Hello to all out there.
I have been reading for quite some time and found this group filled with such balanced souls and opinions, truly refreshing for me at this juncture. I'm pretty lonely right now and sad about my life, though also knowing that I need to keep staying on course and go the distance with divorcing my N husband-for both our sakes. This is difficult because my decision has caused some pretty severe injury to him as I'm a main source of NS for him, if not the only adult source at this juncture and he is pretty discombobulated and nutty at this time and seemingly desperate and intensely needy, so he is "trying" very hard to avoid my divorcing him and acting very childlike and sad. He is also living with his N mother and broken father and pretty isolated other than his work, which is, frighteningly, as a therapist to troubled teenage boys, whom he spends most of his time flattering to extract Ns from and is pretty much a "peer" to/with, so they like him. He lives a life of a 17 yr old basically right now, its rather frightening. He spends money on gadgets which he shows them, plays the same videogames, is late on his paperwork and has a pretty shallow ability and grasp of the healing process or even good DSM diagnostic capacity. As of yet, his supervisor (he has yet to get his license since he just got his MA) seems to not have caught onto his serious limitations, though he has already borrowed cash advances and other poor boundary issues, but is flying along with his flattery, excuses and charm, she is also a bit, well greedy and he is a good attractor of clientele, presents well etc.
I deal with a great deal of guilt about all this. I too was charmed into many things, I have a good background in psychology, though no formal degree. I wrote many of his grad school papers (is this classic or what?) supported him financially through his grad work and basically made the big mistake that now has credentials. In return, he married me, though to be honest I wasn't that desperate for marriage, having been married before and not really needing to be married to validate me. I think I just went nuts, actually I don't think I went nuts, I think now I was nuts. Like all the oxygen was removed from part of my brain and still hasn't all returned properly. Thing is, I know he believes this is all "normal" like it is ok to have your gf write your papers, or your client evals or whatever, he focused always on the outcome of everything, which should have sent huge warning signs to me, but I was pretty blinded, in a suspension of belief of my instincts always, which is just bizarre as I am no stranger to Narcissisism, not one bit...but that is also the problem, or is the problem too. I am totally adapted to it.
My father is a classic N,diagnosed as one long ago in the 70's, my mother is strongly a potential one as well, she would never dare let us in on a diagnosis, though would tout my fathers like a victory march. My sister and I used to joke that our parents divorce had a custody battle about who would take the children, not who wanted them. "not my weekend" was pretty standard fare for them. My father is a successful Art Director, my mother a private practice psychotherapist herself. Dealing with self centred folk is pretty much standard fare for my life, or not dealing. My parents are a management deal, not a nurturing one. I'm the "bad kid" my sister is the "successful kid", I'm the "pretty thin one" she is the "fat one", I'm the "slut" (got pregnant and married young then divorced), she's the "sensible one" oh the list goes on and on. I've been in therapy and lived away from my parents for 25 yrs now with varied levels of contact, depending upon the craziness of both myself and them (and the treatment I'm receiving). I've watched both my parents unravell their lives and relationships, go to heights of success and kill it and have drama and then some. My mom likes interpersonal family and friend drama and keeps it smaller, but cannot have a relationship. My dad likes big schemes and money craziness, big travel and then a big crash and mess with lawyers and bankruptcy and phoenix from ashes acts. He finally found a nice source of Ns that he seems to be able to stay with and treats her reasonably well as he has gotten old, seemingly since she has no kids or life besides him and seems to have little "neediness" as a person, rather a self contained unit of a woman, which I guess works, so god bless him, plus she seems to have gotten him to turn over all finances to her, which hey is about all that she had for a need...where am I going it's all such a weird life I lead.
So in this long opus of a post is me, really lonely right now. I'm sad and angry at myself, like I cannot believe I did this thing with all this background. I fell like a tanker for this man. Emeshed right into some wacko land of my childhood into all the attention and flattery without a damn piece of self protection and insight from my lifetime. Didn't see a thing, just acted like a big robot falling into pattern of desperation to please, and I'm strong..really strong. I'm needy too, and compassionate. So to get out of this I had to make sure he was ok, or at least in some sort of structure that I could let go and feel some sort of things were somewhat in place to undo what had been done. I started to fight him, which really made me suffer a great deal, because I had to prove to myself that he really was what I thought he might be, which he was, without empathy, but just because he doesn't have that ability. I know he is in a good place, he finally has a psychiatrist, a good one and he goes. His learning curve is very small, miniscule. He was able to sustain with the Dr. even when I filed for Divorce and continue, we had a brief re connection recently and it seems the Dr knows what is up, this heartens me, plus he is getting good support there, encouragement there..so he may stay-it's all he has. It's hard for me now. I feel dreadfully drained and grown up, I am grown up, I'm 40, finalncially poor again, I have a small daughter (not his) and depressed. I luckily have some friends, a good therapist, but god life is just so intense and weird and this whole thing has been so isolating. I have been through so much, one doesn't want to burden too many with it all, people just look at you like you have been just a freakshow if you really let them know the levels of exploiting that one went down to. There is all this shame.
I guess it is a bit too long..so enough.
Thanks,
Pavelle
