Divorcing NPD husband, now Living with NPD dad (I kid you not)

Guess I don't have such great luck with the men in my life!

I was married for 18 years to my husband and filed for divorce about 15 months ago. I am pretty sure after doing a lot of research, and not being able to put my finger on it until recently, that I was married to a man with NPD.

I had a son coming into the marriage who is now 22. Our children together are 16 and 7. My soon to be ex and son were and are very very close. My son has "sided" with my husband since I filed for divorce, upon hearing all of the evil things that I supposedly did ... When questioned, my son cannot provide anything specific that I have done, just speaks in very vague terms. If I ask him what I did to warrant HIM not talking to me, outside of the divorce, all he can come up with is that I wasn't a very good cook while he was growing up. He fails to mention I was a hands-on loving mom who volunteered in his classroom, always knew his friends and welcomed them into our home, and lived every moment to be his mother. It is beyond painful to have him not talk to me.

My two girls are talking to me, the 16 yr old likely has Borderline Personality (dx'd with Bi-polar), and the younger one who is 7 is "normal".

After I left my husband, I was in a panic because financially we (or rather HE if you ask him) had done really well. Everything was in my husband's name though and I didn't even have the money to retain an attorney much less move out. My dad who I have always had a bumpy relationship with, came to the rescue. He was very understanding and wanting to be helpful. My dad is always very financially well off and said he would help.... I do need his help, and the amounts he has contributed are not even significant amounts of money to him. Nevertheless I am grateful. But, he has extremely high expectations and now that we share a home part of the time, I am finding it very difficult to be around him so much.

And, I dont' know if it's because of the holidays but I find myself in the midst of an incredible amount of grief and regret. I did well the first 6 months of the separation... my husband and I were even amicable. I even thought about and truly wanted to reconcile. When I began to talk about reconciling, is when he became more aggressive about the divorce, angrier, and more vindictive... and he launched a ton of litigation on me. I feel he is punishing me on a daily basis thru the legal system.

The more my husband pushed me away and made me feel like crap (I mean, how dare I suggest we should do everything possible to save this marriage - he certainly wasn't going to "suck it up" for the kids or for the 18 year investment we had), the more I realized I needed the support of family. My mom is BPD and just impossible to talk to, or to rely on, or for anything more than a superficial conversation... and the rest of our family is not very friendly, that left my dad. Again he was/is financially supportive but he too is very N.

For example, my dad asked me to cancel plans I had made for my 7 year old, because it seemed like we were "abandoning" him by going out with friends for a full day - then he went ahead and made plans to do something that didn't include us! He will claims he wants to play with his grandchildren but complain 10 min into it that they are blocking his view of the TV. He also acts like I'm his wife - strange as that may seem - by calling to say "I think we'll go for pizza tonight, let's be ready at 7" or something that assumes I am wanting to go. He leaves dirty dishes in the sink to the point of it being really really gross, with some expectation that I should clean it all up (I refuse to do it anymore - I don't even clean up after my youngest, she has to do it herself).

Sometimes I feel that I traded in one type of life, for another that isn't any better. To this day, I am ashamed to admit, but if my husband ever asked me to work things out I would do it. Even though I know he was very emotionally abusive, didn't want me to have anything to myself (even volunteer work that I do became an issue, it wasn't "fair", I could never make any purchases without his approval, and I think he would lie for the sake of seeing what he could get away with), there is still this wrenching feeling that perhaps I was too hard on him, and had it easier before. It is also very painful to the think the life that we built for 18 years is now gone, all of what we had worked for and raised a family. Things were so upsetting with my husband though that I had no choice but to move out back then.

Yes I am in counseling and have been for a year now. It helps sometimes. Other times I feel like I do today - completely lost! My husband became very vengeful in the last few months, fights me in court on everything from money to custody to just any little issue in the divorce.. He got 50/50 custody but he minute it was bumped up from 60/40, he hired a babysitter 10% of the time so he wouldn't have to really be there. Everything he does seems to be punitive and I don't think he will stop until we have spent all our money on this divorce and he knows I don't have as much money as I could have gotten.

Why do I continue to feel as though I have the wind knocked out of me? I feel a pit in my stomach. I go thru daily life feeling disconnected and not confident in myself... I have gone on some dates, even slept with a few guys. Doesn't make me feel any better.

