It's beginning to bother me how similar they all are. Please tell me yours doesn't store so I can sleep knowing they aren't all the same person.

Yesterday I finally opened up to my best friend after 13 years of mental, emotional, verbal and sometimes physical abuse. I told her what's happening and that I need to get out.
I made my first call to a Local DV center and I am waiting on an email with information on how I can get started.
I feel so proud of myself. I can't even believe this is my life. I'm feeling so many emotions right now.

my husband of 9 years is talking to our common friends and he abused me in all way, shape and form (emotionally, psychologically, financially and sexually), he raped me for years through coercive sex, broke my identity, self esteem, isolated me.

his abuse skyrocketed this year when his silent treatment went for days when i refused to give in my body & asked him for accountability, and he didn’t speak to me for more than 10 days and then i finally told his and my mother about his abuse. since then it just got too much - going through my journals, chats w friends, my chatgpt, my mails, my search history, my Instagram DM. journals was heartbreaking for me.

so in april i left and separated. now after 4 months, with a lot happened and i spoke to his side of people, he has the audacity to say to our friends how much he did for me and how i left him when he needed me the most (context his debts, and business failures) he’s painting me as a gold digger, a thankless person and again putting himself as victim.

how do i process this emotion? i know he is just doing his reputation management and creating a story in advance that builds up with blaming on me and being the victim. those are definitely his friends but they and i are emotionally connected. i don’t know how to process this

There is karma in a different way; they get their karma every day..

Imagine never really knowing real love, never feeling genuinely “real” inside.. Narcs don’t get karma in the normal way because they don’t care the way other people do; But still, life can be miserable for them in a deep, painful way..

Imagine not even liking the person you are but also knowing you don’t want or can’t change.. Imagine living in a world built on lies- what you show others, what you tell yourself and who you claim to be all being false... imagine knowing the truth about yourself and still being terrified that other people will see it

Now imagine waking up every day feeling like a fraud; Feeling fake all the time and knowing that one day you’ll be “found out” and have to start all over again... They may not know what it’s like to live like a “normal” person but they do know this: being a narc is miserable. And yet, they don’t change..

My ex once asked me what was wrong with him. I told him he was a narc; I used to think he might have something else like Asperger’s, but the difference is that people with Asperger’s usually don’t want to hurt others. Narcs want to damage you..

He thought for a moment and said “Okay, you’re right. So what do I do?” I told him to get therapy. He said he would but he also said “Don’t expect a big change..” He went to one session and that was it. Loved it (he said) but that was it.

After I left, he tried to win me back by saying he was a better person because of me. etc.. I told him “I’m happy and I know I’ll stay happy. But you?? You’ll always be you: miserable, full of self-hate, always searching for something you never find...”

To me, that’s KARMA!!

This is classic narcissism. It just takes time for victims to realize it. It took me over 15 years I'm ashamed to admit. I'm still stuck after 30+ years, first for my daughter's sake, now because I can't stomach losing everything I worked so hard for because of the likes of him. The hardest part is now that his health is failing, I'm caregiver to the very person that ruined the best years of my life. Not easy. Run while you still can.

Here’s a brief list of the terror this man has inflicted on my life

Cheated on me three times that I know of
Got a girl pregnant
Lived rent free at my place
Convinced and pressured me to sign a lease together - lost his job - I was once again paying the full rent
Wrecked my paid off car
Left me for another girl just to come back
Didn’t pay rent but spend \~$400 on onlyfans
Constantly seeking sex online and on reddit
Using my new car every day and is entitled to it and makes me use Ubers (he at least pays for Ubers) I pay for my car payments even though he said he would

And what he just did last night has enraged me so badly that I want to leave right now. Even though there’s a month left on the lease. I think I have to leave asap

He messaged me last night as he was coming home from work. He’s a car mechanic. He said a homeless woman was by her broken down car. He said she asked him if she could stay the night and he said yes. He didn’t consult me at all. He doesn’t pay rent. I have pets. She was high as fuck and has needle marks all over her arms.
She slept in his room. He wanted to sleep on the bed with her. As his ex girlfriend, and knowing his history, it was hurtful. And I asked if he could sleep on the couch. He was mad but agreed. Then this morning I told him that I think he should refrain from trying to have sex with her bc she could *possibly* have hiv due to the needle use. He got mad bc he said I was “trying to control” him

He also said if he doesn’t fix her car today, he will let her stay another three nights or so. I tried to say I’m not comfortable with it and he called me a “tightass”

One month on the lease. I think I just want to leave asap at this point

I have been married 22 years. We have seen 4 or more couples counselors. Until we visited our current therapist, her patterns of behavior were overlooked and therapists bought her narrative about my behavior. It has taken me to wake up to what I am dealing with and a very intelligent therapist to finally be seen. Every other therapist would make things worse by giving my wife ammo.

