How to Spot a Dangerous Man

It was around two years before my mother pulled the stunt that precipitated my decision to cut her out of my life. The year 2000 thereabouts. The process of my emotional distancing from her had embarked on its final stages in 1998 after an event where I was forced to fully acknowledge to myself that my mother was hopelessly chilish and selfish, controlling and sinisterly manipulative, a big, fat liar and dangerous. Mother's Day was coming and I was feeling very pressured. I had reached the point where I could see that none of the Mother's Day cards applied to my mother. Combine that fact with how she had been ratcheting up her expectations for gifts on Mother's Day year by year. Now she was habitually providing "clues" as to what she would like to get for Mother's Day. She would issue the gift list in such a way as it was supposed that she was simply expressing, wistfully, the things she wanted. We would be out at the mall, or she'd be looking at ca...

I just checked my Amazon Associates account and was amazed and humbled, and yes, a bit surprised to see so many of you buying at Amazon through my site! Thanks to all of you who are clicking through my site I have made over $30 so far. Ya'll just pushed me into the 6.5% referral rate this morning when the 31st item was shipped. Probably the person most shocked is my husband. He predicted I might end up with about three nickels to rub together. You all have put a smile on his face too. Thank you, thank you and thank you. I'm feelin' the love. Sherbie has been posturing in about three dozen completely captivating poses telling me I MUST take pictures of him for your viewing enjoyment. Thing is...the batteries on the camera are kaput, and I haven't been able to get to the store to buy new ones. I discovered this fact when I grabbed the camera to catch the Sherblet in one of his many cute configurations. Sherb apologizes for the ineptness of his human. Thank you s...

From " Characteristics of Narcissistic Mothers ": She terrorized. All abusers use fear to control their victims, and your narcissistic mother used it ruthlessly to train you. Narcissists teach you to beware their wrath even when they aren’t present. The only alternative is constant placation. If you give her everything she wants all the time, you might be spared. If you don’t, the punishments will come. Even adult children of narcissists still feel that carefully inculcated fear. Your narcissistic mother can turn it on with a silence or a look that tells the child in you she’s thinking about how she’s going to get even. This describes my mother; how 'bout yours? The author uses the word "terrorized". This word is not hyperbolic. It is the exact right word to describe what the child of a narcissist mother endures, possibly for a lifetime. At Answers.com we find the military definition of a terrorist: An individual who uses violence, terror, and intimidation t...

I think ya'll are ready for one more song to rock you the rest of the way through the weekend. I promise to not post another song for awhile, but I really think you're gonna get into this one. It is titled "Fighter". No, I'm not a big Christina Aguilera fan. She has an awesome voice, but a lot of her songs don't do it for me. This one kicks butt. I'm going to post the lyrics on this since you may not catch every word. Every word is worth catching. Direct every word to the narcissist in your life. Oh, and be sure to crank it up... Fighter When I, thought I knew you Thinking, that you were true I guess I, I couldn't trust 'Cause your bluff time is up 'Cause I've had enough You were, there by my side Always, down for the ride But your, joy ride just came down in flames 'Cause your greed sold me out of shame, mmhmm After all of the stealing and cheating You probably think that I hold resentment for you But, uh uh, oh no, you're ...

JoDee Messina sold an album the day I heard "My Give a Damn's Busted". It so summed up my mood at that time as I was feeling that way about my sister...and mother. I'm feeling it today. Probably because of today's earlier post. It is a good feeling. A feeling of finally breaking free of something that had weighed me down for so long. The spunkiness of this song and how it celebrates breaking through the bull shit. Yeah. I'm feelin' it. So you can feel it too...

I need to put in a clear disclaimer at the outset of this post. I love motherhood. In fact, I am someone who thinks there is no more important job in the world than being a mother. It is my deep, sincere respect for the high office of motherhood that motivates me to highlight the fact that there are mothers out there who have more in common with a serial killer than with true motherhood. These monsters who clothe themselves with the sacerdotal cloth of motherhood while terrorizing the fruit of her womb are worthy of no honor on this day set aside to thank good and decent mothers. Yes, I know very well that all mothers make mistakes. We could never honor any mother if the qualifications for honor were that she never have made any mistakes in raising her young. I don't believe in perfect motherhood. I do believe that good and decent mothers make mistakes, but she more than makes up for them by the fact that she unfailingly loves her children and puts their best interests ahea...

