head vs. heart
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head vs. heart
| Mon, 10-20-2008 - 7:51pm |
I was married 18 years to an abusive, narcissitic, selfish man.
| Mon, 10-20-2008 - 7:51pm |
I was married 18 years to an abusive, narcissitic, selfish man.
HI there ready2explode,
You don't want to turn your heart off, you want to feel the pain and stay with it.
I know you think you want to hate your ex now, but hate takes up a lot of energy & it really does nothing to the person you are hating. It hurts you more. What you really want to gain is when you stop caring about your ex, not that you wouldn't care if something bad happened to him, but more like what he does has no effect on your life. My ex left me after 13 yrs of marriage & 2 kids. Our youngest was only a year old. There was no affair, no big arguments, so I really couldn't understand it. I was plenty angry at him at that time. I remember one big argument when he said that he left cause he wasn't happy and I said to him something like "well, it doesn't matter then whether our kids or I are happy, then, just as long as you are happy?"
But now it's like 12 yrs later. We both got remarried. It worked out better for him than me, since I'm now going thru 2nd divorce, but we are at the point when we can be friends. He recently had a party for 50th birthday of his brothers/sister, who are triplets, and invited me to the party at his house. Of course I have known all his relatives and was happy to see them. I could sit at a table w/ his wife and stepD and not care one way or the other. I actually think she's nice and am glad that the kids like her. It does take time to reach this point though.
Just keep reminding yourself how much better your life will be not having to live w/ the abuse, even if you never find someone else, you will be happier because you can do what you want and noone will be putting you down.
It takes time to turn off that feeling we have had for someone especially after so many years.
Emom13
I wanted to thank you, and everyone else who posted wonderful advice for me.