Yep. Although in the case I’m referencing, and wondering what happened with the NPD, the scapegoat just left it all behind. Some of the family would fall under the “turned against” umbrella, but probably not all members. Maybe (??) some cousins or extended family members or ILs might have stayed, I don’t know, friendly. But neither did any of them reach out, so it’s hard to say. Not sure I would say anyone outright turned against the scapegoat, more like they just didn’t notice as the scapegoat slipped away from it all. And then if they asked about the absence, they would hear whatever explanation the NPD person chose to share. Of course, they’d all know the ax could fall on them, too, so probably no probing questions were asked even if they felt friendly toward scapegoat. Nevertheless, no contact with any of them for many years. Long enough that scapegoat thought perhaps they were no longer a topic of “discussions.” The interesting thing I’ve gathered from this thread is that it’s likely the NPD still fixates on the scapegoat, even if they have new scapegoats. Scapegoat has reached a point of not thinking about NPD person and their crowd very often, so that’s a bit surprising. Oof, please don’t quote, I may delete some of that later.

It’s not easy, that’s for sure.

lol A million years ago I gave my college bestie a fridge magnet with a pair of red stilettos (she’s a shoe girl) that said, “F*** love, all you need is a good pair of shoes.” She kept it on her fridge till she got married in her late 30s. I am mentally sending you a magnet with a pair of Docs that says something similar. ETA: sorry for the language reference

So, I’m thinking that even if the scapegoat stays NC for decades with NPD person and the crowd around them, and therefore doesn’t ever know if there’s still the same obsessive behavior going on—it’s still likely going on. Especially if NPD person is capable of sort of spying on scapegoat, so likely has little bits of disjointed, out of context info to pick apart and chew on and “discuss.” Then maybe there’s less need to shove another family member down the hierarchical ladder and make another scapegoat? Or would the NPD type most likely *need* to have someone currently in their life to treat that way? Because absent scapegoat isn’t very rewarding, I’d guess, so maybe a secondary scapegoat is needed? So a sibling who was formerly ok might be suddenly the new, for-now scapegoat? If you’ve witnessed a scapegoat make an exit like this, for decades, what did it look like in the FOO once scapegoat had been gone for many years? ETA: I hope I’m making sense.

I probably won’t use the current terms correctly, so please bear with me. I’m not a YouTube watcher and don’t keep up with the NPD stuff, other than reading here. When a “scapegoat” (hoping that’s the right word) essentially exits the madness and goes no contact with the NPD person for many years, to the point that there is literally zero contact, even through other people (so scapegoat just exited from everyone’s life — NPD person’s spouse, kids, friends, siblings, extended family) — what happens to the pattern of behavior that is left, well, without a scapegoat? Does the NPD person continue to rant about the scapegoat and scrape up what little info they can find through dubious sources and online? Or — and this is what I’m wondering — do they ever create a new scapegoat, essentially moving someone else down the ladder to take the place of the scapegoat? It seems to me — and again, I’m no expert — that without the scapegoat, the NPD person still needs to feed that need for one. So if there’s info about the scapegoat to consume, obviously the energy goes there. But if it’s just a vacuum, and scapegoat has not had contact with anyone the NPD person knows, do they find another one?

I do have support, but it’s limited right now. My closest friend has a lot going on, but I can call on her DH if needed. And (older) DS is here, but he’s not the best in emergencies — he has his own challenges and is not independent. In a pinch I know he can come through with the basics. And if it gets very, very bad — I can call on extended family that live several hours away. I know they would come help. So there’s a plan if things go south, but it’s not ideal. It helps to think it through, though. Will be checking in with my doc after the first week, too, so if it’s really rough we could potentially rethink the plan.

I could use some good energy or cheering or something. Starting a two week course of meds with side effects that are *aaaaaghhhhh!* and DH will be out of town for a chunk of that time so I can’t be out of commission, and can’t need to go to the ER. Crossing my fingers, but feeling a bit anxious about it. Tell me I can do this?

I love surprises. And I don’t snoop because I hate a ruined surprise. Gifts, experiences, if it’s meant to be a surprise — I love it. Twice I’ve packed for vacation the night before, with no idea where we are going and only a small bit of guidelines from DH (for one trip, he had already shipped most of what we’d need). Twice DH has managed to get me on the first leg of a flight without my knowing where we are going. He even booked a salon appointment the day before, because he knew I’d want that — for that one, even my hair stylist knew where we were going. But hanging pictures is *not* a “surprise,” and DH would always wait for me to get input on anything like that. Things we are both going to live with for a long time — we do together. That includes rings, clothing. Dawn, I hope you can tell him you need to change the height of the pics and rehang them together. Hanging pics too high is a pet peeve of mine, and that would bother me every day.

My mom loved hers. It was her partner’s second one, at the time. We love our Forester, big puffy heart love it. It’s a 2019, no troubles.

Yes, it could definitely be the reason. FWIW, VT for me was not in our budget for many years — about a decade. We did it for DS, and then there were braces and more braces and other uncovered health needs and college. I got by with just prism glasses fine. They made it workable for me. Adding in VT this past year has been wonderful, but prism glasses alone were a huge help. My rambly point is that maybe this is enough for now, and in a few to ten years your DS will be ready for VT. Or maybe doesn’t need it at all! I hope the prisms are a huge help for him!

