When Your Narcissist Ex Won’t Leave You Alone – Lee’s Story

Betrayal Trauma Recovery - BTR.ORG

If you’re exhausted and terrified because your narcissist ex won’t leave you alone, you’ll relate to this. Anne prayed for years, and her prayer was answered.

She developed the strategies she now teaches in The BTR.ORG Living Free and Message Workshops. Lee came on the podcast to share how these strategies worked for her too.

Transcript: When Your Narcissist Ex Won’t Leave You Alone

Anne: A member of the BTR community, we’re going to call her Lee, is on today’s episode. She’s going to be sharing her story. And then also how she implemented the strategies in the Living Free and Message Workshops.

Welcome Lee.

Lee: Hi, thanks for having me.

Anne: Many women in this situation go through years and years of emotional abuse and psychological abuse and they don’t even realize it. So let’s talk about your experience. You married really young. In the beginning did you realize it was abuse?

Lee: No, I did not. Not until pretty much in my mid 30’s. I got married at 19 and we were really young. so I thought it was just a maturity thing and that eventually we’d get past that. There was also addiction and again I thought that was a just a thing. That we would be able to at some point get over once we grew up.

Struggles with Addiction and Abuse

Anne: What were some of the things that he was choosing?

Lee: He really struggled throughout our entire marriage with pornography. Unfortunately, it just became a bigger and bigger problem. There was always pornography in our home. I think I just became immune to that part of it. So I thought, Oh, as soon as we grew up, he’ll stop drinking and the pornography will go away.

Anne: A lot of victims have that feeling. Like okay, once he can get this pornography thing under control, then he’s not going to act like this anymore. That’s hard to recognize. That all of these behaviors are abusive. They’re not going to get better. What do you think was the biggest contributing factor to not recognize it was abuse throughout those years?

https://youtu.be/LtCyxLBIxJY

The Role of Comparison in Recognizing Abuse

Lee: Comparison, and I feel like so many women do this, and this is something that I am so glad we get to talk about today, because I’ve been thinking a lot about it as I hear different stories from friends and family members.

Just the idea that someone else’s situation is worse than yours. Or your life isn’t that bad because you have a nicer home, or my life isn’t that bad because he doesn’t say this to me. Or he comes home at a decent hour. Hearing other people’s stories and finding one thing that might have been better in my life than someone else’s. It made me assume that it was still okay to stay in that relationship.

Anne: That makes sense to me. What were the things that you thought were better?

An Abuser’s Manipulation Often Looks Like Emotion When Your Narcissist Ex Won’t Leave You Alone

Anne: What are the things you are proud of?

Lee: It’s crazy because you don’t see the things that are in your relationship at that time. He might have done the dishes one night. And I took that one night and pulled it along for everything else. He never cussed me out or called me a name. Even though he was really unsupportive, he was very generous with his time.

Anne: So, at times you’re thinking, well, he doesn’t scream at our kids, so he must be a good guy. Or he didn’t scream that one time, or the other night he was great, so I’m lucky. A lot of women don’t realize he’s abusive because they think, I’m so lucky. He’s such a great guy, that’s really common.

Lee: I also don’t think women realize how much effort and work they put in to make their spouse a good guy. And what I mean by that is. A lot of the things I was proud of were what I was doing, not him. I would make sure we were at family gatherings. And also made sure our kids looked good.

I made sure we were going to church on time. And you know, all those things that were important to me. Things that I felt were essential to building a good family, I did. Instead of looking at how much work I was putting in I included him in that. I made it like it was his, like these were his accomplishments.

I think that that’s where my mind got a little bit skewed. Like we had a good family and I looked at it like that. But I didn’t realize that so much of it was my own work and wasn’t really his work.

Shame and Pressure to Stay

Anne: Yeah. A lot of women do that. They attribute characteristics to him that actually she has. That comparison is interesting because there’s always going to be someone who seems like they have it worse. So you think well all marriages must have problems. But the problems we have seem “manageable” or something like that. So here you are thinking these are just maturity things or that you’re so lucky in some ways.

Were there any other factors that kept you from seeing the abuse?

Lee: Shame. I married really young and a lot of people questioned that. Also I had family and friends both tell me I was too young. I felt the pressure to stay and keep it together. I think that’s why I kept it together and stayed a lot longer. And I didn’t want to admit to anybody that I failed.

