A Narc Study – Recalling Narcissistic Abuse – Mood Swings

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Usual Moods

For the much of the time, my dad was a cool, funny, and level-headed man with a lot of stories inside of him and a whole lot of life lessons to teach my siblings and me. I learned so much from him, and even now I still utilize the lessons he taught me that have been essential for my daily life. The only lesson he could not teach me was the lesson he had not yet learned himself, and that was how to overcome a narcissist. In retrospect, he did not fare too well in mastering how to overcome a narcissist until he later divorced my mother. However, by that time, plenty of damage and heartache had occurred to him and his family.

I was quick to brand my dad as a sadistic narcissist based on what I sometimes deemed as his harsh treatment towards us (the children). He was very strict. Sometimes I felt his strictness was to the extreme. He had never been in the military, but he had such a command that my siblings and me often felt like we were little soldiers. We would literally stand at attention awaiting his orders. By the time I was five years old, I could make my bed perfectly. I could also wash dishes while standing on a stool.

My dad was all about cleanliness. To him, cleanliness was next to godliness. In the house, he was the only god. His law ruled the household. Nothing passed him without his approval (which excludes my mother’s shenanigans). I often felt inhibited and controlled. I was told what to do and when to do it; what to think and how to think it; and where to go and when to get there. It felt like an unrelenting cesspool of demands. As if it was not enough to have a covert narcissistic mother, I had a dad with narcissistic traits too.

We cleaned constantly. If we were not cleaning inside the house, we were cleaning outside the house. We cleaned every nook and cranny within the house. My dad has us cleaning things that I did not even think necessary to clean (of course I see things differently now that I have my own home). As if the housework was not arduous enough, there was yardwork and gardening. Looking back, we did have times of play and downtime, but when we worked, we worked hard. We worked long days – early mornings into late evenings in the summer. We [the children] were trained well a soldiers, and we stood ready at attention for all commands.

Do not get me wrong, I do appreciate the good work ethic I developed as well as the desire to keep my home neat, tidy, and clean, but I was not a fan of the narcissistic abuses we were subjected to in order to do our chores and attend to the things that my dad wanted us to do. It was frustrating to say the least. My dad was a tyrant when it seemed absolutely unnecessary to be that way. I could not wait to grow up to get away from the house because it was constant mayhem and a lot of nitpicking.

Work

My dad worked very hard and very long hours. He worked swing shifts. We (the children) often never knew when he would be home. Sometimes it seemed like he was suddenly visible but then mysteriously absent. He was always at work. My mother worked too, but she seemed to be home more. For whatever reason, she often had periods of sporadic employment. This may have attributed to my dad’s overall stress. He was mainly the one carrying the financial weight of the family.

Needless to say, I did not like my dad’s job because it often resulted in his ever changing moods. Yes, the job took care of the family, but the job did not take care of him (if that makes sense). My least favorite shifts for him to work were the second and graveyard shifts. First shift was my favorite. First shift made him a more pleasant person to be around. First shift also meant that he was not home terrorizing us during the day, and we could somewhat have a break. First shift also meant that as my siblings and me grew older, we did not have to worry about neither he nor my mom haggling us over the most ridiculous things. First shift for my dad was less of a nightmare for us.

Second and graveyards shifts were the worse for us as a family. It seemed that my dad was irritated by every little thing. His voice was always an elevated shout. He would bark out commands in a very tired voice. If none of use had thick skin, we needed to surely develop thick skin to save ourselves from his venomous wrath. He was always on the warpath. No one was safe from his annihilating wrath – not even my mother. For lack of a better word, my dad was mean. Although I knew it was all mostly related to sleeping all day and having to work during the nights when most people are usually sleeping, I always sensed that there was a lot more going on even when I was too young to understand.

In the next post, I delve into more of why shift work was just not good for our family and my dad’s ever changing moods.