If you know the lingo in the world of dealing with narcissism, then you know what going "grey rock" means.  If you don't, then I'll tell you that it's a way of concealing yourself among everything else in life, so you don't look like the sparkling glittering gem you are.  And you do this because when you are your sparkling glittering self, you are prime target for the narcissist.  You stand out to them, like a shiny stone among the rubble.  But you need to be part of the rubble.  Which is how you dull your shine and become a part of the background.  Which is the only way to protect yourself from a narcissist that you live with or have frequent dealings with.  

And becoming a part of the background?  Is not only not always easy, but can be excruciatingly painful and lonely.  To shove down the parts of yourself that make you "you".  To become so boring to the narcissist, that they pretty much ignore you (until they get super bored).  When you have to live this way each and every day, it takes a toll on you.  At first, getting ignored feels good.  You think, wow, this is working!  But then you slip up and become glittering again.  You forget for a moment who you're dealing with and who you're talking to, and act like everything is normal.  And you quickly get reminded of the fact of why you went grey rock to begin with.  And then, with enough slip-ups and then learning your lesson, being grey rock just becomes second nature.  

And that's when you start to notice just how bad it feels.  

Everyone always talks about how this is a good way to deal with a narcissist that has frequent access to you.  And it is.  To a point.  But nobody ever talks about the mental and emotional toll it takes on a person to practice this technique when you live with one for an extended period of time.

It's be almost two years now, that I chose to live with her.  The choice wasn't made out of anything other than the fact that both she needs us and we need her.  She needs us physically, and we need her financially.  I promised myself that I would never sell my soul to the devil again, after going no contact with her the last time, which lasted fourteen months.  But here I am, living in the devil's lair (okay, exaggerating a little here), even though we lived in two separate apartments before.  But it wasn't enough to live upstairs from her.  She was risking her life daily by going down her basement to wash clothes.  And going for walks alone.  And driving a car.  Which risked many other people's lives in the process.  So she had two choices: go into assisted living or we all move in together (which also meant, unbeknownst to her, that all those things would be taken away: the walks, the basement steps, the driving, etc.).  If she had went into assisted living, we would still be living in an upstairs two bedroom apartment with four dogs and four adult humans, but then with a stranger living downstairs from us (and us losing the ability to wash our clothes at home).  So the choice seemed to be simple.  Even though I knew it was so not going to end up well at all.  

At first, I tried to pretend we were all normal.  I tried to pretend this was our house, too.   But soon, I realized that if I did that, I was at the mercy of my crazy mother, who tried (and still tries) to make our lives a living hell.  It's a game for her.  A way to alleviate her boredom.  A way to pass the time.  The idea that someone can get off on hurting others, well, it's just beyond me.  When she sees weakness, she uses it against the person to hurt them.  Which means, if you show her that her opinion matters to you, which she sees as weakness, she will use her opinion to hurt you.  

So, that's why I went grey rock.  Because I was sick of her hurting me.  I would do something as simple as ask her at noon "Do you want some some lunch?"  And her reply would be "You're going to eat, again?  I literally can't each as much as you people do!"  She loved to food shame me, ever since childhood.  But then she moved onto my son, which I utterly hated.  And after yelling at her enough about it, she's better now with him, but mostly only because I make her eat alone (she used to require us all to eat dinner together every single night).  If I don't have her eat alone, she will get on everyone's case about eating, and it literally makes me physically sick (and was giving horrible food anxiety again, something I had as a child).  

Now, we all eat in isolation, in order to stay grey rock.  Sometimes I eat with my kids in the living room while we watch our shows.  But mostly we all eat wherever we want.  Though, I will say, we always did that before moving in with her.  It was only her that forced us to eat together at a table each night (we spend the rest of our days together, so meals aren't that important to us).  But only because I grew up with her abuse at the dinner table my entire life and now I hate eating dinner at a table because of it (well, her and my father's abuse).

Being grey rock is isolating, to say the least.  It's also depressing and causes apathy to creep up inside of your emotions.  You find yourself being quiet, when you want to speak.  Acting flat when you actually feel excited (or when you have any emotion at all).  And, most of all, slapping on a smile when you want to scream.  

