their pets

Lots of single men tend to have pets. My former Narc boss had cats;they loved him, he loved them. I had an openly gay professor who not only had a cute Asian boyfriend, but a pair of cute little terriers. The ex-Psych professor, on the other hand, had ZERO pets. He didn't even have fish or reptiles. He always seemed jealous of the way animals took to me, such as a cute dog that followed me all the way back to campus, and the family pets I talked about. In an unguarded moment, the ex-P said that animals feared him. It was too freaky to be one of his lies. One of my classmates observed that yes, of course, animals were afraid of the ex-P because he was a predator. Narcissists and animals tend to get along well together. My Narc grandmother AND my former Narc boss have great relationships with their cats, and dote on them. But Psychopaths are entirely different.

When we were together I had a dog. It turns out that after he D&D me he got almost the exact same dog. Can I say that the breed I had was not common. Does anyone else think that is weird? To my knowledge he had never had a dog like that growing up. When I found this out it stopped me dead in my tracks. He is good with animals which is bizarre given his cold nature.

oh...he though i was his pet....he went taking me around telling people that I was his pet following him around.....haha. At times he assumed i was his slave too...

I don't know if it matches someone else's experience, but in my experience they care much more for their pets than for human beings in general.

we had a cat together. This is hard to write as I had to have her euthanized recently. Julie was in my life for about 12 years. He was the one who begged to get her. But then she bonded with me and I was the one to take care of her. Just like a little boy. Wanted a pet, but didn't want the responsibility of taking care of it. When we broke up, I took her with me, I didn't even ask him if he wanted her. She was my cat. She thought of me as Mommy because I did everything for her, from day one. He bitched to others about how "she even took MY CAT!" He refered to the cat as his "daughter" (they will say some crazy shit, won't they!?) Bullshit. He coulnd't care less about the cat.

mine never had any. he knew i adored my cats and missed them terribly. i had to leave them back at my parents house, but at least they were well taken care of...frankly, i wouldnt have felt safe with them there with him. He didnt understand why I was infuriated and repulsed with his mother - she dropped off his 4 year old cousin's 11 year old pet cat at a high kill shelter one day without saying a word to anyone, after I had offered to take the cat if she didn't want to care for it..that way his little cousin could still come visit her kitty. Her reasoning? "He was meowing all night and I couldnt sleep". Cold hearted bitch. I offered to take care of the cat, and she would rather nearly guarantee it be put to sleep and a child who has already been abandoned by their narc mother (his aunt is a real piece of work) would have her pet cat taken from her too. That entire family is sick. He claimed he 'didnt like animals'. I suspect it was largely a control thing - having my cats would have been a great comfort to me.. can't have that. amusingly when i finally left him, one of the first things he offered when begging me to come back was a dog or cat. doesn't work that way, buddy.

I think this is a really interesting point. I take it now that the 'animal lover' part of my husband was more of his propaganda. That is, it communicates to some degree that he is a nice, caring person. We know different now! The pets were kind of tools if you like. In the same way, he made a great effort to appear to be 'good with kids'. Someone posted a question recently about Ns wanting kids. I see it as part of the same pitch. I fell for it and I know alot of other people did and do too. What a nice man! Isn't he great with kids (and animals), he must be just lovely. Pure propaganda and image management. To fill you in, I got my husband a cat after his previous cat, his 'best friend' that he had with his previous victim, died. Only later did my sister in law tell me that she nearly had to take the cat away from him because he wasn't looking after it properly. Some animal lover. At times when I was with him, he would kick the cat down the stairs because she'd be too vocal asking for food in the morning. He thought this was funny. Why not just feed the cat? He was very possessive over the cat so I barely got to make a relationship with her. He would put the cat between us in bed and give her love first, always letting me know I was firmly at the bottom of the pecking order. More manipulations. I had a pet rabbit who I was devoted to. I think he was jealous of this. Later on my husband convinced me against my better judgement to get another rabbit. Looking back I wonder if this wasn't to 'seperate' me from the original rabbit. When the rabbits didn't get on and fought and the new one nearly had to go back to the farm I was distraught. He thought I was being ridiculous. Eventually, luckily the rabbits got on and my husband would take great joy in asking me if I 'missed' the original rabbit now she had a partner. Nice. As we did not have children, my husband used the animals as pawns as he would have done the children if we'd had them, particularly when we split up. The hardest thing for me when I left was to leave them behind. Like walking away from your children really. I remember the cat had been frightened of him when he came barging in to a neighbour's house to find me. She wouldn't go near him. Once I had left I had to cancel bills or put them into my husband's name. I had to cancel the car insurance because the policy could not be transferred (it was also dodgy and in my name so I wanted rid). Of course he was very angry about this and told me I was effing up his life. A few days later I had a missed call from him. I instinctively knew this would be his retribution. I rang back and he calmly told me the (original) rabbit was dead. He span me some heroic line about rushing her to the vet etc etc. I spoke to the vet and it became clear that she had been seriously ill for some days and by the time he took her it was too late. I spoke to the neighbour and she said he'd come rushing to her house 10 mins after the rabbit died saying, 'I don't want anyone to think it was neglect'. In other words he confessed to that exactly. He also said, 'Oh well, she (the rabbit) always was my nemesis'. Right. Now he's not stupid enough to nail her to the back door by her ears, and did everything necesary to make him 'appear' to do the right thing, but I think we all know different, don't we? The next time I took a stand against my husband he used the neighbour again (herself a very vulnerable woman) to communicate that the surviving rabbit had gone to stay at his new victim's house. That was how I found out he was with this new woman, notably the woman that he'd used as his reserve for the past few years. Using the rabbit as a pawn again. When I questioned why the rabbit had to go there when the new woman was coming to our house every day to see to the cat, he again, very quickly and convincingly, span me another line to cover his real motivations. Except I heard the millisecond pause while he conjured up his latest BS. I can hear hit now, clear as a bell. The only reason the rabbit went there was to 1. punish me for taking a stand, and 2. communicate that I'd been replaced, as expected, within 6 weeks of my leaving. No great surprise. Everything these 'creatures' do is part of their manipulation, part of their scheme to make you think they are something they are not. Everything they do has an ulterior motive and a purpose. But when you really start to look at their behaviour and not listen to what they tell you, you'll quickly see the real deal. Cruel and unnecessary. *** Living well is the best revenge ***

