Psychopath and Narcissist Survivors Support Group

Milly1956 · Joined: 16 Feb 2007 Posts: 571

One of the hardest things I am finding in the aftermath of the N catastrophe is coming to terms with and forgiving myself for having put up with things for so long. I often feel so disgusted with myself when I look back at what I allowed XN to get away with and the behaviour I tolerated from him that I want to crawl out of my own skin.
Anyone else feel this way?

whitebirdwoman · Joined: 03 Mar 2007 Posts: 7 Location: Alaska

I often feel like that Milly, that’s when I have to remind myself that I knew nothing better so I couldn’t have made a better choice. I was raised by a Nmother and a masochistic step father. I wasn’t even created in love, rather was created through a well thought out lie in order to save the step father who was sterile from going to war. My Nmother hated kids, made no bones about it and never had another. She played me like a fine violin and I responded with predictability. I believed every lie, I fought her every battle, I mothered her while she used me over and over again. The result I became what I believed, what I adored, her alter ego, her on demand demon to do her sick bidding.

I knew nothing else Milly and I didn’t understand fully what was happening for the first 50 years of my life. I knew I was a train wreck but didn’t know why and of course she was quick to affirm my brokenness, my failure to ever ‘become anyone’ especially since I had quote, “Received all the best a child could have been given.” I picked out and married men who were abusers over and over again, each time to leave only to pick out another one.

Don’t fault yourself. These people are without conscience Milly. No one knowing what they do could do what was done to me and continue to live in simple denial. N’s deny because they really believe their own sick lying stories. They sincerely believe their warped rationale for their behavior. Given such you and I and everyone else in their path are just ‘something’ to use to further their delusional sense of their own self importance.

Be very thankful that you escaped and wasted so little of your life with this person.

Hugs
Trisha

survivormomoftwo · Joined: 20 Feb 2007 Posts: 311 Location: USA

Milly, it's not your fault. You have nothing to feel guilty about.

It is a process. You have to first realize what is going on and work through that and then try to figure out what to do about it while factoring in numerous facts such as children, finances, will I have support from family and friends? And so on...

Then you also have deal with trying to leave and not being permitted to..being afraid he will come after you, etc.....and you know what?

Women have left and ended up dead because of it so that concern is very real.

You are a hero and a strong person for enduring what was dished to you and you are here to tell about it.
_________________
"The quality of your life is determined by the quality of people in your life."

H. Jackson Brown

lolacat · Joined: 17 Feb 2007 Posts: 98 Location: canada

i to feel shame and anger when i think of the things i allowed him to get away with. it is no more, and i have built a protective wall that will be difficult for any man to penetrate. all the lies, cheating and insults that were hurled at me during our brief "thing" has me questioning men's motives and examining thier behaviors more carefully before i get involved. prior to this experience i thought i was careful-but i guess i was too trusting. [/url]

jomo20071 · Posted: Sat Mar 03, 2007 11:24 pm Post subject:

I am going through this now. Every day since I haven't lived with him, I become more and more aware 1. just how despicable his behavior was and 2. of this creeping sense of shame that I accepted it.

I am amazed and even though I KNEW he had a personality disorder, and made him go to therapy for it, I still became so captor-identified that I became numb to SO MANY of the ways he acted that raped me of my dignity and self-respect, over and over and over.

Particularly, the control. I had never been with a controlling person. And that was insidious... even after I knew he was PDd, I still didn't get the control aspect. I guess I thought of controllers as like, someone who would yell at you for being home 5 minutes late, or who wouldn't let you go anywhere without his permission (not the case with him so much)...

I wasn't clued into the part of control where emotional extortion/blackmail predominate...and how I eventually semi-unconsciously incorporated into my behavior beliefs like, "only he has a right to express anger.." or knowing that if the dog barks while N is taking a nap, and N gets angry, that he will direct it at me in some way, and I will be too afraid to stand up and say, "hey, stop blaming me for the dog barking."

I was on one hand SO aware of his distorted self, but it appalls me how much of it I absorbed and allowed without seeing how sick it was.

I really saw this when I hired my divorce attorney. N told me that I had NO RIGHT to use 'our" money for that. He said "we" can't afford that kind of thing; and recently when he emailed me a lowball lump sum settlement offer, he said "Frankly, Jomo, this is more than I have to do..." When it was half of what the support guideline was....but he was used to asserting his beliefs to me, and seeing me shrink....

I can't even describe how disgusted I feel with myself for all that.

