I stumbled on this site a few days ago, and have read your entire Madonna/Whore thread...start to finish. For the first few sections, I was fascinated to find that your story sounded soooooo much like mine! The husband you described in the beginning could be my husbands twin..lol
Then things started to diverge somewhere in the middle of the threads and I started to see something different in your husbands personality. I can't tell you how thrilled I was to read of your MC and ST...thinking that you were going to find answers to your SSM. And dang me, I was so darned proud of your husband for going to the counseling and seeming to work at bettering your relationship.
Try as I might though, I couldn't manage to fit my own husband's LD into the Madonna/Whore syndrome...yeesh, where DOES he fit?
(I'm getting to my point, honest I am...grab some coffee and get ready)
Soooo, along about chapter five or six of your threads, I ran into the bit about your husband feeling that you two should just do your own thing to repair the marriage and shouldn't "have" to follow that silly therapists homework and bingo, my antenna shot up and started doing whirlygigs. Combine that with your husbands "affair" with an escort and the fact that he told you he was "fine" on the day(actually, he told you this before, during and after that day!) he had to be in her town, yet all the while planning to meet with her and spend the afternoon and then top it off with his current refusal to acknowledge that he NEEDS to make changes, and you have a whole nother kind of personality disorder.
I am NOT coming down on you with what I'm about to point out...I'm actually just pointing out inconsistencies or oddities to help illustrate why I'm thinking that your husband has more than just attachment theory or Madonna/Whore complex, k?
Inconsistency: In the beginning you said that he was vulnerable to that particular escort because he's always had a soft spot for needy kids....yet later on you said that he's never been particularly empathetic towards his own daughters, never really wanted kids and left you to raise your own without his input (except if you asked for it, and even then he was simply supportive, not proactive).
Oddity: You often tell us that he refers to you as "an angel", "a good girl", etc...terms that don't connote any emotional attachment to the object in question. He tells you that you are the only person who can put up with him and that he wouldn't be able to put up with himself! That's not love talking, that's manipulation. Patting you on the head and telling you what a good girl you are to him, as he heads to bed, is...well... NOT the behavior of a man who is emotionally attached to his wife.
I'm going to post a section of a FAQ by Sam Vaknin...and though I haven't asked his permission, I'm pretty sure he'd not only approve, but (since he's a professed narcissist) he'd even be happy to see it here.
Before I do though, I wanted to ask you a couple of questions if that's ok.
1) Are your husband's adoptive parents still alive? If not, did one of them die prior to either of his known affairs?
2) Were there any other life crisis events that occurred prior to the affairs and/or his depression?
On to the section taken from Sam Vaknin's FAQ page:
"Some narcissists prefer "complicated" situations. If men they prefer virgins, married women, frigid or lesbian women, etc. The more "difficult" the target the more rewarding the narcissistic outcome. Such a narcissist may be married, but he does not regard his extra-marital affairs as either immoral or a breach of any explicit or implicit contract between him and his spouse. He keeps explaining to anyone who cares to listen that his other sexual partners are nothing to him, meaningless, that he is merely taking advantage of them and that they do not constitute a threat and should not be taken seriously by his spouse. In his mind a clear separation exists between the honest "woman of his life" (really, a saint) and the whores that he is having sex with. He tends to cast the whole feminine sub-species in a bad light (with the exception of the meaningful women in his life). His behaviour, thus, achieves a dual purpose: the securing of Narcissistic Supply, on the one hand and bringing about a replay of old, unresolved conflicts and traumas (abandonment and the Oedipal conflict, to mention but two). When inevitably abandoned by his spouse the narcissist is veritably shocked and hurt. This is the sort of crisis, which might drive him to psychotherapy. Still, deep inside, he feels compelled to continue to pursue precisely the same path. His abandonment is cathartic, purifying. Following a period of deep depression and suicidal ideation the narcissist is likely to feel cleansed, invigorated, unshackled, ready for the next round of hunting.
