Alongcameanarc

I wish I could have kept a daily journal of the 19.5 years living with my Ex. Somewhere around year 3 I began to realize the things my Ex stated just didn’t make sense. By year 7, the financial math just wasn’t mathing. And his almost continuous anger was wearing down my soul. I could do no right in his eyes. The more I questioned him the more sever he raged. In the beginning I weighed my options and decided remaining quiet was more bearable than his rages. Instead I began journaling my thoughts onto what I believed was my private personal laptop and a website I could post anonymously with questions and vents. Without exception, others posters advised to get out and get out now. The day I was shown I had no privacy is as vivid a memory as this morning. I walked into our living room. Ex was sitting on the couch with our youngest sitting on his lap. It was his face that kept my attention, completely missing my laptop sitting on the coffee table. It was his angry smirk with those terrifying solid black eyes. Then he looked down at my laptop and I saw it for the first time. Without saying a word he turned my laptop around towards me angrily chuckling. The website was open to my anonymous posts. Without my knowledge my Ex had downloaded a keystroke application to my laptop which then sent the keystroke logs to his email. He had been watching me pour my heart out for months. He instructed me to delete all my posts and shouted how do you think this makes me look? I said, but it’s all true. You did those things. Without skipping a beat, He told me either I delete all my posts or he would divorce me and take the kids. He said he would make sure I had nothing and would never see our kids. He made me feel small and insignificant, as if I was the naughty child caught with my hand in the cookie jar. As if I was the one completely in the wrong. He never once showed any acknowledgement of my concerns, my wounds, my fears. Any defense of myself was met with his counter of how I was making him look bad. Completely defeated, I deleted my posts in front of him. His smug satisfied smirk haunts me even now. But all the memories are etched deep into my soul. Devastating and unforgettable. I write from memory.

2021 rolled around and I couldn’t bare to be in the living room once Ex started drinking anymore. I was hiding out in the master bedroom watching TV by myself most evenings hoping to avoid his verbal beatdowns. Our youngest child could now drive and avoided being home in the evening, going to her friend’s houses instead. Ex let me know nightly how infuriated he was that she wasn’t staying home and having her friends over to our house. He seemed to be oblivious to the negative impact his drinking was having on everyone. Or maybe he just didn’t care.

February 2021. Ex was once again increasingly perseverating on buying a new much larger travel trailer. He was almost giddy about the trailer he wanted, but told me there wasn’t one locally and he would have to wait until another came in. After picking our two youngest up from school, the 3 of us went to the RV dealership to look around at the trailers. I told the salesman who my husband was and he said yeah the trailer he ordered will be here tomorrow, want to tour a similar model to get a feel for it? I was in shock. Narc had not said anything about ordering one and having it shipped from a sister dealership in another state. I got a lot of word salad when I asked Narc what was going on. February 16th, Narc got ready for work as any other day and left the house. I found out later that day that he took the morning off to go purchase the travel trailer. I asked him if he needed me to come down to sign any paperwork. He said no, he’s in a hurry to get back to work and doesn’t have time to wait around for me to be added to the paperwork. He will just take care of it. Now we had 2 financed travel trailers, 2 storage lot fees and insurance for 2.

