Narcissistic Revenge

What can’t the narcissist let go of needing revenge.  It has been over 5 years since I left and divorced him.  He has remarried and moved on, yet it seems he cannot let go of his incessant need to prove to the world I’m a crazy ogre so he can be devillainized and all in the world will be set right again; his tarnished armor will shine bright and the mask of illusion will be firmly back in place.  I have read and been told that narcissist don’t forget, they like revenge, and that my “outing” of him added to his narcissistic injury.  My “outing” was what I shared with family and a few close friends as to why I left and 4 years of sharing with a domestic violence support group.  I feel the real “outing” to him was my education in understanding the narcissistic personality disorder; how they think and having the vocabulary to call by name the tactics he uses to abuse.   I exposed him not to the world but to myself.  I saw beyond the illusion and façade; he was unmasked and vulnerable and that is not a position a narcissist likes to be in.  

I was reading all of the email exchanges between us and the one common thing is that his anger is constant.  They contain blame, threats, character assassination, and he always refers to the delusional realty I live in.   I’m delusional and crazy so anything I say can have no truth or fact.  It is interesting how everything he ever did has been diminished or erased and our history re-written.  I am the villain and he is the poor victim. 

His plot for revenge will be through our child; it is the only thing still connecting us.    I have been told I’m an unfit mother since the day she was born.  He has used parental alienation since our child’s memory serves her.   My daughter is 16 and I’ve been struggling with her for 4 years and he’s using this struggle to extract his revenge.  I asked for help in getting our daughter to see a therapist and his reaction was an email to our daughter “You don’t need counseling, your mother is poisonous and you need to get a way from her.  She lives in her own reality, lies, and is a miserable person.”  The irony is that he told me in an email I would have to live with myself for destroying the the father/daughter relationship with lies and manipulation and yet that's exactly what he did!

So, how many years of wasted energy will he put into discrediting me to our child, my family and a few select friends so that he can wear the crown of “the wronged, hurt victim?” 

Passive Agressive

The definition of a passive aggressive personality is “A personality disorder in which aggressive feelings are manifested in passive ways, especially through stubbornness, procrastination, and inefficiency so as to resist adequate social and occupational performance.” My first experience with passive aggressive behavior was with my ex husband who was clinically diagnosed as a Narcissistic Personality Disorder. I have always associated that behavior with a narcissist. I did not know that passive aggressive behavior can be a disorder all on its own. The difference with a narcissist and a person with passive aggressive disorder is that the narcissist knows what they are doing and the passive/aggressive person does not. This does not excuse the behavior because both are very abusive whether they know what they are doing or not. 

I believe my daughter is passive aggressive. I feared she was narcissist because the way she treats and interacts is so parallel with the way my narcissistic ex treated me, but she has empathy and compassion so how could she be a narcissist. I ended a friendship a while ago because it was toxic and I even used the words passive aggressive to describe it, in my head I still associated it with narcissism and I knew she was not a narcissist. The conversations with my sister regarding her boyfriend’s behavior were the key to my understanding of passive aggressive disorder. My sister’s description of her boyfriend was very narcissistic from my experiences, yet my sister also described a very loving, gentle and giving man; how could he be both? I started to research passive aggressive behavior outside of a narcissistic personality disorder and learned it’s a disorder all on its own. When I shared the information with my sister it helped her understand his behavior although it did not save the relationship. It allowed her to let it go emotionally, because she realized it was not going to change and it was unhealthy for her to stay. 

There is no cure or treatment for narcissism, you can’t teach someone to have empathy and compassion other than to mimic it. Passive aggressive disorder on the other hand can be treated and cured, but the individual has to want to get help; directly or indirectly. They have to learn how to deal with anger in more healthy ways and address and change the way they react. I believe my daughter’s experience growing up in a home with abuse that she has developed ways of avoiding feeling or confronting her anger. She does not know how to talk about conflicts, frustrations, hostility and anything else she thinks is unfair. Our home environment while I was married was one where we walked on eggshells, we both were not allowed to communicate our anger without retaliation and only he was allowed to rage at us and we were to remain silent; both our voices silenced and paralyzed.

