hi Morty, today is Thursday, Oct,14 and I left you new message for you way down your long thread on the End Game, let me know what you think of it, appreciate it. Onwithmylife
"Years ago I said to my EXN you want to drop me out of fear I will abandon YOU and a smile crept over his face,knowingly and he said yes to that. They have terrible issues of abandonment and as I mentioned earlier i will swear on a Bible it is because their MOTHERS abandoned them by not letting them develope their own unique self!!!"
I’ve thought about this quite a bit. I’ve wondered if it was fear of abandonment that drove him to dump me. I have some anecdotal evidence that suggests that may have been part of it. On the night of the dumping – he behaved so bizarrely, sending so many mixed messages – a true reflection of the chaos inside his head and mind games he plays with himself. He first didn’t come right out and say he wanted to end the relationship; he just said that it was at a crossroads and that it needed to change. That’s when he laid on the talk about cold calculation and the endgame and all that crap. I asked if everything needed to change including the intimacy and he said, “Well, I’m not sure what to do about that because you really like making love to me and I really like fucking you.” I was floored. He had never spoken crassly to me before. So we took his dog for a walk and we said nothing the entire time. When we got back to the house, I put on my coat and sat down in front of him. He took my hand and I said that I really needed to go. He said he understood. And so I got pissed and I said, “Thank you for participating in my quest for happiness and at least I know I was a good fuck.” He ripped his hand away from me and asked me how I could SAY such a thing?!? (classic) So then I started to cry and that’s when I said the thing about not believing this was happening and that’s when he raged at me (see my post on narc rage). He made me feel like I was the one doing the dumping! Like I was being selfish!! Once he calmed down, he started to get a little teary and I hugged him. When I was hugging him, I asked him if he wanted me to stay with him that night and he lost it. He started sobbing and clinging to me. He sounded like he was a drowning man. I kept whispering in his ear, “it’s OK sweetheart, it’s OK, I will never abandon you, I know you’re scared, I know you’re afraid of being alone, I won’t leave you, I won’t abandon you.” He was sobbing uncontrollably at that point with snot running all over his face and tears making me soaking wet. He finally calmed down and we separated from the hug. We were lying quietly together in each other’s arms. I said, “I don’t know how I’m going to make it through this because I love you” (first time I said that to him) and his response was to start to cry again and wail, “I love you too and that’s what makes this so hard!” (first time he said it to me) Then he said, “thank you for saying all of those nice things to me before.”
Nice??? WTF? NICE?!? They weren’t nice. They weren’t compliments. I was trying to tell him I wouldn’t abandon him and he comes out with NICE? I’ve had almost 12 months to think about this and I think that actually, in his mind, they WERE nice things to say. Because I think he does have a fear of abandonment and to hear me say those things was truly nice in his mind. Like maybe she won’t abandon me. Maybe she’ll stay loyal to me no matter how badly I treat her. That’s certainly what he was banking on.
I also had a thought today related to this abandonment/rejection/ mother issue. I honestly think that it’s his mother he subconsciously wants to reject; he just has no idea how. She definitely controls him; pulls his puppet strings; manipulates him and lays guilt-trips on thick. He said they can’t spend more than two hours together without her dredging up “stupid stuff I did when I was 12 and making me feel guilty for it.” So I think that the reason he treats women the way he does is because of her. He used to tell me that there were a lot of things I had in common with his mom (God forbid). I’m smart, an extremely hard-worker, artistic, talented, etc. He said that up until he met me, he had never met anyone as productive as his mom. So part of my appeal was that I was (in his mind only, mind you) like his mother. And while he loves her, he wants nothing more than to break free of her. So the reason he targeted me was because he could purposely set up this situation in which he could subconsciously reject his mother. That was the endgame he had in mind all along. To reject and dump a mother.
