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Finding out your mother is a narcissist is a step in the right direction as you now have the ability to seek help for yourself and your own healing. It is the opening, however, to so much pain and a reality you never knew existed.

For me, I became aware of what was really going on in my family after my dad, whose flaws were always highlighted by my mom, left my mom for a few months in what may have been the biggest shock of her life. She reacted as any narcissist mother would, working hard to ensure her four adult children choose 'her side', divulging intimate information about their relationship the children should not be involved in, and having emotional breakdowns daily. When I began to set boundaries, such as stating that she cannot call me five times a day or that I will not lie to my father for her, among others, she became increasingly full of rage. I knew I needed to act to protect myself and my new marriage of 6 months.

The first place I found help was through the support of friends and my husband. Good, therapeutic friends do not mind helping you process through this new reality. I then searched for articles online and read anything I could get my hands on about narcissism, what it is and why narcissists act the way they do. I checked books out at the library (Why Is It Always About You is a great one). But mostly I am where I am today emotionally due to therapy. Signing up for therapy was the most difficult but most rewarding thing I have ever done for myself. To hear an unbiased person tell you that you are not responsible for others feelings, that your mother is a narcissist, then week after week give you strategies that REALLY WORK! After a year of struggling and really in the thick of it...I'm talking my close siblings are trying to pull me back into the dysfunctional family system, petty, monstrous messages left on my answering machine every other day...you name it, I am emotionally healthy and my dysfuntional family had re-calibrated to my new boundaries. Therapy helped me stop being a people pleaser as I was conditioned to do from my narcissistic mother who sought to have her needs me way before mine or anyones. Therapy has helped me create boundaries that she now respects and is fearful of.

Because once you set and hold your boundaries with narcissistic people, you have conquered them. They are fearful of boundaries because they are boundary-less and deep down weak. Narcissism comes from a deep rooted insecurity and security intimidates them and makes them feel bad about themselves. Next comes the narcissistic rage in order to correct and punish you, but if you detach from the narcissistic person (detaching not meaning no interaction just detaching from the behaviors that make you feel miserable) then they do not have an opportunity to expose you to the guilt, rage, and dysfunction they live in daily.

The best lesson I learned from therapy and the most difficult is forgiveness. I forgive my mother of all the horrible things she has done not because she deserves it but because I do not deserve to be carrying around the baggage that is hers. I don't forgive her for her, I forgive her for myself. AND I stick to my boundaries. Therapy will teach you a systematic, step by step approach to setting boundaries (something unnatural for children of narcissists).

Lastly, once you have set new boundaries, slowly but surely the loneliness and emptiness you feel because you have 'betrayed your family' in your mother's eyes will give way to more and more self love and openness to good things in life. You will see wonderful things start to occupy your thoughts and the space in your life where all the hurt and anger once was.