Anyone have ideas as to how to cope? I know that is asking a lot. I am 46 years old, in very good shape and you would never know by looking at me that I am struggling so much. I have friends but I don't open up like this - I am too embarrassed. By this point I should be over it, or at least better adapted and making better decisions.

Play along! Do the washing up and make yourself useful. But plan for an independent future. I'm sure you'll get your son back when he's old enough to make his own descisions. It sounds to me like you are a mild codependent. So you've got an ego of your own. Employ it to your own ends!

californiamomof3 wrote:I have friends but I don't open up like this - I am too embarrassed. By this point I should be over it, or at least better adapted and making better decisions.

You need to speak to other people who have had relationships with narcissists, and will understand exactly what you've gone through and how you feel. Otherwise, people won't understand, however much they want to help.

It's good that you've contacted this forum, but it's primarlly a support forum for actual narcissists - hopefully, though, some non-narcissists will offer you advice. (I'm a narcissist.) All I mean is that it's probably worth additionally seeking out support forums for people, like you, who've been affected by narcissists, for the emotional support that you seek.

I'm sorry for what you've gone through, and I think that you've made the right decision to leave. I hope that you're able to leave your father's home sooner rather than later, as he can't be doing your recovery from your marriage breakup any good.

npd everywhere.
intersting

Oh yes, everyone you've been close to so far is mentally ill, except you, very convenient, makes sense.

Thank your dad who saved you, do the darn dishes, go for that pizza (omg what an awful thing to be asked to do, my heart bleeds for you!!!) and think about saving yourself next time, instead of this entitlement to a life with your ex or your dad or whichever person is next. Stand on your own two feet, and if you can't, don't be so foolish as to figuratively bite the hands that have fed you.

Have a little think about where you would have been without these people, maybe that will put your feet back on the ground, you don't seem to have a concept of reality. I don't know about those other people you mentioned. but you yourself seem to be in the right forum.

I think that you've overlooked or misunderstood some things there, UntilTomorrow, although I agree that it's possible that the OP may have issues of her own, due in one way or another to her narcissistic father, causing her to have been attracted to and previously remained with her husband.

I see what you mean, Bitty.

calmomof3,

Ok, I'm a non, so I'm gonna give a different perspective. I'm not sure who it was, maybe the mod xdude, on the SOF&F forum, who said that a PD doesn't exist in a vacuum by itself. It takes two to tango, er, tangle, and I think at this point in time now that you've had some counseling that you may hopefully have started some awareness of YOUR role in the relationship dynamics with your ex and your father, as well as your mother.

I understand that you are currently dealing with a nasty divorce and custody issues, raising two children not yet of age, and a slew of PDs, but this is actually the time to start thinking about your long-term happiness. You have only one life to live, and you should consider if your long-term happiness is contingent on having a man in your life to support you and underage kids, with the chance that the ground under your feet may shift again if things go south, or becoming independent with a career of one's own while supporting your own kids, with the ground more solid under your feet because it's your own, not someone else's.

Don't spend a lot of time on the woulda's, shoulda's, or coulda's. Acknowledge that what's done is done, and your role in such relationships so you don't repeat the pattern. Take some time to heal but don't keep looking at the wake behind your boat. Look forward and steer your own ship.

Thank you all so much. I realized that my post was so negative - I had re-read it last night and thought some more. All I did was go on about the bad stuff as if things were so great before. Most definitely, I do agree, it takes two to tango... my 16 yr old always called the relationship between myself and her dad as "bi-polar". The two younger kids witnessed a lot of hostility and door-slamming and meanness in the fights. My son didn't see much of that, because things didn't seem to get to that point until after he moved out to attend college. So that being the case, I can see how it was so easy for my ex to persuade our son that I was evil enough to disconnect from his mother completely (at least for now - I do agree someday he will move on from this, and likely form his own opinion).

As for where I would be today without my ex - I will never know, and that is totally on me. When I met him I was 26 and already a single mom for a year, my son was 2. I was working full time and not doing such a bad job. I had a nice apartment, a car, and I was doing everything for myself and my son - not receiving any child support from my son's dad. I did work for my dad's company but not FOR my dad; he set it up so I would report to someone else, which was a good thing to do, because no one could say it was a hand out. When I met my husband, we dated for 3 months and it was a world-wind type of relationship. He is 10 yrs older than me. He pushed really hard to get engaged in short order, then married. So basically I married him after dating only 6 or 7 months. I never really understood at the time what the rush was. I wanted to take it slower but he reasoned that we spent most of our free time together anyway, and so why maintain two homes? When I wanted to live together instead, he said he didn't feel comfortable with that because of my son. I will never forget, one night I broke down in tears about a month before we got married (he had been married before too by the way, both he and I had very short first marriages, but he had no children)... he said "Oh I can see maybe you are not ready to get married, let's re-think it". But when I calmed down enough to talk about it he dropped the subject. Next thing I know, we are planning an elopement.

