Addicted to a Narcissistic Cheater

Actions of a Person Addict

Being in a relationship with a narcissistic cheater can make you do things you could never imagine. Believe me, I know. I was with one for almost 50 years. This is the story of how I reacted, which was not pretty, and I hope that anyone going through the process of discovery and the resulting fallout can gain some comfort in knowing that you’re not alone in your misery. And you are stronger than you think you are.

One thing I think it is important for people in situations like mine to know is that whatever crazy stuff you do in reaction to what you discover is NORMAL for what you are being put through. Narcissists (narcs for short) are known for starting out by being the most wonderful person you’ve ever met. The person you’ve been waiting for, the one who will complete your life. You get hooked!

Gradually, so gradually you don’t even know it is happening, the narc subtly turns things around on you. You become deficient to them in ways that you already think you are. They figure out what you don’t like about yourself quickly by making you feel safe enough to talk about it. Then you can never do enough to please them. You aren’t beautiful anymore. Nothing you do is good enough even though you’re working harder and harder to make them like you again. Sometimes they throw you a crumb and you’re elated. Then it starts again. All the while, they are carrying on with others behind your back and you’ll never know until they get too confident and get sloppy. And even then, they will deny, deflect, and do damage control until you decide enough is enough. DARVO — deny, attack, and reverse victim and offender.

My reactions to the various discoveries of my narc ex-husband’s infidelity over the years scared me. I felt crazy and lost and alone. I was sure that anyone who knew what I was doing would have me committed. And certainly think less of me. The most shameful thing was that I could not find it in myself to actually leave him.

I met my ex when I was a senior in high school, a shy country girl. He was a sophomore in college, on the five-year plan, and a gifted athlete. So I got groomed very early in my life. And he became an enduring addiction that has lasted a lifetime. Everything I did was for us. My college major was one that guaranteed a job so that he could pursue a flying career (even with only one eye). I always had to have a job. I kept our houses clean and nice. I was a good cook. Took care of our two children. And I tried so hard to be pretty. That was a losing battle. No matter what size I was I was either too fat or too thin. My hair was never the right length or color, I was too pale, had ugly feet, bad mother…. Nothing I ever did was good enough. I was even an “underachiever” in his eyes although I had and have a very successful career in healthcare IT.

Person Addiction

Addicted to a person? What does that mean? Awareness of addiction in relation to substances such as alcohol and drugs is pervasive today. It seems that everyone has an addict or alcoholic in their family and the associated stigma has lessened a bit. There are lots of resources to help too, most famously the free 12 step programs started by Bill W. many years ago to battle his alcoholism which has morphed into programs for other substances, gambling, food, families and friends of addicts, and even sex or sex and love addiction. But I can’t find anything out there for Person Addiction. Yet. And the stigma of staying with a cheater has not abated at all. And guess what y’all? Ole Bill was a cheater. After he got sober. The original 13th stepper.

Here is some of what Google has to say about Person Addiction that resonates with me:

· An addiction to a person involves obsessive thoughts about the relationship, feelings of hope, anticipation, waiting, confusion, and desperation. Addictive relationships are toxic and very powerful. Healthy relationships do not involve constant drama and continual feelings of longing.

· Although addiction to a person isn’t a formal medical diagnosis, it’s possible to fall into a pattern of emotional dependence on someone. Breaking out of this relationship pattern can be difficult and often means getting to the root of what’s causing your emotional dependence.

OK, so I’m an addict. Now what? Well, there is the drug of choice. Hopium. A word used to describe a fictional drug to help one stay hopeful in times when there is none.

The Trauma of D-Day

First there is the process involved with the discovery, that D-Day when the narc’s extracurricular activities begin to be exposed. This can happen all at once where the evidence is right there in front of you, or it can begin with suspicions that are gradually confirmed. Either way it is a devastating, traumatic, life-altering experience. It is shattering in every sense of the word. The grief is indescribable. It would have been easier if he had died. At least I could have held onto the good memories (there were some) and not had to work through the grief of losing him to deceit and betrayal, making my entire life a lie. I could have retained my dignity. And gotten casseroles and sympathy.

