People Keep Asking What Woman Would Tolerate Being Mistreated by a Man

I’m sick of this question — people just don’t get narcissism

Ugh, if I read this comment one more time I will scream. There are many variations of it. But they all imply the same thing. And it’s not pretty for this particular woman and relationship columnist.

As a journalist, my work is published in multiple outlets.

Obviously, people don’t know me.

Unless they are regular readers, my story can be perplexing.

And lead to the same version of comments.

“What woman in her right mind would ever put up with a man like this?”

“What woman with any self-respect would allow herself to be mistreated?”

“Doesn’t this woman have problems if she tolerated this?”

“How could a woman stay with a man like this for so long?”

I get it, kind of.

If I was reading my life story I might say the same thing.

But you MUST understand narcissism to grasp why I tolerated it.

A narcissist has two emotionally polarizing sides.

Those of us who have loved and escaped a narcissist understand this. It seems impossible to understand if you haven’t been ensnared by a true narcissist.

My husband was the best guy in the whole world.

I mean everyone including me loved him.

It reminds me of a portion of a Henry Wadsworth Longfellow poem about a little girl with a curl.

“When she was good, she was very, very good. But when she was bad she was horrid.”

Most of the time my husband was very, very good.

He was charming and fun. As a covert narcissist, it was easier to hide his narcissistic personality disorder. He appeared to be a laid-back and a go-with-the-flow kind of guy.

My husband could be easy to get along with for months at a time.

Of course, I was also unknowingly keeping that peace.

I did my own thing. I took care of everything at home with our children, our bills, our properties, and everything else. I stayed in my own lane and I rarely veered into his.

This is why I stayed.

When things were good.

They were very, very good.

But back to that poem…

When my husband was bad he was horrid.

A diagnosed empathy-lacking narcissist would turn my life upside down for weeks at a time. He would make me cry until I had welts on my face. It wouldn’t phase him. He would walk right past me.

And then the narcissistic dust would settle.

Things would go back to normal.

Not because a narcissist resolved the conflict but because I would pick myself up and move on. A covert narcissist would go back to a seemingly low-key guy.

I continued to stay because my husband (a narcissist) confused me.

Most of the year, I could snuggle on a couch watching TV with that great guy.

I could laugh with him like no other.

He felt like my best friend and the love of my life. Until the horrid part (the true narcissist) came into play again. Until an otherwise wonderful man cut me to the quick and confused me over and over.

I rejected the horrid narcissist.

In favor of the very, very good narcissist.

I saw the best in a man, in my husband, in a narcissist.

I didn’t lack self-respect. I wasn’t weak. I wasn’t insecure. I wasn’t a shrinking violet. I wasn’t a doormat.

I was an indescribably confused woman.

Narcissism wasn’t a term that I had ever heard. I didn’t understand what a lack of empathy meant. I didn’t know that two wildly different personalities could reside within one person. I had never known anyone with a personality disorder.

It took a marriage counselor who was a psychologist to educate me.

It took an empathy-lacking narcissistic personality disorder diagnosis.

These are the things that curbed a cycle of confusion.

This is what made a woman realize she wasn’t married to a great guy she insisted on seeing the best in. She was married to a man with a terrifying narcissistic personality disorder on the severe end of the spectrum.

Had I known this earlier, my choices would have been wildly different.

I wouldn’t have gone back to my husband after leaving him the first time.

I wouldn’t have given a narcissist…

a second, third, fourth, fifth, sixth, and so on chance.

I don’t identify as an abused woman. I left an abusive man. He doesn’t define me. His behavior does not attach itself to me.

It was the better parts of me that made me stay.

I cared too much. I thought the best of him. I was as happy and content and easygoing as he was difficult. I’ve spent years in counseling and research learning about myself and why I made the choices I made to stay with my husband.

I’ve learned from my mistakes.

I lacked self-protective instincts and boundaries.

But I was never a woman who lacked strength or self-respect.