My H would tell you that he would work for 80 hours a week if there were no me. Funny thing is? He would not be telling the truth. The man would be CONVINCED he was telling the truth, but he wouldn’t be. I worked in the same office with him for 15 years, including during our initial separation. During that time? At BEST, he worked 50 hours a week. But I suppose that’s a whole other conversation altogether.
Narcissist? Maybe. If you ask my mom, save my first boyfriend, I’ve paraded around a string of narcissists. And that’s my fault. I need a strong person to deal with my strong personality, but there is a big difference between a narcissist and a strong person. I just haven’t quite figured that out yet. And honestly? It’s very hard to pinpoint. At the beginning of a relationship, even the narcissist pretends to be interested. It’s when they get comfortable, tired or whatever you start noticing things… like having whole conversations with the person without them asking you a single time how you are doing. Easy to miss when you are in the fog of whatever…
I was completely and totally in love with my H and missed some danger signs. When he left me, well I gained some interesting perspective. This man adored me for years but that stopped somewhere along the way. And more and more he displayed tendencies to do things or make decisions that were not good for me. For instance, moving to TN. This was something I was dead set against… but no matter what I said or did, he was moving. And truly, CV? That was the beginning of the end. I fell into a depression that drove him away. He watched me in that state and did nothing but run. He needed to go find his happiness and I brought him down. And I suppose someone could make a good argument for him that he did the right thing. His friends and his parents certainly made that argument. Your W is depressed and not being a W, so you should go. But we are talking about why WE don’t feel love. That just wasn’t very loving to me. He could have come after me or run away from me. He chose to run. I feel that if there was any connection left, he would have stayed. During a lot of the separation, I was pretty convinced that I wanted him back. Definitely one of those, “be careful what you wish for moments” though because when he came back, I couldn’t let the fact that he ran go. And suddenly, in pretty quick order, this image of who I thought he was, the things I did admire about him, vanished in smoke.
Again, someone could EASILY make the argument that my inability to “forgive” is my fault. But, at the end of the day, it came down to I didn’t feel love the way I needed to feel love. I could love him all I wanted, but if I didn’t feel it back, what did it matter? So yes, it comes down to the actions in many ways. The words become virtually meaningless. And none of this is to say that I don’t come fully equipped with my own issues that made him feel unloved. I’m equipped with lots and lots of issues and faults. Thing is? He is not telling me that he feels unloved. He has apologized for leaving. He has said that he made a lot of complaints about me that were not true. He said that the depression I had hit him hard and he didn’t know how to deal with it. So what happens the next time I am depressed? The trust that he would take care of me when I need him most is GONE. In addition, he is an alcoholic, he’s a workaholic, he likes to party all weekend with his friends, he lies about where he is and who he is with and maintains a R with the woman he had an affair with (although, he denies that to this day). Interestingly, I finally told him the entire truth about the R I had for a year when he was gone. I was very honest. I guess I thought that MIGHT open the door to him being honest. Nope. That door was swiftly slammed in my face. Now, don’t get me wrong, this man is texting constantly and calling constantly and that is escalating by the second, but he’s UNWILLING to have a R that is based on truth and honesty (a place where I feel safest). So… I guess it was my turn to ramble… but does he love me? I still think so. But in a way that is totally contrary to what I need.