D-Day 1 — My first D-day was many years ago. He had divorced me after our daughter was born, but kept hanging around keeping the hopium flowing. One night when we were planning reconciliation his girlfriend called. I didn’t know he had one. He left, I called her back and got the story. Years of cheating. Wow. So, we confronted him together. She walked away, head held high, and I eventually married him again. She advised against it but said she understood since we had a child.

Not too crazy, right? I thought he had learned that I was his person. Just wait, it gets worse.

D-Day 2 — The second D-day, after the remarriage and another child, was when a number came in on his beeper. I called it and it was a woman named Wendy at her job. Another beep with the same area code (not ours) and it was Wendy again, this time at home. I talked to her, and she admitted that she was seeing him. She had no clue that he was married. I made him call and confess. We hung up in tears. And I threw a pot of boiling SpaghettiOs at his head. He called the police, but they didn’t do anything except try to calm us down. He crawled on the floor and begged me to stay and because that was what I wanted, and I liked the begging, I did.

I also grilled his work friends, and one told me he might be seeing their secretary who was also a friend of mine. That will make you nuts! I went and parked in front of her house for hours hoping to see him. I never did and she was marrying someone else anyway, so I gave up.

Hopium was still active. But my thought process was shifting. I became chronically angry at him. I could never look at him the same way again. I was completely invested in him still, though. We had kids, we had a house, cars, money, family entanglements. I had been alone (sort of — at least financially) when we were divorced for that short time, and I found it scary.

D-Day 3 — This one happened many years after D-day 2. I do not for a second think that he had stopped what he was doing, but nothing really came to light. I had some suspicions about a nanny we had that he suddenly fired, and there was a DUI that he got in Denver, and he lied about the circumstances, but I didn’t pursue anything. The wife of one of the guys he flew with was doing some recon to find out what her cheating husband was doing and during that process learned that the DUI occurred when he was driving a drunk woman home in her van. And she did not know he was married. A pattern with the lying about not being married, right?

So, D-day 3 was the worst. I found an external drive with videos of him having sex with other women. Irrefutable evidence that I had to do something with. And I did all the things that you shouldn’t do. I called him (he was in Brazil for work, where the women were) and confronted him. When he came home, I threw everything I could pick up at him when he walked through the door. I told everyone I could think of, his friends and co-workers, his family, my family, my friends, our kids (18 and 23). I emailed all the Brazilians I could find to let them know that he was married. I started smoking, which he hated, and smoked up the house. I even got a lay off from my job of 26 years. I was too devastated to work and my boss, a good friend, understood and let me go with a year’s pay.

I sleuthed like crazy and found dating profiles, stalked the women’s social media pages to find him (which I did), went through all his stuff and found secret computers and phones and sex toys (not mine). I was so ANGRY there are just no words to describe it. I threw his work clothes in the river behind our house and tried to slash his tires, but he called the police. They were very gentle with me, one having gone through the same thing, and told me to pray to Jesus for peace. But peace was a long way away.

I took his computers to a techie person to see if she could get anything else out of them. He burst through the door and snatched them and ran back to his car. I followed and hurled myself inside it. He sped home and when he got out of the car, I grabbed his gun (he LOVES his guns and always has several on him). I am not sure what I intended to do with it, but it discharged accidentally (I promise). Fortunately, I didn’t hit anything, but we lived in the type of neighborhood where police could easily have been called (someone down the street screamed). So, I threw it in the river (same one where I had thrown his clothes) but he hired someone to swim around and retrieve it.

I also made a plan to fly to Brazil and sit in the lobby of the hotel where he always stayed so I could see for myself what he was doing. I got a visa, booked a flight, and made a reservation at the hotel. I even bought a wig so I could disguise myself. I was very excited by the idea of that confrontation. But the people at the hotel knew him and told him that someone with the same last name was coming to visit. And he told them not to let me stay there. They complied. I looked into other places but in the end, I decided against going as he abruptly changed his work schedule to fly to countries other than Brazil.