I really can’t help but feel sorry for him. He is destined for a miserable life. And it makes me sad.
this is all so incredible what you wrote about the guy you were with, it is so obvious he has mother related issues and they transferred over to you, unlike my EXN whose mother is gone, this man's mother is still very much around to haunt him. I remember one day, the EXn's first wife saw her then husband and his mother go down to the basement, it must have been to talk in private and when they came back upstairs together, his first wife said it looked like he had slapped her across the face, as one of her cheeks was very red and it was nit from rouge,Also my exn lived with his mother for a while when was working and still married but not living with his 3rd wife. I am convinced she put a stranglehold on his growth and developement as a man, I would have given a lot to observe the relationship between him and his mother, it could not have been healthy. another thing Morty /i want you take on, he had a very friendly relationship with a woman, close to his mothers age, not sexually or anything but she was the most homely woman and downright ugly, I have ever met in my lifetime. He would go visit her and they would play cribbage together, what do you make of that, I think he may have known her before his mom died but definitely after, I cannot recall, what does that suggest to you. i know it was not sexual at all, she looked like a witch and I do not mean cute..maybe a mother substitute? Also this guy told me once he was afraid of women and mentioned his 3rd wife and one of his daughter, that is very telling, wouldn't you agree?
Sounds like it. Sounds like a nice, older lady with whom he enjoyed spending time. Perhaps she was like the mom he wished he had. An perhaps her physical unattractiveness by conventional standards was part of the appeal. What drives a lot of this narc behavior and inability to mature into adult men is an unresolved oedipal conflict. For example, mine told me one time that he coudln't understand why his mom couldn't find a sugar daddy to take care of her (and alleviate the financial burden off him because he pays all of her bills for her) because someone should find her attractive. He said, "hell, I think she's hot." Ewww....
So perhaps your ex narc was subconsciously attracted to his mother. If she was a typical N mother, like my ex narc's, she had an inappropriate relationship with her son. I don't mean that anything actually incestuous occurred, but my ex narc's mother made the narc into her substitute spouse because she and her husband barely spoke. A little boy growing up has to feel horribly guilty but also secretly proud that mommy likes him more than daddy. And in my narc's case, when he left for college, she left her husband and moved halfway across the country to be with him. The husband couldn't deal with it and bascially died because of it. So how do you think THAT makes the narc feel. Like he, in part, killed his dad because mom chose him over daddy. That's why he blathers on constantly about not being "like my dad, living a life of quiet desperation."
I think his uncomfortableness with my daughter was tied up in all of this as well. He told me that he wanted me to be the Queen of his castle and he didn't want to share me with anyone else, including my daughter. But he said he felt very guilty about it. I think he was putting himself in my daughter's shoes in a way and thinking that she would resent him for any attention that I would give him over her. And it brought out all of his guilt feelings about this unresolved crap between his mom and his dad and him. He rejected me in part because I was like his mom and he wanted to reject her AND he rejected me because he felt guilty about wanting me all to himself like his mom had him and he just couldn't deal. He actually said this on several occaisons - he couldn't deal with the guilt associated with my daughter. He set himself up in this tangled psychological web. And that's part of the disorder, isn't it? To seek out complicated situations filled with real or manufactured drama. Part of the sex addiction problem too. He wasn't addicted to sex, but he was addicted to an inappropriate relationship that dredged up all of these unresolved feelings in him.
And it was all about his feelings; nothign about me. He even said that I did nothing wrong. None of it was my fault.
So, back to your guy. This lady sounds like a no-strings-attached friend who could substitute as his mother in a way that he could feel good about. My ex narc has the same kind of relationship with his mom's elderly older sister.
i think you are spot on about this woman being a feel good mother subsitiute, there is something he did not get with his real mother and that is total acceptance for being loved for just who you are and to this day i think he has no clue as to who he is. I think it may even be tougher for your EXN because his mother is still around to pull the apron strings and with his dad gone, who sounded like a weaker character, this guy you went with is as screwed up,maybe more if that is possible, as the man i went with! But you would think when my N's mother died he would take time to reflect but he just went on with his lie as before.Never processed anything,they replay outwith US their broken relationships with their mothers, like i told him to revisit your relationship with your mother, not the thing to tell the man, but I think at some point my comment will haunt him or least i hope.............And it sounds to me like he carried guilt with regards to your daughter, with his not being normal he was not aware that you can love him and make time for him, as well as your daughter and have been a loving family. We are left to wade through their messy lives, I am done.
