I still love abusive ex

[CharlieLima]

I feel sad tonight. I’m getting over an abusive relationship with a narcissistic ex. He discarded me with no explanation. I know that I’m much better off without him but I did love the person he presented to me in the first 6-9 months that we were together. I went through denial and anger, I was feeling strong. Now I’m back to feeling really sad. I miss the person I thought that he was. I miss the amazing connection that I felt while he was lovebombing me. I can’t quite let myself believe that he abused me intentionally. Will it get easier? Will I stop loving him one day?

Yes, I love myself.
Yes, I’m in counselling.

You just have to keep reminding yourself that the person he 'presented' - the person you loved - does not exist. Contacting him will not help, because he's not the person you thought he was. You will have waves of sadness, and I know it's horrible, but only time will make this better.

Try to fill your time with things that bring you joy - friends, hobbies, family. It will absolutely get easier, I can promise you that, and then one day you will suddenly realise that you've not thought about him in a while, and that it doesn't hurt any more. But it is a process.

Thank you. I’m fortunate to have a busy and fulfilling life so I can easily fill my time.

I try to remind myself that the person I fell in love with doesn’t exist but it’s hard. It felt so real. It really was a text book lovebombing. I had even felt like we were twin flames (one step beyond soul mates). What a fool I was.

I do wonder whether I will hear from him again. I don’t think I would be strong enough to resist him hoovering me.

The only blessing is that we weren’t married, no children or house together and we live in different cities!

I have been in your exact situation. They can treat you terribly again and again, but it's impossible to let them go until you're ready. One day you will look back at this in horror that you ever put up with it, but right now it's so hard to resist.

The best advice I can give you is to block him. Block his phone, block him on all social media. You don't need the temptation of looking at him or messaging him, and it removes his power in that he can't choose to walk back into your life whenever. If you know that text isn't coming, you can forget about him.

It's OK to love him, but you've got to remember love isn't all it's cracked up to be. It's not transformative, it doesn't conquer all, and it does fade away. The intensity was traumatic bonding. Grieve for the good parts and what it could have been, and for the way he treated you instead. And remember, it'll pass and fade into memory.

Do the freedom programme.

I’ve dreamt about him every night for at least the past 10 nights.

I’m really desperate to contact him today and break NC to find out why he discarded me. Someone stop me please.

The dreams all involve him ignoring me or rejecting me or humiliating me in some way. My subconscious mind wants me to maintain NC!

Hello, can you explain a little bit about the bad things he did to you? before you decide to contact him?

I know that exact feeling. I have those exact dreams. I wish I knew the answer. I let him back in over and over and it’s really destroyed me. I have to see him regularly and I’m usually the one who after seeing him calls him and ask if he wants to do something. Then I am always back a sq 1.
So if you can no contact is the way forward. It is trauma bonding. Admitting to yourself that it was not love.
That’s the hardest part I find. I feel like a failure and unlovable
Trying no contact again.

I know that contacting him will just cause me more pain.

It’s hard to describe what he did because it sounds like nothing and I could never bring it up with him because he would have an answer for everything. But it included things like:

• initially he totally lovebombed me
• then started to devalue me by putting me down, commenting on my clothes, ridiculing me but making out he was joking, etc.
• he would give me less and less attention and time but would still dangle the old him in front of me as a carrot.
• he played me an another woman off against each other, trying to make us both jealous.
• he had all the power and would get me to reveal everything about myself to him without ever revealing much about himself and would then use that information against me.
• he made me feel so low that I considered suicide.
• he then discarded me at a vulnerable time with no explanation whatsoever.
• if I ever had sad or bad news he seemed to enjoy my pain.

I let him back in over and over and it’s really destroyed me.

I’m so sorry.

At the moment I feel like I still have my dignity and pride. Although he knew I loved him and would have done anything for him, I never actually told him so because he switched from being warm to cold. I want to keep that dignity and not contact him. I’m hoping that it will get easier.

From what you have written there he sounds nasty, and abusive and extremely manipulative, and selfish.

Contacting him won't achieve anything....there is no reasoning with people who are unreasonable, especially people who get a kick out of making you feel bad.

