...monitoring the disorded one's web activity isn't what I would call NC. I was trying to empathize, believe it or not, with the fog that is present in the early stages of NC; the obsessive thoughts, like the one you started this thread about. No one, especially me, is trying to convince you of anything.
...There is a step called 'getting real' and I think that's all members were trying to convey; I believe we were trying to be helpful and not hurtful.
You seem content with what you know. That's good. Again, if you know what you know, no one will be able to convince you of anything.
I send the good vibes and wish you peace.
Sincerely (determined to stop) spinning
I was checking his web history back in Nov and Dec. I've been NC with him since this past weekend.
I left him 7 months ago and went NC totally until the web thing and then he emailed me back in Dec.
But this is not even the issue, I've stated over and over, I know he's a narc and is sick. All I said was "In my mind, he did show some true feelings"
And him looking or keeping FB pics may or may not have displayed that but really, this is all about trying to convince me he had no feelings.
I can list about 100 examples that he did have feelings.
But there is no point, you're all dead set that all narcs are the same
Let me ask you, how many of your narcs walked into AA and stopped drinking. How many of your narcs walked into a step group and told their deepest secrets?
How many of your narcs walked into a AA couples meeting and stood up to cry and told 100 people he was sick and needed help?
He did all of this on his own.
Yeah yeah, he was putting on a narc act? For whom?
Not me, No one sits in AA and group for 3 yrs 4 x a week as an act!
YES I KNOW MY EX IS SICK AND A NARC, but I also know he had some emotion!
I'm not fooling myself to believe I was special to him. It doesn't matter and once I left him 7 months ago, it still didn't matter
And why do I focus on him? Well there is a whole slew of blogs on here teaching how the mind of the narc works. I am trying to figure it out!
I focus because I am stil in the trying to understand the narc.
Man, some of you need to take in a few al anon meeting to learn to let go of the self righteousness!
This is like HS where all the girls gang up on the newcomer.
This mess of a thread should be locked! It's now counterprodutive!
Mine attended NA and AA meetings, went to church, the whole Shaa-bang! He even cried quite a bit over the HORRIBLE things he did to my children and I. He even went to a nine month rehab program. If it means they can secure some supply, if it means that they will get something out of it, they will do it. Maybe the most convenient thing for them to do was unavailable...so they will do something that they really don't want to do, such as attend rehab for nine months and years of NA meetings. If it means that I would stay with him, take care of him, provide constant supply and validation...he thought it was worth it. This is just my situation.
My Narc was from NA...I'm not convinced...
And some of his other "dyfunctional" buddies helped him enhance and justify his actions because of his disease...
Read The Orange Papers...
and a ton of other stuff that enables disordered behavior rather than getting to the root cause...
12 steps are great for initial detox and not all 12 steppers are disordered in this fashion...
But just like church...meetings are great places for supply, attention and validation as well...
It is up to the individual, so the fact that he's gone to meetings and has gotten cleaned up is an accomplishment and I am glad he's been able to kick it as a child of God...BUT...that doesn't mean he's still not addicted, disordered, a user or a manipulator...
In fact, mine was clean 18 years and was very "devoted" to his "program"
Michele just posted something that might be helpful to you.
What can we help you with? We want to help so I guess I'm wondering what it is that you are asking for guidance on? I would say a lot of us here have the same personality types and we are all very helpful women. That's what the narc is attraced to. We are all kind and loving and giving women just as they are all NPD. It has taken me a long time to come to grips regarding my narc. I was with him for 3 years and it's very hard. He left 2 weeks before Christmas and it's such a hard thing to overcome. The ups and downs are a killer. The emotions are everywhere and I post on here for the guidance I need. I hope you feel better.
Happy
To answer your question, most of them have gone to AA and12 step porograms, if you keep reading you will see they can not be help!
My friends husband is in the psych word seeking help as we speak!
But it appears you know better!
There is a Narc Manual...page ONE Chapter ONE
""Oh, I care for her so very much but we can't be together" gradually becomes "I did everything I could, but I just couldn't make her happy."
AND we knew this is classic B.S. and we fell for it anyway...
Getting to the WHY is on my personal list of things to figure out...
...the disordered one I was involved with actually said your 'what it becomes' line. I learned this in December from a mutual friend. The exact line he said was "I was doing everything, attending to her every need (while my family member was dying)...and I just couldn't seem to do enough."
Funny, though, he never clued me in on that one. He just disappeared; changed his phone number and left the area.
To Trulybroken, with these guys WHITE IS BLACK and BLACK IS WHITE. It does no good to try to FIGURE THEM OUT. Work on figuring out why you're still so involved with whatever it is he's doing and/or thinking. Shift the focus.
