The Warning Before The Downfall
Sometimes I get a warning before impending doom or a downfall. This warning often happens in my dreams, but sometimes there will be occurrences in my waking life that alert me to keep my eyes open.
Spiders have always been a sign for me to watch out for what is going on around me. I have always been afraid of them since I was a child and would always associate them with wickedness. Although most dream interpretations use spiders as a symbol for good, they have always represented evil to me even though, in actuality, spiders being evil is not the case. They are insects. Yet, whatever works to get my attention is what God uses to arouse me to attention.
My association with spiders as being evil are engulfed within my childhood fears and other associated trauma. So, seeing them in dreams filled me with intense fear to the point that would often awaken from sleep in terror. Seeing them in waking life rendered me in a state of paralysis as I tried to escape from them for the fear of them crawling on me to bite me. Although I was fascinated with their webs, the fascination ended there.
In my personal experience, spiders have always been used as a sign that I need to be watchful of somebody crafting a web or trap for me to fall into that I may not see. Anytime I’m around narcissists, I believe God uses spiders as a personal sign to me that things are awry around me and that I need to be careful and watchful. Needless to say, seeing them within their natural habitats usually doesn’t cause me to consider danger or doom, but seeing them in dreams or seeing them around me more than I think is necessary is another story.
On one particular day, I went into the workplace bathroom and encountered a huge spider. For me, it was more than out of the ordinary because it was HUGE and in my face. Within my spirit, I instantaneously heard the word “DANGER” as if someone had whispered it into my ear. In the past with narcissists, I became very aware that spiders were used in dreams to alert me to the dangers around me.
I believe the sight of a spider are the one way God gets my spiritual attention. So, in my waking life, when I see them under what I consider unusual circumstances based on things such as their size or other unusual characteristics to the point that I can’t miss seeing them because they stand out, or seeing them in too many different places in one day, my spiritual eyes and ears open up and my discernment regarding what is happening around me is attuned to make me a watchman. I always know to be on high alert, and that alert always involves a narcissist.
So, when I saw the spider, I was instantly bothered by it’s size and characteristics, but then a more spiritual component came into play. I automatically knew I needed to be careful of what was to come, and I needed to watch my surroundings. I already knew I was around narcissistic types within the work environment. There were the mobster bullies, including Damsel in Distress, but there were also three other narcissistic individuals with whom I always limited contact with as well.
Throughout the rest of the shift, the spider stayed in the back of my mind as a precaution. I wondered what it meant, and later on, the sighting was recognized by others too, including Damsel. It would be she who would mentioned that the type of spider it was – a brown recluse, and from what I knew about those types, their bite can not only cause severe swelling around the bitten area, but their bites can also be deadly.
Beyond the point of description, I didn’t give the spider much more thought except to make sure I didn’t go into that particular workplace bathroom until I knew it was gone, but the sighting of it stayed with me as I attempted to determine its direct spiritual correlation to my surroundings. Well, I didn’t have to wait very long to recognize how deadly the bite of a narcissist. In fact, the very next day afterwards, I was surprisingly thrown under the bus to one of the supervisors by none other than Damsel in Distress.
The attack was not a harsh attack or even all that direct, but I was caught off guard though. Damsel in Distress had made it appear in conversation to a supervisor that I was in joint agreement with a statement that she’d made regarding another coworker. Instead of speaking on her own behalf about an issue she personally had with another coworker, Damsel included me in her statement because doing so would somehow make it appear that she wasn’t the only one who had a complaint against this particular coworker.
Just days before Damsel had complained to me and another coworker about the situation she was dealing with concerning the coworker. She wanted to know what course of action she should take, and I recommended simply documenting occurrences of what she considered harassing behavior instead of “ratting” the person out. I had mentioned that telling on the person would only make her appear as the possible troublemaker and that it was better to have proof of instances.
However, instead of applying any measures of documentation, Damsel simply called a supervisor over to where we were working and spilled her issues about this coworker while using me as a “witness” to the issues. I WAS NOT A WITNESS. I am usually on my days off when the issues with the coworker and Damsel even occur. Damsel had lied by omission. She’d conveniently inserted me into the situation as if I had first hand knowledge of what was going on.
Not only was I stunned and caught off guard by Damsel’s admission, I could feel an unnerving heat rise to my cheeks. This was not my character at all. I’d never tattle on a coworker over petty nonsense. I’d simply document occurrences of what would be considered abusive and unprofessional behavior. Otherwise, I’d find ways to deter the person or ignore their behavior altogether. I’m all about peace – not chaos.
