Zelda - reflecting and grieving

[Zelda09]

Just read your last post, GG.

I will. I will get back to my fabulous self and do it up. I never let that really slip, but it's been a long time since I felt like myself - vivid, strong, full of life - I've felt like a watercolor of it trying to manage H post accident and being more of what he said he needed.

Thank you for your support.

[Ggrass]

^^^^ that was me.

But those nice things they can do is refered to love bombing. They love bomb you and feed your needs just enough to give you hope and have you coming back.

Even tho I've been 98% nc for a year, I have gossips coming and telling me how my h was a lovely bloke who was forced to hit my son!

He was forced to threaten me, they phone up and spend lots of time trying to convince me that h re written history is 100% correct. It's is from h view.

He has justified his cheating and those that defend refuse to believe such a charitable man would cheat. The early stages of his a, was a secret so hence no one believes.

Bad memory is narc trait, they don't want to remember the harm they cause.
They know its harm because of it was done to them, you would cop,the biggest spray of verbal lashings. They know.

My h was projecting his cheating onto me for 3 years. The first time I was blind sided and devastated that he could think I was cheating. Often I worked 80hours per week at times, where was the time?

My h made me coffee the morning after h had been on the phone texting and phoning ow. We went out to dinner the night after he spent the night with her, best Intel suggest that's true. He had done all these "nice" things but his motivating factor was his wanting a pay off and his resentment and spew used to follow when the pay out wasn't to his liking.

It was pure control.

[Zelda09]

Not much of an update but I am proud to report a nice benefit of NC - the forest becomes increasingly visible when not lost in the trees.

It's been almost 48 hours that I have been consistent in my view of H as an unbalanced, sometimes sweet and adoring child and sometimes raging child - neither one 'got' life and was willing to be responsible or accountable. I am sorry, H, I will always love you and I'm sure you will make plenty of sense to me if I desperately want you to. But I don't anymore.

Per Cadet's kind instructions, my love is firmly in a box on the shelf and an authentically responsible and bslanced H would have to come seeking me out to show me that. Over time.

My H has never pursued much or put consistent effort into things. Lacks grit. So it is about as unlikely as winning the lottery and I no longer wish to reclaim him as he was. I realized this morning he would have been happy to ignore me as long as I would have let him, after our last incident, just like the sulking teenage boy he was acting like before - entitled to home, food, friends' parties, all the while acting as though I didn't exist and it's acceptable to be in a marriage like that. No thank you, this is not how I will live. My next love will share my beliefs in effort and communication, and will be someone who walks the path beside me.

Enjoying my family for Easter. Wishing everyone who reads this far moments of joy in your new beginnings as well. The calla lily is such a wonderful symbol of death and re-birth. It was my wedding flower, too. My anniversary is in three days.

[TLEE86]

Z- I am so sorry to find you back in this forum but I am glad you are writing. Few thoughts of mine because this post of yours really made me reflect. I'll be honest, I didnt have time to read all 9 pages of it but here we go. You've read my thread and how I was, and maybe I can shed some light for you on this after 6months separation, 9months of reflecting (while I was in school). This isn't a highjack or a...lets talk about T post, but hopefully it helps understand his behavior.

-H threw an broke your phone- I've done that at least twice
-H stood in your path and blocked your way out- Ive done that more times than I can count
-H was overbearing stood over you- Done it
-H screamed bloody murder and somehow it was your fault that the bowls were broken- Been there

Now I never threw things at my W, but as you can see I've done more than my share of what will be considered abusive, whether its physically hitting someone or not, its all the same.

Now I have asked myself WHY would I do that, to the one person that I love the most in the entire world. And I have asked myself over and over and over and over again until I am so tired of thinking about it and then it starts again. I never figured it out until this separation. I started thinking about it in Ranger School, vowed to never do that again, and when W left, i thought some more. Here's what I came up with,

I was and still am very insecure about certain things- less so now than before. I wasn't happy with who I was, with my work, how I was viewed by other people. Before I got my Ranger Tab, I was extremely insecure, it was a chip on my shoulder that I did NOT have because everyone else had it- so I was viewed very differently. I felt judged and insecure. It didnt help that my W is 24, blonde, and just beautiful and life of the party. I felt that people liked her company more than me, and these are my friends. My whole life became very...insecure and i was very anxious when we went places, because i knew the attention was on her and not me, and I was unhappy at work because of the whole Ranger thing. So i took everything out on my W. She was the only thing in my "control" that I could feel better about myself with. So i took her for granted and "abused" her. And you know the rest.

Something deep down in your H, he is missing something in himself, not in you. When he gets angry, just like I got angry, its really not entirely because of you. What triggers the anger is, but the escalation of the anger is not you. It is something that he has to find out what is causing it. For me, it was the insecurities at work and with my own W. Idk what your H's is but until he finds it, that anger will always be there. Maybe its because he finally realizes that Z is awesome, and that he is unhappy with how he has been to you and what his life is like. Maybe its because he's pissed off about how he is treated at work, or how things aren't going well in the separation and he cant figure out why. Maybe he cant swallow his pride enough to come home yet. Who knows, it can be anything.

