20 year marriage to a N

When I met my husband nearly 30 years ago I thought he was the ant’s pants (so to speak). He was handsome and somehow he knew how to hold an audience captivated. I was young and obviously knew nothing about the man he was and would continue to be to this day. Long story short…we married 24 years ago and our relationship and my self belief and confidence went down hill from that day on until I left him 3 and a half years ago. When my youngest was 14 and after I had given N yet another chance to change his ways I ended the nightmare and it was the best decision I have ever made in my whole life.
The word narcissist didn’t even enter my vocabulary until 5 or 6 years ago and it was such a relief to finally have a word that described this monster that I called my husband. Alarm bells started to ring in my head on a regular basis now that I knew that I wasn’t the one going crazy. my EXNH is the most selfish human being I have ever known. He had a high paying management job that should have allowed us to live very comfortably...even with 7 children... but I struggled to feed the kids. He refused to help our eldest son when he went to university. I had to secretly give him money and pay his rent for him. N always drank but it quickly got progressively worse. N is an alcoholic. In our last 5 years together he had started to gamble quite heavily as well.
Quite often N would come home from work and suggest that I shouldn't cook dinner because HE wasn’t hungry!
It was a regular thing to be lectured on the topic of “if only you could make me happy”.
I wasn’t to question his spending because it was his money and he bought himself boats, computers, and holidays that he would take alone (that I knew of at the time!).
I was most likely having affairs with any or all of the other men in my life.
I was always getting fat or wearing my hair the wrong way or wearing the wrong clothes or not talking enough or talking too much. He told me he would talk to me if I had something interesting to say. I could never be good enough for him.
He would blatantly point at people he thought were fat or ugly and make loud and very rude comments that made people stop and stare.
When asked who was the most inspirational person in his life he said it was himself.
If I ever built up the courage to tell him that I was upset with our relationship he would take it out on the kids by making them believe that they had upset me because he could never be held responsible for anything.
I remember he had to organise for some work to be done near the school our kids attended. He told me he had been speaking to the lady in the office. I told him she was one of my clients and he asked me, “but does she know who you are?” I told him of course she knows who I am. He then asked, “But does she know that you’re King Dick’s wife?” (real name not used here!!!)
This man has never had any good friends. He couldn’t hold a relationship with anyone other than family for more than a year or so.
He would always talk about wanting to rule the world. He wanted to be the president of the new world order.
My eldest kids (21 and 19) begged me to leave him. They begged me not to give him another chance. They could see that he was an emotionally abusive man. He manipulated our words and wore away at our belief in who we were.
I walked away from the marriage knowing I had given 100%. I walked away knowing I had made the right decision. Did it surprise me that he fell into the arms of 3 other women the moment I said enough was enough? No.
Looking back I only wish I had have walked away a lot earlier. Hindsight is a wonderful thing but I know now and that’s all that matters.
Anyway I just want you all to know that you are always better off without this kind of person in your life. You can never be happy with someone who can never be happy no matter how hard YOU try. Oh, and you are NOT the one going crazy.
Funny how my head can know all of this but my heart still questions my abilities. It's been 3 years since our marriage ended and I still doubt myself and I know it stems from the emotional abuse he dished out.

I worry about my children who still have contact with him. I am always reminding them to be careful.

In all my time being with N I felt that no one really understood what I was going through. I couldn't explain enough how horrible this man was (and still is). I felt relief when I found the word N. It was a sign to me that someone out there knew something about this type of person. To find this forum has been the best thing for me so far. For me to know that there are people out there who understand my story confirms for me that I wasn't the one going crazy.
Now to stop beating myself up for being so stupid and marrying him in the first place...