Making sense of these disordered individuals just isn't possible.
Sincerely (still trying hard to stop) spinning
Sorry sweets I hate to be brutal. I don't mean to be. I sounded just like you six months ago.
The narc left pics up of her and told me she was bipolar but that he had really loved her just like he really loved me the first time. I found her on fb she is in a relationship w someone else she looks content and happy and guess what the still has a pic up on classmates of the two of them looking like a couple. So yes he would leave your pics up
The narc has tons of pics of me and I bet you he looks at them daily and we have not spoken in almost five months
Sorry sweets I hate to be brutal. I don't mean to be. I sounded just like you six months ago.
The narc left pics up of her and told me she was bipolar but that he had really loved her just like he really loved me the first time. I found her on fb she is in a relationship w someone else she looks content and happy and guess what the still has a pic up on classmates of the two of them looking like a couple. So yes he would leave your pics up
I hate to say it sweets but I think you are deluding yourself and confusing attraction,control,curiosity and boredom for his feelings for you. I don't think those pics are there to tell women not to get too close I think its quite the contrary. I think they are there to illicit pity from other women and inviting them to come close. he will tell them that you were evil to him and that they are the only one who understands him
Not sure why the pics are still there, but I do believe he had feelings.
Maybe they were not loving feelings or feeling accompanied with emotion, but there is no way he was looking at our pics (vacation pics etc) over and over out of control.
No one but him knew he was looking at them
In either case, it doesn't matter if he had moments of clarity, I think deep down these people know they are truly damaged and live in this strange fake world.
Could be he was looking at the pic wishing he could be NORMAL! Who knows!
He was probably staring at your pictures, cause he was obsessed with the fact he lost your supply. They panic when they lose supply...they get depressed. They want to get it back. He was obsessing over you...
All these ladies are correct! What exactly do you want to hear? If you know the answer why ask for an opinion!
Please continue reading, you do not understand fully, what/who you are dealing with!
I wish more than you know that what all of us are telling you is a lie, it's not! These men are evil, sick disordered humans!
Hang in there Idealk
Please listen to SOI and Michele and at least CONSIDER what they're saying. For what it's worth, I think they've nailed it.
Just because he is the only one who knows he is looking at the pictures doesn't mean this isn't about control. I'm not sure how you're drawing that conclusion. This is basic obsessive behavior, a step away from cyber-stalking, if you ask me. Stalkers (and many of these guys have the tendency) don't need to announce to you or anyone that they're stalking. They get off on the CONTROL they feel by finding all sorts of way to keep (or feel like they're keeping) a foot in our life.
I understand that you want to believe that he had feelings for you. We all do/did. Keep reading and learning. I'd bet my last dollar that emotion has nothing to do with this.
Sick of it said:
they are there to illicit pity from other women and inviting them to come close. he will tell them that you were evil to him and that they are the only one who understands him
What you are having a hard time understanding and it is not meant to hurt you...is that for a Narc...the drive, the compulsion, the obsession lies in his need for control...those pics are a way for him to feel some form of domination...he "owns" you?...that's why he's looking at them obsessively...he's sick...
AND he will use those pics for other sick forms of manipulation as well...
It's not about YOU...he's sick...and actually your knowing he's been looking at them over and over would have me a little shaken...it's not about love or missing...it's a psychological disturbance.
It's not personal...you are lovable, you are special, you are beautiful and he was attracted to that - but not for the reasons that healthy people are attracted to those things...he was attracted to it to FEED off of you to get those things for himself...to FEED himself...and now he's on the quest for more supply...
This I can grasp. He is sick, this is very clear!
And it doesn't feed my ego to know he was looking at my pics over and over, At the time, I thought it was creepy!
When I saw how he was with his kids, nothing after that, I took personally!
He's always been about supply.
I was fooled into believing, that because he went to AA, stopped drinking cold turkey after 30 yrs and then went into a step group once I left. This showed me he was willing to change, but what woke me up really, was last weekends phone call and how he attacked me again.
My therapist said his rage and anger at me for leaving and making a new and amazing life, has instilled so much silent rage in him, he had to be mean and abusive with me on the phone.
The vets I know from AA, my therapist and my Al Anon group all tells me it will take him a full year to even begin to change once he starts the steps.
I have to give him credit, he did walk into AA on his own, stop drinking and went to step group and he goes 3 x a week.
HE wants to get help and better, he is just unaware of what he's trying to heal from!
Whatever, it's over now. I know that there is no chance even with all the helps he's getting.