I later found out that he had been engaged twice between his first divorce and meeting me, in about a 4 year period. Although I never found out why those engagements ended, I did find out that he had been physically aggressive with girlfriends before and had an explosive temper that seemed to flare whenever he was jealous. If another guy looked at me, he got very upset, and if I wanted to go out without him that was an issue too.

When we got married, neither of us had much. After we got married, we moved about 4 times in order to advance his career. He pushed to have a baby of his own, which I knew when we married he wanted kids of his own so that was fine. But he did push me on it before I was really ready. He was almost 40 by that time, so again, I took the position that I needed to be understanding. After we had our now-16 year old, he wanted me to be a stay at home mom. This allowed him to work more/longer hours and focus on working his way to the top. And it would save us on the high cost of daycare. This all made sense to me... I didn't mind NOT having a career, I loved being a mom. But I did see being a mom as my job and as such, I signed on for classroom volunteering, playdates, etc. making sure that I was very hands on and that it was benefitting my kids. I wanted to contribute to my family even though it wasn't financially.

As my husband got more successful, he got more distant. After our 3rd child, things really changed a lot. Our 16 yr old was dx'd with trichotilomania at age 8... she began pulling her hair at age 2, and I had no clue or was in denial about how bad things were. She was never like my son, who was so happy go lucky, but rather extremely high needs child, seeming anxious and depressed and exhibiting rage at times. I later found out that my husband's mom had experienced a lifetime of depression and suicide attempts; I knew she had problems but didn't realize the extent of it. A sister in law hinted that other family members had mental illness too. To this day, I don't think I know the whole family history. 3 years ago when my daughter was 13, things just hit a whole new level... I believe because of the hormones combined with bi-polar, she ended up in the hospital twice (both times for auditory hallucinations) and stopped attending school. I had no idea how to handle this, nothing to compare it to. I did the best I could but sometimes I really broke down, just not knowing what to do for her... if I vented to my husband, he got offended. Yet he didn't help me to find solutions. If I did try something for instance a new school, he wouldn't give his opinion, but later when it didn't work out he would be happy to tell me it was my fault for making that particular choice. He would tell me that our son's room was messy but not want to confront our son himself... he would tell me I had to do it, so that our son didn't think he was the "bad guy". Sometimes he would come back at me and tell me I was wrong for confronting our son at the time I did - either it was too close to dinner time, or i was too harsh or whatever. But now in retrospect, I think that was the beginning of the parental alienation and why it has been so effective with my son at this point. I am sure all my husband had to do is say "mommy is so much meaner to you than her sisters, what do think?" or "I don't feel the same way, that is her opinion about your room". I say this because his own dad did the same thing. I remember my husband telling me that growing up, his dad would pull him aside and even tell him that the mom wouldn't have sex with the dad - who does that? He was a teenager and his dad would come and ask his advice on the marital issues, and also say that mom was responsible for discord in the family (the mom and dad stayed together, although the dad used to tell my husband that it would understandable for him to have a girlfriend if he wanted LOL).

As my husband's career progressed, he made a lot money doing mergers and acquisitions. No, I don't feel entitled, I don't think that is the word. But I did come into a marriage that I felt was a team and expected to be treated like a partner... for instance, had I married a man with money, I wouldn't be entitled to half of our finances. But we built a lifestyle from nothing and I was proud of that. I do think that if I had not stayed home and focused on the kids, he wouldn't have been able to travel so much for work, and work the long hours. I mean, I never told him to, I always said as long as our family was together I didn't care if we lived in a crappy apartment. Oddly enough, he would argue that I would never agree to live in a crappy apartment, he didn't believe me... yet he was the one buying expensive boats and cars. He would claim I am ultra materialistic but he was the one with high end taste. Anytime we did travel, I had to use airline miles and travel with him, basically tag along on his business trips. He would always claim we didn't have extra money for trips so this was my only way to get away... even then, he would complain that it's not fair that I had free days to sight-see while he had to work. I could never win. I wanted to spend time with him, and that seemed to be the only way to do it, yet he always managed to put a negative spin on it.