The next week was the usual, Ex was drunk and surly every night. February 25th was the first night of the end. Ex started drinking early and heavy. He was extremely drunk, slurring, yelling. But tonight was a bit different, more forceful, more hateful, just more. Narc was yelling that he hated me, that I was fat, a pathetic wife and that he didn’t want to be married to me among other things. I said you’re saying you want a divorce? He screamed I want a divorce. Then just like that, he sat down, laid his head back on the couch back and was snoring. February 26th Narc got up, got ready for work, came home after work acting as if the previous evening had never happened. That part wasn’t completely unusual. He never took any responsibility and never apologized, just acted as if nothing had transpired. But he had been so drunk I wondered if he even remembered what he had said. February 27th was a Saturday. Narc got up and stated he was behind at work and needed to go in for a few hours to get caught up. After he left, I logged into his personal email and there it was. A letter he wrote to his married work whore. It was weird and juvenile and referenced sexual encounters. The thing that stood out was the quote – ‘I will eliminate all obstacles to be with you’. I had been referred to as an ‘obstacle’. I remember my very first thought was- Thank God, it’s over. But I also felt numb. No anger, no sadness, no nothing. I spent the day with friend and contemplating my next move. I didn’t say anything to Narc that evening. It was a typical evening. Narc drank himself to sleep sitting on the couch, listening to his blaring music. I printed the email and laid it next to the coffee pot. I knew he would find it early in the morning. Narc has always claimed he prided himself on his integrity morals and values. I wrote at the bottom of the page I didn’t think he understood the meaning of those words. I woke up early and walked downstairs. He was sitting on the couch and I knew by the look on his face he had found the email. I walked up behind him and leaned in. I said given what I now have proof of you have no business ever stepping foot in my bedroom ever again. Get your stuff out right now. He shot up like a bat out of hell and flew up the stairs. I heard a lot of banging around up there. The loud noises were him dragging his dresser out of the master bedroom down the hall into the spare bedroom. I don’t remember everything I said to him that morning. But I do remember 19 years of pent up frustration spilling out. I didn’t hold back. I can only describe his behavior as cowardly and resembled a suddenly trapped caged animal. It was comical yet pathetic to watch. It was also the only time I remember him with no words in the moment. He typically cut me down to size if I ever questioned him. I guess he didn’t want to hear my perspective as eventually he ran out the front door and drove away. 

He was gone the entire day, returning in the evening. It was evident the moment he walked in he had spent the day formulating his justification for his affair as he immediately went on the verbal attack. I was to blame for everything. He stated that he didn’t ‘cheat’ and made large air quotations as he said the word cheat. He stated that I had already broken the marriage vows by being such a pathetic disgusting wife so he was free to move on.

Narc would not touch me at all. No hugging, no kissing, no nothing when he was sober. Nothing. Every now and then when he was falling down drunk he would try, but he was so drunk he couldn’t maintain.  

November 2020 was the beginning of Narc’s seriously overt spending spree. He decided to put solar on our house. $38,000 worth. He did it without my input and signed for the loan on his own. I asked the salesman what if I didnt approve, he said they only needed one owners signature.

I have read many times narcissists will treat their significant others with such absolute horrific behavior in order to provoke them to leave so the Narc will look like the victim who was left. Looking back, 2019 was that year.

Silent treatment is Narc’s absolute go to. Funny Narc never told me about the silent treatment when describing himself before we were married, but oh man, I learned how adept at silence he is within days of living in the same household. No eye contact, side eye sneers, refusing to acknowledge me when I spoke to him, even pretending I wasn’t in the room, speaking louder than me to the kids when I was speaking to one of our kids as if I wasn’t there, ignoring phone calls and texts, flying into a rage if I attempted to force conversation. And all the same things Narc’s first wife described in great detail had taken place during her marriage to Narc. 

Although the silent treatment had been prevalent our entire marriage, 2018 brought an almost continuous deafening silence. His nightly routine was to sit on the couch with his laptop on his lap, head phones on, music blaring at 100%, surfing the net and getting drunker by the minute, only leaving the couch to use the bathroom or refill his 20 oz mug. His extreme drunkenness loosened that steel trap door on his silence, allowing glimpses into his black heart. Out of his drunken black heart poured all manner of cutdowns and name calling.

Our teenage youngest child was voicing her embarrassment at her friends coming over to visit and seeing Narc stumble into walls and furniture and hearing Narc yell derogatory remarks.

Narc perseverated on buying a travel trailer in early 2019, stating he wanted to start camping. We took the camper out for a couple overnights at local camp grounds right after we purchased it. It wasn’t fun at all. Same old drinking, new location.