But you can seriously do nothing about it. It took me at least a good 5 months to figure out that I was verbally abusive because I had so many fears and concerns about ME, NONE of which had to do with my W at all. I wish I never did those things. Your H will learn the same.

I don't have much advice, but to seriously give him the time and space to think about what he did. Every time I did those things, even while doing it, I knew it was wrong. But i brushed it off, and so did W, and we never addressed them. Now separated, I know that it was horribly wrong and it pains me to say it, but, I can see why she left. Let him seriously dwell on the awfulness of what he did. Really give him time to think.

Not sure if that helps, sorry it was so long, but Ive done everything your H did and more possibly, and thats how I view it, 6 months into separation. Have a good weekend Z

[Zelda09]

I value your perspective, TLEE.
I doubt my H has the ability to look at his actions. He's rather been in the habit of running/ignoring his problems or turning his anger to everyone else for however he feels they've failed them, whether as friends, professionals or in my case, a partner.

If you have time look at my 'I want it all thread and how it went down in the end.'

I believe my H was systematically (whether planned or instinctive) trying to tear down my self belief prior to the incident. He was not a man who wanted to be with me. He sabotaged this and used me for a roof over his head and sex before his settlement. I wonder if he actually believed he was trying when he came home, or if this plan was lurking in the back of his brain if he wasn't hilariously pleased.

I think my H had mommy issues. She was a closet alcoholic and he was in his mid twenties and she was institutionalized before he realized all was not well. (How can you be in that kind of denial??? I knew when I was five about my dad.) She neglected him, and it's all I hear in his raging, "you don't care about me, I guess I'm on my own, everyone just runs me over, I need people I can depend on, I need people who can teach me about myself..." Yes, all that from a 37 yo man. I don't doubt he is legitimately, furiously angry and disappointed in me. I just don't feel like owning it anymore. Because of DR, I tried real hard to own it, and he used it against me when he came home - asking how mich therapy if need before I realized how bad if been for him, telling me I was just being me, he couldn't talk to me - anything I said I took responsibility for, he used as a weapon against me, as belittling attacks.

TLEE, he's gone around telling people it's not healthy for him to be with someone who 'causes' him to blow up that way. Was this also your attitude before you started looking at why you behaved this way?

Let's say 5-6 months comes and goes. How could I ever respect or trust him? Would you be able to promise you wouldn't react with violence when you felt the same ole feelings? I think knowing is only half the battle and I don't know what the other half is...

[Vanilla]

Z

Some men and women do wake up to the fact that the issues are within their own souls. With others i believe it is in their charachter to control others from childhood.

If they are narc then another is a 'supply' of self esteem, by putting others down and controlling them they gain self esteem. Each time the 'supply' needs to be greater to control, the lower the other feels to themselves and the more the narc is serviced then the better the narc feels about themselves. This is Passive Master Talk and applies whether the other is narc (BPD) or acting that way. To know which is which requires a clinical diagnosis. Cadet was very helpful about this on Scherman333 thread in discussion with his wife. Sherman thinks his wife has both BPD and bipolar.

I was recommended to read the life story of Lady Caroline Lamb or to see the film. That girl had a loving H but was in an A in a very destructive way with a BPD. She was addicted to her OM as her H was addicted to her.

If you had seen me in Screaming Banshee mode then at that point my behaviour was very ugly indeed. You have described the odd equivalent moment too. And this protected me a little until eventually H went too far and I said STOP. No sweet talking me back H, no more abuse.

I have thought about this a great deal. Are abusers a narc with BPD and deep in shame for who they are, unable to relate and wanting to hide the true self. Put themselves first or is it guilt and remorse that drives the frustration with self?

In the end I decided it could not matter to me, I will not be abused and why should it make much difference? The end result is the same, abuse. Will the abuser be like TLee and wake up? Is the intervention or loss enough to get them thinking and resolving?

I really do not know, I care, but I care more about a life free of abuse. This is H bag of eels to carry. We resolvie our own baggage. some indicators do not bode well for the eel bag being emptied! When they lie drink gamble, golf (or other to excess) and POWs to numb pain, there is no facing up to responsibility. Your H is blaming your behaviour for his blowing up- not a good sign at this point.

Some of these men and women wake up when their WS has an EA/PA, but to do that to make your S wake up or in revenge is slightly yuk to me.

Passive masterdom at it is best.

V

[Ggrass]

What both those 2 said nilla and t! Omg it's so spot on.


My h used to do most of those things, and each time was always the last. What made me think h is narc, was the fact he had the a. I suspect now looking back at how many times there was big breaks for a couple of weeks at a time h was always having a.

I do know h had a long ea while married to first wife. He always said it wasn't, but he way he talks of it, it most defiantly was.


The other things are narc when done, they don't look back as your supply is used up. "Dirty used up" direct quote

They never fully detch, they always keep track of old supply. H always wanted to know what xw was up to. Quote " she brought her new bf to rub on his face! " they had been ssperated 9 years.

