Moving On Over to Surviving the Big D

[AndrewP]

I think that many of what we call MLC people keep chasing after their rainbows and the next "high". Running from their past rather than toward a future.

I'm pretty confident that my own ex has settled in to her new life despite following much of the playbook even down to the obligatory tattoos. Must come with the kit. On the other hand, how many other options does she perhaps have? She's not rich, she's not young, she's decent looking but nothing really special. She wouldn't be able to "trade up" like men like your ex perhaps expect to be able to do. She's more or less trapped where she is.

I think that many of them lack the self-awareness or courage or both to be able to face their issues and I expect that some like your own ex regard themselves as not having issues but the rest of the world being the problem.

If we go back to what is "canon" for MLC - they go down their paths until they hit rock bottom and then climb back out. But what that narrative doesn't speak to is that it is always possible to dig a hole deeper. There's a country music song "Can't dig out of the hole" - but most people don't see that.

Are they content? Can they ever be? Doubtful - otherwise they wouldn't have run off in the first place. The very few reunification stories I've ever encountered show that even if history doesn't repeat that the lives of themselves and those around them are in turmoil and uncomfortable.

My ex-wife had and presumably still has a lot of anger issues and would rage about how unfair and horrible that the people she worked with / dealt with were. Your's had a basket full (or perhaps basket-case full) of control issues and phobias that he projected on the rest of the world. To us when we are in the midst of building a relationship with them, we try to accept this as a "normal" - it's only from the outside that we see how distorted it is.

And I can certainly say - that from my experience with entitled and narcisistic people, they only get worse with age. What is charming and quirky at 30 becomes disturbing. My ex-father in law who my ex-wife was much like was a charming and friendly man who also incidentally had multiple affairs. When he was older though, he was just a creepy old man who took no responsibility for anything around himself.