(My Note: This is the type of man your husband sounds most like to me) But there is another type of narcissist. He also has bouts of sexual hyperactivity in which he trades sexual partners and tends to regard them as objects. However, with him, this is a secondary behaviour. It appears mainly after major narcissistic traumas and crises. A painful divorce, a devastating personal financial upheaval and this type of narcissist adopts the view that the "old solutions" do not work anymore. He frantically gropes and searches for new ways to attract attention, to restore his False Ego (=his grandiosity) and to secure the subsistence level of Narcissistic Supply. Sex is handy and is a great source of the right kind of supply: immediate, interchangeable, comprehensive (it encompasses all the aspects of the narcissist's being), natural, highly charged, adventurous, pleasurable. Thus, following a life crisis, the cerebral narcissist is likely to be deeply involved in sexual activities very frequently and almost to the exclusion of other matters.
However, as the memories of the crisis fade, as the narcissistic wounds heal, as the Narcissistic Cycle re-commences and the balance is restored the second type of narcissist reveals his true colours. He abruptly loses interest in sex and in all his sexual partners. The frequency of his sexual activities deteriorates from a few times a day to a few times a year. He prefers intellectual pursuits, sports, politics, volunteering anything but sex. This kind of narcissist is afraid of encounters with the opposite sex and is even more afraid of emotional involvement or commitment that he fancies himself prone to develop following a sexual encounter. In general, such a narcissist withdraws not only sexually but also emotionally. If married he loses all overt interest in his spouse, sexual or otherwise. He confines himself to his world and makes sure that he is sufficiently busy to preclude any interaction with his nearest (and supposedly dearest). He becomes completely immersed in "big projects", lifelong plans, a vision, or a cause all very rewarding narcissistically and all very demanding and time consuming. He then regards sex as an obligation, a necessity, or a maintenance operation needed to preserve the comfortable human cell that he has constructed (his family or household). He does not enjoy sex and by far prefers to masturbate or object sex, like going to prostitutes. Actually, he uses his mate or spouse as an "alibi", a shield against the attention of other women, an insurance policy which preserves his virile image while making it socially and morally commendable for him to avoid any intimate or sexual contact with other women. Even while ignoring women around him (a form of aggression) he can feel righteous in saying: "I am loyal to my wife". At the same time, he feels hostility towards her for ostensibly preventing him from freely expressing himself sexually with others, for isolating him from carnal pleasures. The thwarted logic goes like this: "I am married/attached to this woman. Therefore, I am not allowed to be in touch with other women, which might be interpreted as more than casual or businesslike. This is why I refrain from having anything to do with women because I am loyal, as opposed to most other immoral men. However, I do not like this situation. I envy my free peers. They can have as much sex and romance as they want to while I am confined to this marriage, chained by my wife, my freedom curbed. I am angry at her and I will punish her by abstaining from having sex with her." He minimises all types of intercourse with his close circle (spouse, children, parents, siblings, very intimate friends): sexual, verbal, or emotional. He limits himself to the rawest exchanges of information and isolates himself socially. This way he insures against a future hurt and avoids the intimacy that he so dreads. But, again, this way he also secures abandonment and the replay of old, unresolved, conflicts. Finally, he really is left alone by everyone, with no Secondary Sources of Supply. In his search for them, he again embarks on ego-mending bouts of sex, followed by the selection of a spouse or a mate (a Secondary Narcissistic Supply Source). Then the cycle re-commence: a sharp drop in sexual activity, emotional remoteness and cruel detachment leading to abandonment.
The second type of narcissist is mostly sexually loyal to his spouse. He alternates between what appears to be hyper-sexuality and a sexuality (really, forcefully repressed sexuality). In the second phase, he feels no sexual urges, bar the most basic. He is, therefore, not compelled to "cheat" upon his mate, betray her, or violate the marital vows. He is much more interested in preventing a worrisome dwindling of the kind of Narcissistic Supply that really matters. Sex, he says to himself, contentedly, is for those who can do no better."
This post is already WAY too long, so I won't bugger it up with any more ideas of my own... but if any of this rings a bell with you, let me know and I'll happily give you tons of info, links and personal experiences with a narcissist.
Take care of yourself and please know that I'm thinking about you today, SB