If you contact him and he does reply he will likely blame you.....you know it's not you. He is someone who gets pleasure from other people's pain.

I should say that the last few months with him was very difficult because every time we met up I would feel traumatised afterwards. He would hold back emotionally unlike it the beginning and it was like I was craving a drug that he was holding but wouldn’t hand over to me. I would cry for days after I saw him each time and it triggered my old eating disorder to start up again.

I’m a very warm, kind, high empathy person so I find it really hard to understand why someone would choose to be cruel to someone else just for their own pleasure.

Have you been dating my ex? Those abusive nasty men are really acting like they have all read the same script.

mine was a good 15 years ago. I fully understand that he would have totally destroyed me, if we had stayed together any longer. I don't miss him. But I sometimes briefly miss the feeling - they are really masters of lovebombing, aren't they.

Nothing is real though. It was an act.

If he made you cry then that is not something that is good for you, or that you want to go back to. If you think about it rationally ( hard I know), why would you want to go back to something that made you upset?

I'm no psychologist, but I'm sure there is a name for this. Is it because it's something you think you have done wrong to make him act like this? becuase you haven't. It's hard to understand other people's actions when you aren't like that yourself.

KatharinaRosalie, I guess that there are a lot of these men around.

How did your relationship eventually end and did it take a long time to recover?

why would you want to go back to something that made you upset?

I was always hoping to see the ‘original him’ again. Now that I understand the situation much better, I realise that was never going to happen because the original person was an act.

@CharlieLima, you are so lucky to have escaped while you are free. My narcissist was with me for over 20 years and discarded me for an old flame when I was at my most vulnerable. The old flame had always adored him, and was easy new fuel. I adored him too. I was love bombed for many years, then quickly devalued and discarded when I needed support from him temporarily. I am older than you and sorting out the breakdown of my marriage. For a while I grieved and loved the man he presented as. Not any more! Whatever happens to me I am glad to be breaking free as I had lost myself. His family discarded me too. They suffer from varying degrees of personality disorder I can now see. He has not admitted his affair. I have evidence. The reality is that he will not tell you why he discarded you. What he tells you will place all the blame on you. You will end up feeling worthless, with no self-esteem, and none the wiser. Let him go and count your blessings. You are intelligent and strong and deserve so much more than half a life with a terminally disordered person. Be brave!

@CharlieLima, you were chosen because you are an empath. So was I. One of my character flaws (and they were many it seems) was that I was ‘too kind’. He was never kind to others unless there was something in it for him. Narcissists are dangerous people. Do not be fooled.

It will get better it took me 3 years but what a relief it is now!

You need to grieve, the person he portrayed he was, the relationship you had and the future you won't have with him. Grieve all of that, it does take time.

What I found helped was to find things that took my mind off my ex, things that totally absorbed me. It's like an addiction, one that harms us. It's almost like giving up drugs. It's hard but you will get through it.

I’m so sorry to hear how you were treated SuperbMonkey.

I’m interested that he lovebombed you for years as it’s amazing that he could keep it up for so long. Apparently a typical lovebombing burns out at about 6 months.

I know there’s no point in talking to my ex about the situation. He would twist it around to be my fault. In the past he suggested I expected too much, more than he could give, that I was too emotional, too needy. In his mind nothing is ever his fault.

He dumped me. I was devastated. Suicidal. Took me a while indeed, but the trouble is that I didn't realise at the time he was abusive. All his actions were framed as 'constructiv criticism', he was trying to help me to improve. Or he was just sensitive and I had clumsily hurt his feelings. and so on.
Once I realised what he had really been doing, I got over it.

Oh and that his next victim actually killed herself just after they got married..

One of my character flaws (and they were many it seems) was that I was ‘too kind’.
Same! He even told my mother that I’m too nice and it will affect my progression at work. He said that the first time they met before we were together and she was like afterwards.

Another thing that helped me was watching Richard Grannon videos on youtube, he talks about people like your ex and it might be helpful for you.

you were chosen because you are an empath

Do you think they really choose a partner in that calm, rational way, rather than just being attracted to their opposite?

Actually, typing that, I remember what he said about how he very rationally chose his ex. I have answered my own question. He chose me.