Trying to figure out the psychopathy of these N's is a dauntless undertaking. I have wasted years and an enormous amount of time trying to make sense of it. Believe me, please, when I tell you it can go on forever until you just see it for the sad ugly monstrous thing it is and start thinking about you instead and where you need to be moving on to. So easy to say, I know. The problem with all this thinking is the 'humanity' that we can't help to interject in our rationalizations and they just aren't there for them. There is no humanity. They are users plain and simple. That is it. Scheming, conniving, soulless, heartless, users that will not change. I can tell you all that I figured out in years of thinking of these things, years wasted thinking about it because it amazed the hell out of me, the exN's mother shot the lying cheating father 5 times. Mother went to jail, Father went to the hospital and all 8 or 9 children were abandoned. Whatever happened after that, must have been equally as horrible. I would say he blamed his Mother and has hated all women ever since. So why is he with men now and playing the same games? Because he is heartless and soulless. The N's are a product of, from what I have learned, 3 things: abandonment, smothered only child, or raised by an N to become one. That is it.
I know it is the worst thing trying to deal with the why's the how's and the maybe's. But, in truth, for you, you will never really know the answer and you can waste forever trying to piece the puzzle together of how this man who loved you so could do this to you. Because he is what he is and that is all he will ever be. Eventually, you will understand, as I have come to understand, he did to me what he will do to anyone and everyone, you will be no exception. I have read, and it was my experience as well, that there is that one that they believe may stay with them no matter how many cruel and evil things they do, and because we have stayed, and returned again and again, they seem to think somehow we accept their behavior and will stay no matter what. But is this what we want for a relationship? Not abandoning them does nothing to alter their behavior AT ALL. Let me say this again because this is really the point here: NOT ABANDONING THEM DOES NOTHING TO ALTER THEIR BEHAVIOR.
As perplexing as all this may be, please find a way to accept that this is what it is and there was and is nothing that could be done to save this man in any way. Instead it is us that need saving, and us that need all of this thinking to free us from this most damaging experience. I was consumed by this thinking for so so long. It incapacitated me and stole much valuable time from me moving forward.
almostlydia
thanks for your posting, I feel the same way Morty does, we, from the sounds of it, are not mired in the whys and wherefores, more likely, at least for me, just understanding and digesting it all and hearing others stories have helped me move on, more so that ever, maybe it is the fascination of horror in trying to figure out how these people work and the relationship of the man to his mother. I have always been fascinated by psychology and how the mind works or does not work, as opposed to dwelling incessantly on the subject. It is recovery in its own sense for me!I am definitely moving on with my life, thanks largely to this site and other stories so similar!I know what you mean about wasting years, I have done just that for to long!
Thanks for this. I agree with everything that you said. I actually did 'abandon' him, if you want to call it that because of just what you say, whether I did or didn't woudldn't have changed him in any way. I've been NC for 8 months (yay for me!). Just wanted to make two points clear - I'm pretty confident I've figured this all out. I've made sense of it all and the details that I've pieced together are just because I have a detailed mind. But none of this has prevented me from moving on. You made an awesome point about that. I have a lot of cool new stuff in my life that I've purposely sought out (pursuing a MFA in interior design, for example) that I would have never had if I was still with the N. So I'm no longer trying to figure out the whys and what ifs. I've got it down. I'm posting stuff from books with examples from my ex-relationship in the hope that it will help others.
The other point - this isn't just about the ex-narc for me. It's about my mother too, even though I don't post a lot about her. For one thing, she's pretty crafty and might stumble upon this site one day and read everythign I've written. And the other is, well, she's my mom. And even though I know she has a PD, I still wouldn't want to air her crap, know what I mean? So much of what I've pieced together and figured out applies to her just as much as the ex-narc.
