How My Narcissistic Ex Broke Me

I have spent a lot of time contemplating what got me to this place of having no self esteem and feeling broken.

I was married before, from the ages of twenty to twenty five to a Salvadorian man. Our marriage wasn’t a good one either, but for different reasons than what my ex has put me through. Mauricio was charming, good looking and I just wanted someone to care about me. I think he wanted to get out of the house he shared with his three roommates. He moved in three weeks after we met. I was 18 and he was 28. It didn’t click that he was just as immature as I was until I started to grow up and he didn’t. He was a wannabe actor and waiter while he waited for his big break that never came. I went to a community college to become a medical secretary and then he went to hairdressing school.

While he was playing soccer, he broke his wrist and in the emergency room, he told me that he was going to go back to being a waiter. I ended the marriage shortly after.

I couldn’t see a future because our life was so unstable, coupled with my gut instinct telling me he wasn’t trustworthy. He never came home when he said he would, his excuses were terrible. It didn’t feel right.

I still had some self esteem and confidence at that point. I decided that I was going to stay single for awhile and say yes to whomever asked me out on a date. I told my friends that I didn’t know what I wanted. I just knew what I didn’t want. I said that every man deserved one date.

I had some doozies. Like the man who took a bus to my place, because he lost his license due to a DUI, insisted on leaving a small bag at my place and snapped his fingers at the waitress. While waiting for the bus back to my place, he tried to make me go into a porn shop to look for his photos in an S&M mag. I refused. Then he got mad at me for making him take a cab home and not giving him a kiss. He snapped that I wasn’t a virgin. He called the next day and was mad again I wouldn’t go on a second date.

Enter my ex into this fray. I had been single for just over a year. He presented himself as a calm, engaging presence. He wanted to know everything about me. We started out as friends for about six months. I continued to date during this time. Everything I said was intelligent, my opinions mattered. He never interrupted me, he always paid. He always wanted to do what I wanted. I was redoing some high school courses because at the time I was considering moving to Calgary for their Respiratory Therapist program. He took me out to congratulate me on my math 12 final. The next night I was going out for dinner and dancing with some friends and he asked to come. I said ok. The following day, he took a friend and I out on a boat ride and we watched a movie, then he made his move.

If I could go back in time, I would have seen that he was love bombing me and setting me up. No one is that nice for that long without one single argument or complaint. It’s not possible. He also knew what I was looking for in a relationship and presented himself as having all of those traits.

Once we became romantic, everything went so fast. It wasn’t dating, we were an instant couple. It still had similarities to before, but red flags were popping up. I brushed them off because I mistook them as arguments that all couples have. But looking back they weren’t, because there wasn’t two sides, just his.

These are examples of the ways in which he broke my spirit

1) I remember going to his friend’s cabin which was in the middle of nowhere and you had to drive on a one lane twisty road. I get car sick and asked him to pull over. He was dismissive until I insisted. Then he negated me because I wasn’t sick enough. When I asked him to drive slower because I was scared, he drove faster instead. When we got to the cabin, we only had a couch to share and my ex got a bad cough in the middle of the night. I asked him if he took cough medicine. His response was “Don’t be such a cold bitch!” I was mortified because I worried that his friend heard him. The next day I tried to explain that I asked in case he wanted me to get some medicine. He said I was lying and refused to believe me.

I look back on that and wonder why I kept going with the relationship. We weren’t living together yet. The only thing I can think of is that I was looking back at when he was so kind to me and I wanted that back. That it was a misunderstanding. That he was sick. Little did I know that this was the beginning of hundreds more incidents and things would get a lot worse and these types of incidents would come quicker.

2) A few years into the relationship, he started to tell me that I didn’t deserve his affection or for him to be nice to me.

We moved into together about six months into our relationship, when he was still able to love bomb me off and on. I believe that’s called intermittent reinforcement. I used to cry back then in front of him, thinking that it would mean something to him. I think he liked it, because he knew he had hurt me. It didn’t matter how nice I was or how long we had gone without a disagreement. It was never enough for him to be nice to me.

3) The longer we were together, the more he swore, yelled, slammed things and the bigger he made his physical presence known. It became daily at the end and he didn’t care who heard, the kids, the neighbours, friends, taxi drivers, etc. You don’t need to use your hands to make a person feel small.

4) He encouraged the children to treat me badly as well. He told them they didn’t have to follow my rules, he scoffed at me, mimicked me, etc with them. When my kids are mad at me now, they use his language and mannerisms. He has been gone for almost two years but it’s like he is right here.

5) He slowly created complete financial dependence on him and did it in such a way that I thought it was my idea. Nothing was in my name except our townhouse and that was only because the bank insisted that it be in both of our names. Now I have to sell it for reasons I won’t get into here.

He threatened for months to call the police and say that I stole the car I drove with the kids, so I had to hide it. The kids had to lie to him about where I parked it. Then he let the insurance run out for three weeks. I couldn’t renew it because the car was in his name. We had no transportation. Who does that to their children?

6) He once made me ignore our children for 8 hours when they were 8 and 11. I had to stay in the office and answer his questions because he was convinced that I was cheating on him. He said if I left the room, he was going to tell the kids that I cheated on him, broke up the family, the house will be going into foreclosure and it’s all my fault. I have never cheated on him or anyone.