The pitty-pat of the approach of Mother's Day in the U.S. is even now discernible. A month away, I'm sure some of you are starting to feel the creeping dread rise up in your throat. Your stomach sinks; your heart squeezes in the vise-grip of expectations of family and society-at-large to bequeath honor on the dishonorable. At the other end of whatever I end up writing here today, I'll direct you to my ode to evil mothers written last year since I'm not sure I have anything better to say on it. Let me stop for a moment here and tap into my internal rage and see if anything else comes up. Ummmm, ummmmmnnn. This coffee is too good--it's put me in my happy place. Perhaps I'll recount for you part of a conversation with my husband yesterday. We were discussing the comment that I dealt with this last week here and here . Hubby brought up the presumption of the commenter that I was selfishly motivated as well as the implication that I had casually tossed away m...

I was asked to revisit the comment that I parsed out in this post and make a more thorough job of it. The request came because I had glossed over a couple of paragraphs due to my boredom with the lame arguments therein. Because the request was coming from someone who found themselves disquieted by those glossed-over-by-me paragraphs I have found the motivation to finish the job. I don't want anyone to be struggling with residual discomfort from the words of an ignorant, drive-by Christian. I will pick up where I left off. The commenter's words are in italics. God's word gives us clear principles to live by as far as dealing with those who are living in sin. Yes, it does give us those "clear principles". The principles vary depending on whether or not the sinner is a repentant one or not. This person doesn't acknowledge that fact. Many of the claims of this commenter I have dealt with in my second post on the 5th commandment. In my post, " A W...

A comment on the last post has sparked my thinking. The comment introduced the idea that a ministerial work, or an effort designed to help others in some way, is somehow sullied when the worker offers others the chance to support the work. This idea of payment always contaminating a charitable effort is held by many the world around so I'll address it a bit here. Also, it is very likely that many of us have been taught this by the narcissist. Let me peel the layers back a bit and give you another way to look at this. The narcissist doesn't want to acknowledge the labor and intellect of others as being worthy of being compensated. They devalue us, dismiss us and steal our efforts because they can't stand the idea of having to thank us or praise us, least of all, pay us. We've been taught to think that if we ask for anything in return for our efforts then we've ruined those efforts. The narcissist demands of us servitude. All labor for the narcissist is to be...

Okay, folks. I thought I'd try something new. I have signed up with Amazon so that any time you folks decide to buy something from Amazon I can get a piece of the action. I have a widget added in the sidebar. I have some books listed there along with my recommendations. If you click through the widget and then purchase something from Amazon they will send me a percentage of the sale. Even if you don't buy what you clicked on, they send lil' ol me a percentage. So, let's say that you wake up tomorrow morning and think, "I need to buy a Samsung LN40A650A 40-inch 1080p 120Hz LCD HDTV with RED Touch of Color." Your next thought will be to go to Anna's blog and click through to Amazon through my wee widget. Amazon then will kindly forward 4% to me. Maybe 6% depending on how many of you feel like helping out. Four percent of 1,849.38 is....well, you do the math cuz I can't without a calculator. See? This is so not complicated. For me--cash for ...

I wrote a post in February titled, " From Such Turn Away ". If you want to get the full impact of what is to follow I hope you'll go back and re-read my post. It is the context within which the comment I'm going to address was made. It is important to see exactly what this person chose to ignore in order to make the statements he or she did. Assuming you've done your little homework assignment above, I'll proceed. The person whose comment you'll be reading found my blog on 4.7.08 @ 6:48 a.m. by doing a Google search, "biblical view of narcissism". Google landed this person on the blog post above. This is the only post on my blog that this person read. They read, clicked on 'comment', did their thang and left. Obviously, this person doesn't believe that my blog presents a biblical view of narcissism. You'll soon see why. I have gone to considerable effort to deal with the clubs that are used on Christians by Christians. I ...

I want to examine a little further the narcissist appeaser otherwise identified in my last post as "The Peacemaker". When last describing the 'peacemaker' I put it in a religious context by identifying the N-appeaser as being a member of the Cult of Nice. This cult has doctrines and faith. It punishes and proscribes 'heretics'. The 'peacemaker' himself is a self-appointed priest. His god is the narcissist. The role of appeaser and so-called peacemaker is not a new phenomena. It has been an important role in human societies for millennia. The lengths to which a peacemaker/priest will go to appease an angry god was seen in multiplied and ancient cultures and always appeared in a religious context. Cultures which believed in a capricious, vengeful and angry god had elaborate rituals designed to appease their pagan god. Up to and including human sacrifice. There is mild argument about the prevalence of human sacrifice in ages past, but there has bee...