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It’s been 8 months. I feel different. Sometimes I feel better, stronger, and wiser for what happened to me. But sometimes I just feel resentful and bitter.
I feel like my innocence was taken, and I’m hardened because of what happened to me. I’m apathetic about a lot of things. I’m not really sure how to get back to my old self, or if she even exists anymore.
Anyone else feel like this? What did you do? How did you find that soft, kind side of yourself again?
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This post makes me cry. I just discovered that my useless waste of a relationship with my N for the last 5 years was a total lie. 3 weeks ago I didn’t know what the word ‘narcissist’ really meant.
I don’t know if we will ever find that soft place again – but I do know the praying can help. I prayed and prayed for the truth of this puzzle that was my boyfriend (or whatever we were) and I received the answer via an online book that I wasn’t even consciously looking for.
3 weeks after just feeling relief (I finally have a name for it!), obsessing about every piece of information i could get on the topic, blogging on this site – which I have NEVER done in my life – I have found a dream little cottage in a dream of a beautiful town that I will be moving into tomorrow.
I believe that soft, kind side must be used by projecting it inwardly – not outwardly. Our bodies, mind and spirit need love. Real, deep unconditional God like love. That’s what I’m praying for now. Once we can learn to unconditionally love ourselves, pray to God for strength perhaps we can come out as better, stronger women.
I am also praying for the N from my PAST life. I am praying that God shows insight, truth and wisdom to him and that perhaps he can turn to Him and embrace His love – and for the first time probably since he was a child, actually feel unconditional love.
I’m not saying that because I want to get back with him or some type of magical thinking. That part of my life is over – for good. I am saying it from a higher place – focusing my head and heart upward. And hopefully healing.
God bless you and may we both be healed…
Jan
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Jan1000 – Thanks for sharing those empowering insights. “I believe that soft, kind side must be used by projecting it inwardly – not outwardly. Our bodies, mind and spirit need love. Real, deep unconditional God like love. That’s what I’m praying for now. Once we can learn to unconditionally love ourselves, pray to God for strength perhaps we can come out as better, stronger women.” … even though it’s only been 3 weeks, you have a lot of wisdom.
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allison123,
I love what Jan said about projecting our kindness inward, toward our own healing and self-care. I think it is totally normal to feel ‘hard’ now, with a kind of emotional shell around yourself. It is not time for you to feel open and vulnerable toward the world, and certainly not toward the person who tore your heart in two.
Part of this hardness is anger. Anger is part of the healing process. It helps us out of despair and depression. It starts to externalize our devastation. Go with it. I know it doesn’t feel very ‘settled’, or like you have moved on. But you ARE MOVING FORWARD. This is just a difficult, long, arduous journey through some SERIOUS grief.
You describe it so well, that some days you feel stronger, and more wise (accepting?). This exemplifies that grief processing is not linear. It is like a spiral, and you can revisit the same stages many times; albeit weakening as you process. Eventually you will get off the spiral, and reach a very peaceful, clear, knowledgeable, and loving place.
You got this allison…you are doing the work.
Love and hugs,
Slim -
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allison123 – You absolutely can find your warm, loving essence again. Right now, you’re processing the pain. Roll with it. The process is messy, but in the end you’ll release the burden and be available to give and receive real love, not the fake variety.
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I feel stronger. I am more comfortable in my skin. More confident. Better. I see his games for what they are and never hesitate to throw up the middle finger during our phone conversations when I know he’s telling me his BS. (We “share” 5 kids and have to coordinate schedules and stuff.) I want to never go through something like that again, but I feel like I couldn’t. I’ve grown too much. My soul won’t fit in that small lock-box they call “love” anymore. Lots of little pieces of recovery have helped me to get where I am and I am thankful for each one of them. The best is Dr. Sandra Brown’s Living Recovery Program here. https://saferelationshipsmagazine.com/living-recovery-program-4 She’s done the groundbreaking research to know how they work and how WE work and what we need to recover and move forward to make the most out of the rest of our lives!
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Hi Allison123,
I can totally relate to what you are feeling as i am freshly out of a relationship with a narc. I feel hurt and angry and sometimes numb which has become my new norm, but i get moments of clarity coming through that show me that im on the right path. Ive been struggling with no contact due to the fact that i still have some of his possessions at my place but that will be sorted out soon. I know i am different now but i look at it as being wiser…All the best
Julie -
My N devastated me nearly 3 years ago. He was unbelievably cruel when he broke up with me by barking at me a laundry list of all the things that were wrong with me including being “too needy” and “too demanding.” Those were both completely false as I did no such thing. I had become some spineless person doing anything and everything he wanted and nothing I wanted just to make him happy. The next day he asked me out to dinner, which didn’t work out but the following day we spent the whole day together with his young-adult son shopping and visiting friends. My head was a mess to say the least. The reality is that, like he did with everything else in his life, he became bored with me, was messing around with other women, and needed to make me the bad guy. I didn’t recognize myself and friends told me, “you’re not you.”