I love mine. However, for me, vision therapy has made an even bigger difference. DS had prisms in 4th grade, the year he did VT, and no longer needs them.

Oh goodness, no need to apologize! I wasn’t bothered in the least! Wow, those prices. Drool. And in my head, a package of Oreos contains soooo many cookies (I’m sure my memory is way off!). Boxed cookies here are a once in a while treat, and run around $6 for a 5 oz box. I don’t know how many cookies that is — not many, I can tell you. For comparison, a box of knock off Hostess type cupcakes is $6.74 plus shipping for 4 cupcakes. Yes, 4 per box. I think we bought those once, just so the kids could try them. 🤣 But it’s ok — we don’t need to be eating those types of things anyway. Still, though, there’s something to be said for convenience at times!

Raising my hand here and waving. And laughing in an ironic way, because our bread is $9 a loaf! Isn’t that exorbitant?! That example totally made me laugh. We’re all so different. I would never buy it either, if we had another option. Quoting you, @Kassia, only for the bread reference that made me laugh out loud. We have, in our household, life threatening anaphylactic allergies to (no kidding) 9 common ingredients plus a Celiac so we have to add gluten to the list of no-nos. *Anything* we buy that is prepared is incredibly expensive compared to regular prices. It also involves emails and calls to each and every company to verify safety details. It’s definitely not a choice to buy the $9 loaf, but cutting it out means zero bread (and I’m not making it from scratch — sourcing safe ingredients is also difficult and pricey, but more importantly, my health doesn’t allow for that). We do cut out the premade bread at times, and other “treats” because they aren’t the healthiest choices. Also, not a need. But we can afford it, so mostly we buy the stuff so kids have things like bread and sunbutter (also expensive!) and relatively normal kid foods for treats at times. Fortunately, DS bakes a lot of safe treats so we don’t buy everything. I think if we were cutting back, we’d stop the bread and prepared treats first. We don’t do a lot of other things listed, but, ahem, I do love my acid free coffee! Cutting that back would be hard, but doable. I am also on a doc-ordered low acid diet, and I drink alkaline water per doc orders. I could stop buying it and use alkaline drops in glasses of tap water, though. I listed some of our non-grocery options above, but have been pondering the grocery dilemma for a while now. Our groceries are just expensive. Now, though, I am curious: how much is a loaf of bread for most people? What if you wanted to buy treats for kids, I don’t know — a box of cookies? (What kind of prepared treats do kids eat? We are pretty limited!)

So glad you saw her! Thank goodness you were only inching forward. And now you know about the side panels. Way back when I was in HS, the crossing guard was hit by a student and badly injured. My understanding was that the student hadn’t scraped enough of the windshield, and frost/snow was covering the side of the windshield. Sort of like your wide side panels, maybe. Scary stuff.

There are little grocery changes we could make. Our extremely specialized food is (very!) expensive, so backing down to buying only safe ingredients and just not eating certain foods, etc, would cut quite a bit, though we don’t use a ton of those foods anyway. Subscription services — we could easily cut some of those. Streaming, Kindle Unlimited & Kids type stuff, our newspaper subscriptions — though I am pretty committed to supporting paid journalism on principle.

Wow, wow, wow! So happy and tear eyed for you!!

Adding that the enamel pins are egg stuffers. For baskets, what about things like t-shirts or special interest things (whatever kids are into — special interest themed goodies or clothing)? Art supplies, if they are into art, etc.

My teen and tween collect little enamel pins. They make great Easter egg stuffers, and then they pin them on backpacks, clothes, whatever. DD also has a canvas banner made to display her collection. The pins come in all sorts of themes. This year we are doing pop art for DS and dragons and mushrooms for DD.

Thinking of you all.

So glad you went in! Hope you get some relief soon!

Go get it seen. I have been dealing with something strangely similar, started the same way, in the same spot on my neck though no blisters or crust (it is similar enough that I showed DH your post, though!). I went to urgent care. Steroid cream — Rx — has really helped. UC or your doc can rule out shingles, send off a culture, start you on antivirals or antibiotics if needed, and give you an antifungal and/or steroid cream if those might help. Also, they could start you on oral steroid. May it go away quickly!

Holy cannoli. So glad you are ok.

@Harriet Vane Ugh, I’m so sorry. I hope you feel better soon, and wish we could send you soup! One supplement that I take daily, and have heard that others feel is beneficial if one has Covid and for a period afterwards: Boluoke. My doc insists on it. You can buy it on Amazon, or from Researched Nutritionals, probably some other places as well. I have “sludgy blood” (a tendency to clot), and this helps. I double up when sick. Something like that might help prevent clot issues later. Nattokinase may have a similar action. ETA: it’s expensive. You could probably find a different brand of lumbrokinase, this is just the one I trust, and have taken for the last ten years or so with good results.

I’m so sorry for her loss. Your DD is a good Dog Mommy, and gave wonderful care to her pup. I hope he will come visit her in her dreams, and that that might bring her some comfort.

If flowers are your thing, this might help: https://www.nps.gov/shen/learn/nature/wildflowers.htm I am partial to rhododendrons and mountain laurel, but those are more May/early June, IIRC. I think early April you would see redbuds and serviceberries in bloom, probably. Shenandoah is always beautiful, so you can’t really go wrong.