By mid 2019, Narc wasn’t even attempting to hide his disdain for me. At times the enjoyment he took in attacking my self worth was written across his self satisfied shit eating smirk he appeared incapable of hiding. One such memorable encounter, I walked up behind Narc and put my arms around his waist. Narc turned around and stated in his most snarky tone-I feel you admiring my physique, too bad I cant reciprocate. The look that passed across his face was hate. I remember how black his eyes looked as I backed away from him. On another occasion, after yet another attack on my weight, I made the mistake of stating that I was trying to lose weight, to which Narc outright screamed that I wasn’t trying. He screamed that the way to lose weight was to STOP eating. He said that he had calculated out the number of calories he needed to intake in order to lose weight, furthering that he calculated his alcohol calories because he wanted to drink and deducted the necessary calories from food. Narc was eating one very small meal once a day almost immediately after arriving home from work and that was it. The rest of the evening was devoted to alcohol. Narc wrote and sent me an email, telling me my weight did not match his body image and he couldn’t bring himself to be physically close with someone that looked like me. I admit was approx 12 pounds heavier than when we met and married, but this was over the top and the thing he harped on almost daily. I said I don’t understand, Im not significantly heavier than when we met. Black eyes beamed directly at my eyes, nostrils flaring, and with that ever present smirk he sneered- I know. I tolerated your weight back when I thought I loved you, but you haven’t lived up to my expectations and I cant overlook it anymore. If words could manifest as a slap, this was it. Also of note, Narc was on a diet. He wanted to lose weight so he restricted himself to one baked chicken breast with some no calorie dressing that smelled like paint thinner. And if he was super hungry, he added cottage cheese with sriracha as a snack. And alcohol. Lots and lots of alcohol.

I demanded marriage counseling. We ended up seeing separate counselors. Narc went to one session, but told me the counselor wasn’t a good fit and refused to go again.

Narc’s mother came for a visit. Narc and I were not speaking. The day MIL arrived, Narc put on a huge show, purchasing a big bouquet of roses for me and telling me he loved me in front of his mother. And he was nice, at least for the length of her visit. Im not sure if her plane had even taxied down the runway before he reverted to pre visit behavior.

Christmas 2020 was my last Christmas with ex Narc. What a terrible Christmas season it was. Leading up to the end of the year Narc barely acknowledged my existence. When he was forced to speak to me it was only slightly vailed rage. Black eyes rounding out the smirk. I have never really known if Narc realizes he has a pronounced tick. Chewing on the inside of cheek with the corner of his mouth twitching and his lips repeatedly curling back on that side into his smirk, as if the words are barely containing themselves inside his mouth, fighting to be released. Distinct signs the verbal beatdown is coming. He just needs enough alcohol intake to flame his ever brewing anger and free his mouth to say what it will. It is the witching hour. That window of time when you can visibly see the alcohol working in harmony with his inner demons formulating the perfect insults. 

Just before Thanksgiving 2020, as I was gearing up for Christmas shopping, Narc let loose one of those ever increasing verbal attacks. Drunk, angry and shouting, he stated that he was broke and had no money for Christmas presents, so if Christmas purchases  are dependent on him, Christmas is canceled and I will have to be the one to tell our 8 children and grandchildren. 

I scrimped together what I could for presents, even applying for a credit card to fill the christmas gift gaps as he made good on his statement and provided zero dollars for Christmas. The back story of our financial situation is an entry for another day.  

Mid December a friend I hadn’t spoken to for a bit called. Her husband and Narc worked together. During our conversation she asked if Narc had picked up his new gun from the gun dealer yet. I had no idea what she was talking about. What gun? Narc assured me he was completely broke. Christmas was my responsibility. After the phone call I logged into Narc’s checking acct and sure enough, Narc had spent almost $4000 on himself in December 2020. I didn’t let on I knew about his expenditures. I wanted to see how he played it off. A few days later, he came in after work carrying the gun. I asked him where the money came from as he has assured me in November he was completely broke. Narc’s face went from an initial sheepish I just got caught redhanded look to eyes glazed over, turned completely black and he spit out the words- I save my money so I can buy what I want, how much money have you saved? My mouth gaped open. I had no words. I had no money to save. Every dime I had coming in had a predetermined destination. He had spent years making sure of that. 

I’m not sure if it was quilt he was feeling, but few days later Narc asked me what I wanted for Christmas. I told him I wanted a wedding ring in the case at Costco. 19.5 years at that point and he had never bought me a ring. Also an entry for another day. He asked want else did I want. I said a roof rack for my vehicle. He bought the roof rack. He bought himself approx $4000 worth of gun and gun paraphernalia and bought me a token $350 roof rack. I paid for 100% of the Christmas gifts for all the kids and grandkids, as well as 100% of the gifts and party related expenses for our 3 daughter’s December and January birthdays.

His spending spree on himself is just beginning. 

2 months until his adultery is laid bare in the light of day. 

I was married prior to Ex. I met my first husband in high school. I was young, naive. He was a few years older. My boss.  

