See Saw
I have a see saw. It is very special and I only allow special people to climb on to it. You have to be special to get on my see saw, someone like you is allowed on because you are special. In the beginning you do not even realise that you are sat on it, but you are. Of course when I meet you, you will have some kind of burden that is weighing you down. You may be lonely, you may be recovering from a different lost relationship, you may be grieving over a bereavement. You might have money concerns, perhaps started a new job which is causing you apprehension or your children may be proving difficult. There will be something that is preying on your mind and weighing you down. Even when to the outside world you may appear happy and delighted, there will be something. Everyday things, deeper and more meaningful concerns or even something dark from your past, childhood traumas, a dark deed done some time ago or a difficult relationship with dearest daddy.Perhaps it is the burden of expectancy or the crushing weight of dejection, but ultimately there will be something which weighs heavy on your soul. I can tell because you are sat on my see saw and you are weighing it down leaving you sat at a low point.
Of course when I appear all that changes. As soon as I clamber on the raised part of the see saw I ensure that the weight of my integrity, my immense gravitas, my substantial presence and my massive love all lower my side. I cannot help but do this as I am a man of substance and importance. I carry great responsibility on my shoulders as I lead men, pioneer into new territories, task risks and shoulder so much on behalf of others. At least this is what I tell myself.
My arrival delights you because you now sail up into the air, carried high by the weight that has appeared on the other end. This see saw is fantastic because up and up you go, racing through the air up into the firmament.It is exciting and dizzying as you soar towards the rarefied atmosphere. You feel light, your feel elevated and those burdens have somehow vanished such is the effect of my presence. You recall from your childhood that eventually you reached the apex of the see saw and you readied yourself to come down again but this is different, there seems to be no end to your upwards movement. You can still see me below you, looking up in awe and delight at you and that only adds to your sense of delight. You wonder if you can do the same for me, whether you can send me soaring upwards and you try to push down but it is to no avail, you cannot muster any force and you continue heading up on high.
I watch you soar and your smiles, laughter and praise for my wonderful see saw pleases me, so I allow you to continue with your ascent. Your exhortations of thanks for this wonderful ride shower down on me and I accept it all with gratitude. Still, what goes up must invariably come down and with a violent application of force I begin to shoot upwards towards my rightful place above you. You are suddenly falling. Your descent is rapid and sudden and it is unpleasant. You can see the earth racing up to meet you and your screams come long and loud. I laugh at your distress and cause the see saw to move even more violently as I soar upwards and you plummet. You see me ahead of you, smiling and laughing as if nothing is wrong and confusion grips you. Why are you going down now? Why is it happening so fast? I pass you and wave as you grip onto the see saw, bracing yourself for the impact, terror and dread wrapping around you. You see me now above you as you close your eyes and wait for that sudden thud as you hit the ground once more but it never comes. You are just above the ground, way below me as you hear me pouring scorn on you from my elevated position. It seems so odd. I am no further away from you than when we got on this see saw yet I seem so distant, so far away that you struggle to even recognise whether it is me. You don’t like being down here. It feels horrible. You want to climb once again and so you push hard with your legs in order to gain some purchase that will send you up and me down but nothing happens. You shove again but there is no response. I am calling to you, my cat calls drifting down to you as you repeatedly try and force the see saw upwards but it is to no avail. Tears of frustration gather in your eyes as you push and pull at the see saw but nothing happens and then, without warning you feel a lurch and you start to climb again. The relief washes over you and you blink away the tears as that sensation of joy and delight begins again.
Up and down you go, climbing one moment without knowing how high you will go before then you start to plummet. Sometimes the descent halts part way through and you are lifted up again, if only for a second before down you go once more. It is a tumultuous situation and you feel dizzy and disorientated. It is becoming harder and harder to know what is going to happen next or whether you are going up or down. You cling on, knuckles whitening, desperate to remain on the see saw because you have no idea what might happen if you try and get off. Will you be catapulted into the air and to freedom? Or will you plunge to the hard earth below and shatter into a thousand pieces? If only the see saw would stop for a moment so you can get your bearings. You need some respite from this up and down movement over which you have no control. All the time you see me across from you, seemingly delighted at this ride. How come I do not feel sick or anxious? How is it that I am enjoying this random ride so much? One minute it is all highs and then you sink to the lows before a sudden jerk halts the descent. You need to get off but you daren’t do so, so instead you decide to hold tight but this only seems to encourage me.
You call for help at the group of people you can see gathered below. You know they can see you but as you are lowered towards them, their hands outstretched ready to lift you from this nightmarish ride, you are suddenly wrenched upwards and away again. You are so confused. It feels better to be climbing, that wonderful lifting sensation sweeping across you, but this takes you away from those people who are trying to help you. You tell them to wait that you will be back soon but you can see them walking away as you keep on climbing again until they have vanished. You shout for them to stay but it is to no avail. You are isolated, alone and soaring once more.
