be a lie to say otherwise. My lies are mostly harmless: “No, officer, I was not speeding” or “Yes, cute little girl, Santa is absolutely real!” I can’t wade deep enough into my brain to produce the skillset to generate falsehoods about people I care about. I am simply not capable of deliberately hurting another human being on purpose.

And maybe it’s a gift, but when I do, I apologize. Readily. Willingly. If I like you and I made you sad or mad, or you felt unheard or unappreciated, I am genuinely sorry. I know how that feels and would never inflict that on anyone. Well… not anyone I like anyway.

In my sleepless nights, obsessing, searching for the elusive “why,” I have found a pattern. There is a tell. I know the tell because I have this weird habit of memorizing situations and overanalyzing in a simulation loop of doom. Yeah, it is my standard operating system, but when it’s mom-induced fury… one of these days my head is literally going to explode. It’s like watching a magician pull a dead pigeon out of his hat and tell you it’s a rabbit.

My mom lies. That’s it, that’s the tell. When she knows she has done something exceptionally horrific, she fixes it with lies. Not just an ordinary manipulation of truth, but a whole manufactured deception with no elements of reality. It’s funny in the “where in the hell did that come from” sense, but when you’re living it…

For example: she came into your house after you told her not to. You are so mad, and let me be the first to assure you, you are well within your right as a tax-paying adult to be angry. But you don’t even get a chance to express your mad because she upstages and starts yelling. at. you. Confusing as hell, right? Now you’re off balance. This is followed by tears and door slams. She can’t hear you because she is making so much noise that none of your noise ever reaches her ears. Sneaky, right?

I do this in dog training: distract and redirect. Yeah, you’re supposed to feel insulted because you now realize you are being conditioned like a Pomeranian listening for the bells of Notre Dame.

Phase two is the smear. She calls the hairdresser, the finance guy, anyone who has seen your name in a manila folder at some point since your birth, and she tells them things like, “She borrowed things and didn’t return them,” or my current favorite, “She has her boyfriend’s money now; she no longer needs mine.”

(Side note, saved here for my insanity hearing: I have not taken money from my mother. Not for survival, not for incidentals. More often than not, if there’s a dinner out or a run to Grocery Outlet, I’m paying.)

Now these lies will reach you, trust me, when you least expect it. Imagine walking through the garden enjoying all the beautiful flowers and suddenly getting smashed in the face because you stepped on a rake. It’s that jarring.

But do you see what happened? You are now fixated on the rumor. The story. How did it start? How far did it travel?

You’ve completely forgotten the origin story because you are focused on finding the rake and stopping the proverbial bleeding.

Technically, I don’t forget, but that rake punch sends me to the compost bin and I temporarily lose sight of the flowers. I eventually find my way back. I always return to the things that bring me joy. But fuck, there are a lot of rakes lying around.

I know I’m not supposed to complain. I’m not supposed to put personal shit on the internet. I know all that. But you know what else I know? Moms are supposed to be safe places that offer unconditional love to their children. She’s benefited from my silence far too long.

I’m going to suffer a lot of self-induced guilt for putting this out there. I’ve given up on ever getting any form of apology, even with the butt. For her to stop talking about me completely is an unreachable dream, but it’s like playing the lottery. I keep throwing dollars out the window hoping one of them gives me a win.

But a two-year keychain would be nice, too.