Anne: You weren’t failing. You had a spouse that was failing, but it feels like that when you’re being emotionally abused. Because you think everything is your fault, right? Or that you’re responsible for everything . So that’s common as well.

Finding BTR Support When Your Narcissist Ex Won’t Leave You Alone

Lee: I had just a few friends that I would communicate with about it. The problem with those friends, even though they were a good outlet for a release. They didn’t really understand my situation because they didn’t have a spouse like that.

I mean, they knew it was bad, they felt sorry for me. I could feel that they understood it. They gave me the space to be able to talk to them, which I appreciate. But they just weren’t in the same situation. And a lot of times, the friends that I did communicate with had pretty decent marriages. It made me feel again, like I needed to be more like them. I needed to maybe not complain as much, you know?

Anne: Okay, so how do you recognize that it is abuse

Lee: I ended up in a Facebook group with one of the members of Betrayal Trauma Recovery, and she was very open about it, which I’m so grateful for. And I’m so grateful for women who are open about it. The group that we were in had actually nothing to do with this topic. She was just open and shared a lot of her personal life.

Again, I’m so grateful for that. And the BTR community, opened up a whole new world for me. I started to understand that everybody’s looks different. Even still then at the very beginning. I don’t think I was ready to let go of the idea of keeping my marriage together.

The Turning Point: Abusive Videos

Lee: Then it started to get really bad, my husband sent me some really abusive videos. Videos of him talking to me in a very violent and perverse way.

I didn’t know what to do. I finally sent them to the Betrayal Trauma Recovery Group. Within 10 minutes I had a whole group of women together supporting me and helping me through this.

Anne: With the support of the women in the BTR Group. Is this the moment you realized that woah, this is really serious?

Lee: I really believe that was the moment. It became very clear to me. I always felt like maybe I was being dramatic. So when someone actually got to witness it and said to me, this is not okay. Then they said, this is abusive. I realized that it was time, probably, to make a big change. I decide to start opening up and start talking a little bit more and sharing more of my experiences I wanted the BTR community to understand the magnitude.

Maintaining Strategy When Your Narcissist Ex Won’t Leave You Alone

Lee: It seems so big at the time and so scary. I worried about his reaction, my finances, and my kids. Also about this home we just rented together what would we do. We just got a new dog and there were so many things that I was worried about. I was scared. Each step was a step that I didn’t think I was capable of doing. And they told me I could. And so I kept taking that step.

Anne: What about your real life friends and family? What did they think?

Lee: I had left him seven different times before this time. I think family and the friends that I opened up to were hesitant to believe it this time too. They were excited, all of them were going to continually support me. This time would it stick because my narcissist ex won’t leave me alone.

Anne: Let’s talk about the first few months after you left. How did you get through that time?

Lee: So that was a really, really hard time for me. I would make fun of the the situation, by saying I lived in a house of depression. After work I would come home and lay on the couch. I watched the same movies over and over and over again every night. Lord of the Rings and Forrest Gump. I was just really sad and fearful and I didn’t know if I could really do it financially. It didn’t feel real to me because I had tried so many times

When Your Narcissist Ex Won’t Leave You Alone: The Power of Tender Mercies

Lee: While I was living in that house of depression, I didn’t really feel like I had a lot to live for. Then I bit into a delicious peach. I started looking for tender mercies. That’s what held me up along with the women from the Betrayal Trauma Recovery Group. Constantly looking for those tender mercies and finding those simple things. A lot of times it feels so dark. And we feel like we need something of a greater magnitude to take us out of that darkness.

Instead of looking for those little things, that speck of light almost. And I do want to share one significant tender mercy. It’s a night I came home exhausted. I just wanted a bowl of cereal and a clean spoon. Like I said before, I hadn’t really been keeping up with my housework. There’s probably a lot of dishes and I just wanted there to be that one clean spoon.

When I opened up the drawer, there was one last clean spoon. I just remember thinking, thank you. Because that’s all I needed was a bowl of cereal and a clean spoon. I feel like it’s so important for women to hang on to those little moments every single day. To try to find something in their life that is small but so significant.