The common denominator between a narcissist and the passive aggressive is that they use bullying tactics both covert and overt to control, manipulate, divert, project, blame and to gain power over. The problem I’m having with a passive aggressive child is how it is affecting my life. “Bullying is not limited to physical violence. It is a prolonged pattern of negative and repeated behaviors that overwhelm the target, degrading him or her to the point of powerlessness. It is an imbalance of power that, over time, wears down the intended target.” 

I'm at my wits end. I desperately want my daughter in therapy and when I reached out to my ex husband (narcissist) as a last resort for support it was just an opportunity for him to prove once again that his hate for me is stronger than his love for her. 

The Scorpion and the Frog

I always tried to rationalize why he did the things he did.  I constantly asked myself why couldn't he stop and why could he not see how he was hurting the person he claimed to love?  I tried to change every inch of myself inside and out so I didn't have any more flaws for him to dissect even though he always found more and continued picking me apart with his magnifying glass.  I think of all of the work I put into trying to make him happy hoping if I pleased him it would stop, but I only lost myself in the process.  All of this didn't matter, because it was never about me nor was it personal, it was just in his nature.  The Aesop fable of the “The Scorpion and the Frog” outlines the narcissists thinking so perfectly and I know now it didn't matter what I did or how I did it, the outcome would have always been the same.  “Once upon a time there was a scorpion who wanted to get across the lake. Once day he came upon a frog. He asked the frog if the frog would be willing to swim across the lake while the scorpion rode upon his back. The frog replied, "I am sorry Mr. Scorpion, I cannot do that because you will sting me and we will both drown." The scorpion replied, "I give you my word, I promise not to sting you, I just want to get across this lake. Besides that would be stupid to do that!" So the kind hearted frog trusted the scorpion. The scorpion crawled on his back and the frog began to swim. When they got half way across the lake the scorpion stung him viciously in the back. The frog, now mortally wounded, screamed out crying: "Why did you do that? Don't you realize that now we are both going to die and drown in the lake?" The scorpion responded, "Yes I know, but I could not help it... IT IS IN MY NATURE"

I wish in hind sight I would have paid more attention to this fable perhaps I would have trusted my instinct rather than trust a narcissist’s promise which are also not in their nature to keep. The narcissist in my life was as toxic and poisonous as the scorpion and I kept falling for his promise that he wouldn't do it again, yet every time we reached the middle of the lake he would sting me and its funny how I still felt surprised every time until I grew old and wise and no longer trusted the scorpion in my life.

Closure

One definition of CLOSURE is “A feeling of finality or resolution, especially after a traumatic experience.” Closure is one of the most important steps in your own healing with the ending of a relationship. Closure gives one a chance to tie up emotional loose ends with an official ending.” Unfortunately, you are never granted this opportunity when you are/were involved in a narcissistic relationship. Closure for a survivor is waking up from one of the most painful nightmares and realizing that you never meant anything to this man or woman. You’re caught in an emotional crossfire with yourself reflecting on all of the years you’ve spent with and loved this person, but realizing you never had any meaning in the narcissist’s life. This is the hardest part to accept and why closure and moving forward is often difficult and delayed. It is hard to fathom that a person could do this to you and have no remorse or regret, in fact when you or they leave, they rewrite history to justify their behavior and if children aren’t involved they simply write you out of the story entirely. In the end after all they have denied you in the relationship they even try to deny you one last thing "your own reality." People wonder why it’s hard for a survivor to pick up the pieces and just jump back into life all bushy tailed and bright eyed but when you have been broken and shattered into a million pieces it's not really that big of a surprise. To glue a million pieces back together takes time and patience and remember "Rome wasn't built in a day."