Another lurch and you are falling but this time alarm seizes your heart. You cannot breathe and terror causes the scream to stall in your throat. You are falling way too fast, faster than ever before, hurtling downwards at such speed. You look across to where I should be but there is nobody there. I have gone. I have vanished without warning and announcement. There is nobody left to control this see saw and you are dropping, dropping, dropping. The hard and stony earth is rushing up to meet you. You are in free fall and there is only going to be one outcome.
5 thoughts on “See Saw”
Vent Your Spleen! (Please see the Rules in Formal Info)
This site uses Akismet to reduce spam. Learn how your comment data is processed.
And I would like to add something – why I say that. I think that many victims think if they go totally silent, the narcissist will cling to new supply more. Well, yes, he will but you must remember that him clinging more also means that the whole “narcisisstic dynamics” will speed up and become more intense, including devaluation since he has less people (supplies) to fuel nis needs.
If you stop giving him fuel (and if you are ex, this is negative fuel mainly), he will need someone who will give him that negative fuel instead of you. And most likely this will be his new primary source since she is closest to him.
So don’t be afraid to go no contact, you will be amazed how this speed up his new cycle.
I don’t know if it’s possible and my observations are correct but I noticed that my behaviour as an ex has some impact on the way narcissist treats his new supply.
I am in no contact with narcissist for a long time meaning I have blocked him, I do not interact with him, I do not mention him, I do not respond to hoovers. But because of my duties I am visible online – if he want, he can search me and see what am I up to. I doesn’t mind as long as I am not forced to interact with him. And I am not because I blocked him and I am in control.
Because he is blocked but at the same time he still is able to see what I am doing he sometimes try to grab my attention, test the waters, see if he is able to provoke a response. Of course he is not. But he is trying. I think he has that obsession “I must grab her attention, I can’t believe she is out of my control, I failed many times but this time I will make her react!’.
I moved on so I post things about my daily life. It isn’t directed at him, the break up was long ago, my moving on was a slow process, I didn’t try to speed it up, it just happened naturally with time. And now I act normal, like before I met him and I act like he never existed.
And I noticed that when he is alone, maybe my contentement injures him so he tries to ignore it, maybe he is more focused on looking for supplies elsewhere. But when he finally found a new supply, he became more active trying to start a competition between me and him – who is happier right now. I never engaged in that race. He wanted to grab my attention and see if I react to it but I didn’t. I go with my own schedule. But he is delusional and I think he was sure that since he has new supply I will engage in this race. I even think this thought was enhancing his golden period with new supply. I am pretty sure that if I started to react to his postings, even in very inderect way, but way that would tell him I am trying to win this competition it would increase his happiness with new supply – it would add some meaning to taht meaningless relationship.
But I did the opposite. When I noticed he is trying really hard to grab my attention and start the competition, I went totally silent and halted all my online activities. I had vacations that time so maybe this was the main reason. But it was 2 weeks of total silence. He wasn’t able to see what I am doing, I stopped posting anything. And there it is – the devaluation of his new perfect supply beginned.
I don’t know if it’s just a coincident but I feel that he became frustrated with the fact I am beyond his control and that I don’t give a f….k to his new life with new supply. Maybe he thought that his new life with new great supply will hurt me deeply and will give him plenty of fuel. And when I showed him I am not interested in his supply he became frustrated and he directed his frustration (since I am in no contact with him and I stopped posting anything online so he can’t grab even some accidental fuel) at her.
The fact is he started giving her silent treatments, he is triangulating her with others and flirts with others so she could see it. He tries to provoke me since he doesn’t know what am I up to. She is no longer on pedestal.
But I don’t think I became white. I think I am very black, because he doesn’t know what I am doing and it irritates him. But she is also black right now – I am sure.
I think it is because as HG states, he likes to mix negative fuel with positive fuel. So when she was giving him positive fuel during golden period, he was trying to get some negative fuel (even if it was only thought fuel) from me but since I went totally silent and gave him nothing, positive fuel from her became stale and because he can’t interact with me, he had to devalue her to get that negative fuel he needs. And probably he is looking (or getting) for positive fuel elsewhere – not from me and not from her right now.
I also think that if I started to react to that, she would get a respite period. But I won’t do it. It is more fun to see how things between them fail just because he gets nothing from me.
Interesting observations, Bluewave. I was IPSS and often noticed that IPPS would be in devaluation when I was not, though I did not know about the fuel matrix at the time. When I was being feisty, IPPS would be golden. And when IPPS ignored MRN or was away, I would be in devaluation – the opposite of what I would have expected – almost as if MRN lost his balance and therefore needed extra potent negative fuel. Poor narc balancing all of the sources to feel properly ‘fueled up’! It seems like a lot of work!!
