First timer...

Hi all,
So I'm going to start by saying that me and my Narc have been seperated for 8 months now. I have read thngs on this website before and found it all very helpful, but this is the first time i've been able to tell my story and have someone understand. Long story...

When I met my ex narc he was everything i ever dreamed of, just like Narcs tend to be (also 10 yrs younger). I was a single mother of 2, working 3 jobs and handling my business, very independent. I had relationships before but none of them compared to my ex. He wanted to do everything i was interested in, taking walks, going bowling...just doing anything that was fun and got us and my kids out of the house. We met in the month of July (he's American, I'm Canadian), he wes here with the Marine Corps. By the end of July he had flown me to the states to visit him, we went on a road trip and I met his family, he came to visit us on any long weekend we had and by October of the next year we were engaged and married that December. He was my soul mate and I couldn't beleive that i was so blessed to have met this man. He worshipped the ground I walked on, thought my kids were great, that i was great mother, he couldn't beleive that he was so lucky to have found me (so he said). The thought of having found someone like this after all the struggles I had been through made me the luckiest girl in the world!
In between all that time, I can look back now and see the warning signs, we would have arguments (over email) and he would take it completely way over the top, and there I was trying to be the more "adult" one and talk him down and appease him. I just figured at the time that he was just young - hadn't been in any serious relationships so he didn't know how it worked, gave him the benefit of the doubt and plus, how could i F*ck this up - he's all i've ever wanted.
In the beginning of our marriage things were okay, there was a lot of adjusting going on, him dealing with being in another country (after leaving the Corps), not knowing anyone, me and my kids having to adjust to sharing our home full time with another person, my kids adjusting to now having this man ("father") that they have to listen to and respect..just alot. But i wasn't expecting miracles overnight.
However, since he couldn't work in Canada right away he spent alot of time at home on his computer, and talking to his sister (whom I think was/is part of the problem) via skype. Any way it led to him getting into things like Conspiracy Theories, and the next thing i know he's Vegan because the gov't's putting stuff in our food to "program" us. And I'll be honest when he would talk to me about this stuff I may have rolled my eyes once or twice, i mean he is really into it - saying that some of the major disasters that have happened (shootings etc) are all a gov't plot etc...he would get angry at me for rolling my eyes or even arguing about whether or not any of this was true. I told him once that for every thing on the internet he can find that says that all this is true, I can find just as many that say its not..but if it is who are we to stop it or fix it - we are 2 people in Canada!
There was even the whole falcon/phoenix thing (not sure if that was what it was called) but some sort of bird was coming and he felt he needed to live his life the way he was because when it came he wanted to be one of the chosen ones to be taken...??? What?? we had a conversation about that..i could go into more detail but i'm sure you get the idea.
Needless to say he went from Vegan to just eating vegetables and meat to back to a normal diet but inbetween all that, the relationship with him and my kids was starting to deteriorate (sp?). He had nothing positive to say to my son or about my son (he was 7/8 at the time). Nothing he did was good. I had been having some issues with my son in school and had told my Narc that i thought he had ADHD, but he felt that he was just looking for attention and i should work on my son's diet and stop doing this and stop doing that, because this is why my son is the way he is. And funny I started to beleive him, I second guessed my parenting based on the advice of someone who has no kids and had no experience raising them but i believe these things to be true.
As for my daughter (she was 16/17) they didn't have a relationship, yes she spoke to him but again he had nothing positive to say to her either, very condescending in the way he spoke to all of really but i heard it with her..she would ask a question and he would say things like.."Do you hear youself? Before you ask that question again think! Think about what your asking!"...she's a teenager - they don't think! He didn't want to ever help her out - give her any money to do anything, refused to pick her up from anywhere (unless it was sports related). And again, there he was in my ear, telling me why my daughter acts the way she does, that if hadn't done this with her or that, she wouldn't be this way, she will never learn to be independent and save her money if blah blah blah...and guess what? I beleived him, so i started to treat my kids unkindly and unfairly. My daughter barely came out of her room - my son was always trying to get some sort of attention from him and I was thinking that he was right, that things need to change.
On top of all of that, there were those signs but i was so blind, by this time I just wanted to come home from work and not hear what my son did wrong that day - wanted to come home and have fun instead of wondering what mood am i going to walk into today - is he going to talk to me? Is he in a good mood? what can i make sure I don't say that won't piss him off.
Thats how our conversations became, I became stupid (he didn't call me that) but his comments would suggest it, so if he was talking about something I would be thinking "how can i comment on this and not cause an argument? "what response will make him keep talking to me the rest of the night and not shut me out?" This was a constant thought. He used to call me the same time everyday at work and in the beginning I would say things like "oh man its really hot out there, i'm jealous you're home to enjoy it", his response "its not that hot"....so i just stopped commenting on the weather eventually. As i did everything else, he would shoot down anything i said and i had this mental list of things i could and coudln't say.
I even had to deal with his sister always being right...if i mentioned something about something i saw on the news i would hear "yea i was talking to my sister and she said..." or "well my sister thinks...".
He didn't like the holidays, he said it was because during most holidays he was on tour (marines - never active duty), so he didn't enjoy them, but always knew how to ruin them for all of us. Don't get me wrong he would partake in them because I always did but he would always somehow say or do something that would ruin it for me, not so much my kids. For instance he would open gifts his sister sent him first, make this big deal about them, he couldn't beleive she remembered he liked this or that, he would have to call her and thank her and be over the moon happy, so of course, by the time he would open the gifts i gave him, they paled in comparison - there was no over the top reaction, just "oh thanks babe".
He always grounded my son from playing video games or watching tv, I agree a lot of that isn't good for kids but there was times when my son didn't get to watch tv for 3 months. He would tell me that we are all too plugged in, all the kids want to do is be on the computer, phones or in front of the tv...but yet he spent majority of hours on his computer every day, looking up movies, gov't things etc...but he wasn't plugged in just me and my kids. By the way i don't have a fancy cell phone, I hate computers when i'm home because i'm on them all day for work and I watch tv once a week...but i'm plugged in.
But nobody in my house understood him, he felt he didn't belong there, we were all sheep following the herd (this is what he emailed to his sister).He couldn't live in a house where we were all programmed to be sheep.
He never really let me into his world, always told me i wouldn't understand and that if he told me even half of the things he thinks about or talks to his sister about i would think he is crazy. so instead he just shut me out. I constantly would tell him, you can't keep doing that, i'm trying to understand but if you don't talk to me how can i.