When I was 16 my parents moved us light years away from where I grew up. It could have easily been Siberia. My 16 year old self felt like it was Siberia. We moved from one of the most populated areas in the US to nowhere. I was resentful, rebellious, looking for excitement in a sleepy tiny little town 100 miles from absolute nowhere and in walks Mr. Party. Looking back he was wrong on every level, but I was young, naive and in love. I caught him cheating once. He begged my forgiveness. It was a mistake, forgive me please. Sigh. I forgave. Little did I understand what was to come. 

Shortly after high school graduation my family moved yet again. 18 hours away to be exact. I was heartbroken. I was leaving my friends. I was leaving him. 

After about a year of phone time he moved to me. Still unwilling to make a permanent commitment but he was back. He was still Mr. Party. I was working towards a degree and didn’t have time to party, so he partied without me. I caught him cheating again. I was just a glutton for punishment I guess. I forgave him. 

Time passed and he ended up taking a job in LA. I had no intentions of moving to LA as his girlfriend. All of a sudden he was hot and heavy to get married. I think going alone scared him a little. We got married and moved. I found out I was pregnant about a year later. Somewhere in there he started leaving me at home alone more and more to go out with work friends. I suspected he was cheating but never caught him. When our first child was about 6 months old he took a different job and we moved again. Child number 2 and child number 3 arrived in very quick succession.  Once he became comfortable with his new work friends, he was right back to going out more and more.  He told me I was welcome to come along but he wasn’t staying home. He knew I couldn’t go. He was staying out very late almost nightly. I suspected he was cheating but never caught him. We had one car and he took it with him to his outings which made it hard to catch him. 

 I couldn’t take it anymore. I told him I wanted to move back to where my family is. Either he find a job there or Im going without him. 

He found a job fairly quickly and we moved back. At first he settled in and seemed content, but that didn’t last long. New work friends and more partying. Baby number 4 arrived. He had a vasectomy shortly after that. 

His employer closed their doors, laying off the entire staff. He found a comparable job within days, and that’s when things took a decidedly noticeable and weird turn. He started going on out of town ‘work’ trips for trainings. Because of all the driving he demanded he take our new minivan rather than his older daily driver. He came back from one of his ‘work’ trips with a car trash bag attached to the passenger door. Huge red flag. I didn’t mention it to him, but realized it was time for some investigating. He had a whole string of email addresses. Same password for each and every one. He was using 2 different ones for porn purchases. He was using one to communicate with a woman he worked with at the site that was closed down. She had moved 5 hours away after losing her job. They were meeting 1/2 way at a motel every week or two.  Using yet another email he was coordinating early withdrawals from his IRA to fund his affairs. 

When I confronted him about the affair, he of course became defensive. I asked how many woman. He said he had ‘only’ slept with 3 others besides the current one. So if he’s to be believed, he slept with 4 women in 9 years of marriage. Add those 4 to the 2 I know about prior to marriage we are up to 6 he is willing to admit to. 

Our divorce took almost 2 years to complete. I was awarded sole legal and physical custody of our 4 children, as well as a small cash settlement and my minivan paid off. His girlfriend broke up with him almost immediately after our divorce was final. 

Those are the highlights of our marriage and divorce. Side note he has had a long string of girlfriends over the years. Cheated on every single one. He finds a new one before leaving the old one. He remarried maybe 6-7 years ago. They worked together. She was married, he was living with a girlfriend. She had school age kids. It was super messy.

Along came a Narc about one year into our two year divorce. 

I’m not a therapist. My ex hasn’t been, well at least to my knowledge anyway, diagnosed narcissist.  What I do have is 23 years, and counting, of life experience that has left indelible marks. Scars. 

Why did I spend years making excuses, years of covering up, years of feeble attempts at justifying what I eventually came to see is unjustifiable and wholly inexcusable. This is my journey to find the pieces of me he chipped away day after day, year after year. 

But this is not only a journal of Narc’s exceedingly bad behavior but also a testament of God’s faithfulness. I have to give glory to God. Every evil intention Narc directed my way turned back to him. Every evil finger point, every false accusation, every gaslit recreation of events shined back on Narc. This is a testament to the power of my friends and community lifting me up in prayer. God’s hand was evident every step of my divorce.

The beginning. 

