Let's Talk About Narcissistic Abusers

   When you think you are trying to be vigilant against most abuse, it pops rights up before you. Recently, my best friend (I will call Tom) and his girlfriend (I will call Cassie) gaslighted me. I have known them for years, him being longer with getting to know her after they got together. I thought I had a great friendship with them, doing what regular friends do. I had met Tom through my abusive ex (who I call Bully), and when all of those things with Bully went down, Tom ended things with Bully, and Tom and I became allies. We also dated for a couple of months, and both realized we were better off as friends.  Cassie was an ex-girlfriend of Bully too, so we had something in common and an understanding. For 12 years,  Tom and Cassie have been a couple, and we all have shared many things, and our kids played together, etc. Unfortunately, we argued last year, and Cassie and I didn't talk for a few months. I missed her very much, and then I made the move of rekindling the frien

       If I were to tell you that I fall apart inside every day while I look happy, would you believe me? It was a question that I wanted to ask people who thought I was with a very good man who appeared to have an okay life. I was a victim of child abuse until I moved out of my parents' house at 19. Five boyfriends from age 20 to 45 were all Hell. All of them were abusive, each of them having a different method. Unfortunately, my children paid the price for the choices I made. I had no idea my decisions were being taken from me by the bullies with emotional, verbal, sexual, and physical abuse. In my early 30s, I became educated on generational abuse. The bully I lived with made me believe he was correct on disciplining the children (he was probably a victim too), that I became passive and should've stopped him. I swore I would never hit my kids or say mean things to them as a child. When he was disciplining the children, I had a flight or fright issue stuck on fright.      

       Gaslighting . For all its intent and purpose is one of those things that somehow get unchecked and somehow gives you a sense of "What just happened here?". The gaslighters love to tell you what they want you to believe and may even argue with you so that you may lose track of what is said to you. When I started dating "The Bully," he knew I got away from an abusive relationship before him, so he sensed a vulnerability in me. He knew he could use this vulnerability against me to question how I felt about the last relationship and (honestly, I still should've worked on myself) if it was something I did or didn't do. I told him I didn't do anything to cause the last boyfriend to hurt me, but that only made him dive deeper to get more information to use against me. I started trusting his thoughts on  my  feelings without realizing that he was trying to control my mind. I've never heard of the term gaslighting for eight years, only to look back and

       After being punched in the head, slapped in the face so hard the opposite ear bled, and countless times my confidence kept getting wasted away, I suddenly realized I was afraid to do the things I used to do before those relationships. I also feel I am in a state of flux with myself being on the defensive about almost anything. While I am in these relationships and during the healing phase (which has lasted years for me), I have made some of the worst decisions of my life with rebound relationships and moving residences. "Why do you stay?" they ask, but they could never understand the whole dynamic of a toxic relationship and how that person can deceive you slowly over time, that you don't see it. For people in love, it can be an easy thing to forgive their transgressions. That's what love is, right?! When a toxic person has wronged their victim and wants forgiveness, they are so overly sly and sweet that "how could you not forgive them"? Over time you

       Mental health seems so hard to treat in the United States. I tried to get myself in psychotherapy about 15 years ago, but that blew up in my face. The insurance I had, which I paid $125 a week, did not cover these services. The sessions cost $190 a session. I also did not like the therapist very much. I felt she was using her own opinions about an action many people do and is widely accepted even as a therapy. Still, she told me people who practice it have mental illnesses, and there are serious issues. I thought it was pretty biased and that she should be more open-minded. I also figured I was wasting my money, and I needed my money because I'm a single mother. Kids are a different story. Kids are always covered 100% for these services until they are 19. Now, I can't get the help I need because I went through all this abuse. I feel I learned how to cope or push it aside to concentrate on my kids, but I rebounded 5 years after I left the last abusive relationship.