The Challenge of Recovery and Healing
by
Allie
The XNH has been gone for over 2 years now from my daughters and my life. There has been absolutely no contact for almost 4 months now. I had to stop the insanity of contact as it was progressing into the N patterns of the triangle. It was leaving me obsessed and depleted. I took the final steps in totally blocking XNH from every avenue and source of contact with me. My recovery and healing were being delayed because of having contact with XNH.
The challenge of recovery and healing has taken many twists and turns. Help has come from unexpected places and people. XNH's family is one of my biggest supporters. If you had told me this last year, it would have been LOL, as we had not had contact for a year and a half. Now they are closer than ever to my daughter and me. They have become my family. I have learned through this example that help does come when you need it and if you need it speak up and reach out your hand and you will be surprised who shows up to hold your hand and help you through it. I have learned how to be humble and set aside my pride.
My life and my daughters have totally changed. I would definitely say it was for the best. If you believe that what happened was actually very positive then it will be. I saw only negativity in XNH leaving but now I see that life is actually going to be great without him.
Our whole world crashed the day XNH walked out the door. He left us with so much debt that my daughters and my beloved house and home had to be sold. I fixed it up, crying all the while that I replaced kitchen cupboards, regrouted bathroom floors and walls, painted, cleaned, organized, packed, boxed up and threw out or gave away. At night the two of us would climb into my huge bed, turn on the TV, eat dinner, and cry some more. I would hold my daughter while she fell asleep crying. Then we would wake up to start the day all over again. I started having physical problems and could not perform at work. My daughter started having anxiety attacks. I had to take a leave from work. I finished the house and sold it.
My physical symptoms were increasing and getting worse. We moved secretly, silently because of his harassment and stalking, never telling a soul except for my family and my best friends who helped me pack and move. We live very close to them in a fantastic neighborhood in a very large and spacious apartment. I went back to work and deteriorated at a rapid pace physically. Within six months, I had to take a medical leave. It has taken me 2 years to receive diagnosis. They are multiple and as such, I probably will never work again at a full time career position. I had to accept the loss of my home and my career. I felt dead inside and outside. I felt like a zombie. I was barely functioning. However, the end was not near as there still was the divorce and custody to go through. XNH had no problem with the divorce but he fought over the sole custody issues. I did win sole custody giving my daughter the right to decide for herself what kind of contact she would have with him and when she would have contact with him. She has decided that it is no contact and she has instituted and maintained the no contact for almost two years.
I still had the challenge of recovery for not only myself but for my daughter who was 12 when XNH left. My daughter was my priority. I had to ensure that she was well on her way to her recovery before I could even think about mine. She had a father who has numerous disorders – NPD, OCD, Psychopathic, Depression, Seizures, Physical Illnesses (hypochondriac) – he is a mixed soup pot. She saw him going through life using everyone and everything to get what he needs and wants. She observed his behavior – false charm, empathy, caring will get the things you need to survive in life, whether it is financial security, stability or sucking the lifeblood out of everyone around you. My daughter was exhibiting these behaviors. We worked hard and with several doctors (medical and psychiatric) to overcome these behaviors. She is now on the right road and is becoming the person who she truly is meant to be. I am so proud of her. She is my shining star and my inspiration. She never gave up on me and I never gave up on her. We are closer now than ever. Therefore, once I saw that she was going to make it I started my own recovery and healing. This has only happened since September.
The beginning was hard - hard to accept, hard to let go, hard to believe and realize that the dream was dead, it was time to let go and admit that everything was make believe and a made up life. One by one I burst the bubbles and let the remains go up into the sky. I let the emotions and thoughts go. I let the illusion go because in order to have a life and not become a recluse all of that had to go. I still have days though few and far between now of thoughts of "how could a person be so cruel, cold, arrogant, indifferent, emotionless and mean to other people especially a child who loved them?" Even in my wildest dreams, I could not imagine a father turning so viciously against his beloved child the last 3 or 4 years he was with us. I never imagined for a minute that "he" was the problem and once he was removed from my life and my daughters that we would blossom and grow into the beautiful people we are. No more hiding in shadows or in dark places. No more playing dead. We laugh, we smile, and we talk to strangers about nothing at all. We do not bow our heads down anymore and shuffle our feet thinking we are what XNH said and implied we were. We have looked inside us and found out who we really are. We have sorted out the truth from the lies and manipulations that XNH contrived to brainwash and control us. We like what we have found and what we see.