Eight weeks later I was told he was marrying someone else. We lived in California, she lived across the country in Tennessee. He claimed he met her on line AFTER he left me. I highly doubt it. Even so, you’re going to marrying someone you’ve only just met and via on-line, long distance???? I thought I was at an all time low when he left me, unable to get out of bed, sobbing all the time, wishing I would just die in my sleep so I wouldn’t have to wake up to the pain again but I was taken to a whole other dungeon level of despair when I learned of his plan to wed another. I spent over a year with him, together nearly all the time. We were both retired so we spent our days on some sort of adventure or another. He spent most nights at my house but he refused to keep even a change of clothes there let alone move in with me. He was the ultimate “word salad” chef. He could tell others we were “just friends” or he’d pick a fight with me over nothing and leave for 2, 3 days, a week. I’d find out later he was seeing another “because we weren’t together.”
I stayed in my sweet little home that I loved for another year but I just felt sad there and it was full of bad memories. I did make some wonderful new friends through Meetup groups that are in my closest inner circle to this day, I went on a Singles Cruise and have since gone on a few more and from those I have friends who live all over the world. I’ve gone on additional trips with them because of the friendships we’ve grown. Some have come to visit me from across the States and as far as Australia.
But early after the breakup I also rebounded into a lot of bad choice behaviors, ie, one night stands, that I regret. I tried a long distance relationship with a man I met on a cruise. Ultimately it didn’t work but we are still friends. I decided I needed a big change. I never lived more than 35 miles from where I grew up. I sold my house and moved over 1000 miles away to a beautiful log house in the mountains of Montana.
I’ve dated here and there and am currently in another long distance (4 hours apart) relationship but like you I experienced the power dayside and not so powerful days. But I also feel more hardened, distrusting, and like I will never love again like I loved my N. I will never allow someone that close to me again. While I’ve felt like was beginning to love again it faded before it became too encompassing and I don’t believe I will ever deeply love again. And I’m okay with that. I have a great life with great friends and family, and plenty of activities but even more so, I am the confident person I was before my N and much stronger than I was before. But yes, I am definitely a different person after and because of my N.
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I feel a new person. I was naive before, did not even suspect that such evil could exist. What made me enter the marriage without suspectig was having known him some years before in our workplace, where he seemed to be a nice person. Our families became friends, our children were in the same school. Then, I lost contact with him. Years later he found me, told me he was alone (I was alone too) and that he always felt attracted to me. In a few weeks he moved in. The first four years were heaven on earth. I left my partnership in a company, took the money to start a business together. As all stories go, he kept “borrowing” the money until it was almost gone, no business was being built, promisses and promisses only. Then the devaluation started. In my agony I looked for a marriage counselor. After 3 sessions he told the therapist that he was not coming anymore because “as she could see” the problem in our marriage was me. She answered, ok, I will take care of her, and led me safely till the end of our marriage, knowing but then not telling me that he was a sociopath. Later she told me that if she did tell me he was a sociopath, I would leave and she would not have the chance to save me. Two years after I started the therapy alone he left, leaving me without money, without work, full of depts, devastated, suicidal, ugly, and ill. The recovery process went through learning that such creatures as sociopaths existed, and my training as a psychoanalyst, focusing on the victim´s survival. Today I lead a working group called Superasas (super wings, in Brazil), specialized in helping sociopath abuse victims to recover, and in spreading the knowledge about such abusers. As in other parts of the world, people do not know about it, not even the professionals who work with public health. There is a huge amount of work to do, and Lovefraud was one of the major sources responsible for my recovery and rebuilding my life. I am enormously grateful to Donna Andersen.
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the me “after the divorce from abuse’..is far more sassy, brash, and apt to shoot off her mouth. I don’t tolerate the nastiness that I often see, in other couples (especially if one partner is a control freak)..I will not, will not EVER put up with that crap to have a partner. Sadly, my trusting nature is no more. I don’t trust even seemingly ‘nice’ people. I wonder when or if the ‘other shoe will drop’..In some ways, my heart has become colder, sometimes it feels frozen. I’m not who I was, that’s for sure.