7) He left my daughter when she was 9 in China for 6 hours in a hotel room while he took a train to a seafood show. This one by far is the worst thing he has ever done because had anything happened to her, I never would have forgiven him. She let in housekeeping and went to the lobby by herself and he told her to lie to me. Unforgivable.

8) He started financially abusing me the second he sat the children and myself down saying that we were done. I don’t think he meant it. I think it was an escalation tactic, but his abuse was getting worse and I couldn’t take it anymore. But, when he told three of us we were done, I decided to go with it.

So, the financial abuse started. It has been awful. It is so humiliating to send your children away because you are trying to juggle four credit cards to pay for a new oven that you have been without for three months. Or your cat has been attacked by a raccoon and the 19 year old receptionist is staring at you while you are $150 short for the bill. I think I have cried more tears about the money then the name calling. He tells everyone he loves his kids above all else but won’t pay child or spousal support, has hid hundreds of thousands of dollars and so far has gotten away with it.

9) He put a tracker on our laptop. It hacked into my email and monitored all of my keystrokes. We were seeing a marriage counsellor at the time and the counsellor would occasionally see us one on one.

Tom (not his name) told me that my ex wouldn’t change. I should plan to leave him and in the meantime sleep on the couch. I did and one night I drank half a bottle of wine and took a look at one dating site to see what single people in their 40s looked like. My ex had a tracker on and became convinced that I was cheating. He has since admitted that he found no evidence, but that hasn’t stopped him from yelling in front of my kids that I am a cheater. He has even gone on legal record calling me one.

He also looked at all of my texts for weeks, because I accidentally left the password off.

But, oddly enough he has looked at Craigslist sites throughout the years for women that would come to the boat discreetly. When I brought that up he freaked out. At this point, I don’t care if he ever used their services.

10) Due to my past trauma, the bedroom is a sensitive spot for me and thanks to the love bombing, my ex knew it. He used it to his advantage. He would offer world travel with strings attached. Our last trip was to Japan. I knew our marriage was done and I would probably not get to travel like that again. His condition was x number of times but I must show that I liked it and if I look like I am faking it the deal is off. I only did it until the plane tickets were booked. His full wrath came after that but it was too late because the kids were excited. Thank goodness with Japanese hotels, if you book four people, you get four beds. Three of us slept well that trip.

11) The incident that had me call the police is one involving tools. I received a court order to put the car in my name, which is a no brainer as I need a way for the children and I to get around and my ex has two trucks and three boats. He refused to do it. I had the papers ready to go for weeks and he was living on the couch, refusing to move out.

For some reason one day, he started escalating and pacing. My daughter was watching tv. He went into the pantry and came out with four tools in his hands and was red from head to toe. There was needle nose pliers, a crescent wrench and two screwdrivers. He started screaming and waving the tools around. My daughter just sat there. He kept screaming, repeating the same few words and pacing. I know two of them was cheater and liar, but I can’t remember the others.

I was trying to figure out what was going on and why the tools were in his hands. I was in shock. I sent my daughter upstairs. My son was outside playing. He then started to tell me to get the insurance papers out of the car or he was smashing the fucking windows and he is taking the plates. I asked why because the car is to be mine and I can’t get insurance if I don’t have the papers and plates. He said he didn’t give a fuck. He wouldn’t calm down. I grabbed the transfer papers and put them in front of him to see if he would sign them, he did. When he sat down to sign them, he aimed the tools at me. I managed to sneak a photo by turning my phone on silent. Somehow, I knew I needed it.

I briefly left the house in shock and called my lawyer panicking because I didn’t know what to do. I snapped back thinking of the kids. I went upstairs and told my daughter to get dressed and to not ask questions. My son and his friend came in. I sent his friend away and told my son to come with me.

My ex asked why I was taking the kids and told them to stay with him. It became a verbal tug of war for a few minutes. The tools were back in his hands at this point. He wanted to know if I was running away with them like last time. Luckily the kids didn’t argue and came with me. My lawyer did call me back as she didn’t answer the first time and told me to call the police. We ended up at a friend’s house the first night and a hotel the second night. The kids were mortified about being at my friends because her kids go to the same school, but I didn’t know what else to do. The police wanted us to go to a shelter but I couldn’t do it. I called a friend in tears and she told me to wait. I am glad I did.

The kids went to school the next day, I think they wanted to pretend it didn’t happen. I did get my protection order because of this. Having these tools in his hands makes no sense. When I removed the plates to get my own, I needed one screwdriver, that was it.

I still remain an empathetic person and to this day it remains unfathomable that someone would want to break someone’s spirit by being so cruel to them over and over again. I don’t understand the need to control someone else.

I keep writing these very personal stories because I believe that keeping secrets bottled up is unhealthy and I want to release my shame as I am not to blame for what happened to me.

It started off slowly, I didn’t notice what was happening at first and I blamed myself. I thought it was my fault and I deserved everything that happened to me.

I put my trust and faith in the wrong person but that doesn’t mean I deserve what happened. I was kept off balance and so embarrassed, I didn’t tell anyone around me.

My friends that noticed something was off didn’t say a word until after our marriage ended. Only one friend has used the word abuse since then.

It will be two years in September that he will have been out of the home. I hope one day he will no longer feel the need to keep financially punishing the children for me having the courage to say enough.

Thank you for reading. If you are in a similar situation, I hope reading this helps you in knowing you aren’t the only one.