I wasn't allowed to spend money unless it was on needs, not wants. So i would buy things and keep them at work. I wasn't that stupid that when we got married i kept my own bank account, so I had extra $$ everyonce in awhile.
He hated all name brand things, would look at symbols on shirts or sneakers and go on about what they mean "third world power" " all seeing eye"...conspiracy things, so he wouldn't wear any of that, and thought people who did were just ignorant...sooo, what was I supposed to do, I couldn't even say i liked something without wondering if he would judge me for it, so again, there i was conforming to him and what he thought was right.

I could go on and on abou the things he said/did but i'm sure whomever is reading this gets the picture.

Eventually though about a year ago now he decided he was going to become more spiritual, one with the earth, meditation etc...so i thought okay, maybe this is another phase..but this time he met this woman (an instructor) and started going to yoga all the time, he started to pay more attention to his cell phone, getting more txt messages then normal, so i started to be nosey and called him out on it...well....what i do that for? I'm the one with the isecurities and I need to deal with my shit before accusing him and why would i look at his cell phone. he's not the one with the issues..I am.
I ran to my room and cried and for about 20 mins thought.."OMG what did i just do" then it dawned on me that for the last 1.5 years I have done nothing but try to make him happy and not once had he even asked if i was happy..not once. Anyway we had a fignt, which while i was ranting and raving he was just looking at me with this smug look on his face and this smirk. Asking if i wad done? and telling me about Karma and negative energy that i'm putting out there...
He went away to see him mom the week before he moved out and i seen that he had met a new girl the friday before he left, but while he was gone I went on his facebook and email (trying to make sense of everything) and seen the messages to her, in one night she was his light at the end of a dark tunnel and blah blah blah...a girl who is 6-7 years younger than him and like 16yrs younger than me.
So when he came back he left and has been with her ever since, i have been with noone and I feel like i'm obsessed over it/him/them.
8 months now and i feel like he has won. Don't get me wrong - we have exchanged emails along the way, even in the beginning I was trying so hard to still be that person he wanted, i was going to meditation classes thinking about taking yoga (i have no use for those things) but thought if I could just get back what we had in the beginning. Sadly, our email exchanges got worse, even to a point where i called him a Narcissist and he attacked me back tellin me that i was the narcissist, that i treat my kids like shit, thats why he didn't want to have kids with me, i treated them like second class house guests, fed them garbage all the time, that i need to look at myself and see what i'm doing to myself becuase the work I was doing (seeing a shrink, reading books) wasn't working etc.
Totally ripped me a new one, since then we haven't spoken, I didn't respond to that - he supposedly wanted to keep contact with my son but since that email I don't want him anywhere near him. (i think he was only doing that because his mom was on him about not walking out of my son's life).
He's made no attempt to talk to my daughter.

Now that i'm out of that I don't want him back, i realize how toxic it was, what he was! I have a hard time dealing with the fact that he lied ( i know when he met his girlfriend and he tells me he met her after he got back from his trip). That he is with this girl who all of the sudden is the "one" and I'm garbage to him. He did call to apologize once, but i highly doubt it was sincere, probably trying to clear his conscience.
Why is he happy? how can he just walk away and be like "whatever"? do i really have issues? Yes we all have issues but...
Now my kids are happier, we all are really, the first week he left, I looked at my kids and they were laughing and carrying on, my daughter was out of her room, my son was talking non stop and i thought "omg these are my kids"
so i know me and him are not good together, but why her? What makes her so special?
I feel like i just need that validation that he still is the same, that he's not this changed, spiritual, loving all god's creatures man he says he is. He's not nice to me or anyone who knows me, but get angry if i see him and roll my eyes - telling me does he or the girl his with deserve that negative energy, did i notice my actions???
again, WHAT?! he's done nothing wrong.
He thinks that if you aren't living your life the way he lives his or the way he thinks you should then you are beneath him and you are wrong.
But he loved me didn't he?....

so confused and still obsessed. When will my happiness come? when will i stop caring about what he's doing?
I thought I'd be over this already!

Thanks for reading and any comments are welcome!

Marie