Mannie:

You are too kind. Thanks for your response. I am glad you found my story uplifting and useful.

I wish I could claim to be as strong as you believe me to be. For three years after the breakup, I cried every time I talked about her. I missed her constantly. I felt weak.

I tried many times to communicate with her. But she had changed her e-mail address and phone number and moved to another city. The only option I had was to send e-mail to her “contact@” business e-mail address. I used multiple e-mail addresses to send from because I was sure she had a macro program to delete all incoming messages from me as spam, unopened and unread. She never replied to any of my messages. Not even to tell me to stop trying. I eventually gave up.

I was not a perfect boyfriend. I could be arrogant. I was a know-it-all. I made some momentously poor business decisions. I took my ex for granted at times. But I took care of her financially so she could take a year off to write a business book. Which she dedicated to me. I did my share of the household chores. I loved going shopping together even for groceries.

We were not very good at communicating our needs and our romantic life had declined to twice a month. I was often lonely in my relationship. Why did she always think so badly of me? She used to say “Norm, you don’t know how to be happy.” Or “Norm, you live in regret of the past and fear of the future”. Or “Norm, you’re going to die alone” Or “Norm, you don’t listen”. She used to say “Foreplay starts in the morning”. Now these things were all probably true of me but it still hurt to hear them.

I had to wear only the clothes and shoes she liked and only the fragrance she picked out for me. French of course. I learned all the names of the famous designers. Jimmy Choo, Donald Pliner, Manolo, Drees Van Norten, plus the ones everyone knows like Armani and Dolce & Gabbana. She knew the best high end thrift stores where the wealthy unloaded their designer clothes so she could buy them cheap.

I would look deeply into her eyes and she would become uncomfortable. “Why are you looking at me like that?” she would ask. I eventually discovered why she could not bear my looking into her eyes.

If I could have one night to do over, it would be her birthday in December 2008. She had traveled back east to visit her mother. I had sent a beautiful flower arrangement that morning and we had a pleasant conversation. She sent me photos of the flowers.

Still in the entire six years of our relationship, whenever she would travel, she would never say she missed me or couldn’t wait to see me. When I would ask her “Who loves you?” she would always answer “The dog”. I always insisted on picking her up at the airport no matter what time she arrived. Sometimes I brought a bouquet.

I won’t bore you with the details, but that night my so called “friend” who was older than me came over to my house with his 26 year old girlfriend. She was beautiful and seductive. My friend hated my girlfriend because he felt she wasn’t treating me as well as I deserved. He said “Why do you have to make an appointment for intimacy?”

We all got drunk and I ended up kissing his girlfriend with his encouragement. The whole episode couldn’t have lasted more than a minute. He took photos with my phone. My ego was so flattered that instead of deleting the photos, I kept them on my phone. And I never told my girlfriend what happened and what I had done.

Of course my girlfriend found the pictures, but never said a word for almost two years. But I think it was then that she started planning to break up. But never mentioned her unhappiness until 4 months before the end.

It wasn’t until after she broke up with me via e-mail that I came across a book entitled “Help! I’m in Love with a Narcissist”. I didn’t even know what a narcissist was in real life. I only knew the Greek fable. But reading that book and reading the symptoms, everything became crystal clear.

My girlfriend was a selfish narcissist. She was an unwanted only child. (And so too was I.) She was the product of an affair and her father abandoned her at birth because he wanted a son. He already had a two daughters by his wife and did not need another girl to raise.

Her mother only had her in an attempt to hold on to the boyfriend in hopes he would leave his wife to be with her. My poor girlfriend was a victim of childhood trauma. She learned before she was three that if she wanted love and affection, it wasn’t going to be forthcoming from her parents. She would have to look out for herself and could trust no one.

I learned the opposite. I was a “mistake” in a loveless marriage. If I wanted love, I would have to work harder to earn it. I learned to be a pleaser.

Due to her condition, my girlfriend was incapable of real love and could not feel empathy. She felt a sense of superiority and entitlement. The person I was in love with was an illusion, a character totally created for my benefit. I learned about the three stages of a codependent / narcissistic relationship.

Idealize. Devalue. Discard.

I learned that they will never work on the relationship. They live behind a mask and use the mask to coverup a deep seated sense of inadequacy and self loathing. And worse of all, her condition is deemed to be incurable. She will never get well. There is nothing I could have done to save her. We were doomed from the start.

Narcissists are expert at destroying the self esteem of anyone who falls under their spell. I became addicted to her during the Idealization phase, when I believed I had found my soul mate, the person I would spend the rest of my life with. We were so amazingly compatible.

I had to realize after the breakup and a lot of work on myself that I didn’t miss her, I missed me and how I felt when I was with her.

Because a narcissist never believes that have any faults. In 6 years, she never once said “I’m sorry. I was wrong. Will you forgive me?”. I am quite certain to this day, 8 years later, she would still say I was the one totally responsible for the failure of the relationship. She was perfect. I was the cheater and the liar. As I said at the beginning, I will own my 50%. She will never own any part of her half of the responsibility.

So, Mannie, how could I not forgive her? She never thought as I child “When I grow up, I want to be a narcissist”.

Forgiving myself took a lot longer. By being such a co-dependent, having no boundaries, putting her needs ahead of my own, never being able to say “No" and not recognizing all the red flags at the beginning, I was not understanding enough at the end to help her, if that was even possible.

She isn’t the worst narcissist. I have read of much worse behavior. Narcissists are usually men and their victims are usually women.

I have been single now for 8 years. I have not been in a romantic relationship in that entire time. I am sure it is partly my reluctance to open myself to that level of possible pain again that keeps me alone. One great thing about aging is the hormone levels drop. I don’t have the same urgent need to be with someone that I experienced in my 20’s.

And to be honest if I could slice off the narcissistic part, my ex was an amazing woman. She spoke three languages and she was my ideal body type. I thought she was really beautiful. Just being seen with her felt so good. Our friends though we made a cute couple. She was smart, educated, independent, and well traveled. She was a self taught florist and interior decorator. She was a great cook and had an amazing sense of fashion style. And it seemed we liked so many of the same things. Music, food, travel, film, wine. But this is all external stuff and learned skills. Still, I was proud of her.

Who she really is under the mask remains a mystery. One that will forever remain unsolved. And I think I know her better than any other human on the planet including her mother.

I have learned that while I am not perfect, I am good enough. I am fortunate to have some good friends of both genders, but I am closer to women than men.

Maybe I’ll meet a compatible romantic partner or maybe my ex’s prediction that I will die alone will be my destiny. All I can do is live my life one day at a time. I am retired. I am able to live well outside the US without working. I expect to be able to afford to travel anywhere starting in three more months. The plan is 4 one-month vacations a year.

I am more than anything grateful for what I do have and not what I don’t. I still would never trade those 6 years despite how badly it crashed and burned at the end.