Layers of Hurt

January 6, 2013

     One thing I was unprepared for in all of this was how many layers of hurt I would be experiencing.  Firstly, my ego and pride are bruised as I realize how foolish I sounded as I explained to you how I liked our “barely there” arrangement, where I saw you just often enough to pretend that we had some sort of relationship, and you had the space to get your life back on track and pursue your hobbies and interests.  Little did I know that even more of your time was being taken up by an actual girlfriend…someone who believed she was in a relationship with you because she was.  And you sat there and listened to these words come out of my mouth and you said nothing, or worse yet, agreed with me.

     On the next level, I feel intense betrayal.  I can’t even fathom how many lies you have had to tell me to keep up the illusion that you were a free agent.  It makes me weep to think on all the times you told me that you couldn’t be and didn’t want to be in a relationship, but this whole time you were, and it was with someone that wasn’t me.  I trusted you with my heart and my soul and you lied to me, knowing that the truth would bring pain.  It is the malicious act of lying to my face which I find so hard to wrap my mind around.  Direct questions responded to with straight-faced lies, a skill I have never been able to hone in my personal life.

     Not only have I lost the ability to trust you, but I have lost the ability to trust myself.  I have always relied on my intuition and my ability to read people in order to steer clear of dangerous situations.  My heart has never been so wrong.  While all of my friends and family could see things so clearly, I alone blinded myself to every red flag, convincing myself that these were good things…the space, the distance, the infrequent phone calls.  In reality, I was giving you all the space you needed to deceive me, never questioning the lies you fed me.  I never once suspected a thing.  I was so thoroughly duped.  It makes me crazy to think I handed you the power to hurt me so deeply.

***

     I had always heard stories of wives being shocked that their husbands were leading double lives, with second houses and families on the opposite side of the country.  I always thought to myself, “you fool, how on Earth did you not see it?”  I had this belief that abusers were uneducated drunks, and easy to spot a mile away.  The women with them must know they are being abused, and choose to stay because they think they deserve that kind of treatment, or have known nothing else.  I pictured the woman, night after night asking him where he had been so late, as he gives the same old “I had to work late” excuse.  M had always provided me with more information than I needed about what he was up to each day, so that I never had to ask where he was or what he was doing.  He would often tell me he was having dinner with his parents.  As soon as I felt a little jealousy rising about him hanging out with other people, while making no time for me, he’d tell me how busy he was with band practice.  His family and his music were two things I had told myself I was not allowed to be jealous of.  I knew these things were important for him to get his life back on track, so I never questioned it.  I literally thought I knew where he was every moment of every day because he had offered up the information without my asking.  When I found out about his double life, I was blindsided by exactly how many lies he must have told me about his whereabouts to cover up his relationship.  He must have been texting me from her house feeding me lies on numerous occasions.  The thought of him spending time with her, while lying his ass off to me via text was enough to make me want to vomit.  When I met up with A, she had told me she had seen texts from me come in and he lied to her face about it, saying I was “just a friend.”

     I had run into him a few weeks prior at a concert, and I finally had a chance to have it out with him now that I knew the truth.  For the first time, I was able to hear the tactics he was using to manipulate me in real time as I blew holes into his facade.  I heard him mirroring A, as he used direct quotes from her to fake empathy for how I must be feeling (I knew because I had spoken to her prior and she told me some of the things she had said to him).  I heard him projecting his own bad behavior onto me as he told me how bad I was for contacting A in the first place.  I saw him switch mid-sentence from anger to a pity-play when he realized that I did not, in fact, cower in the face of his rage, but rather rose to meet him.  I saw him cry crocodile tears for the first time.  His girlfriend had warned me that this was something he did, but I had not personally seen him cry before…most likely because I had never rose up against him.  I heard him try to rationalize away almost an entire year of shitty behavior.  I heard him lie to my face when I confronted him about the fact that he wasn’t even single when we first met (which had just been confirmed that very evening by his ex-girlfriend).  I felt like I had developed a sixth sense for seeing through his bullshit.  Not a single word out of his mouth was honest.  It was 100% psychological and emotional manipulation.  He had been doing it since the day I met him, but only in that moment could I see it clearly.  This man, who I had loved with my entire being was a complete farce.  He was an abuser.  He was broken.  He had no sense of morality or empathy.  He was a Narcissist.  In my opinion, he was evil. 

     Now I can understand how these women were fooled for so long.  A high-functioning Narcissist does not leave an obvious trail of evidence to follow.  He knows the doubt and insecurity you are feeling as a result of his behavior, because he has orchestrated it.  Now he will use that doubt and fear to control your behavior and emotions to keep you in line with his agenda.  Theirs is a mind game, and unless the victim is well-versed in psychological manipulation, some of the tactics are very hard to see.  It has taken a very long time for me to shift my view of him from “soul mate” to “abuser” and to forgive myself for being blind to the truth, but little by little, things are snapping into place.