Love this piece by the way, HG. One really feels it.
Thank you SMH.
Hi SMH,
I also can relate to that typical see-saw dynamic (her devalued- me golden, me devalued – her golden). But it was before I blocked him. When he discarded me I became black of course, then he found other girl (it’s not the one he is with right now, there were many others in between) and she was all good obviously. He was hoovering me for negative fuel for months, trying to hurt me with the fact he is with somebody else. But suddenly something has changed – I did nothing but he started sweet talking me and even apologizing for things he did to me – I became white again for no reason. As I learned they broke up 3 days later and me becoming white again was the effect of problems in their relationship. So yes, this was classic see-saw, he wanted my positive fuel when he was getting plenty negative from her.
But then I blocked him (he wasnt able to sweet talk me, my ET was low at that point, I was tired of this hoovering game and I had some cruel satisfaction I am blocking him not when he was nasty but when he was trying to re-idealize me – I thought it will be unexpected to him and he will feel humiliated). And I suceed very much, it changed the whole dynamic, since the break up he got all power and control over me and the situation so my sudden blocking in least expected moment changed everything. And I immediately became very very black.
And since he is blocked for a long time and I give him zero reactions and I moved on and am happy now, I think there is no reason for him to paint me white no matter what happens in his current relationship. I am villian, I injured him I am the one in control. Still he wants my attention, he wants to punish me and break me and feel like a winner once again. Of course if I unblocked him, he could paint me white again and put again in his fuel matrix, but I won’t do it so black is the only colour he can paint me right now. I think his lack of control over me is his little obsession, it still frustrates him, maybe to the point he can take it out on somebody else. But of course it is only my hypothesis, I am not sure how it works.
I think there are possible 2 scenarios:
1. He found new IPPS lately and it was finally a girl you could call a good supply. Someone you can flaunt around. Also steady and reliable, totally in love with him. I think he thought to himself (of course instinctively, since he is mid range) “Finally I have found a proper girl! She will give me plenty of fuel herslef but also thanks to her I will get plenty of fuel from those envious villians who disappointed me in the past! What a great investement!”.
So he starts this little competition. step by step he reveals more and more about his new relationship. He posts on social media things that are directed at you, then he looks if you react. You know he does it. But what he gets? Nothing. You go totally silent, you give him zero emotions and he can’t get any fuel from you. He becomes a little irritated. Funny thing – she is the person who gets devalued.
What just happened? I think they treat people as cars. If narcissist buys new car, he wants every neighbour to react – tell him compliments or give him envious hurt reactions. But when neigbours ignore the fact he has new car he starts to think that maybe this car is not good enough if nobody cares. They want cars that will make their neighbour miserable, not cars that nobody notice!
2. Second possibility – it is just a coincidence, maybe during these 2 weeks she did something that trigerred devaluation. They had a fight, she ignored him, she asked for more commitement and he panicked, who knows. But even in this scenario, if she triggers devaluation but he still gets attention from his ex and it is envious, competitive attention I think it can increase his willingness to keep this false image of perfect relationship at least in public. “You disappoint me, I devalue you, but still you are useful. Other people give me fuel because of you”. But if you as an ex give him nothing he stays alone with her and their boredom which always happen in relationship with narcissist, especially if nobody reacts to your relationship. So he needs to add some drama by starting devaluation, triangulation, flirtation with other new people and the cycle goes, adding new problems to the relationship.
Of course we can speculate what would happen if you as an ex started giving him positive fuel when you see he starts devaluing current girlfriend. It also could speed up devaluation, he could use you to triangulate her.
But firstly it is not in your interest to interact with him and be his plaything. Secondly, if he gets easy positive fuel from you he doesn’t feel the necessity to find positive fuel elsewhere.
And it is flirting with new people that allerts new girlfriend the most I believe. Because to find a new positive source of fuel he needs to target many people at the same time – these people doesn’t know him, he needs to focus on them to win them over and their affections, some will buy it, some will won’t. He needs to put more energy to seduce them and it means his current girlfriend will get less of him. It will be difficult for him to keep this hunting in secret.
But when you as his ex are still in play, he can be quite content with 2 reliable sources of fuel – her negative and your positive. He can juggle between you two for years and he can do it quite covertly so she stays with him despite he has you.
So in my opinion the best thing is to give him nothing as his ex, starve him with no fuel so when the devaluation of new supply comes, he is in need to find new sources.- that will add more drama for sure. And there is possibility she will see through him quicker and get out earlier and it will be good for her also. Better than being with him for years not knowing he has you as a secondary source of fuel that keep him alive and paradoxically in this toxic relationship with her.