Wolves among sheep
Alert: If you have a personality disorder or mental illness of your own you may not want to read on. This an account of my relationship with a mentally disordered person and isn’t very pretty.
By far the abuse that affected me the most in my life came from one the most unsuspecting of places. It was an unfulfilled promise of love, compassion, and companionship from a long time friend. Apart form sending me into a deep depression and adding symptoms of post traumatic stress to my abundant issues, it also damaged my innocence and faith in humanity. I’d always assumed that compassion was a trait of all mankind. I assumed people were around for support, to protect, and to lift you up when you are down. I couldn’t have been more wrong. Some prefer to keep you down.
I got involved with my ex girlfriend, like many others, because the environment she is in often creates the illusion that she needs to be rescued. Indeed she does need help, but most of her conflicts are of her own doing. The first red flag that something was seriously wrong was the pathological lying. She lied about anything and everything even if it defied all logic. The second red flag was that she made a habit of sexually harassing men and setting them up to be hurt. She strategically and purposefully set men against each other and would sit back to watch the chaos ensue. She lied to and about those she proclaimed friends and abused them. I watched her repeatedly berate and belittle one of them in public, telling everyone he was a liar and that he was ugly, and that she “hated his face.” She often told others that I abused her and that I was paranoid. She called all her friends liars behind their backs. The biggest red flag of all was that not once in five years did I ever see her experience guilt or compassion for another human being. There was none.
It went against my better judgment, but I thought I could help her break this never ending cycle. At the surface it appeared that I did. She got new employment and earned a degree. For the most part she toned down the behavior of manipulating men, and she started treating her mother with respect and had a relationship with her family. She didn’t, however, stop looking for new ways to cause people discomfort and pain or new ways to manipulate me. She never stopped lying, she never stopped being abusive, and she never developed a conscience. She just took it from being public and directed it at me privately and covertly. The psychological warfare she used seemed endless and it kept me down, powerless, and isolated. She’d smear my reputation, endanger my job, and constantly violate my rights and privacy. I was literally held hostage on many occasions and not allowed to leave, with a fear that calling the cops would result in false accusations of a beating. She’d block the door, or my car, or lay in the street or cling to my hood. Leaving wasn’t an option, especially with my own guilt involved and used as a weapon.
She intentionally lied to cause pain, and was certain to make sure that I never trusted her and that I’d always be worried about infidelity. What I initially thought was a bad liar was a person who actually wanted to make me think she was cheating. Sexual frustration was one of her favorite tools. She’d been known to seduce men, even me, with a promise for more and then refuse. She’d use it as an excuse to make men think they only thought of sex and that they were pushing or forcing sex on her, but it was deliberate act meant to confuse and confound people. She had no qualms about promising marriage or proclaiming love if it would allow her to get something she wanted. She was a bully who never compromised, and made her way through life with threats and intimidation. When I finally told her how I saw it, she admitted that she didn’t enjoy herself unless she was screwing somebody over. She creates problems, and projects the blame.
Eventually I came to the conclusion that someone with such severe mental problems can only help themselves and moved on. Nobody’s going to change if they are happy the way they are and see nothing wrong with what they are doing. Besides, there comes a time when you’ve exhausted all resources and you have to start taking care of yourself. I started doing research and eventually found some support groups for people like me. Before I reached that place I just found her behavior bizarre and unexplainable, but afterwards I found a plethora of people who had experienced the exact same things. The lying, the chaos, the manipulation, were all forms of narcissistic abuse and was more common than I had ever realized. I was not crazy or paranoid, and I was no longer alone. Despite what others may say, being mentally ill shouldn’t give you a free pass to wreak havoc on those around you and be abusive. Its okay to feel bad.
I was disappointed she made so little progress in our relationship, but even more distressed to see the turn her life took after we went our separate ways. Her new partner encouraged self harm like it was a sexual game. She became pregnant not long after and touted on the internet that it was experiment and that she hated children and intended to use it as a slave. She never found employment, and had the baby in a bathtub alone with no medical supervision. She gave the baby seven ridiculous names, and touts that she will never be allowed to call her “mother.” Despite the outrageous outbursts she garnered much support from the internet and those around her who seemed not to question the bizarre behavior, or the complete lack of concern for anybody involved but herself. They tend to make excuses instead, denying and rationalizing, until things get completely out of control.