Living Free Workshop Insights

Anne: Oh, I love that story in the Living Free Workshop. We have an exercise about this. We call it the best possible tasks And best possible moments.

Here you’re calling it a tender mercy. So that’s awesome because those little things. can really give us a feeling of peace.

There’s another part of Living Free, where we’re focusing on our dreams, and what we want. Was there anything that you decided, Hey. I have a goal and I’m going to accomplish it.

Pursuing Personal Goals When Your Narcissist Ex Won’t Leave You Alone

Lee: I’ve had so many, but the one biggest one, this is crazy, I painted my piano pink.

In my relationship, I was always told that I couldn’t do anything, I would always want to do these projects. And he was a carpenter and he would always tell me that they were too hard. If I explained to him what I was going to do, he would tell me it wouldn’t turn out right.

He was always saying that it would look like garbage. So I was scared to do anything. I started painting this piano, I thought it was going to look like garbage. Because that’s what I had been told that anything I did was going to look like. And it is so beautiful.

I love that piano and it turned out so good and I moved into a permanent home this year, too. I want to remodel and do a little interior decorating that I’ve never gotten to do either, really. To really learn how to play that piano that I just finished painting and then set better boundaries for myself. I’m trying to work on boundaries. Then just strengthen my faith in my home and in myself, continue on with that.

Advice for Women in Similar Situations

Anne: Do you have any advice for women who might have the same fears that you did?

Lee: Yeah, you need to find support. Betrayal Trauma Recovery is a great group for that. And I know I’m on this podcast. I want everyone to know I’m not pitching this because I’m on here. It changed my life, being a part of that group. I do not think I would be able to get out of my situation without their support. And that support hasn’t ended. That support continues on and it just keeps growing.

I haven’t ended those relationships, I’ve only grown and extended those relationships. As my situation changes, I just meet new people and new women and new friendships. That I’ve created in that group. The other thing is what we talked about in the beginning, and that’s don’t compare your situation to someone else’s.

The Harm of Comparison

Lee: That is so important and something that I wish all women would stop doing. I don’t think women recognize when it really, truly is doing them so much harm. Women should not look at someone else and say their situation’s worse, and mine isn’t.

I would encourage women to look more at, is the behavior acceptable? Are they happy? Is what their husband is doing in line with their beliefs and standards? And if they’re not, that’s the problem. It doesn’t need to be someone else’s standards or beliefs. It’s what they’re comfortable with. I wish a lot more women would look at that.

Anne: Meaning I’m not okay with porn in my home, or I’m not okay with yelling, this is not acceptable for me in my home, and I don’t feel safe.

Lee: You also might find someone that says that pornography is okay. I had a lot of friends tell me that, like, why was I upset? Or, I had people tell me that it’s okay that he’s drinking, we’re having a good time, those kind of things.

Again, that put a lot of shame and guilt on me. Because I thought I was taking the fun out of our lives. Or, I thought there was something wrong with me that I thought that pornography was wrong, and maybe it was okay. Maybe it was beneficial to our relationship.

Setting Personal Standards When Your Narcissist Ex Won’t Leave You Alone

Anne: Having the confidence , to think other people might feel differently, but this is my home. This is my life. I deserve to feel safe. I want to be able to live a life that is consistent with my own values.

Lee: Yes, absolutely. I really wish I would have looked at those and told myself I wasn’t willing to accept that or put up with it. Now I’m going to be 35 and I know that there are so many things that I’m just not willing to put up with. Even though someone might tell me that they’re not significant enough or they’re not really a problem, I will go by my own standards.

That’s something that I’ve learned and would like to tell my younger self. Hey, don’t go by the world’s standards, I would go by my standards.

Anne: Even some women don’t go by, maybe, your church’s standards. What I mean by that is, people who might say, well, you just need to love and serve and then everything will be okay. Don’t judge or something. Those types of things that an external church or a therapist or somebody might put on you. To be like, no, tolerate this for some reason, or be patient with it for some reason. I deserve to feel safe in my own home.

The Rock in the Shoe Analogy

Lee: What you’re comfortable with, right? It’s what you’re comfortable with. Would you be comfortable with a rock in your shoe? And would you continue to walk with a rock in your shoe? Or would you remove that shoe and take out that rock? Even if someone said, you could walk a little bit longer, it’s okay. No, you’re uncomfortable with that rock in that shoe. You would take the time to sit down, and take off that shoe and take out that rock.