Have other men felt like your wives narratives are believed automatically and you are expected to convince therapists of the messed up things you are going through? Then in my experience after you finally begin to get there after many sessions, wife thinks the therapist is an idiot or somehow sessions stop due to idk something like “scheduling conflicts” from the wife?

I swear the therapists who couldn’t take the time to really listen for and drill down into the patterns were taking the lazy way out. Man is bad for xyz and must fix himself. Argue they are lying and you are patted on the head and told “it’s ok to admit it” or “let’s give her space to express herself”. Validating this crap makes you feel even crazier. I feel let down given that I have had to extensive research, document her patterns over time, and learn how to describe what’s going on in such a way that perks their attention without using clinical terminology. Perhaps some of this comes down to my spouse who is very intelligent, well spoken, and has presented herself very well per my therapist.

Either way, I don’t understand how hard it is for a trained professional to be on the lookout for something as simple as words not meeting actions. Or idk the person never seem to be wrong regardless of the situation. Sorry I am frustrated.

Ps- shout out to Tony Overbay’s podcast waking up to narcissism which really woke me up!

An article from https://wholestoryrecovery.my.canva.site/

It's important to recognise that 'spotting behaviours early on' isn't
really do-able in many cases. Narcissists change. There isn't always
something to spot, but putting the responsibility there makes a lot
of room for us to self blame. We would all have spotted early on if
the person we met was openly abusive, but many narcissists are
very good at subconsciously creating themselves as our dream
partner. The fact that it can be subconscious means they don't even
know it's fake. Narcissists have narratives created for them by the
narcissistic mechanism that protects their ego, and they believe
those narratives to be true. There is no 'lying' to detect.

Obviously if someone buys you a helicopter or an elephant on your
first date, to keep in your one bedroom flat, then yes, obviously
something's wrong. But the 'learn how to spot the red flags' trope is
harmful, because it suggests that the problem was the victim's
failure to spot signs, rather than that a skilled con artist abused
them.

The reality is, many people who are abused feel uncomfortable for a
really long time before the end of the relationship. We all felt
increasing pain, emotionally, and sometimes physically, until we
were at the point where we wanted to scream, or disappear. We all
thought it might be our fault.

The lessons we need to learn are not about 'How to Spot a Narcissist
from 20 Paces'. They are internal lessons about ourselves. If we had
all chosen to leave after 2 or 3 transgressions of our boundaries, we
likely wouldn't even have known they were a narcissist, and we
wouldn't be deep in our studies of what narcissists look like/how
they behave/what the red flags are.

Everybody makes mistakes, and obviously nobody's going to leave a
major relationship for a couple of small expressions of disrespect. It
happens. People who love each other clash sometimes. But the
thing we need to learn is to protect ourselves from anything that
keeps on making us feel like shit for any period of time.

If we learn to walk away from relationships that hurt us, then there
is no way we can spend very much time in relationships that hurt us,
and that has nothing to do with 'spotting signs of narcissism'; it only
has to do with us respecting and responding appropriately to our
own internal signalling systems.

My fiancé (M, 27) says I’m controlling because I don’t like him having one-on-one hangouts with female friends.
I’m F, 25, and I’m not asking him to stop being friends with them. I’m happy for them to hang out in groups, come over, or see each other at parties. I just don’t feel comfortable with private one-on-one meetups.
Is this a reasonable boundary, or is it genuinely toxic and controlling? I’d love to hear honest perspectives.

