Hello ladies.
happy 2023.
things moving along here and we are getting settled in to our new home. My daughters are ages 12 and 13 and they’ve been amazing.
I’m taking this slowly, observing them, their emotions, etc and myself as well.
One of my top priorities is not to rush into anything and to give us all time to just settle, reflect and enjoy our new home and environment.
im so incredibly relieved that he is out of my life and so thankful that I didn’t stay longer and that my children are ok. I feel terrible for his biological children as they by default have to struggle with him for a lifetime.
They already kept him at arms length and don’t trust him but struggle with what they realize now are the realities of his lies and manipulations.
I’m reading a book titled “malignant self love” and it’s helped me tremendously. It’s considered one of the best books written on NPD and it’s helped me process and understand what’s happened and armed me with the knowledge so that I can recognize these abusers in the future!
so we are taking it one day at a time and just enjoying the simple pleasures – making dinner, decorating our home, spending quality time together.
Many blessings!

Yes thanks to you both!!

yesterday was the last day he was in this house. He officially moved into his new place and my big move is tomorrow. I feel so at peace. Yes I’m sad, but not because he’s out of my life. I of course have scars from the abuse but I’m embracing it and coping and know I will heal.
regarding my daughters – yes good question. Because he is highly manipulative, he knew just how far he could take his insults, abuse, etc and knew he couldn’t go there with them like he did me. However, as time went by, his abuse def starting to creep in to them too and more so recently. Not in direct ways, but in ways that were confusing to them and manipulative. That’s when I was truly motivated to end it. Motherly instinct kicked in for sure.
you’re right – he had many chances to look within – 4 years ago during my counseling, then in our marriage counseling together, then in individual counseling, then I also wrote him a very thoughtful long letter outlining my issues and asking he look within too. Like all the other chances, he projected it back onto me and never addressed anything.
he lives a sad existence.
I’ll keep you posted but it was a beautiful thing to wake up this morning not walking on eggshells!!!

much love to you!!!

Dear Anita And Tee

i logged on to update you and saw that you blessed me with more guidance unsolicited. I’m so truly grateful for this. You’ve been instrumental at keeping my momentum going. I’m doing great. Yesterday was my big day as my precious daughters left for grandma / grandpa with their dad after we spent Christmas morning together. I was now free to start moving things out and I started right away!!
I told my daughters about the break up last week. They handles it very well and are excite about our new life and home together. I took them to our new home so they could visualize and so they’re reassured that nothing major like their schools and schedule between me and their dad has changed. We have a flock of 15 wonderful chickens and we bought a new coop and I assured them they’d be moving with us and we’d make a new home for them too!

I can tell you that yesterday was the happiest I’ve felt in a few years. I was packing my things and loading my car taking things to the new house. My soon to be x attempted to usurp my car in a very manipulative way so that he could use it to move his things (mine is an SUV type) but I quickly retrieved my keys.
yes he’s still using the same tactics – manipulation, guilting me, projection, love bombing, etc But Im not affected by them

I’ve distanced myself from him and just focused on moving forward. He’s got no access to my finances either. My big furniture move is Jan 3rd but he’s already moving things out and he’s moving his big things later in the week

when I’m around him I feel like I’m being poisoned. When I’m not I’m at peace. I’m spending as much time as I can away from this house and I’ll be free soon!!

I will check in soon but please do send me any videos , advice you might happen to find on narcissists. I’ve realized fully now that he’s been an abuser all this time and I know I’ll have to heal from that. Believe it or not his x wife reached out to me through this. We were already pretty well acquainted over the years since she had kids with my soon to be x husband. She left him too and it turns out all the stories and narratives he’s spun on her are completely false. I was suspect as I watched his behavior unfold over the years and now so many inconsistencies make sense. He bankrupted her as well, abused her emotionally, cheated and she was in counseling for years after to recover from his abuse. She’s thrived since she left him and pretty much raised their two kids (my stepchildren) on her own. He hasn’t paid a dime in child support since they divorced. All his lies are coming to the surface and it’s confirming what the sages says thousands of years ago – the truth always finds it’s way to the surface. It may take years, days, months, but it will.
thank you and blessings to you!!!!

Thank you!

so it’s getting down to the wire and I wanted to just ask for some advice re logistics.
As you know, I’ve been keeping things neutral around the house for the sake of my two daughters, ages 12 (just turned 12!) and 13. IRS Christmas as you know and my plan has been to wait until right after Christmas to tell them anc to start moving out.
they’re leaving for their grandparents house late Christmas morning after we spend Christmas t morning together. I sat down with my husband Friday night to make it clear that I was going ti start moving my things out Christmas afternoon and spend the week in between moving things. And that the big movers were coming Jan 3rd.
he did not handle this news well even though I’ve been telling him for over a month what my plans were. He then started trying to sell me on he would help me move my things , that we should do it “together” and that he was under the impression we would share a mover for the big things.
thus is Not at all what I’m planning as I plan to do this separate from him. I want ti make this clear to him but at the same time it risks him turning very nasty right around Christmas.
I was planning on just telling him on the day of that I’m doing this separately

I’ve been reading on narcissists and it says that there’s no good way to give them news they don’t want to hear

I’ve been clear with him for over a month now and even tried to bring up logistics of the move and he’s only buried his head in sand trying ti love bomb me. So I don’t feel I need to babysit this at this point plus I’ve come this far keeping the peace for the holidays w the kids.
Wheb he suggested he help me move I did not agree but I didn’t fight it either. He was starting to get hostile so I just backed away.
Bottim line is I’m not sure if I need to bring this detail up again with him before the actual day or leave it be. Thank you !