But I forgive myself, with the caveat that I never ever let it happen again.

survivormomoftwo · Joined: 20 Feb 2007 Posts: 311 Location: USA

I feel so bad that you guys are beating yourself up like that...

I wish there was something I could say so that you wouldn't do that.

Have people said things to you that make you focus so much on the "should-a, could-a, would-a's?"
_________________
"The quality of your life is determined by the quality of people in your life."

H. Jackson Brown

Theresa13 · Joined: 16 Feb 2007 Posts: 1546 Location: , Ontario

Dear Milly: Oprah quoted.....'FORGIVENESS IS WHAT HAPPENS WHEN YOU REALIZE THAT THE PAST COULDN'T HAVE BEEN DIFFERENT"

I beat myself to a pulp for far too long over a man who has no conscience. I DID NOT KNOW. (Truth be said, I didn't want to know) I lived in DEEP DENIAL and ignorance wanting to believe that people generally were inherantly good, and that everyone had something redeemable about them. Well I've grown up, AND I OWN MY OWN PART IN THIS. No one can do to you what you don't let them do to you. I for one will be very discerning in the future about the company I keep.

I will always be one of those people who follow my heart, BUT.....
I will now follow it with information , and trust in my gut feeling.

I couldn't have known before what I couldn't have know.

KNOWLEDGE IS POWER..... AND I NOW HAVE THE POWER TO MAKE BETTER CHOICES.... I'm so very grateful to have gotten out alive with my sanity....... I came very close to CRASHING AND BURNING but GOD knew the condition of my heart and that my motives were good..... and he did for me what I couldn't do for me. It is the biggest learning experience of my life,and obviously I needed to learn.

Please don't beat yourself up.... you're either in the business of living or the business of dying . I CHOOSE LIFE...... and the healing will come. God Bless you, I'll keep you in my prayers, Always Theresa
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I've given my memoirs far more thought than any of my marriages. You can't divorce a book.

Lynnezer · Joined: 15 Feb 2007 Posts: 534

If we could forgive ourselves at the drop of a hat then we'd be in that catagory of possibly being Ns.

Forgiving ourselves comes when we dust ourselves off and start all over again!!!!

Milly, we are human, we get suckered, we screw ourselves but we AREN'T the nuts in these scenerios....they are.

We were taken by trained professionals......they are VERY GOOD at what they do. We are just trusting individuals that trusted that the people we were attracted to were who they projected themselves to be.

It could happen again tomorrow.....sadly enough. And not show their true colors for a while......

The important thing is that we smarten up, understand why it happened once, and not let it happen again.

Its all we can do.

Cool

Lynnezer
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Ns are equal opportunity offenders. Shampoo, rinse, repeat. Wink

sallyishere · Joined: 15 Feb 2007 Posts: 833

I also put up with alot of crap. Too much. I dont care now that I did. I am just glad I am free. I can see the fog lifting all the time and thats what matters. I dont think i am the same person. I have changed in a very short time. Im just gratefull that i am not with him anymore and not putting up with that crap, which i felt alot of was my fault. Now I know it was about him being a very sick person. I was a scapegoat for him.

I still get angry though. I still think hes a real ^&*(*(*. But it has lessened as I dont respect him one bit and to be so angry means i have expectations of him. I dont think there is any hope for him and this seems to decrease the anger. I dont care if by some miracle, he gets well. Let someone else deal with him.

But at first, oh god, i was full of shame and self reproach to have taken such crap. But now I see hes the one i should be ashamed off as i was a victim. Im not a victim anymore.

Sally
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Sally

Just when I thought my life was over, it started again.

Liamo 722 · Joined: 16 Feb 2007 Posts: 77 Location: Ireland

Guys
I feel the same today, a deep sense of anger and shame within me that I compromised myself to such a degree to this man.
I wish I could have the time back and had known what I was dealing with. He had me over a barrel also in the sense that I was making allowances for that fact that he had just gone through a marriage break-up and his "business" wasn´t doing well??????
My therapist put it together for me, that he actually left his wife for me thinking I was an easy meal ticket!!! Embarassed

and of course he couldn´t hold it together with me in the end as I was asking too many questions???? and I blew it by telling him to get a proper job???? Rolling Eyes

One thing I have leaned, there are men who leave their marriages and go on to have new relationships.........but when there is Nness in this equation it just leads to one word.......nightmare!!!!! Embarassed

Liamo
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Sandy