The last two years of our marriage, he was completely withdrawn. He would say there is too much "drama" in the house, referencing our hard to manage 16 yr old. I tried to keep him out of it as much as I could, since it seemed to agitate him. Even when she went into the hospital, I didn't make a big deal of the fact that he stayed at our vacation home, and went boating while I sat in the ER watching them put her on a 5150. I knew that on some level, he had a hard time "being there" for any type of illness. I'm not sure what it is, but he can never seem to being there for someone who is ill or in the hospital... we returned from a trip one time, and I had to go the ER right from the airport as I had extreme stomach pain. It turned out to be an appendicitis and I had surgery the same day. But when I told him I felt so sick that I needed to go to the ER, he said "well what am I supposed to do?". I ended up dropping him off at home, and driving myself to the ER. When our 7 yr old had her tonsils out last June, and ended up being hospitalized with some minor complications, he wouldn't come to see her. He has a long history of withdrawing when someone in our family is very sick... I still don't know what is up with that. I had a miscarriage one time and he was very insensitive... he made me to go the mall with him the same night. Almost like he is a fair weathered friend, but it has to run deeper than that.

When I left him, it was after a year or so of feeling boxed in and very vulnerable. He had put everything we own in his name only, I had no way of changing it back. He blocked me from seeing our cell phone bills by changing the password about once a week.. it was like a sick game. I wanted to see MY bill one time, but we had a family plan. Out of nowhere he changed the password so I asked for it and he said "Ok but I will change it again after, because I don't want you making changes to our plan". It seemed paranoid - I had never made "changes" to our plan, I had no reason to. I didn't think he was having an affair nor did I accuse him of that, rather it was just another oddity to deal with. But he also became strange on other things, like re-routing his mail to a PO box (he would offer me a copy of the key but the post office was 15 min away, I had no interest in doing that and yet he never could explain why he suddenly couldn't receive mail at our home), he "forgot" to tell me that he let his CPA expire 5 years prior (he had always maintained that credential due to employers wanting him to have it - yet he lied to employers by saying he still had it. All he had to do was a few hours of continuing eduction each year by home study yet he let it slide for some reason), he also came down on me very often and very hard on anything I forgot to tell him. Usually it would be a minor thing like I scheduled a dentist appt for one of our kids and if I didn't tell him, I was guilty of sabotaging him as a parent. Yet he never came to the kids appts or their school events or anything... so I would have to make sure I told him everything yet he never showed up. He would get so mad at me that he would not only threaten ME with divorce but he would call my family members and tell them he was going to divorce me; it was bizarre to have family that I am not even that close to, call and tell me he had ranted to them about divorcing me. I felt I had no control over my life anymore.

As my kids got older, I wanted to be produtive outside the home. I found a volunteering job that I liked yet my husband didn't deem worthy. So even that was an argument. Then it seemed like he was suddenly pushing me work... only in the last 6 months of our marriage, he decided what I really need to do is get a job. Despite many attempts to start my own business in prior years, or go after a full time job, and he would discourage it, all of a sudden he began claiming that I was not pulling my weight. In retrospect, I am glad I didn't, because he was obviously trying to set it up so that when we divorced he wouldn't have to pay spousal support. What I do see now is that my husband didn't mind spending money as long as it was on things he loved... all of our decisions were based on his preferences, even the vacation home we bought was based on him loving boating in a particular area. I don't really know what I like to be honest because all of our life was built around his hobbies and I ended up liking what we were doing, or not minding it anyway. But there was a definite discouragement to me for doing anything for myself or following thru on my own goats, he would be negative if I presented him with anything. And he did not like me to have family or friends around, that was discouraged usually by him finding something wrong with each person.