Strong emotion is like fire to a moth with narcissists.  The moment you feel a strong emotion: happiness, anger, etc., they gear up, ready to pounce on you.  So you have to act flat at all times.  You have to pretend like you don't feel anything at all.  But ask anyone and they'll tell you that playing pretend can eventually lead to actually feeling what you're pretending (method actors know this all too well).  

There are good parts about being grey rock.  When they want to get a rise out of you, as in the case with my mother, she will do something stupid I would normally need to scold her for, and instead, I just don't react.  And it feels good to not play into their hand.  When she does something dumb, I just say "Well, I guess you're intent on hurting yourself.  So have fun with that." and walk away (though I don't let her actually hurt herself).  And when she sees I don't react, she quits whatever it is she's doing and stomps off like a little baby.  Or, if she's doing something really stupid, I don't even scold her, I just go behind her back and make sure she can't do it again.  Like when she wouldn't stop going down the basement, I put a lock on the door.  When she wouldn't stop pulling our HUGE garbage pails out down our long, winding driveway, I locked them up.  No need to scold her.  I just take action.  Unlike her parenting style, which was threaten, threaten, threaten, but zero action, I bring the opposite with her.  If she's been told more than once and she still does something?  I just plainly take action.  I show her that if she won't listen to me by choice, then she won't have a choice anymore.  Getting angry at her is exactly what she wants and will only make her do it again.  So I don't give her a choice anymore.  I know how she is.  And she doesn't make good decisions (because bad decisions bring her attention, which she likes).

So I became as boring as a grey rock to her.  No rises out of me.  No reactions.  No sharing anything with her.  Nothing.  When I got my Covid vaccine, I didn't even tell her.  She was going around telling her friends that I was a jerk and was refusing to get mine.  Which was not the case, as I have a phobia of taking new medication, which includes shots.  She got angry I didn't tell her, as she had to hear it from her friend, who I did tell.  But I wondered why she ever thought it was her business in the first place?  Yes, we live together, but I literally share nothing with her, ever.  Instead, when she brought it up to me, that I had gotten my shot,  I instead shared with her the fact I overhead her telling her friend that I was holding her hostage in the house, not even allowing her to go outside (which was toooootal bullshit).  And that was a showdown in which I was NOT grey rock.  That day I fucking glittered like a goddamned gemstone.  But it did work.  And she did stop her negative behavior and stopped telling her friends bullshit about me.  I guess the fear of being put in a nursing home really can make a narcissist think twice about making up lies about their caretaker.

Now, not all narcs will respond that way.  Mine does.  If I finally get angry enough to yell at her?  She will be good for a long time.  She knows better than to act up right away again, otherwise I may keep my anger from last time and direct her ass to Shady Pines.  

But when I did go grey rock with her, she turned to my husband as her source of supply.  I mean, she already did, but now she double downed.  Though not for meanness, but as her golden child.  So in reality, she's still trying to get at me through him.  If he has a migraine, she will be all caring and sweet  And if I do, she will look me straight in the eye and make as much noise as she possibly can.  She also acts as though she owns him, and thought she could tell me what to do with my own husband (though that part wasn't new).  She thought she could make decisions for him and for things that had to do with him.  But then he went grey rock, too, and now she leaves him alone for the most part.  

What happens when a narcissist has everyone around them go grey rock?  They get depressed.  And what happens when they get depressed?  They lash out.  Which is what happened when she told her friend that stuff that I overheard (that I talked about above).  She got so bored with me not giving her an ounce of narcissistic supply, so she turned on me.  Which can be a consequence of this technique, so be prepared.

But what happens when you live with a narcissist you have to deal with daily?  You get depressed.  And what happens when you get depressed?  You watch a lot Netflix.  I mean, look at the difference between a narc and us.  They feel bad, they lash out.  We feel bad, we retreat and isolate.  And going grey rock can make your depression worse, because eventually you feel like you've lost touch with yourself, due to the fact you have to act so different on a regular basis.  Not that we should quit being grey rock around our narcissists.  But maybe, we can find an outlet to be ourselves more often than we are allowed to be with them?  