Yet, Damsel made it appear that I was a part of the issue when her issues with this coworker had nothing to do with me. All the while, the supervisor looked from Damsel to me as if to find a way to understand the issue. I couldn’t agree nor disagree. I was speechless. I was mute. I had been utterly thrown under the bus. It was then I woke up to the fact that Damsel, despite her trauma, needed to deal with a lot of issues in her life, and until she does, she’d likely continue on in her narcissistic ways.
Her behavior in that moment signified something I saw as an attack. If I wasn’t going to agree with her desire to have something done about this coworker, she was going to make me agree one way or the other. What better way to get what she wanted from me by throwing me under the bus under the guise of a lie. I only knew of her issues with the coworker based on what she’d said, but I hadn’t witnessed a thing. I wasn’t even working the shifts with her or the other coworker to see anything happen. Damsel lied on me by omission, and I was livid.
In fact, I was speechless for the rest of the day. I don’t even know if I was speechless because I went mute or if I was speechless because I was attempting to process how quickly I’d been hit by the moving bus she’d thrown me under. Later on in the day, I went to the supervisor only to feel like the damage Damsel had caused had been done already. I tried to explain to the supervisor that if I had a problem with anyone, I’d always be sure to have written documentation of occurrences and that I’m simply not going to complain about pettiness, but I felt that my words went into one of his ears and out of the other.
In that instance, I felt that Damsel had made me guilty by association even though I wasn’t aware of the true issues between her and this other coworker. I only had her words, but by her words I’d been made a guilty partaker into workplace drama that I wanted no parts of at all. I was absolutely beside myself with anger, and that rendered me unable to speak to her or anyone for the rest of the workday, and Damsel was very aware of this, and I’m almost certain that I could see a look of pleasure on her face at having thrown me under the bus.
It was then that the spider came into the full view of my thoughts, and I knew for certain that I had been warned of an attack. The narcissist had “bitten” me, and I perceived this had been a planned attack based on my responses about her situation that didn’t seem to foster the additional drama she wanted or based on her attempts to get me to open up hadn’t gone her way. Whatever the case, I was immediately aware that I could never give this narcissist the benefit of doubt no matter how traumatic her life story or no matter how I felt instances of sorrow for her life of grief. She’s a narcissist, and she’ll always be a narcissist bringing stings of pain to someone else without any remorse.
The Apology
Although Damsel in Distress later apologized to me about putting me on the spot with the supervisor, she snickered with a huge grin on her face as she gave me her apology. I took note of how her face became the color of a flushed red, and I was more certain that the redness signified embarrassment as opposed to shame. She knew I’d been caught off guard. She knew she threw me under the bus. She knew my silence the rest of the workday signified that I had to have been angry.
Hearing her apology while seeing the flushed redness within her face as she gave a huge grin made me freeze in place to capture that grin as a snapshot within my mind. I’d seen that facial expression before … enough to where I was absolutely familiar with it no matter who wore the expression. It was the narcissistic grimace I was so familiar with … that narcissistic smirk. That smirk signified a callousness of a narcissist which was unbridled with a mixture of absolute anger, smugness, and satisfaction.
Perhaps the anger was in the fact that up to the point that Damsel had thrown me under the bus, she hadn’t been able to gain control of me. Perhaps that smugness was at the fact that she’d been able to frame a false narrative that I was a part of her drama. Perhaps that satisfaction was at the fact that she’d gained a reaction from me because of throwing me under the bus, even though that reaction was encased in silence. Either way, Damsel had gotten me good, and I hadn’t seen it coming at all.
I hadn’t expected to be thrown under the bus in front of a supervisor with words I hadn’t even said … with words that Damsel had only said that made it seem like I agreed with her. She did it in such a quick and slick manner that I didn’t have time to react to her words. Instead, I felt an anger rise up within me on the inside that rendered me absolutely speechless. It was the type of anger that needed to be encased in silence.
My inability to speak the rest of shift might have been God’s way of keeping me calm because I might have blasted her to smithereens if I could speak, and that would have only added fuel to my already dampening reputation as a troublemaker that she was attempting to insinuate about me in the first place. Looking back upon this now, I was so angry that I could not even look in her direction. Yet, despite my anger, I couldn’t feel it deeply enough to process it. All I could do was ponder over the sight of that spider and how Damsel, herself, had mentioned the effects of being bitten by it.
In retrospect, Damsel’s narcissistic smirk through an apology that wasn’t truly sincere was a reminder that reiterated to me that I could never ever let my guard down with her, and I should never ever give her the benefit of doubt. She had proven to me that she was incapable of being a friend. Her need to talk smoothly to me repeatedly and almost daily by saying “I hope you consider me a friend” was her manipulative way to gain an entrance into my personal life. Like a typical narcissist, she just wanted control and narcissistic supply.
Stay tuned for the final part … sort of …
My Voice Unchained 