I always said that all of the materialist stuff we have is meaningless if we aren't together as a family. But now I realize, it still means just as much to him LOL. I saw our lifestyle as something we had achieved together and the individual parts of it - like our vacation home, nice cars, etc - were things I enjoyed because they were ours. He went on a rampage after I moved out and made sure I didn't have access to the cars and boats, even the house, because he wouldn't move out but made things bad enough for me to where I had to. What i regret now is telling him those things didn't mean anything to me anymore... because when I told him that it was our family that I truly wanted to be together, and how I felt about all the materialistic stuff, he not only refused to work out our problems , but went about talking so much crap about me to my son that my son finally believed it and told me off. I always said to my son "no matter what happens, he still raised you, and you are not to take sides". I used to worry about him being angry at my husband, and somehow having their relationship go south. I am still shocked by the ill will that has gone into that effort to turn my son against me. My husband went so far as to buy my son house! He told my son that "no thanks to your mother", he had to vacate our vacation home (my son had been living it it while attending college, as it was very close to his school) yet there was NO reason he had to vacate that home. He lied to my son saying that I was forcing him to buy me out of that house, and that he would do it but the HOA fees were so high, and ohhh why is your mother doing this to me blah blah blah. In reality, my husband was the one forcing the sale, it was quickly sold and then my husband wanted me to sign documents allowing him to buy a home even though our divorce was not settled yet. I was advised not to sign away on that because we had not split all of our assets yet... when I refused, that too was used against me. Even when I would send my son proof that my husband was the one to want to sell our joint home, my son would write back that I had obvioulsy doctored the document because my husband has no reason to lie. Any time I defended myself, my son would say "he said you would say that!!" and write it off as being a complete lie. It's as if he doesn't question anything my husband has ever said, and he won't listen to my side of the story. Then my husband recently bought the house he wanted but put it in my son's name... well fine by me, I am happy for my son, but I know this will be one more nail in the coffin of my relationship with him. Now that my husband really has proven his love by buying him a house, it sure is easy to rationalize not talking to me. Once my husband understood how badly it hurt to have my family in a shambles, he went about doing all he could to put more nails in that coffin. He has tried to alienate my 16 yr old from me, but has had hard time doing that - the only good thing about her mental illness is that she doesn't have loyalty to anyone. She thinks very in the moment and all over the map. I don't worry about my 7 yr old right now because she has always been a mommy's girl, extremely close to me. She isn't easily persuaded either... so he would have a hard time with her. My son however has always been the type to buy into a story.

It is hard to move on from what I thought my place was, a wife and mom I hate being single, I miss our family living under the same roof, and it is really painful to realize that my kids won't have an intact family. I keep wondering how I spent 18 years with someone who must be very emotionally disconnected from me. It is hard to not sit here and wonder what else I could have done. I know I need to move forward... and yes my dad is a big help, I probably should do the dishes and just shup up LOL, but I also offered to work in exchange for the help he is giving. The way he is helping is that he splits the rent with me on a home that is in the same neighborhood I lived in before, it is too large and too expensive for me to do alone. My dad lives in another state but likes to visit us here, so the way it worked out is he is paying half of the rent... it does benefit him too, although I admit he would still be staying with us even if my husband and I were together, without him having to pay half. And there isn't really a job for me right now at his company so he did appreciate me offering but my brother is already working there full time, and so is one of my uncles, and he is probably worrying about the other employees thinking it's a handout if I suddenly work for them again.

Well thank you all, sorry I wrote a book here. What I want, money cannot buy. I guess I married a person who IS the person he accused me of being.. shallow and only worried about money. I wanted him to be that family guy who would do anything for us. Looking back, I see many signs he was not that type, and maybe I will never understand who he is.

"I guess I married a person who IS the person he accused me of being.. shallow and only worried about money."

It's ok to feel angry and confused, calmom, 18 years of being under another's control because of his disorder is a lot to process. Your ex does projection to a T.

But, yes, you ignored or didn't see the red flags occurring. Have you asked yourself why? Was it because you were trying to convince yourself that your ex is still the man he was when he first courted and married you? Was it because you had a hard time, after witnessing his odd or negative behavior, that he was all that, perhaps disordered after all, and realized ala deja vu that you married your father in a sense? Was it because you were trying to hold the family together at all costs? Other reasons?

The reason I'm asking such questions is because you may have co-dependency or traits, stemming from your birth family dynamics, that lend themselves to how the relationship with your ex played out. Hopefully you can grasp this concept of what it takes for two to tangle. I know it's hard to stop pointing the finger at the other person as you want to put the blame squarely on him and turning it on oneself at a time like this, but eventually you will have to, if you don't want to repeat a pattern of attracting the same kind of person a second, third or fourth time later into your life. Not saying that you're the ogre that your ex has painted black, not that at all, but that you have something about your personality that attracts such a person. Something to contemplate on your healing journey...

All the best~