Anne: If someone said but don’t you feel bad for the rock? What’s the rock gonna do? How is that rock gonna get around without you? You can be like, the rock can do whatever it wants. It’s not going to be in my shoe. It’s an adult rock. It can handle it. Me taking it out has nothing to do with the rock. Whatever helps women to be like, I can do this, is what works. It’s different for everyone.

Gratitude for the BTR Community

Lee: I just want to say, because I know they’re gonna listen to this, to all my Betrayal Trauma Recovery women. That helped me through this, and the ones that I’m gonna meet in the future. I am so grateful for each and every single one of you. I really don’t think I could be where I am. And I don’t think I could be going where I’m going without their continual support. So I’m so grateful.

Anne: Have you found that being away from him has enabled you to grow stronger?

Lee: Absolutely. It has made me recognize it more, too. I actually have been dealing a lot with anger lately, as well. There’s those five or seven, grief cycles. I am in the cycle of anger. The anger for me is a protection. It’s like a shield. The problem with showing anger to an abuser is, it gets them the same amount of attention they’re seeking.

Anne: They’re not looking for peace. When peace becomes your absolute top priority.

Implementing Strategies for Peace When Your Narcissist Ex Won’t Leave You Alone

Anne: Many women start using the strategies and the BTR Living Free Workshop and the BTR Message Workshop. So you were really interested in implementing strategies to get some peace in your life. First of all, let’s talk about what your concerns were.

Lee: A lot of the women in the group I know experienced some alterations of reality. Because of the situations that their husbands have put them in. They like to twist your thoughts. I lived in that false reality. Anytime I had concerns where I knew something was real. He would alter my reality, confuse me and just convince me.

That what I was thinking was completely illogical or not accurate. As I went through my divorce he continued to do this, to manipulate things. I kept thinking my narcissist ex won’t leave me alone. He continued to tell me that I said what I never said. Or things that I did say he would say I never said.

That was really difficult to live like that. Always questioning my own reality and not knowing if what I was thinking was actually real. It was very confusing.

Documenting Abuse and Gaslighting When Your Narcissist Ex Won’t Leave You Alone

Lee: So, why I wanted to go into this is because I needed documentation of what I was saying and what he was saying. So I could trust myself almost more. And trust that what I knew to be true was truth and I had that evidence in writing.

Anne: So you have this evidence that he’s gaslighting you, emotionally and psychologically abusing you. You have this evidence that he’s trying to alter your reality. You’re thinking, I can’t communicate with him in any way, shape or form without him lying to me. Without him twisting the truth, without things going sideways.

Lee: Yeah, without crazy making because that’s what it was.

Anne: What were your concerns ? You’re thinking oh that would be amazing if I could stop interacting with him, but I’m scared it won’t work. Because what were the things at the beginning before you decided? Hey, I’m gonna try this out that held you back from even considering it at first.

Lee: When I tried to implement a little bit of this in the past, he said he was computer illiterate. Or he didn’t really know how to use technology.

The second was that he would use it to not communicate certain things about the children. While they were with him. Again, it would fall back onto, oh I was computer illiterate. So I forgot to tell you that I was going to drop them off later. Whether maybe not telling me that the kids were uncomfortable and wanted to come home. He would use it as an excuse to say oh, sorry couldn’t communicate with you.

I think that was my biggest fear was with the children. That if there was an emergency, how would we contact each other?

Overcoming Fears and Taking Action When Your Narcissist Ex Won’t Leave You Alone

Anne: You were like, I really want to do this, but it just seems impossible. And I remember talking to you on the phone. And I said, the first step is believing that it’s possible. To know that you can. And then you just have to figure out the how. How did that change in mindset from, I don’t know, I can’t do this. How did that change of mindset help you to start actually looking for solutions?

Lee: How that helped me is I took away the impossibility of it and thought I need to do this. It wasn’t even that I can or can’t do it. I needed to do it. For my own sanity. I had to start implementing this. Otherwise, I just knew that this was going to be a constant cycle and a constant battle. I was going to constantly be questioning my own reality and I would just stay stuck in that cycle of his manipulation and abuse. So it just came to the point where there was no option. There was no choice. I had to do it.