Good Memories

A person once said to me after 15 ½ years of marriage there must have been some good memories; the only good memories were the ones I created by not rocking the boat, walking on eggshells, remaining silent, being a good little girl and following the script exactly the way he wanted it to go. The best memory I have is the day I left and never went back. I could finally breath and the burden of what I had been living in was lifted from my shoulders and the possibility of a new life free of abuse was within my reach. It was the hardest step, but one I had to take in order to move forward. The four years since I left haven’t been easy; still get bouts of PTSD. I’ve made mistakes and bad choices along the way, but it’s all okay because I’m in the driver’s seat; I decide when to brake and when to go; I don’t like to parallel park, so I don’t. I have the keys and I don’t have to let anyone else drive unless it’s my choice.

My daughter shares all of the things he says about those good memories and sometimes I wish she wouldn’t share them with me, but on the other hand it reminds of exactly who I was married to. Listening as he dissects and picks me apart piece by piece; devaluing and attempting to annihilate me as a person all because I know what’s behind the mask; the narcissist worst fear is exposure. His words use to ring loudly in my ears, now they’re just an annoying whisper and eventually they will fade altogether. He attempts to poison our child against me, but all he really is doing is sabotaging any future relationship with her. Some of his phrases are new and some he’s used on her since her memory has served her. “Your mother and I hated each other from the beginning.” So, if this was true, why did we get married? “Your mother never wanted you.” This was his continued attempt at parental alienation. “Your mother is crazy.” Only while I was married to him! LOL “Your mother lives in her own reality.” Just another way of him indicating I’m crazy. “Your mother only prepared cheap and easy meals.” Yes, that’s why I used to spend 2 hours every Sunday morning preparing my menu for the week. It’s a shame but our daughter has come to the realization that her dad hates me more than he loves her.

He resented anything I did for myself because that made me selfish…..and in the last 3 years of marriage when I was being selfish a.k.a. doing things I enjoyed on his time that’s exactly what he would throw in my face when he’d blow up. How dare I go to church on Sunday? How dare I spend my Saturday’s working on an art project while I was attending college? How dare I attend my weekly support group for domestic violence (he always referred to it as my man haters group) every Wednesday evening and thus forcing him to prepare a meal. You see I was doing things for me and they were taking from his time. There was an unwritten rule that I was allowed to do things outside of him but only while he was at work; all other times I was to be at his beck and call; he even tried to control what time I went to bed. I was not allowed to have a life outside of him. When you’re married to a narcissist he becomes your jailer and you even help him unknowingly put up the bars that imprison you with him. It is only until you realize that you are a prisoner and unshackle the chains of fear that have kept you imprisoned then you are truly able to be free. It’s not quite as simple as that, but it’s where your change begins.

I have to remember according to him I’m crazy, bipolar, and I live in my own reality and I’ve made this all up, if only that were true. Four years in a support group for domestic violence taught me my memories are quite real and all too familiar with the other survivors in my group.

The Narcissist and his Scripted Illusion

A narcissist puts so much time, effort and energy into fostering the illusion they present to the public, yet they apply nothing towards their own family in reality. The illusion is a farce and it seems the more they perpetuate this image the more they believe their own hype.

The plot in which the narcissist stars is very well planned. He uses the screenplay to skillfully manipulate and exploit the key characters (his family). The family’s parts are only significant in that they serve to promote how wonderful he is so that he may shine and bask in the applause of his adoring audience “the public.” Behind the scenes though lurks another story, but that one will never be written into the script, because it is not the idyllic “Leave it to Beaver family,” but a horror story in which the family lives in his version of “The Stepford Wives.” They must be submissive and docile and if they break from their assigned passive characters there will be repercussions for defying him and he will protect and preserve the illusion at all cost. You can’t have “Prince Charming” act like “Darth Vader” and get the audiences sympathy can you? Eventually the insignificant key characters (his family) no longer want to be confined to playing the two-dimensional characters that they have been locked into. They desire for their roles to be more true to life rather than tightly scripted. Well, the narcissist can’t have the mask of the main character tainted with there lies and jealously so, the narcissist is forced to terminate their contracts and then he replaces them with new players who hopefully will be more grateful for a chance to work under him and follow the dam script just as he has written it.

