Rewriting my story
I am 2 months out of a 20 year marriage to a covert narcissist.
In the 20 years we were together, I was the main and mostly ONLY breadwinner, did the majority of the housework, had to sit there when he told other people we were with that I "refuse help" and that's why I do everything (I would tear him a new one privately but that never went well for me - go figure), was subject to his out of pocket behavior when I dared to ask him about something HE SAID HE WOULD DO, and let's face it just had to put up with man-baby tantrums on a more or less regular basis.
Now that I know who I was married to (and also why after 20 years together, he seems to miss me and our dog NOT AT ALL), I think it would be easy to look at all of this and wonder - HOW DID I LET THIS HAPPEN?
Instead I'm going to say something different. I'm going to say - he was a lesson I needed to learn and learn DEEPLY. I've been journaling a lot about the things I have learned:
Watch out for victims - they are not all really victims some are only victims in their own mind
Watch out for moments when you are setting your own needs aside for someone else
All of the energy I spent pouring into him, I can now pour it into myself
I only have another probably 40 years max in this life (I'm 51F), don't spend one more MOMENT wasted on wondering about him in the past present OR future. I'm going to spend my present and future moments dreaming dreams for myself!
I'm so glad I found this sub! Let's all heal from this together! 💕💕💕