Anne: So when you decide, now I know I’m doing this. Now I’m in the problem solving, how do I do it phase? What were the first things that you needed to consider before implementing it?

Lee: One of the first things that I needed to consider was. In case of an emergency, if something happened while the kids were in his care or my care. How would we communicate to each other? And I thought of a plan immediately. It wasn’t even that hard.

Connection Broken: When Your Narcissist Ex Won’t Leave You Alone

Lee: All of a sudden it was fixed. I think that was my biggest hurdle. If I were to be honest with myself I think it was losing that connection with him. Even though I was going through this divorce process. Even though I was so badly hurt for so many years by him. There was still a connection that I had to him, losing that was somewhat painful for me.

I sold a car and even that had a connection to him that was painful for me to let go of in a weird way. The reality sank in. That can go two ways when that reality sets in. No hope of it getting better. That can lead to wanting to run back to that bad situation. That could lead to growth.

Implementing Strategy When Your Narcissist Ex Won’t Leave You Alone

Anne: So you decided to implement the strategies I was teaching at the time. The ones that are in the Living Free and Message Workshops. Can you talk about that moment?

Lee: There was a pivotal moment where I knew I needed to do that. One catastrophic day my son had actually had a confrontation with him and I went to pick him up. We had an altercation outside of his family’s house. He did end up getting a little bit physical. Later on that evening, he took my daughters. And told them he was dropping them off in the middle of nowhere.

When I came to pick up my son, I talked to him and I rolled down my window just a little bit. He was able to reach in the car and take my phone. During our marriage he was really obsessed with my phone too. He would wake me up in the middle of the night to go through my phone and keep me up all hours. He was really obsessive about it. And so it didn’t surprise me that he went for my phone again.

When I got out of the car to grab it from him, he started smacking me. Telling me to get away. Eventually, I gave up and thought, you know what, this isn’t worth it. I’m gonna walk away, and he threw the phone after that. It was after that day that I thought, you know what? I cannot live in this anymore.

Do Restraining Order and Communication Boundaries Work When Your Narcissist Ex Won’t Leave You Alone?

Lee: So, that’s when I implemented what you had encouraged me to do. But I don’t know if you remember during that conversation. The other thing that you encouraged me to do, which was to get a restraining order. Finally I get that implemented and these two things came together.

Anne: Let’s talk about some common myths with the Message Workshop tools. You were concerned that he wouldn’t participate.

I had a smile on my face when you said this, because they can’t not participate. If you block them on your phone, there’s nothing they can do about it. They can’t call you. They could call you from another number. But if you have a boundary for yourself that you never answer the phone, if it’s an unknown caller. You just wait for them to leave a message. If you block them on your email and delete your social media accounts. There’s nothing they can do about that.

Lee: How the protective order works here in Arizona is once they grant you that protective order. They send it to the sheriff’s department. It just automatically goes out. So it takes away you having to sit there debating should I, or shouldn’t I. Once it’s done, it’s done.

During that time, I was able to notify him that we would no longer be communicating verbally. Everything would go through email and he did put up a fight. This was through texts and he did put up a fight and say, that’s not going to work. I don’t do good with electronics. Now we’ve been doing this since June. He can email just fine. He is not computer illiterate and is perfectly capable.

My Narcissist Ex Won’t Leave Me Alone – It’s Driving Me Crazy

Lee: Again, it goes back to him altering my reality or confusing me or making me believe something that’s not true. He had convinced me that he doesn’t understand, he’s not good with electronics. And that was part of my hesitation, was him convincing me he couldn’t do this. So there was no way. Like, how was I going to be able to communicate with him? When he didn’t know how to really write an email, which is what he told me.

And it ended up being not true. So, again, it goes back to that crazy making, and me questioning myself. And is this possible, based off of his lies. So he can’t call me and can’t text me. And isn’t supposed to be within a certain feet of me. He can only email me.

If he needs to contact the kids, they have their own separate phones, so he is able to communicate with them. But if he has any specific questions for me, or we’re making plans, it all has to go through email.

Women Grieve The Abuser and The “Relationship” When Your Narcissist Ex Won’t Leave You Alone

Anne: And how have those been? Have they been gaslighting?