Not long after, she was temporarily placed in a mental institution after her ego got a little out of hand. She decided all the medical needs of the family would be taken on by her, including performing surgeries. Her fiancé high tailed it with the baby after she decided she was going to perform a vasectomy on him against his will. Soon after CPS swooped in and took the baby and thats about where the story ends. I have no doubts that shes more interested in going out and partying and clubbing and proud of herself that she is still able to cause so much difficulty in others peoples lives. Rumor has it they are going to give it another go. I hope they learn to set limits and boundaries for everybody’s sake, because despite her sadistic urges, she could certainly use a stable force in her life. She wasn’t that delusional before. Regardless, it is not possible to form a healthy relationship with a person when love is not involved. Anything else is a lie.
Eventually, I found my peace and forgave her despite her not being sorry. I’m reluctant to talk about the pain it caused because I know somewhere inside she’d delight in knowing that she damaged me, and I remember how angry forgiveness made her. She doesn’t want you to get over it, after all. Love and compassion just seem to bring out the worst of the defenses of whatever disorder she may have. She wears the mask of sanity, and any attempt to remove it results in another enemy thats deserving of much punishment. I do not regret trying, though. As futile as it was, I did my best and I hope she finds peace as I did.
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7 Responses to “Wolves among sheep”
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“…being mentally ill shouldn’t give you a free pass to wreak havoc on those around you and be abusive.”
No, it shouldn’t; but all too frequently, it does. If we’re not setting limits, the ‘narcissistic’ won’t be setting them either. We have hold people accountable even though we tend to dismiss their abuse as “O gee, they can’t help it.”
I’m delighted to read your blog today. I stumbled upon it from a google alert. I’m so glad you’re writing. It helps us makes sense of our lives.
I’m also interested in reading about the female narcissist and how her pathology manifests differently from males.
It’s not often that people write about female Ns unless they’re writing about their Mothers. And that’s an entirely different situation!
I hope you’ll keep writing because you have a talent communicating with people.
hugs,
CZBZ
she defiantly has all the ear markings of a crazy bitch… what do you think is the most positive life lesson you brought away from that relationship??? i would be interested to know….
Wow. That was fucking painful to read. I think I love you. I’m gonna ask the same question paisley asked. Can I??
@CZBZ
Thanks for stopping by! I probably will be writing more about my mother in the future, but I’ll be sure to make it a point to write about my female NPD in the future. If I didn’t have the attention span of a gnat I’d probably write a book. I sometimes do feel like I have a way with people, but its quite odd for a loner like me who never makes use of it. I’ll keep writing and maybe I’ll snap out of that.
@angry ballerina
@paisly
Its hard to draw out positive things from that experience. One of the most important things i learned was that I did not love myself. I consider that a positive, because being aware of it gives me something to work on. Learning to love myself has had a major impact on my life, even though I’ve done a bad job of it. I imagine if the tiny bit of esteem I was able to whip up made a difference, learning to master it could be life changing. Unfortunately, it often takes major trauma and hitting rock bottom for people like me to do any changing.
Your comment about “Love and compassion just seem to bring out the worst of the defenses of whatever disorder she may have” was especially striking to me. I had the sense when I was with my ex-lover that I was “under the devil’s tutelege” because it was almost like he wanted to convince me that there was no such thing as true love or truly good people or intentions. He seemed to want to wipe out all faith from my being because he didn’t understand it and was jealous of my peace and happiness with the world and myself and others even in the face of his horrible abuse towards me.
I agree with the other comments too - very interesting to hear from a man’s point of view. Have to admit though. I do have a little bit of doubt in my head that you are “telling the truth” and that the reality isn’t that you were really the one abusing and she was the abused. Yeah, I know. Messed up, isn’t it? I can’t trust a man’s experience after my ex accusing me SOOOO many times of “messing up his life”, “emotionally abusing him”, etc. etc. when all I was doing was trying to have some normal boundaries and put my foot down when he was abusing me.
Like CZBZ, I’m also a survivor of emotional abuse by a partner, and I hope you keep writing, too. And also hope that you don’t take inappropriate comments by some readers personally, but consider instead where they might be coming from and just accept them at face value.
@wecanmakeitthroughthis
Wow, the whole “not being believed thing” is a touchy topic. It seems when dealing with personality disorders that people often don’t understand, and you end up sounding crazier trying to explain what happened than the people who did it. You also have the people who don’t recognize that a woman can be mentally ill and abusive just like the worse of the men out there. And then you have people like me and you who probably have a hard time trusting the other sex because we were treated so badly, and thats probably a normal reaction and not so messed up. Thats exactly what happened to me, when I stood up for my rights and set boundaries I was faulted as being bad.
@marie
Thanks for the comment! I know dealing with narcissistic abuse is tough, and I’m sorry you had to deal with it. I’ll take you advice on the comments =), but it wont always be easy. Its hard to not be sensitive on some topics.