Victim Hoovering vs. N Hoovering

I broke nc again to send him emails of info on psychopaths and narcissm and to basically tell him I know exactly what he is and how he is treating me. No replies as he hasn't responded to anything from me since his rage outburst on me. I guess I am trying to Hoover some acknowledgement but he seems to be very good at ignoring me. I'm so angry at myself for this and also angry at him, so angry that today I saw him drive past me and gave him a waxxxr hand gesture which is just not normally me. I feel like a confrontation in public is going to occur if he keeps ignoring me. How can they be so cold as to not to reply to any questions about their behaviour? I felt like the psycho today when I know fine well this is what he is after. Annoyed!

I think the perceived loss of self respect is one of the major issue of the narc aftermath. I believe almost all of us have a lot of self blame exactly because of that. We all have something to blame ourselves about. Many posts here state it openly: "How could I ever allow such a crappy tretement?" In some we can read it between the lines. I think this is why it is much more difficult and long to recover from narcs. I think it is also the reason why many of us want so much to have the last word and "show them". They are witnesses of our loss of self respect. We lost it with them. We want to reclaim our dignity and prove them that we do have self respect. Ok, done. We were not at our best in this r/ship. Can we forgive ourselves? I think, yes. We are human and we have right to make mistakes. In addition, it was not a consious choice. We were addicted, we maybe have this little emotional weakness inside us we were not aware before. Now we are and we will not make the same mistake again. It is in the past and they are gone. We maintain NC. This is the way we reclaim now our dignity and our self respect. You are not lonely. We are all together. Love Winter

I didnt exactly stalk the ex-narc, but I had to know what he was doing. It was what would validate me at the time. He did a major D&D out of the blue. I knew he would never leave unless it benefitted him (OW). He was so covert and sneaky. He was hard to catch in action. I did find what I needed to validate myself, so I don't regret spying one bit (I never got caught either). I just wish I had been strong enough not to need that validation and kicked him to the curb for being a deceitful, evil, abusive bastard for 20 years. In my warped head I needed to know he cheated. Now that I have reclaimed myself, he wouldnt last 2 weeks around me. Don't beat yourself up. At the time we do these things, its what we are needing to do to move forward. I don't regret being a spying jilted wife, it got me to where I am now. I think its a normal reaction to these suckers. Stay strong and let it go. It has got you to where you are now and where you are going to be. HUGS

I would get so confused by her reaching out. I would think, wow, she is wanting me back, regretting the infidelity, all sorts of stories I would tell myself. Asking her didn't help, remember the part about how they lie? ...I made the mistake over and over of assuming she was acting like I would be acting, missing me, remorseful, etc...What I understand now is that they are selfish, that is numero uno. Selfish period. So they reach out for a selfish reason. Nothing, I repeat nothing to do with us. It is all about them. It is for supply, attenion, distraction, or a hundred other unfathomable reasons. It simply doesn't matter why we think they are contacting. It won't work out for us regardless. That needs to be known inside deep. It won't work, it hasn't changed, it will never change, it will suck big time. They will go on, so will we. What matters is that we get the disordered nature of them, and that we know that the sickness is permanent, unchangeable. When the r/s was new and seemingly good, all obstacles seemed irrelevant. It was a powerful feeling of completeness, wholeness. What an ironic situation, looking back. Truth is, we were whole before we met them, and maybe just didn't realize it, or believe it. But deep down inside I see so much strength in us here, I believe it to be true. I trust that this separation is for the best, and trust that good will come when the past is finally left in the past. Thats what I try to do, anyway. The insanity returns from time to time for different reasons. Fear of the unknown. Latent insecurities, self doubt. All voices from the ego. What feeds it is the initial hurt and absolute abandonment and brutal character assassination. Perhaps they put a mask on us as well. The mask of complete acceptance of them as they are. Maybe they thought we really knew them. Who knows? I know I stuck a fork in it awhile ago, and it was done. Little wispy hauntings occur from time to time, reminders that vigilance is required as narcs are capable of appearing in the waking state or in dreams...subtle foes all of them. All of me must be filled with light to illuminate all of the darkness that lurks, and this flushing process takes work, time, and diligence. What keeps us captive is not their weakness, but our own weakened state. Nc is what gives me the time to restore my energy, as their had developed a psychic connection between myself and the narc. That connection kept the supply line open, and every single time contact occurs some energy can get transfered...and it is uni-direcional, every single time. In typical cases of surrender, absolute submission is required. In the case of these r/s's, surrender gives us the freedom. We aren't captives or hostages. We have total freedom to move on and have complete useful lives. If other things in our lives are unacceptable to us, we can work towards changing those things. The narc was never going to do that for us. Maybe here is a good lesson there for some of us. I know I have had to accept responsibility for all of my life now, no narc to blame any of it on. It is mine to do with as I will, and sometimes that can be scary. I did play the victim sometimes, and it gave me excuse to idle. It obviously wasn't part of the great plan for me. I have so much to do now in my life, and feeling the omnipotence of that can be daunting, and threatening. I'm rambling all over today, too much coffee. Lazy sunday in the outdoors sitting in the shade doing the cyber thing on the computer. Glad that I have you friends to bounce ideas with, and to share strength, awareness and experience. ds

NEVER underestimate how much damage he inflicted on your self esteem. These people are serial bullies. It takes a great amount of introspection to overcome and regain confidence, and that takes time. Continue to spend time on the positive aspects of yourself. If you aren't sure what they are there is a very good (free) assessment test that you can find by Googling Via Strength Survey. If you incorporate the theories of Positive Psychology it might help you to stop thinking of the negative and focus on all your positive traits and use them to make your life happier. There are many daily routines that can be used to do this. One that is rather easy is at the end of the day write down three good things that happened. Then write three reasons why they came about. (The input you had) xxx, Ruby

Tresor, I think the reaching out is a way for you to get some kind of closure. Whether it's hurting him back or hearing his voice or even having him hurt you again with his crazy making behavior, just so you can be sure it's really over. Don't beat yourself up about it. I think it's all part of the healing process. I've read so many articles that say forums like this aren't good because it causes you to think about it all the time. I disagree. For me, it's been a huge support. When you feel weak or like reaching out to him, come on here and vent. It works for me. Stay strong :)

YES, it is a dangerous combo, the lowness you feel is so despairing...i am not going to bang on with platitudes, i am just going to say, you must work on forgiven your self...that is the key...so OK.you did what you did,so have we all,thats why i believe it is so hard to get passed,as opposed to a r/s with a *normal*, but then in a normal r/s we wouldnt have to demean our selves, or hoover ,or humilate our selfs, preetypeeved has just written a post about forgiving narcs? but we have to begin the process of forgiving our selfs.....why should we even be thinking about them,we should be thinking about our selves...calling then weak is being kind....THEY ARE SPINELESS....so spineless, all the know is HOW TO RUN AWAY AND NOT FACE ANYTHING.......you will come thru this...tiredness is a depressing thing....but you will live to fight another day, and we will be here for you....xxxx

I don't see contacting him after a few months as inverted narcissism, maybe I am not educated enough about this, but to me it just seems like you wanted to reach out to someone you cared about. As you said, you didn't know he had ow and such. I don't consider people contacting me after an absence as being unusual. Are we just analyzing too much sometimes? We fell in love with someone and sure, they hurt us, why would we want to reach out? Maybe just to repair some of that hurt. Being tired and lonely is a dangerous combo for sure, add to that blaming ourselves instead of understanding we didn't create their disorder and that it had nothing to do with us. Perhaps blaming ourselves is inverted narcissism - as if we had that much power to MAKE him be an asshole. Just rambling thoughts here... xo