This was one of those times Narc truly came out of left field, blindsiding me with the sheer absurdity  of his rage. We went from point A to point B by way of Timbuktu. I believe it was sometime around early 2017. Our youngest daughter was begging to get a dog. We already had two dogs but one favored me exclusively and the other dog favored the Narc first and then me second when he wasn’t home. Our daughter wanted one that was hers alone. The Ex took our daughter to the county animal shelter to look around. She picked one of two sisters recently transferred from an overcrowded kill shelter, but the dog she picked hadn’t been spayed yet so we had to wait. My daughter and I went back after the designated quarantine time to bring her home. As it turned out she wasn’t doing well after her spay, but her sister was up and around and begging us for attention. Daughter asked to bring the lively sister home instead. So after paying the fees she was ours. We named her Belle. They said they believed Belle was approximately 9 months old. It was quite obvious Belle had been abused and neglected and had never been inside a house before. She wasn’t potty trained so we had no choice but to kennel her while we were at work. Belle came to us with partially healed cigarette burns and cuts and she was terrified of Narc, cowering any time he came near her. It was obvious her abuser had been a man. She was open and loving toward daughter and I from the first moment. 

After a month or so of kenneling her she seemed to grasp potty training well. Narc said we should let her free range our home while at work. We moved into our new build home 10/2015, and I was hesitant to let her loose. I left for work at 6:45am  Monday-Friday. Narc left an hour later. I didn’t know he had let her free roam our home that day until I returned  home after work to find all exposed electrical cords chewed to extinction. Lap top, phone, lamp cords, my curling iron. Everything had been chewed to small pieces. Back to kenneling. 

 After about a month Narc left Belle out without discussing with me again. While at work I received a text from my son after he returned home from work. Our love seat had the entire front shredded off and the love seat was on the opposite side of the room. I pulled my phone out to see the picture sent to me and all I could do was cry. My boss rushed over to me and asked what was wrong. I turned my phone around and showed him the picture. My boss said oh shoot, i will give you a minute. 

I cried for days. Every time I walked into the living room I cried, I just couldn’t help it. It was all I had and it was ruined. Saturday morning rolled around and the Ex angrily announced we were going to Ashley Furniture to look for a new sofa set. We picked out a new set for our living room. 

The next weekend we had all of our adult kids over for dinner. Narc behaved as usual. Standoffish, not engaging with any of us. We were talking about the new couches. I joked that thanks to the dogs, I can never have nice things. Maybe you can guess where this is going. 

After all the adult kids left, Narc was in full silent mode. No eye contact, pretending I wasn’t speaking, acting as if i wasn’t in the room. This went on for weeks. I tried repeatedly to get Narc to talk to me. Alternating rage and back to silence. No explanation. On and on the days passed. Then one day, probably 6 weeks later, he blew up at me and stated: I work my ass off to provide you with nice things. How dare you tell your kids I don’t provide you with nice things. I was gobsmacked. What? What are you talking about? He raged that I had disrespected him, telling the family he doesn’t provide for me. I told him everyone in the room knew we were joking about the dog’s destruction, not Narc, but Narc doubled down on my ‘disrespect’ of him.

I endured 6 weeks of alternating silence and rage, just to be lied about and falsely accused. Narc regurgitated that false claim against me again and again from that point forward until our divorce. Every time he was angry, which was often, from that point forward until I caught him cheating he brought out the accusation that I told the family he doesn’t provide nice things. 

Along came a Narc
Who made me his mark.
As he studied me online
He mirrored my values to make me believe he was a man I wanted to be mine.
Little did I know none of his charm could he sustain.
So after we married and 2 children later so began his narcissistic reign.

He discovered me online in a divorce chat group, my unknown voyeur for months. I was in the midst of a divorce from my first husband who had cheated and left me with 4 very young children. He silently watched as I conversed with others going through similar situations. I expressed my frustrations with my soon to be ex’s excessive pornography use, his hiding of money and ultimately taking early withdrawals from a work IRA to fund his affairs. His disinterest in being a father. How easily he moved on from all 5 of us barely looking back. My total distain for infidelity.

After months of watching me, in rode my white knight, mirroring every single one of my beliefs. Oh how naive I was.

It was a mostly ‘online’ affair for quite a while, moving to phone contact and eventually meeting in person. He was overtly charming and had a pretty face. I was hooked.