My ex was never a dog lover until he met me...i had a weinerdog who looooved me...he couldn't stand it,so he started taking him to work with him everyday(he owns a tree service),imagine the attention he got with a miniature little red weinerdog..he would always say,remember what a lttle asshole your dog was until i taught him how to love....then we got a wirehaired little weiner...he disgarded red weiner(oscar)left him home and started taking wirehair puppy(jackie)..people ate it up..anyway,jackie woke up newyears day paralyzed at 5yrs old..we were devastated,he was admitted to vet hospital,had disc splinter cleaned out of back,was in hospital for 5day,N,would go every morning and every night,laying next to him crying..the vet techs had never seen anything like it..i'd never seen him cry like that...anyway,Jackie gets a set of wheels cuz hes now paralyzed and N is the hit of the town with his weiner on wheels...he eats it up...on top of the wheels,Jackie had to have his bladder manually emptied up to 8times a day which he or i did religiously.....fast forward 2yrs,N was backing out of driveway,i had just run inside and i hear a blood curdling scream....i thought our daughter had fallen out of his truck,i ran to the door and N is standing w jackie in his arms..bloody,and looking at me..saying oh my God,oh my god,....he ran to the truck and said he was driving to vet,i knew jackie was dying....i was hysterical..N returns a minute later with jackie..falls to his knees holding his dead 'boy'....he went in the backyard and buried jackie......that was the only true emotion i had and have ever seen him show..EVER....just writing that made me cry my eyes out,reliving everything....i would wake up hearing N ,sobbing and wailing into his pillow saying why,why,why......and in the shower in the morning.he still says jackie was his only true friend..shit,that part right there just really got to me,telling this is sooooo hard...red weiner stopped eating,gave up on life(he was 17),he missed his brother...he was put down 3mos later...anyway,3mos after that,our best friend was killed in a tragic car accident and i didn't see N cry once........nothing........I have no explanation for any of this,just thought i'd share...

My ex N had a golden retriever when I met him. It was like a boy-and-his-dog. xN would take him to peoples' homes when they held parties. Yes the dog was part of our wedding. Dog's ashes were buried in my backyard. Guess who wanted them unearthed after the divorce? Guess who yelled at me in front of our daughter "You better have not tampered with Turbo! (the dog)" He wanted 'dog visitation" with the new dog after the divorce. The hate-filled emails I got were amazing! MY cats hid for YEARS! When he finally moved out, my cats have been so present & visual in my home. (Not hiding under the bed etc) odd

My exN had cats that he doted on. I never saw any cruelty whatsoever. But the thing you mentioned about how loving and affectionate he was to the pet and so cold and nonchalant to you when he got home is EXACTLY what my experience was to. My exN would even compete with me for the pets' attention. If they would come to me and give me attention and affection, he would do something to distract them and entice them to come to him instead. I always thought that was so weird. In fact, come to think of it, my exN was extremely competitive with me about everything. He never had my back - more like always finding a way to "one-up" me. But think about it. Animals can never figure them out and realize they're big fakers. The pets are TOTALLY dependent on the N and the N only gets love and attention from their pets. We, however, eventually start to show our disappointment when they can't keep up the perfect facade of their false selves. At least that's my take.