Tag Archives: Strong

Survivor Stories – Women who Married Narcissists and Yet they Prevailed

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Can you think of other famous women who prevailed, while or after being married to a Narcissist? It helps to remember, and helps us to stay strong and not give up hope.

Here I have shown you Catherine the Great. She was married to Pytor, a Russian Tsar, for a moment. The royal house conducted a coup d’état, and boom, he was gone. Catherine was Empress of Russia longer than any other monarch in that country.

Eleanor Roosevelt had a husband who embarrassed our country by sleeping with every woman he could get his hands on. While he was a great president in many respects, Eleanor is seen as being the first female president to some. She advised him, gave speeches, travelled the country, held press conferences with women journalists only. She survived by focusing on what she could do and could control, not by what she couldn’t.

Frida Kahlo is a famous Mexican painter, who was married to Diego Rivera, another famous Mexican painter (famous before marrying her). He slept with anyone and everyone, including her sister, before she could not take it anymore. And, before this, (and after) she focused on her art, staying strong despite her many miscarriages and terrible medical issues. She also had her own lovers. In the end, Frida is the one whom Mexicans have in their shop windows, whom they revere so much. Even Mexican restaurants in the U.S., you can find images of her, whereas you will see Diego in California doctor’s offices. She was quite an amazing woman.

And who can forget Princess Diana. A lovely woman, who learned on the day before her marriage that her husband to be was in love with another (who he is married to now). Yet, Princess Diana was more famous, more loved and will be while her husband is the King now and not many people care – except his loyal followers. She did more for the homeless, AIDS, raising awareness about land mines, and many other things. While she had a tragic death, which only made her more of a saint, her memory and contributions will live on. King Charles? Who cares. The world waits for her son and daughter-in-law to take his place. Right now, her ex is nothing more than a token object. A tradition, a bump on the log.

So, who can you think of? Don’t be shy. Comment below with your answer.

For Strong Women: Marge Piercy

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A strong woman is a woman who is straining.

A strong woman is a woman standing on tiptoe and lifting a barbell

while trying to sing Boris Godunov.

A strong woman is a woman at work

cleaning out the cesspool of the ages,

and while she shovels, she talks about

how she doesn’t mind crying, it opens

the ducts of the eyes, and throwing up

develops the stomach muscles, and

she goes on shoveling with tears

in her nose.

A strong woman is a woman in whose head

a voice is repeating, I told you so,

ugly, bad girl, bitch, nag, shrill, witch,

ballbuster, nobody will ever love you back,

why aren’t you feminine, why aren’t

you soft, why aren’t you quiet, why

aren’t you dead?

A strong woman is a woman determined

to do something others are determined

not be done.  She is pushing up on the bottom

of a lead coffin lid.  She is trying to raise

a manhole cover with her head, she is trying

to butt her way through a steel wall.

Her head hurts.  People waiting for the hole

to be made say, hurry, you’re so strong.

A strong woman is a woman bleeding

inside.  A strong woman is a woman making

herself strong every morning while her teeth

loosen and her back throbs.  Every baby,

a tooth, midwives used to say, and now

every battle a scar.  A strong woman

is a mass of scar tissue that aches

when it rains and wounds that bleed

when you bump them and memories that get up

in the night and pace in boots to and fro.

A strong woman is a woman who craves love

like oxygen or she turns blue choking.

A strong woman is a woman who loves

strongly and weeps strongly and is strongly

terrified and has strong needs.  A strong woman is strong

in words, action, in connection, in feeling;

she is not strong as a stone but as a wolf

suckling her young.  Strength is not in her, but she

enacts it as the wind fills a sail.

What comforts her is others loving

her equally for the strength and for the weakness

from which it issues, lighting from a cloud.

lightning stuns.  In rain, the clouds disperse.

Only water of connection remains,

flowing through us.  Strong is what we make

each other. Until we are all strong together,

a strong woman is a woman strongly afraid.

*This poem that is one of my favorites. I think all women who have faced trauma in one way or another should read this and feel comforted by her words. It really captures the essence and beauty of a strong woman.