Finding My Happy: Healing from Narcissistic Abuse

Until recently, it’d been a long time since I can remember being genuinely happy. I mean, I thought I was happy for a minute, but with every conversation-turned-yelling-match-for-no reason or every time I got called a “liar” or a “piece of shit,” I couldn’t stay in denial about what was happening in my life.

The Power of Therapy

Two years ago, I started going to therapy because I was so jacked up from from the “relationship” I was in. Throughout the entire time we were together, if you can call it that, I endured verbal, emotional, and mental abuse near-daily for over three years, most of which he justified as punishment for some perceived offense I’d caused him. Swear to goodness. He said so.

Ironically, he was the one who encouraged me to see someone, even though it was because he believed I had an addiction to male attention. I didn’t. Turns out he’s projecting and that was gaslighting. Trying to make me out to be the crazy one. But in the hope that I could “save” our relationship, I went.

Best decision ever.

Even in its honeymoon phase, my relationship was abusive. Every day was some new trauma that just got more intense as time went on. When I started telling my therapist about the things I’d lived through and was dealing with, she was horrified that I was still involved with this man, and she began helping me make the long, slow climb out of the pit he’d pushed me into to die.

After a few months of talking about my abusive relationship, other narcissistic exes, and unpacking certain abuse from my childhood, she diagnosed me with Complex PTSD, and the more she helped me research it, the more I realized just how textbook my situation was. Honestly, figuring that out was wildly reassuring — there was help! I wasn’t alone! The more work I did for me, though, the more I came to realize just how textbook he was, too, and eventually, I realized I was in love with an introverted narcissist.

A who??

Where the typical understanding of narcissism is overt, that loud, boisterous personality screaming “look at me!” all the time, the introverted (or covert) narcissist is someone who has all the same traits but can be much harder to identify because this person isn’t over the top. They’re homebodies, even, maybe having one small outlet to get their biggest fix. Sadly, that outlet is probably you. I think the introverted types are way worse, too, because you don’t see them coming. They seem normal, likeable even.

To the ex’s credit, there were moments of sweetness and humanity. He was funny. Once upon a time, I found him attractive, instead of looking into a face with no soul. He’s great with babies and animals and a charmer when it suited his agenda. We managed to have happy days here and there. I clung to them.

However, it wasn’t much to build on, and I saw more than was there because I wanted so hard to believe in all the things he told me. That laid the foundation for my faith that he was innately good. Holy shit was I wrong. When it came to me? his previous partner (and probably the others)? The relationship pattern was Psych 101: Love-bombing. Triangulation. Gaslighting.

Hoped Myself Stupid

But I hoped those rare, sweet moments would string themselves together into something more consistent, which kept me attached to him for entirely too long despite knowing full well what was happening was technically abuse. Like most people in domestic abuse situations, I struggled to break out. Honestly, I didn’t want to. I wanted to believe in him despite having absolutely no reason to. Stockholm Syndrome, maybe? I lost count of how many times he broke up with me, and he could’ve stayed gone when he did, so surely he was still around because he was fighting for us, too, right? Sigh.

Even though he became a raging ass, it hurt to think of life without him. I was still clinging to the man I thought he was and the happy little life we were supposed to be creating together. My friends and family were fed up with me, clearly able to see this guy for what he was and helplessly unable to convince me to leave him. For over three years, he’d give just enough effort, love, attention, and validation to keep me strung along.

The last year of my fight to have a relationship with him was riddled with name calling (which admittedly went both ways in times where my tolerance gave), attempts to manipulate me and my perception of the world, attacks on my character, and so much more. You don’t realize how screwed up your story is until you tell it to someone. The horrified looks people have given me say everything.

How was I supposed to know I was with an introverted narcissist?

For me, I didn’t know until I knew, if that makes sense. I knew that the way I was being treated, even in some the best of our times together, was not the way that you treat someone you say you love. Shouldn’t be the way you treat people in general, even. Our happy times were simply him love-bombing me. I was pouring everything into him. He was screwing with my head. He destroyed me, and I can’t unsee the smirk of delight on his face when he realized it. I went back to him over and over again, gave him multiple rounds of the shit show before I shut it down and walked away. I defended him to everyone, validated the way he treated me. That’s how much I wanted it to work out.

But it was never going to work out.

Happy wasn’t an option. There were plenty of opportunities to make that happen, so that’s obviously not what he was after. I believe there was something about him that cared about me here and there, but it wasn’t love, and it wasn’t lasting. Looking back, and knowing all the lies I was fed, it feels like he was after the sport of it. I was just prey to him or some kind of conquest. He even told me once that perhaps it was his own ego that he thought he could tame me, break me like some wild horse. I stayed with him another two-plus years after he said that.

This is the ugly face of empathy. Of still believing in people who show you you shouldn’t. Of codependent behaviors and unhealthy coping mechanisms. I know now how I was toxic to myself, too, by allowing him a place in my life when I should have set boundaries and walked away time and time again, when I shouldn’t have begged him to come back every time he left.

Should’ve seen it coming…

Sadly, I ignored the signs I did see. I gave all of my energy to trying to build him up, support him, encourage him, reassure him. I gave him space when he deliberately distanced himself from me as a control tactic. I brushed off all the hateful names he called me. I made excuses for him slamming doors in my face and never following through on any of his promises. I lied to myself when I realized he was a narcissist because I didn’t want to believe it. I carried the responsibility for our relationship, as he had no investment in it. I accepted bold-faced lies as truths.

Therapy taught me how to process all the things he was saying and doing to me. It helped me understand why he was doing them. It helped me realize that it wasn’t even really personal, that narcissists are incapable of real emotional connection with someone else, so there’s nothing anyone is going to be able to do to break through that. Therapy helped me unpack the trauma of what I’d been through in a safe way so that I could process it and move past it.

Past him.

Thanks to learning to trust myself again, I’ve learned how to see more of the warning signs much sooner. It took a lot of hard work (and some really amazing people), but now I know what to look for in others to protect myself. I’m so grateful to all my friends who’ve been patient with me while I reparented myself and for the space they made for me to sort myself out and rebuild after I finally had the strength to cut him out of my life.

They all tell me I look so happy these days. I think that’s my new favorite compliment. Thanks, y’all. I am.

Think you might be with a narcissist or someone with narcissistic traits? Look for these red flags!

Featured Photo by Fuu J on Unsplash