Codependency

I despise the term codependency. This term is often used in marriage counseling towards the target (partner) of an abuser/batterer and she is defined as having excessive emotional or psychological reliance on her batterer. By using this term the therapist shifts the blame for abuse to be shared equally between the 2 partners. Therapists are taught to be a referee; to navigate and keep the lines of communication between the couple open and fair; to help them hear each other’s grievances and respond with understanding and sincerity. Unfortunately that only works with a healthy relationship that is having difficulty communicating. When you are in a relationship with a Narcissistic Personality Disorder and you are asked to share in the blame for your own abuse; you leave therapy not only being labeled as a codependent, but also burdening you with more abuse not only from your abuser, but also from your therapist. Now, once again you are being told that it is you who must change to make the relationship work and isn’t that what your abuser has told you all along?

Abuse is a choice and you do not share in the responsibility for your abusers choice. This is why Domestic Violence Support Groups never recommend marriage counseling because your batterer will only use it to manipulate the therapist and put the blame on you. The correct label rather than codependency would be Traumatic Bonding or Stockholm’s Syndrome which are much more accurate terms in the attachment to the relationship with a narcissist.

Cycle of Abuse

I know how abuse affects children because I grew up with it. I’m 50 and I still remember vividly when my dad and mother would fight. It always took place in the kitchen in front of the refrigerator; why, I don’t know. My mother would be frustrated trying to communicate with my father and he would be threatening her with anything and everything then it would always end with the lunge and him choking her. My sister and I would always be standing behind my mother screaming for them to stop, but our cries were never heard. We would run into the living room and go the window on the left side of the fireplace; open it and both in sync on a 1, 2, 3, count we’d scream over and over until we couldn’t scream anymore. I don’t know how many times a week it happened, because it always began and ended the same except for the one time when my dad through a glass at my mom; she ducked and it hit me in the forehead; I still bear the memory just like the scar. I always remember the hurt, pain, and humiliation my mother felt with his affairs; which he didn’t even try to hide. One time we were having a barbeque at our house with neighbors and friends; his latest woman came to our home in a taxi; she sent in one of her two children to get my dad; he went out to the street with the boy and got into the taxi and left with her. My mom hid her pain until after the barbecue and continued on like the trooper she was. He didn’t come back until the next day; he never had remorse or even an apology for humiliating her like that.

I always swore I’d never marry someone like my father and I didn’t. I married someone far worse. My dad was overt with his abuse; it was easy to see and identify, but my ex was covert; I didn’t realize what I was in until I was too deep; emotionally, financially, and time. I didn’t always understand why my mom tolerated it; why she married him; why she hated him, but after 15 ½ years of walking in her shoes I understood exactly what emotional, verbal, and physical abuse feels like. I never thought I’d ever be in my mom’s shoes, because I was too smart, but the imprint from childhood already marked me for my future relationship.