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regretfullymine … All the experts tell us it is a good idea to be very careful when meeting new – and seemingly nice – people. That in itself might be a red flag: “nice”. It takes experience with someone to know they are trustworthy, healthy. Can relate to what you said in your post “In some ways, my heart has become colder, sometimes it feels frozen. I’m not who I was, that’s for sure.”
There are times when my behavior shocks me, too. Trying to pinpoint WHEN did my behavior change? WHAT precisely made it change? WHICH people from my past caused the most change? WHY did my entire being change so drastically from the relatively innocent, kind, trusting person I used to be? HOW can I reverse this damage to my spirit? Convinced if I will just backtrack, and zero in on re-connecting to that wonderful person I used to be, that will make a profound difference in being able to heal.
The innocence and essence of my childhood has been lost.As the result of the multiple traumas with sociopaths, I have become frozen, and on occasion, highly dissociated. Have done a lot of work – therapy, coaching, and more – now wondering how much of the side effects of the trauma will ever go away. Due to therapy, have gone ‘no contact’ with – literally – just about everyone in my life…anyone who is narcissistic or is a sociopath. Have a handful of friends left, and no family. It is a very lonely place where I stand today. I’m told the loneliness lasts about a year…it’s been 4 excruciating months.
Most recently, I had an Alzheimer’s client whose 70-something live-in girlfriend is a covert narcissist/sociopath. GF is very cold, disconnected, and inconsiderate of her partner. Alzheimer’s patients are very vulnerable emotionally. Had a few educational conversations with GF about this – as did his daughter – GF has no empathy whatsoever. GF fakes not understanding.
Since I’m an empath and very intuitive, I had to resign this lucrative job b/c I could no longer absorb his grieving energy – while she pummeled him to death with her insensitive conversations about every aspect of moving out. I explained to daughter in detail WHY I was resigning, that it’s a form of abuse, and daughter listened and understands. She lives elsewhere and it’s her dad’s home. In this siaution, if family booted out the GF, that would be rough on the patient, too. They’re between a rock and hard place… and they are trusting she will be gone in a few weeks anyway.
Alzheimer’s patients – already vulnerable due to the illness – become very sensitive to their inner circle, including caregivers. They sense any time someone close to them pulls away, in any shape or form. It is crazy-making for the Alzheimer’s patient, causing them to act out at times, at times violently. There was none of this moving info he needed to know, b/c GF has her own bedroom – her own very independent life – and he has his. He is devastated she’s moving to her new place. He would ask her “So … when you move out, how will this change our relationship?” She hems-and-haws without answering his question. The family thought she was moving out soon, to a new place she bought, and she is dragging this move out. New Lesson: Never again will I accept a job without also being able to interview a GF or BF of a patient. I need to get really conscious about sensing toxic personalities.
Allison123 – you mention innocence. After thinking about it, innocence and self-love are both related to purity of spirit. I will work on combining these two to see if it makes more of a difference. It would be nice to have a healthy level of innocence again.
Love fraud-related stuff is very prevalent in all kinds of situations and relationships. Once we experience sociopathic bullying, it’s in our energy field. This can attract more sociopathic abuse/bullying. Donna discusses this dynamic in a very good article here on Lovefraud. IMO, it’s a must-read article for everyone. It affects more of our lives than we are aware, because it, too, can be very covert until we’ve trained our intuition to sense it. The only way to win with a toxic person is not to play. This can be easier said than done for a lot of reasons. I believe at the core of how we can so innocently accept sociopathic abuse is our codepenedency, or our deficiency of self-love. Here is a quote that has been a balm to my soul recently: “Ashamed once, I am no more, as the tenderness of self-love blankets me with humble understanding.” Lisa A. Romano
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I know exactly how you feel,I’m going through the same thing. I want to be my old self,I was confident,happy fun,and I don’t know how to do it.no one in my life understands,they say get over it. They don’t even know a fraction of the abuse I tolerated from him,I think they would be shocked,and think I’m crazy. I don’t miss him,but i miss the life he promised you me,that I put up with all I did for almost 5 years to get. I feel like I’m empty now,it’s the only way to explain it. I think I actually hate his guys,I’m going through all this hell,and he’s living it up with a new victim like he did nothing wrong,I know he hasn’t changed he’s abusing her now but it still cuts into my heart that she’s living for the dream that will never happen,she don’t know it yet,he convinced her I’m the one who treated him bad.
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it’s been 10 years – and I do not feel okay. i have been struggling with serious chronic illnesses since the spath – so, I am running at a deficit. I find that I cannot trust my judgement in romantic relationships.