Anyway, thanks for your post. =)
Oh, I'm so glad to hear this because I was so bogged down with all the how he became like this and what was I really, that I just was drowning in it for so long. It does fascinate me at a human science level, I guess you could call it. And it could go on and on forever without any real answer. I have not seen the exN in 8 months as well. After 10 yrs of being with this man more than anyone in my life, it is a mindboggling experience.
You know artist produce their most incredible work when they have had their worst experiences? Wouldn't this be an interesting outcome for us? Congrats to you. I am doing a great many things I probably would never have had the time to do with the exN dominating my mental world every moment of the day as well. Sorry if I came to the wrong conclusion from reading the post. I just hate to see others repeat the life wasting mistakes I so foolishly made. I can appreciate the 'fascination' of it all but now I have grown tired of his story because it is a dead end all the way around. I will admit though I am waiting to see how it all works out for him. to see if good really does win over evil, and life is just after all:)
almostlydia
Yeah, that's a really good way of putting it. HE doesn't fascinate me anymore but the psychology of it all is very interesting to me. If I weren't going back to school for interior design, maybe I'd try a degree in counseling or psychotherapy. I guess maybe because of my mother - I do find people who have disorders to be interesting. I don't have NC with her but our relationship is now long distance since August and I'm so much happier. So I can view her from a distance and be oddly fascinated by it all.
Anyway - rambling. Artistry - yes, I agree, that strife and the growth that comes out of it is far more of an inspiration for art of any kind. =)
It's not even really that, as I understand this whole Freudian thing. It's that the mother doesn't see the son as a separate human being. He is an image to her, a reflection of herself and this perfect little boy she produced. She treats him as an extension of herself, not as a separate person with his own set of feelings and needs. Hence the inability to detach from her. And hence his inability to empathasize. He was taught from birth that his feelings didn't matter; only mom's were important. It's not that she doesn't accept him for who he is. She doesn't see him as a separate being.
And you know - this is all very theoretical and could lead one down the path of sympathy toward the narc (which of course we all have). But then I remind myself every day that I was raised by a mom with a PD (I think either NPD or Borderline), I was molested as a child, I had an abusive first husband and my dad committed suicide. I could have turned out to be a real manipulative badass. But I haven't. I try to be very honest with myself and I try always to be better and learn. So even though he didn't ever resolve his oedipal conflict - a lot of other people have WAY bigger fish to fry than that and they don't use it, or anything else, to make excuses for treating another person like dirt.
The ex-Psych professor didn't seem so enmeshed with his mother (he proudly claimed that he drove his maternal grandmother crazy, and he might've had her framed for marijuana possession) but deeply enamored of his father. It's understandable when an N/P has Mommy issues, one can say "Oh, that's why he's a misogynist." But with the ex-P, his theme song should be Cole Porter's "My Heart Belongs to Daddy" (like Porter, the ex-P grew up in Worcester,Mass)
He worshipped the ground his father walked on. His father IS accomplished, and he lives in his father's shadow. I've heard his father on the radio... and it's too bad I got the son for a professor instead of the father. The ex-P got defensive and weird when I mentioned I heard his father on NPR. It struck a nerve. He admired his father--but he wanted to be the center of attention.
With the ex-P,I think his psychopathology was organic (so to speak) rather than the result of a lousy upbringing. His parents committed him to the local asylum for a time because his cold lack of emotions scared them. Even his parents were at a loss.
For morty, what else is new?!
On with My Life - Sure
Morty
OWML - Abandonment
Morty
Mother Substitute
Morty
Morty and Onwithmylife
almostlydia
Amostlydia
Lydia - No Maybes
Oh, I'm so glad to hear this
almostlydia
Human Science
PS - No Apology Necessary
Mother not accepting them for who they are
Landlord of the Oedipus apartment complex
Susan - complex