My daughter has witnessed and reacted just as I did as a child at seeing her mother being abused. On July 11th, 2004 my ex and I were arguing about his porn addiction. I had a glass of water in my hand and held it to my head; when you lived with a narcissistic personality disorder trying to communicate makes your head feel like it’s going to explode. The glass slipped out of my hand and broke and that sent my ex into a blind rage. I was standing in our family room near the kitchen door and when he got up from our futon couch he came at me full force; shoving me so hard that I landed in the kitchen. I had just gotten off crutches a few days before after a knee surgery, so protecting my knee was in my mind. I landed on the ceramic tile floor; my head hitting the tile first and my left hand tucked under my left knee. I ended up having a fractured head and broken hand. The worst part was my daughter watched the whole thing. She saw me screaming in pain and when she went to try to help me up off the kitchen floor; her dad still in a rage yelled at her to get away from your mom she’s just f@%king faking. Most of the abuse to this point was physical intimidation; he would throw me, raise his fist to punch me, and corner me in the bathroom and not allow me to exit. Abuse can escalate and it did in my case. Once I got up still in shock and hysterical; I went into our spare bedroom and called my sister, but she wasn’t home, so I called my father in tears and told him what he did. This scared my ex because if I was telling family who else would I tell. He went into self-preservation mode and begged me not tell anyone else; worried about his career not me; saying how it was an accident and he would never do anything to hurt me again. I didn’t go to the doctor until the next day for my hand and head and lied to the physician saying I slipped, because military doctors don’t have to follow the same protocol as civilian in the sense of patient confidentiality. I also scheduled an intake appointment with the local domestic violence support system. That week he was so kind and nice, so I cancelled my intake appointment. Things were good for a while; the honeymoon period, but it was sliding right back to the way it always was. My daughter had just started the 2nd grade and we were called in to her school by her teacher; she was having behavioral problems, hitting, talking back, not listening, and anger issues; something that was not the norm for her. I thought maybe it was ADD/ADHD, no, it was seeing what happened to me and I didn’t realize how it had traumatized her. How I could I see; I didn’t realize how what I witnessed as a child affected me until I was in my 40’s. I found my daughter a therapist to help her with the trauma and I made another intake appointment with the DV support system and this opened many new doors for me; in understanding how his behavior was affecting my daughter and myself; it also gave me a vocabulary to describe and define his abusive behavior. From that point I outlined a plan to get away safely. That plan took me longer than I wanted; 5 years, but my daughter and I got out and I have never regretted leaving; I just wish I would have had the strength to do it sooner.

I carry a lot of guilt and shame for what I tolerated in my marriage; just like my mother. Although, the difference between my mother and I is that I had more education and support systems to help me survive than she had. I also, don’t want to hold onto the pain and hurt, because that’s something that imprisoned my mother; it froze her emotionally. I want to be the last generation of abused women in my family. I’m giving my daughter the tools that I didn’t have growing up, so she can end this cycle.

Revelations After Divorce

I thought when I divorced my exN (narcissist) I would be free of his tyranny, but I was wrong. When you have child/children with a narcissist the connection is not severed with divorce; it continues and so does the abuse until the child is of legal age and you are free to permanently cut all ties. Although, I’ve set boundaries in the way he can communicate with me, it still doesn’t thwart his email threats and attacks. I no longer fear him; he’s nothing more than a playground bully. He’s like the “Wolf” in the “Three Little Pigs,” always threatening to blow my house down if I don’t comply with his command. Over time I’ve learned my house is not made of straw or sticks, but it is made of brick so all of his threats and verbal abuse just bounce off instead of penetrating the wall. You have to protect yourself from the big bad wolf; you need to wear a thick shield of armor, because he will continue to spew his poisonous wrath onto you until you no longer allow it to get under your skin.

When I left my exN I only took my personal belongings; clothes, art supplies/my paintings, sentimental items, and 2 lamps; at a later date before the divorce was final I asked for 2 rugs and my daughter’s bedroom furniture. I realized before I left that everything material that I had accumulated during the marriage wasn’t worth my safety in both body and mind. I remember a woman in my domestic violence support group who said “it’s just stuff and you can get more stuff” those words stuck with me until the day I left. Divorce is never easy and a divorce with a narcissist is like a never ending hate crime against you. A hate crime is usually defined by law as one that involves threats, harassment, or physical harm which is motivated by prejudice, race, color, religion, or ethnicity, but for a narcissist his hate is directed towards you because you’ve peeled away the layers and unmasked the wolf in sheep’s clothing so, he must destroy you to hide his secret. A narcissist fears exposure more than anything else. He is so adept at hiding behind the many masks he wears to shield his true self and when he is exposed and he feels vulnerable; he becomes like an animal cornered and he attacks. Exposure for a narcissist is like in the Greek mythology story of Medusa and if he were forced to gaze upon himself in a mirror; he would see the monster he really is and turn to stone. If he could be honest with himself he would have to initiate and look at the truth that his mask conceals him from seeing, but a narcissist will protect himself at all cost from seeing the truth.

