Saturday

We got treated to another tiny vignette into the realm of toxic narcissistic abuse that Lesley has been subjected to by her sister today. While not monumental in itself it made it clear that a long-running argument was not going to be allowed to be put to bed. Viewed on its own it may seem trivial but it’s the cumulative effect of a mountain of micro-abuses that makes dealing with a narcissist so toxic.

This argument was about the order of service for Dad’s funeral, which readings were going to be included and who was going to do them.

“Dad was very traditional. The service has to be traditional.” Lesley’s sister had said at the meeting with the funeral director.

That much at least was true. Lesley’s dad was indeed ultra conservative. I had always said that he hadn’t changed his opinion on anything since the mid 1950s. His unwillingness, and recent inability, to even try to understand anything new was a constant trigger for the arguments I had with him.

And we’re also talking about a man who never showed any sign that he had a spiritual bone in his body. He never showed any interest in religion and hadn’t been to church voluntarily since his wedding three quarters of a century ago.

The precise arrangements for the funeral service had been an area where Lesley’s sister had expressed strong opinions right from the outset and in spite of her insistence that all decisions had to be made together she set them in stone without discussion. Her justification was that “Dad would’ve wanted it that way” even when her choices seemed to show that she had an idealistic rather than realistic view of the man he was.

Lesley quickly got to a state where she couldn’t bear another argument about something which she wasn’t that bothered about and which we both knew Dad couldn’t have cared less about.

“If you feel that strongly about it then it’s your call.” was a phrase that had been used a lot.

So far, so good. Until you start to look at the list of preconditions that emerged that is. The mandatory inclusions and Over My Dead Body exclusions set up a scenario that was logically impossible to satisfy. I don’t know how she does it but it happens far too often for it to be accidental. And with the funeral itself a little over a week away, something needed sorting quickly if the order of service was going to be printed in time.

So, with all that said, this morning’s mini-drama was about to unfold.

Lesley’s sister had asked Dad’s neighbour to read Psalm 23 in the middle of the service and she had readily agreed. This choice was made on the basis that the neighbours were heavily involved in the local church and Lesley’s sister knew them far better than she knew Dad’s family.

The lady officiating at the funeral service had pressed Lesley and her sister to decide which version of the psalm was going to be read so that she could get her timings pinned down as some are longer than others. Lesley’s sister didn’t respond. Obviously.

Lesley, feeling under pressure, had phoned the neighbour a few days ago and left a message on an answerphone that, it transpired, didn’t work.

Lesley tried again this morning and got through. She explained the situation and said that as the service was going to be very traditional they were going to be using readings from the King James bible.

“Oh no. I can’t do that. I simply won’t read from the King James bible.”

“Well which version do you use?”

“The new one.”

“Which new one? Aren’t there lots of new versions?”

“The new one.”

With the cut-off date for a decision fast approaching, we were in a situation where Lesley’s sister would get the reader she wanted who would only read a text she didn’t like or the text she wanted read by a substitute reader – a family member who’d said he would step up and read anything but who was on her list of exclusions.

Lesley resorted to an email that’s been used so often it should really be set up as a template.

“You asked for this… It can’t happen that way because… You’re options are… Which do you want? It’s your call.”

The response?

“I can’t deal with it now. I’m going to work.”

And that, in a nutshell, is how the abusive narcissist operates. It’s not just the put-downs, the  undermining, the selective memory of people and events, the inability to accept the consequences of their actions and choices, the blame and the projection in the moment. It’s engineering a situation where Lesley will be forced into cutting the Gordian Knot and making a decision on two unacceptable choices on the deadline knowing that it’ll cause an absolute meltdown and having that hanging over her head for days.

We both know what’s coming.

“WAAAH!! That’s not how I wanted it and it’s all your fault! You’ve ruined everything! I hate you!”

This isn’t the only trap that’s been set for Lesley. She lives under a cloud of swords of Damocles. One, some, but probably all of them are going to drop in a week and a bit.

Bloody hell.

Author’s Note

My Mum was in a nursing home in the Thames Valley for a year and a half until she passed away in December 2024. My Father-in-law went into the same home the following January. But Lesley’s sister didn’t approve and made the situation so awkward that he had to be moved. He passed away in March 2025. Names and locations have been changed or hidden to protect the identities of those involved.

Image Credit

Original Image by Nick Gilmore. Extracted from the archive in 2024.