I hate to say it sweets but I think you are deluding yourself and confusing attraction,control,curiosity and boredom for his feelings for you. I don't think those pics are there to tell women not to get too close I think its quite the contrary. I think they are there to illicit pity from other women and inviting them to come close. he will tell them that you were evil to him and that they are the only one who understands him
I must comment on this because it happened to me. Once the narc looked at my fb and saw pics of me and my family he posted a pic of himselfself with a girl and obviously they were together but he claimed she was his best friend. He had been telling all along about his evil ex but never disclosed that it was her. I finally put it together and called him on it. Of course I got some convulted sob story. So my point is the entire time that pic was up he was romancing me telling me how much he still loved me etc.
The pic was two fold. It gave him an appearance of normalcy and longevity in relationships plus he got to triangulate cause jealousy and pay me back so to speak for having made him see that I had moved on and was ble to have a normal happy life without him. I think it was my pics that made him set his sight on me as I believe he felt that my husband had taken something that belonged to him.
I hate to say but those pics have nothing to do with or him having feelings for you. I would almost guarantee they are there for someone elses benefit. Either in an effort to triangulate, ellicit pity or appear normal.
The pictures are trophies, exactly. The trophies of the prey you had been.
He has not been on singles sites? It looks obvious he is not so smart in the PC things...he does not even change a password.
He has been doing something different than that.
You know, a zebra never change its stripes. Do not fall for the BS.
The pictures are trophies.because they must win..so if you have left he still has your pic of the prey..this builds his sour confidence and ego
"In the fiery pit lays a man with two faces.One is the face of a God and the other a face of the Devil.Beware He lurks your souls.Keep one hand on your heart and the other hand over your eyes. Let him walk pass you not into you.Ghost of love will possess
Pics are probably the only proof he has that he, at one time, had a life that seemed to be "normal". However, they captured the image of what the life appeared to be, not the life itself, which was fake. The rest is about control, in my opinion.
Really, though, it doesn't matter and wasting your time thinking about trying to come up with an answer for everything is futile. Checking on these things will only drive you crazy and prompt you to try to find answers to very odd behaviors.
As of a couple months ago, mine still has a pic of me on his business website from 4 years ago and I haven't spoken to him in a meaningful way in over 18mos. WTF?! Don't know. Don't care.
Trying to figure out what he does, how he does it, why he does it is a complete waste of time/energy, he's not committing any crimes just let him be to be who he is and you work on being who you want to become, don't assume because he was on FB he wasn't with anyone, don't assume he did not go out to a party, with iPhone and android, I can do everything from my phone, arm my home alarm, start my vehicle, unlock my doors,FB,dating widgets and gadgets galore just by touching the screen.
You're still seeking something that you will never find...he's a liar and a cheater, they ALWAYS have supply, you don't need to know any of that anyway, just work on figuring out how to forget about him and moving on, best wishes!
Yes, I know he's a liar, but he didn't go to the party cause I had access to his on line history and he was home that entire night on line.
He doesn't have a cell that can access the net.
And I am sure he had a few other women, I meant it's odd that he would not worry about pics of his ex up if he was dating.
You're right, wondering why is futile! I'll never know!
Was just curious if this was a typical narc move
Look at me? Yeah maybe! I wonder, he's also SUPER secretive and he's been dating up a storm so I am sure he wouldn't want his new "sources" to see his ex on his FB!
He never came out and showed me pics of his ex's.
My only thought was he kept them because we still shared mutual friends and he prob wanted it to get back to me that he still had my pics up!
But don't narcs just want to get rid of everything?
I guess if they don't feel pain, why should they?
Hold on, Truly...
spinning
I was checking his web
Mine did...
Yea..
Trulybroken
To answer your question, most
If you want to know the mind
Kind or Honest? We are
The truth in how YOU see
I am convinced...
Michele, right on again...
spinning
Sorry sweets I hate to be
Sorry sweets I hate to be
I hate to say it sweets but I
Not sure why the pics are
He was probably staring at
TrulyBroken
Please listen to SOI and
As you read more this will make sense
This I can grasp. He is sick,
I hate to say it sweets but I
I must comment on this
I agree
The pictures are trophies,
The pictures are
"In the fiery pit lays a man with two faces.One is the face of a God and the other a face of the Devil.Beware He lurks your souls.Keep one hand on your heart and the other hand over your eyes. Let him walk pass you not into you.Ghost of love will possess
ThE photos
Pics are probably the only
Moving on....
stay~strong
Yes, I know he's a liar, but
Look at me? Yeah maybe! I