And the Jan 3rd move is for the large furniture. I still plan to start moving my belongings Christmas.

Hello All.
I’m just checking in as it’s therapeutic to just type things out during this journey. I will be packing my things the day after Christmas.
my daughters will be at their grandparents with their Dad for a couple of days so I can start taking things to the new home then I plan to tell them when they return. That way their Christmas isn’t ruined! My x husband and I (the father of my children) are on friendly greens so we have been able to communicate and make a plan.
in the meantime, my current husband (that I’m divorcing) is still largely in denial and trying to woo his way out of this. He is making a plan to move out but he’s still trying to hold a narrative that we are just separating when I’ve made it clear thars not the case. Because the kids are still in the home and they don’t know what’s going on, I’m making a point to not ruffle feathers so it makes it mentally stressful.
I’m handling it but his reaction to this is a testament to the problems he has.
On another note, the main reason I’m writing is that I had a breakthrough yesterday and was able to confirm something I’ve suspected all along. As I told you, I had an affair at the end of my first marriage that I deeply regret – and my current husband has spent the last two years making me feel like a horrible person for something I did when he wasn’t around. As you may recall, he to carried on an affair in his first Marriage and this whole time has claimed that it was an “open affair” and that everyone knew about it, including his first wife. He went so far to tell me that his first wife was “fine” with it and knew it was going on and that it was justified because he was lonely in the marriage and his first wife had “checked out”. I’ve never been comfortable with this narrative and knew in my gut this was a lie. Over the past two years, I’ve given him multiple opportunities to be honest about this and he’s only gotten defensive maintaining the story. I’ve told him that I don’t judge him for having the affair, that my problem has always been that you’ve denied any moral responsibility for it and continue to do so in light of abusing me mentally over mine.
I confirmed yesterday that in fact his first wife did not approve of it and that she caught word of it when they were married and was NOT ok with it.
so in my opinion this is a HuGE lie / deception on his part. It’s so incredibly abusive In my opinion to carry on this narrative with me for years all the while beating me up – and denying it multiple times when I lovingly gave him chances to face it and be honest.
Im moving forward of course but these are just things I needed to know personally so I’m glad I found out.
I’d love feedback on this as to me this is a huge deception.
I don’t plan on bringing this up with him right now as it’s the holidays and I’ve got to focus on the kids. But when I’m moved out I plan to tell him at the right time.
thanks to you all.

Hello All.
I wanted to check in and give you an update since I last posted. Thank you again for all the guidance! It’s been very helpful. Since we’ve posted, I’ve signed a new lease and made it clear to my husband that I want to divorce and move forward.
I move into my new home jan 15th and have been very open to him about this process and my plans.
I told him right after thanksgiving and to be honest, it didn’t seem as if he took it seriously or wanted to accept it. He cried and said don’t do this and proceeded to spend the next couple of weeks “wooing” me – telling me how perfect I al, how much he loves me, etc etc

I stayed focused on moving forward and made sure not to feed into this and remained clear on my intentions. After a couple of weeks, I reiterated that this was happening and I had found a place, etc. He asked if I loved him anymore and I took the opportunity to tell him that I don’t have anything left – that I’ve been a model wife , partner for over three years and he has only continued to insult who I am, beat me up for my past mistakes and show little to zero warmth in our marriage. I told him that I’ve so much as begged him to work towards finding love for me and it hasn’t happened. I also took the opportunity to mention that I’ve now officially kindly asked you to remove the tinder app from your phone and it’s still there. I also told him that I’m not at all comfortable with the fact he still communicates with the woman he had sn affair with while beating me up over having an affair (that didn’t happen with him!).
So it felt good to express those things even though I’m very much finished with hammering all of this out as I’ve done many times in the past.
I’m writing because the most interesting aspect of this that since then he’s done nothing to respond to those concerns. Instead, that evening he acted as if the conversation never happened and instead continued to try to “woo” me romantically and play the perfect spouse by helping around house, etc.

In my opinion if he truly cared a lot looking within, proving his care and respect for me, he would have immediately responded differently by saying  something like “I’ll erase tinder now  and I’m truly sorry” or “ I can see how me speaking to my x affair would be hypocritical “

but no – he’s done nothing to dive into the real issues which tells me he has no intentions of doing so

I can say that if I truly loved someone, I’d d do what I needed to do to keep them around

in fact I did do that  for him and for myself but he’s not willing to do so

I’ve learned this is how a narcissist works now and I wish I was more aware in the beginning. I researched the term “love bombing” amx wow he fit the description perfectly. I make 80% of our income and he has always spent way too much money and been quite irresponsible with it. I won’t even go into how bad that’s been, but in the context of love bombing – I turned 50 last year and he presented me with a super lavish gift of Tiffany pearl necklace, earrings and bracelet. It was way over the top. It costs 6,000 dollars and he only makes 30k a year at the most. We are tight on money and he’s constantly beaten me up over that too. Yet he bought this gift and put it on credit paying 500 per month the next year to pay it off. That was 500 less he had to put towards our bills and it only put more stress on me to pay them. The lavish gift was the definition of love bombing and hypocritical / manipulative in so many ways
I’m focused entirely on moving forward and very much looking forward to the other side of this.

There are so so many other instances of disrespect, mental and emotional abuse, and red flags that are not even worth going into. In retrospect, I feel like such a fool but this is what happens when you’re truly lost and not living your truth.
thank you all again.