Lee: This is something interesting. Most people think if you go through email, it takes away all the manipulative communication. But it actually doesn’t. You have to still be very aware and very careful.

Anne: Yeah, that’s why learning the BTR Message Workshop tools is so important.

Lee: In the beginning, they were very emotionally filled. Both of us trying to express our hurt and our pain.

Anne: I don’t think he was really trying to express his hurt and his pain. As much as he was manipulating your emotions.

Lee: Oh, of course, yes. And in me, I was trying to express hurt and pain and it just didn’t work. Now I try to answer everything with what you taught. They are great to use when my narcissist ex won’t leave me alone.

That’s it. No more than that. I have been doing that for a while now. There’ve been two times recently where I have gone out of my way to email him. And to address things that are not appropriate to address anymore. After that, I knew I made a mistake and then I got back on course.

I do not need to go into these pages of explanations or reasonings or even comforting him. I just need to respond very simply. Another thing you taught that I love is the broken record.

The Broken Record Technique: A Strategy For When Your Narcissist Ex Won’t Leave You Alone

Lee: One of the things is right now he’s on supervised visitation and he keeps asking me to pick up the kids. I have one line that I say to that, I’m sorry, you can’t do that right now. Then he’ll say something like, well, it would just be easier and nobody else has time to pick them up today. And I just say, I’m sorry, but you can’t do that right now. He might come back with something else. I just keep repeating it until finally he’s exhausted and doesn’t even ask.

And it’s just that you pick a line, you stick with that line. And every single time they come at you, you use the same line over and over again. Until finally they run out of questions. They run out of things to say, and they’re exhausted.

Anne: Yeah. That’s why the tools in the BTR Message Workshop are specific lines, statements to write over and over. The message workshop clearly explains why and how to use them with real life examples from real messages. From women like you who have applied it. Anything you see now that “shows” he can communicate as a good person is grooming and manipulation. This and a lot of other strategies can apply when your narcissist ex won’t leave you alone.

Lee: There still is a big part of me that hopes that he is a good person. But like what you’re saying, there is trickery to it. Yeah, I always tell people. I can’t really give him anything because he is a give an inch take a mile kind of a guy.

When Your Narcissist Ex Won’t Leave You Alone – Freedom from Phone Calls

Anne: How has it felt to be free of his phone calls?

Lee: So good, I don’t have that pit in my stomach anymore when I see his name. My phone isn’t something to fear anymore. I’m not sitting there wondering if he’s sent me a text message on my phone. Now I can go to my phone and it’s not a place of worry. The other thing is so much comfort in knowing the things that I say and the things that he says. Also being able to go back and know that my reality and what I know is true.

I have that evidence now, and that is such a gift for me because I really do struggle with that still. Even outside of our marriage, I really do struggle with confidence in myself and trusting myself still. Because of 15 years of somebody questioning my truth or making me question my truth.

Lee: Now. Again, it’s that rebuild. I’m rebuilding that trust in myself and knowing that what I’m saying is truth because I have proof.

When Your Narcissist Ex Won’t Leave You Alone – BTR Message Workshop Strategies Can Help

Anne: So, if you’re interested in using the strategies in the Message Workshop to eliminate that fear and worry from having to communicate. And have the proof that Lee is talking about. These concepts will work for women in any situation, even if you’re still married.

We describe it when a protective order is in place, but you don’t need a protective order to implement them. You don’t have to be separated. Maybe you’re co-parenting, you can just know the concepts. and then use them in whatever way works for you.

When Your Narcissist Ex Won’t Leave You Alone, Use The Living Free Workshop

Anne: If your narcissist ex won’t leave you alone, the BTR Message Workshop builds on the strategies you learn in the Living Free Workshop. So, enroll in the Living Free Workshop first.

So you can get those foundational strategies. The Living Free Workshop uses an amazing workbook. If you want to you can dig really deep level and process things. Some women don’t even use the workbook the first time through, or they never use it. They just run through all the videos super fast and they don’t even answer the questions below the videos.

There’s no right or wrong way to do it. And once you’re done with the Living Free lessons. Whether you’ve busted through it without doing any of the exercises or questions. Or whether you’ve processed it on a deep level, either way, the message workshop will be available to you. Because you will have an overview of the Living Free strategies.