In many ways I pity the narcissist, he is like “Gollum” the pathetic creature from "Lord of the Rings." Gollum is consumed by the ring like a narcissist is consumed by fear; fear of losing his narcissistic supply. Gollum like a narcissist is the inversion of a human being; trapped in a self-contained darkness for which there is no hope of change. I will never forget or forgive the things he has done to me, because those are my life learned lessons. I do choose to forgive him and that forgiveness is for myself, because I feel by not forgiving him I will hold myself a prisoner of my experiences. A narcissist isn’t worth the time and energy it would take to hate or loathe him. He is like the Grinch "Who Stole Christmas" he's a bitter creature whose heart is two sizes too small and I know his heart will never be touched and it will never grow three sizes larger.

Co-Parenting with a Narcissist

You come to realize that co-parenting with a narcissist is a wishful fantasy and that fantasy will dispel quite quickly after divorce. I naively thought with a little distance and time we could have an amicable relationship regarding our daughter. I quickly realized that was never going to happen; just wishful thinking on my part. To him I committed an act of treason by leaving him and my retributive punishment is trying to take the one thing that means most to me, my child.

During the marriage he never supported me as a part of a parent team. Anytime I laid down some form of punishment for our daughter’s bad behavior (timeout or losing an object and/or privilege); instead of supporting me he would look at our daughter and say “I don’t agree with your mother.” What kind message did that send to our child? Basically, it told our child that my voice didn’t matter and she didn’t have to listen to me. He constantly eroded at my character with our daughter by telling her since her memory serves her that I was a bad parent, crazy, loser, that I never wanted her and many other derogatory names. He knowingly was trying to alienate and sabotage my relationship with our daughter. Now, after being divorced for almost 4 years, it hasn’t stopped. Every time she visits, he constantly belittles and berates me to our child. What he doesn’t realize is he’s destroying any relationship he will have with his daughter in the future. As she said in her own words “She’s slowly disconnecting herself from her father.” I think she’s watched him for far too many years portray himself to the general public as a friendly, caring and nice person, but behind closed doors she has witnessed something else. He is the master at lying, manipulative, deceitful, and his only purpose is to hurt others to get what he wants and he will sacrifice anyone including her to save face. I think our daughter has learned the hard way that what she wants has never been important to him; he only cares about the outward perception. It’s hard to watch what he does and only offer support and unconditional love; forced to bite my lip as not to say anything that could be construed as negative in regards to her father. I will not play his parental alienation game and my only concern is what’s in the best interest of our child. My daughter has had to mature faster emotionally than most children because of abuse and it’s not right and I can’t change it, but I can give her as many life tools as I can so that she isn’t left permanently scarred by her father.

You don’t co-parent with a narcissist. I learned the hard way that you can’t communicate with them, it’s like pounding your head against a brick wall which will only leave you upset, frustrated and with a large headache. They will try to provoke you at every turn and I've just learned to take the punches without retaliation. The only thing you can do is set your personal boundaries even though he will not respect them; it’s for you. I've learned to limit communication to email and texting. I've learned not to react to his threats and attacks. I will admit I have on occasion reacted and learned very quickly that it will only leave you with the short end of the stick. I've come to terms knowing he will not change and it will never get any easier; I just hold on to the fact that in 3 more years my daughter will be 18 and my legal responsibility to him in regards to shared custody is done and seeing that light at the end of the tunnel is what keeps me silent most of the time.