But then the pandemic hit.  And then there was zero way to feel like myself outside of the house, because we couldn't leave our houses very much.  Those that did, and still do, those who congregate with friends and family, get covid-19.  And I am not about that (my family had the worst strain of adenovirus you can get, back in 2018, and I never want anything worse than that--it was horrible!).  So here I am, trying to find a way to be myself through writing and planning for our future, rather than dwelling on what's going wrong and letting isolation make my issues worse. 

Granted, as you can see from my blogging, I am doing both, planning for my family's future and letting her bother me.  But in order to help my mental and emotional health get better while being able to stay grey rock, I am trying to also keep busy by constantly working on an exit strategy.  It's funny, we aren't born with a manual on how to make life work for us, and not finding it until you're in your 40's feels like I am so far behind.  But then again, most people never get it, so I guess, I'm lucky.  I am also planning on a week-long vacation for my husband and I, in order to give us a much needed break from all this insanity, though I am not sure that's going to happen.  Though, once we get our RV's, I think it'll be much easier (plus, it will be part of our future planning/exit strategy, so that won't feel like we're wasting money on a vacation). 

Whatever you have to do in order to keep you mentally and emotionally healthy during this trying time, whether you live with your narcissist or if you are in daily or regular contact with them for long periods of time, it's worth it.  Now, self-medicating is NOT the way to go here, as I know many people choose that route, because they see no other way out.  If you have an issue with self-medication, please talk to a doctor or a counselor to get some help.  Instead, choose creative outlets, like art, writing, or anything else that's healthy to express your anger and pain.  And planning your exit strategy from your narcissist's life, and planning for your future, are great ways to bide your time until you can leave the situation.  I know, easier said than done, but it's imperative to not let the narcissist in your life push you into hurting yourself.  Because you're a glittering gemstone, not a grey rock, and you need to remember that.  Even if you have to be grey rock around them, it doesn't mean that's what you are all the time.

Don't let a narcissist forget just how much you actually shine.

I think my issue with the way I deal with my mother is that I don't have the amount of self-esteem needed to be okay to be myself around her without getting offended when she tries to hurt me.  I have LOADS of self-esteem around many people, but not around her (or other pushy narcissists).  I turn into this goopy mess of insecurity, who is hyper-vigilant, trying to stay aware of her jabs and digs she takes at me.  But why?  Who cares if she's rude to me?  I tend to hyper focus on that, and I need to stop.  The more self-esteem I have, the more myself I can be at all times.  That doesn't mean giving her info about my life.  It just means I don't have to hide from her or stay quiet all the time.  It's like I turned into this piece of brick, rather than a grey rock, who's just a lump in the corner.  I even watch what kind of clothes I wear, or how I do my hair, just so she leaves me alone.  It's quite ridiculous.  But that's when you push grey rock into being a brick.  My entire issue is that I need to stop caring if she sees me.  There's not much she can do anymore to me.  I tend to forget that our lives have changed tremendously, even from earlier this year.  I have almost all my power back.  But I still act like I have none at all.  

It takes time and practice to learn to deal with narcs properly.  We have so very, very many triggers from them, that we can think all we like about wanting to be a certain way around them, but actually doing it is the hard part.  But all it takes is doing something once, and then doing it again, and eventually, it's not an issue anymore to stand up to them or whatever it is you're trying to do.  Sometimes it feels like I have to actually pry my mouth open, like my body is stuck in a wall, and I have to yank myself out of it, in order to actually stand up to her.  But when I can actually manage it?  It feels amazing!  And, since my mother is a certain way, it works.  It changes her behaviors, usually.  Well, at least for a bit.  But, like I said, just take away whatever it is they are using for their supply, and don't give them access to it, and there ceases to be a problem.  

Here are some great YouTube videos to check out from one of my favorite YouTubers on parental narcissism named Patrick Tehan, LICSW, that you can watch to help you on your way from feeling like a brick (if you've gone grey rock either too long or too overboard) to feeling like yourself again.  

My 7 Types Of Toxic Family Systems - YouTube

7 Types Of Invalidating Toxic Parents - Role Play - YouTube