As you can see, the only person I was really hurting was me. The need to know is very, very strong. Just knowing a little bit, and him being unwilling to admit to anything he was not 100% certain that I knew (and minimizing that), was maddening. The control over me that the lack of knowledge gave him was unbearable. Because I was still addicted.

I did file for divorce, but he managed to bring me back around with a surprise trip to Las Vegas and an Elvis wedding vow renewal. Hopium flowed freely at that point. But the anger got much worse. I had no trust and knew I ought to just leave. The kids were grown, although with many problems, and I could take care of myself.

D-Day 4 — Another 10 years or so went by and I was again blindsided, this time by a butt-dial from Hong Kong. He was in the car with a woman, obviously working her. I listened, then called him and confronted him. Of course, he blew it off, but I managed to record him a month or so later in his hotel room, back in Brazil, with not one but two women in one day (separately). Then came the big one: A woman he was planning to buy a coconut plantation with in the Philippines. I had searched his car and found yet another secret computer and it was all in there. I am very good at searching cars.

I did sleuth a bit more and stalked her social media. I contacted her and her friends of course. And all the other women he was with at the time. There was never just one. I tried to tell her about all the others, but he did damage control, and she is probably on hopium too.

I also outed him on some pilot wife Facebook boards. I was immediately kicked off since what I said was a bit too close to home for many of them. Some contacted me privately and I did manage to get into a private group of pilot wives with cheater husbands. They’ve been great.

This time I went through with the divorce. It was not easy, but I did it. I am on my own now and just trying to make sense out of everything. Why was I so invested in someone who is the equivalent of the “office creeper?” You know, the guy that all the women warn you about when you start a job because he hits on every woman he encounters. My husband was THAT GUY. They use the shotgun effect — shoot randomly and you’re bound to hit something.

So, as I ponder the why of it all the only thing that I can come up with is addiction. I am well versed in substance use disorder since both of my kids are afflicted. I am a veteran member of Al-Anon and Nar-Anon so I should know better, right? But I didn’t. Addicts do stupid stuff in pursuit of that fix. And I certainly did that. Addicts behave in ways that no normal person would just to get high. Until they hit a bottom that has two choices: Die or claw your way up and out.

I am trying to do that “clawing my way out” thing now. I don’t know what my childhood trauma was that made me into someone who would put up with such despicable behavior. I had wonderful parents and a great extended family. I have three brothers I am close to. I was bullied as a child, and I am a people pleaser. I am an empath. I care about how people feel, I can feel when someone is in pain, and I always want to help. I never want to hurt anyone. But does that make someone accept unacceptable behavior? I hate labels like enabler and codependent since I think they villainize the victim but there is some truth to the concept.

I say the 12 steps of AA to myself often. But I get stuck at number 3.

1. We admitted we were powerless over alcohol (substitute hopium here) — that our lives had become unmanageable. That is certainly true.

2. Came to believe that a Power greater than ourselves could restore us to sanity. I have a little problem with this one. If a power greater than me could do that, why hasn’t it? Why was I allowed to suffer this much in the first place?

3. Made a decision to turn our will and our lives over to the care of God as we understood Him. This where I stop. If I can’t trust a power greater than myself to restore my sanity, why would I turn my life and my will over to it?

I know it works. I have seen it firsthand with many people I know. You can feel the people that have attained that peace. They really have something special. And I want that very much. I know it is a process and I haven’t given up. It is just not as easy as I want it to be.

Support groups help. I am in several Facebook groups that are very, very active. It seems that most people in my position eventually get divorced. Even after very long marriages like mine (there’s even a group for that).

I am sure if you met me, you would think I am a nice, older lady, who has it all together. I hear that all the time. I have a good job, a house, a car, and a 401K.

But obviously, I don’t.