Narcs don't like truth set a your not welcome on my farm boundary and nc with s17.
H had only turned up twice, to threaten and had not contacted s17 even to offer sympath on the death of his aunt. He spewed, even tho he has been pretty much nc. Like a child a angry.

They were his rules being Inforced on him, but he couldn't see the truth, narcs don't do truth.

[TLEE86]

TLEE, he's gone around telling people it's not healthy for him to be with someone who 'causes' him to blow up that way. Was this also your attitude before you started looking at why you behaved this way?

No, I didnt go around telling people that its not healthy for me to be with W, but Im not the one who walked away. I will tell you that I did, whether consciously or subconsciously, blame everything bad in my life on my W. Work, or whatever happened to me, I felt my W was the cause of it. Or at least, I took everything out on her. Nothing was ever my fault, it was always someone else. Looking back, there wasn't a single decision that I, ME, made that couldn't have been changed by myself. Sure alot of shitty things happened and alot of bad luck, but I was the one in control and could have changed it all. Your H will learn, over time, that YOU are not the one to make him this way.

Interesting you say this, more in my thread when I post later, but my W actually asked me yesterday, that she didnt understand WHY i got SOO angry, that the trigger for my anger (if she did something small to make me mad) was not proportionate to the escalation of anger that I showed. And I responded, because it wasn't you, there was something in ME that needed to be worked on, you were unfortunately just the recipient of the anger.

Z- your H again, will in time learn that you might piss him off, but the fact that he "blows up" over spilled milk ( or whatever the case may be), is something deep inside of him. He needs to ask himself, what that is, do some serious thinking. For me, i didnt wake up until my W left.

Let's say 5-6 months comes and goes. How could I ever respect or trust him? Would you be able to promise you wouldn't react with violence when you felt the same ole feelings? I think knowing is only half the battle and I don't know what the other half is...

YES. Because I don't want to ever feel the way I do right now, EVER again. W leaving me is the only thing that would have ever shook me out of the [censored] storm I was in myself. I told her this yesterday, and she agreed. That if she never left, we would go back into the honeymoon phase of "oh hey T's back, hooray" and go back into the same problems. She agreed she could have handled things easier, and not taken the easier way out, but until she left, I would have never changed.

Now I don't know what it is your H needs to shake the [censored] out of him and realize, Z is the best thing in his life, WHAT THE [censored] ARE YOU DOING to her kinda thing...but like has been said in so many posts, he needs to feel a loss, or something to shake the ground beneath him and realize he is [censored] up and get out of the fog.

You told me once, that my W wasn't ready to come home, that dosnt mean she wont ever be. Your sitch [censored] in the sense that H did come home. And now your at where your at. He just wasn't ready. He didnt do all the thinking he needed to. Give him time, if you want to. If he does, this issue of abuse needs to seriously be addressed, physical or verbal. I know that I wish we addressed it along time ago, but we are only addressing it now, after 5 years of being together, 6 months apart. Hope this helps a little.

[Zelda09]

Man TLEE, I wish you were right here, but I'd be delusional to hold out any expectation of this. He's not like you in one sense - you always wanted your marriage.

1. H has been one foot out the door sort of always. Alternately 'excited' about us or feeling things were hopeless.

2. God knows he said/threatened enough about wanting to see others during our separation.

3. He runs and gives up when things are hard. And he sabotaged this anyway. So.

4. By his own admittance, he "doesn't know how to have conversations with himself." Which will not even get us one foot down the road here.

He would have to seriously develop character and responsibility, hope for his own life, for me to even entertain anything.

I do hate that he is stalling on this quit claim tho. Why on earth. Unless he's just too lazy to get it done.

[Ggrass]

In my m I did often threaten to leave. On each major blow up or event I knew it was t heathy the stand overs that nasty behaivour (without being to specific) there was plenty.

The punishments, where h would say I didn't meet your need because you behaved badly. Or you didn't measure up. Then later h blamed others totally, me s17, his s25! His mother, the ow you name it he's blamed it.

I was trying in my way rightly or wrongly to change the patterns, his biggest compliant was I had changed. Then in the next breath stated like most here that change was for life so things would only work out with ow!

When they start controling you down it will eventually decend to hitting, when it's not enough. Hence my h assulted s17, I do not doubt I would have been next. His script was she left me, but justifies the assult as perfectly fine. He left me with no other options, to be safe I had to leave. H had to start the pattern again, with ow to prove himself right and good, thus me bad and wrong. His whole justification upon which his, life is built.

People eat up the justifications, due to h good works. Churchy community minded folks don't asult with out being right! I have neighbours stop and bail me up to defend h and his actions. Which h feeds on.

The hardest thing I had to do was look at h actions past his lip service words and see how little h actually put forward. Nc helped, it's also helped me to death from it so now for the most part I can talk share and help you others on that same journey without becoming a blubbering mess.

I was independant in my first marriage, very. To gave that stripped was demeaning.

My goal is to do all those thing h said I was no good at and prove I can and I'm great.
some of the craze stuff he said I couldn't do, had been proven total crap.