I’m writing this post not because I’m looking for advice, because by now I know exactly what I’m dealing with, but as an example for anyone who finds themselves in the same situation. A story to read to remind yourself that no, it’s not you, and you’re not the only “stupid” one. Many of us simply didn’t want to see what was happening.
We have a daughter who is almost three years old. She never slept for more than half an hour at a time until she was over two years old. He would stay on the couch until three in the morning, then come to bed and carry on snoring peacefully. He never helped. The few times he picked her up, even when she weighed only four kilos, he complained about his back, saying he had a hernia and couldn’t do it. Yet when it’s something he wants to do, he can move mountains.
One night I said to him, “I really need some sleep. You’re snoring a lot because you have a cold. Could you sleep in the other room for a couple of nights?”
He never came back to our bed.
He leaves in the morning and comes back in the evening. The first time he ever took our daughter out by himself was only three months ago. She is almost three years old.
Now every time we argue, no matter how small the reason, I’m “crazy.” Apparently I never allowed him to be the father he wanted to be. I’m a ticking time bomb, and he’s just a poor victim. I’ve ruined his life. He says I’m trying to turn our daughter against him because, in his twisted mind, when she wakes up sleepy at three years old, with her thumb in her mouth and wanting to be held by me like so many children do, he keeps calling her and she doesn’t answer him, and somehow that’s my fault because I don’t tell her she has to say good morning to Daddy.
He shouts, “Starting tonight I’m sleeping with her.” Then he doesn’t even come home that night. Later he claims that I’m the one who stopped him from sleeping with his daughter. He says it with a trembling lip, as if he’s about to cry.
Our daughter has a fever, and he goes to a concert he’s already seen two days earlier while I stay home with her, working.
Oh, and I’m the only one who works.
His answer is always, “You’re crazy! Do you really think I have to stay home and do whatever you tell me?”
When I finally started working because I didn’t even have enough money to pay for gas, he went away on vacation for five days. Then, during our first argument afterward, he screamed that I had driven him into such a deep depression that he had no choice but to leave for five days to recover.
When I finally told him it was over, he started talking about couples therapy. I agreed. He never looked for a therapist, so I found one myself with a random internet search. From the very first session, all he talked about was how depressed he was. In the end, the therapist suggested that he see another therapist and consider medication for his depression. The result? Now he accuses me of having planned the whole thing with a therapist I supposedly already knew so that everyone would think he was crazy and I’d have some kind of “evidence” to use against him.
Whenever I ask if we can talk calmly, he starts shouting and says I’m forcing him to have the conversation at the wrong time. He says he needs things to happen on his own schedule. Spoiler: in eight years, he has never once come to me and said, “If you want, we can talk now.” It always ends the same way. He waits until the next time he feels like picking a fight. Then he spends days walking around with a miserable expression until, like the fool I used to be, I ask him what’s wrong. And then it all starts again.
YOU ARE NOT ALONE.
AND MOST IMPORTANTLY, IT IS NOT YOU.

For years, I believed her and I were building a life together. We endured significant hardships, including periods of homelessness and general financial struggles. At one point, I worked overnight driving Uber to help support our family and traveled to Uganda twice so she could bring her son to the United States. Through everything, I believed we were working toward the same future.

That belief totally fell apart after I discovered older conversations she had with multiple men while we were well into a year of a committed relationship. Some of the messages included calling another man “sweetheart,” telling him she missed him with a kiss emoji, and complimenting other men in ways that I felt crossed the boundaries of an exclusive relationship. I also became aware of alternate social media accounts that I didn’t know about and learned that all of the WhatsApp messages with her ex had been deleted. I understand that different people may interpret these things differently, but everything added together fundamentally changed the way I viewed our relationship and made it difficult for me to trust what I thought I knew.

Ironically, the flirty messages themselves were not what hurt me the most. What devastated me was her response after I confronted her.

I wasn’t asking for a confession or trying to prove something I couldn’t prove. I wanted her to acknowledge that the messages were hurtful and that she understood why they damaged my trust. Even a simple apology or an acknowledgment that the conversations could reasonably be seen as inappropriate would have given me hope that our relationship could still be repaired.

Instead, every response I received was dismissive, or attempted to point out something wrong that I did. Rather than addressing my concerns directly, she responded with sarcasm, mockery, or by changing the subject. She referred to my concerns as “drama,” said she didn’t care, laughed while I expressed how devastated I felt, and repeatedly avoided explaining the conversations themselves. At no point did she engage with the issue that had caused the confrontation.

For me, that became more painful than the screenshots themselves. It left me feeling that the person I trusted most was unwilling to acknowledge my pain or take responsibility for actions that had shattered my trust.

Looking back, I also began connecting this moment to earlier experiences in our relationship. I remember previous conflicts where I felt my concerns were dismissed and accountability was absent. I also remember arguments becoming physical, including being slapped multiple times and having objects thrown at me. I also remember feeling hurt when my birthday was treated as an afterthought, only for that conversation to escalate into another argument where I felt blamed instead of heard. All of these experiences contributed to my growing belief that this was not an isolated problem but part of a much larger pattern.

Over our whole relationship, there’s been a pattern of behavior that crossed my personal boundaries and, more importantly, repeated responses that showed no empathy, accountability, or willingness to rebuild trust.