Since the spath I realized that 2 close relatives are narcs. one is my father. My Mom died a year ago – the morning after he brought his new gf into my mom’s house, and after erecting a screen between her hospital bed and their martial bed, slept with his gf in the same room as my mom. I am not wholly sure he didn’t kill Mom. Found out tonight that he is going to marry the gf.
I don’t know if i will ever be okay. I see spathy and narcissism now – and i seem to be attracted to them/attract them. This wasn’t always true, but now it seems to be. I am lonely, tired and isolated. And today has been kinda a shit mother’s day.
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one/joy,
Good to ‘see you’ again, but I am so sorry to hear you are feeling crummy, both physically and psychologically. Realizing your father is disordered, and seeing his behavior around your mother’s death is horrible. You saw your father’s true personality. It can also explain some of why you have been attracted to and attracted these types of people. Chronic illness just makes it more difficult to have the strength to deal with all of this, I am sure.
I relate as my mother is highly narcissistic and my grandfather was a pedophile/sociopath. In my case I feel like this made personality disordered individuals kind of normal for me. Their behaviors and inconsistencies were like the ones I had grown up with. And though I didn’t like being treated badly, I also accepted that this was how the world/people operated.
Plus, my therapist told me that we recreate circumstances in our adult life that mirror our childhood wounds/relationships, in order to heal the past.
Of course this doesn’t work and we just end up being re-victimized. But it is our ‘inner’ kid trying as well as they can to figure out how to get a different outcome (to get our parents to love us and treat us with kindness).
I did this over and over and over. So many relationships with so many narcissistic people. So much so that my ‘non disordered’ relationships were really the exception for me. It took a lot of therapy and hitting so many ‘rock bottoms’ before I stopped letting my un-evolved wounded inner child run the show. It really was like I had a split personality for awhile. Therapy helped a part of me mature, but this other part of me could come up and totally derail my whole life.
Truthfully I didn’t expect to have a new relationship either. And even after 3 years, I dated (VERY briefly) another one of these losers. And though this may sound harsh I think that even if we have very good judgement about people, and heed all the warnings, it is still not easy to find someone we are super compatible with. My experience is some of it is just dumb luck.
I am guessing these realizations about your family members have triggered you?? PTSD and depression know no bounds and new insults to our emotional body can have some pretty serious consequences.
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Magnut, I totally understand what you said about people saying just get over it. They can not understand unless they’ve been through what we’ve been through. Use this forum to find the understanding you need. The end of a relationship with a N or Spath won’t be a normal one, because the relationship itself wasn’t a normal one, no matter how great it was in the beginning. We understand. Been there, done that, sadly. I finally sat down with my best friend of 40 years and told her I have changed. My impression of people in general has changed. And that’s okay. You have to take a break from negative people during your time of healing because you’re kind of vulnerable right now. Surround yourself with as much possitivity as you can and hope it rubs off.
Lastly, I got some VERY good advice about trying to get back to the person I was. You shouldn’t, but you can become a stronger wiser kinder more aware version. She said my path was to go forward, never backward. You will never get to the end of the book if you keep re-reading the last chapter. Although I miss the old me sometimes, the new me is friggin awesome. Embrace all that you’ve been through, cry your eyes out if you need to, deal with the pain and loneliness (that’s the hard part which takes time). When you’re ready, tie it all up with a really pretty ribbon, and chuck it. You get a do-over. Find a new interest or hobby, resurrect an old forgotten one, find a new place to eat, buy a new outfit, take a class, whatever YOU want. It’s okay to be a bit selfish right now cuz it’s NOT about him anymore.
Hope this helps ease your heart. Keep reading, keep posting. There is great understanding here.
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When I first left my ex, I was scared shitless and had no idea how I was going to start my new life back in Australia. Everything to me was just blackness ahead, no lights to guide me..it was the most terrifying thing I’ve had to do, and I had to do it alone.
But almost a year later, things are much different, my mother was there of course to hug me
and guide me with her wisdom and love. My mother generously gave me her old car as she had just bought a new one. And my mother knows how much a car means in Australia…I love that car, I
still have it. My daughter was there to cheer me for leaving such a
loser and buy me hungry jacks on my bad days.. lol Both my mother and my daughter helped me financially when I came back to Australia to help me get on my feet.I now have the car, renting my own apartment, and now finally started up my own freelance business online and have just landed my first client.
I feel stronger, knowing that I came through it all despite him trying to destroy me. I am now armed with the knowledge of what a sociopath is, how to detect one, and how to avoid one like the plague. I feel like a strong survivor with bones made of steele, but still my warm heart and kindness in tact, no one can ever take that away from me.
My days are now peaceful and happy and shared with my cat Kishka, who I adopted as she was abandoned. Together, we are in total bliss.. xxx
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