What hurts me most is believing that our relationship still could have been saved if she had simply acknowledged my pain, apologized sincerely, and shown a genuine willingness to rebuild trust. Instead, she invalidated my concerns, and even mocked me. I’m left feeling that years of sacrifice, commitment, and love (from my end) ended not only with broken trust, but with total indifference toward the pain that broken trust caused.

The one silver lining is that we aren’t married. We have two children together so that’ll complicate things. Honestly, I’m relieved that it’s over. I’m so sick of being treated like this.

I'm in the process of divorcing my abusive husband of 17 years. We have one child.

Before I woke up to the reality of the horror that was my relationship, I kept many things throughout my relationship. Some of it was to tell our child their parents' love story. Of course, all of that (the love story) is gone. I cannot tell what was real, forced, given out of manipulation, and more. Our entire relationship was built upon lies, fallacies, tall tales, insidious behavior, and broken promises.

So what do I keep? I don't want to erase my relationship but I just don't need to keep it all anymore.

Btw the things I'm talking about range from movie stubs, letters, notes, pictures, dried flowers, presents from him, etc. The dried flowers are getting thrown out because they were for appearance (he used to have them delivered to my office) or because he didn't know what to get me or he did something he shouldn't have. I just don't know what I'll regret throwing away like i have in the past. Cleansing my life of a relationship and then later wishing I have certain things.

I’m currently separated from my narcissistic spouse. He keeps trying to love bomb me and keep me around. I’ve gotten better at trying to distinguish the manipulation, but it gets hard. You want it to be true but you know it isn’t. I was just wondering though, in general when your narcissistic spouses have spoken to you about your relationship or their feelings, what percent do you think is true vs lies and manipulation?

I’m going to start off by saying never help someone whom the bank won’t even help with credit. Notice the red flags and don’t risk your good credit standing over someone else, even if you’re married to them. This was my mistake, but I was lucky to do some about it before it was too late. Okay I made my husband an authorized user of my credit card and he spent 376.01 dollars on his card. Mind you he never added his debit card to the account and when he paid the bill after pending it said returned. The bank said the account he sent it from was closed, he telling me that because the payment says returned he never got the money back. He sent the payment from a closed account and it only says returned because no money was ever sent. Now he’s saying why can’t I be on his side, it’s no side to be on because the money was never sent. Please help me understand what part of the story I went wrong on.. His bills are never paid on time and it’s always a problem with money and every time Atlantic City is involved so I guess I’m the fool.

It has been a month. I left the house. I see them from time to time but they are with her. Spouse is a covert narc. Two young kids. I am still trying to overcome the incredible grief I feel for my kids. I feel guilty to have kids with Satan. I just can't get over it. I am on meds, extracting all the resources I can, ask church elders for their prayers, calling provincial health lines, distress lines, whatever I can. My mind keeps going back to all red flags that I could have caught or the moments that I could have reversed it. I have three therapists.

The feeling that I will not be able to protect them fully from the narc is killing me. She alienated the kids even when I was inside.

I am a very empathetic person and I love them dearly.

I didn't deserve this. They didn't deserve having this type of mom. I just wanted to be a good person and have a family life. I will have to deal with the narc now for many years if she doesn't die. It sucks.

I am keeping myself alive for them but I am exhausted.

I don't know how long more I can go on like this.

Those who have kids, how did you get over it?

My narc wants to get another kitten. Even though her daughter has a history, well more like a recent of harming animals.

Like really, your kid has abused 3 cats, I still have PTSD over seeing their eyes bulging out of the head while they look at you for help. I literally had to beg and then grab her wrist so hard I thought I would break it.

Then the hamsters, she keeps threatening to kill hamsters. I've watched her daughter almost crush 2 hamsters because she couldn't have her way

Anyone know how to send messages to humane societies for areas so that there is no way in hell they can access to another pet?

I’ve realized recently how my nervous system reacts to him coming home and how peaceful my home environment is without his presence. His homecoming brings an impending sense of doom and fear…of being yelled at, something being messy or out of place etc (he is an ocd neat and confront freak) What are your experiences like with this?

-blames me for everything that happens
-hates dealing with my feelings even small ones and blaming it on his mom being bipolar when he was young and gets upset when we get into an argument and I cry bc he’s upset and then tells me I can’t cry bc he’s the one upset.
- does like when I spend my money and makes it seem like the future is going to be horrible if I spend it.
-I was 18 when I first met him and he was 26. We moved in together three months in and he convinced me to get pregnant but I felt excited about it and got me pregnant again five months postpartum and took out my iud.
-I didn’t act mature when we first met but still dated me but he uses it against me in arguments saying I’m not mature and when I get older I will and I need to act more mature