I look at XNH now as a broken man, as a man that never was and will never be, emotionally and mentally ill beyond repair or hope, a man with so much hate, anger, rage and negativity within himself that he is incapable of joy, happiness, love, sorrow, grief, remorse, guilt. He is devoid of all human emotion. He is an empty shell. There is nothing inside. The only path for XNH is downhill. However, I am grateful that my daughter’s and my fate and destiny is not tangled anymore with XNH’s. He chose his road and he must walk it without us. If he finds others along the way to buy into his illusions and fantasies that is their karma and path in life. It does not concern me though I do empathize with them and will hold out a hand if asked. I have decided I will never turn away the OW or any of his victims if I am asked for validation and confirmation. That has been part of the challenge of recovery in that I can honestly say to myself that I do not wish revenge or ill harm to befall the OW because of her part in the hurting of my child. I acknowledge that just like me the OW was cultivated for his purposes and his alone. I have acknowledged to myself and others that it really had nothing to do with the OW or myself – we are and were but objects and pawns in his games. Acknowledging all this has been part of my recovery and healing. Acknowledging that all women are his enemy and he hates us as well as uses us for punishment. We are interchangeable. Part of my healing came when I stopped blaming myself and came to grips that it had nothing to do with myself, my daughter or the OW and her sons. It was all about him and only him. It was, it will be and always has been. His behavior was the reason he left. He was, is and will always be an abusive man.
I also acknowledged that I did play a part in the madness. I would not go so far as to say that I was a co-dependent but that I am a caretaker and a lost puppy finder. In taking care of XNH in his mind, I was reinforcing his behavior. I will never be a caretaker to another adult again. I will help when asked or take care of when needed. But I will never be a caretaker. I have learned boundaries. I now set them and enforce them. Because this is my life and I am in charge of it. I am also teaching my daughter how to set boundaries etc.,
Do I miss him or did I miss him? At first I did. He left and cut my daughter and myself out of his life without so much as a goodbye – I am sorry. It was much like going cold turkey from an addiction. But the addiction has now been conquered.
I thought that I needed him – this again was a brainwash tactic of his that he uses on women. I don’t need him – what for? There is nothing in the world that he did for me. There was no companionship, no caring, no emotional bonds, no partnership, no friendship and no teamwork. He was not a man but a little child who needed, needed, needed, took, and took until there was no more to give. I took care of the house and home, I took care of the child, I was the major and only wage earner for many years, I took care of the whole life – his, mine and the child’s. I was there solely to be the cash cow, the nursemaid, and the mother. I was there to present to the world the family illusion and the illusion of prosperity and success. I was there solely for the purpose of taking care of everyday life and responsibilities so he could live his fantasies and his youth without the responsibilities of an adult.
Do I feel resentment? I did at first – he left my daughter and me in such a horrendous mess. It will take several more years to dig out. There were thoughts of suing him for financial support for our daughter or suing him in small claims court for the outstanding debts he left behind. The resentment is gone and I don’t feel it anymore because the way I see it now is the sun is shining on me, I am lucky to be alive and in control of my own life, I am lucky to have such a good teenager and I know that if I put out positive thoughts that things will work out somehow, someway in a positive manner. I have faith that all will be well. I can see the light at the end of the tunnel. It gets closer day by day. I am free from negativity and pessimism. I am free from feeling a dark cloud
hanging over my head. I am free from forever feeling a sense of doom and destruction all around me.
It’s slow, its painful, it will take a long time. I block out memories of the emotional and verbal abuse. At times, something triggers flashbacks of his abusive actions and words, etc., some days I block out the memories; other days I have a good cry. The days are becoming less and less. Some days especially as Christmas is coming close I feel extreme sympathy for XNH because he is missing so much of life. Our daughter growing up, his first grandchild by his oldest daughter. Then I come back to reality and remember every holiday, occasion, event was made miserable by his actions and behavior.
I am putting that part of my life behind me and looking forward to the next part. It is really up to me to decide.
I may not have the life that I thought I wanted but I will end up with the life that I really want. I will be able to finally become or go back to the person I was before but with a sense and awareness that I must temper myself with the knowledge that there are people in this world that cannot be trusted and allowed into my life. I have boundaries now. Nevertheless, I will still be sweet, innocent, caring, kind, determined and strong. I will not allow anyone or any thing to invade my core personality and change it into something or someone that I am not.
I have made my peace with myself. I have forgiven myself and my daughter has forgiven me. Neither my daughter nor I will forgive XNH. My daughter will never forgive. There will never be a reconciliation or relationship with him for her. For me there will only be forgiveness if he can show retribution, be truly remorseful, and have regret. Which as we know an N will never have or do.
I woke up one day and decided that I have the rest of my life to live and live well. I will live it as fuller and as positively as I possibly can do. I will never give another human being such power over myself.
This is my recovery and healing. I have thought it was slow but have been told I am doing quite well. For all those here in the stages of recovery and healing – do so at your own pace. When you are ready for it it will come. Don’t try to force recovery and healing. It doesn’t work that way. What is right for you may not be right for another or vice versus. Do know that recovery and healing is inevitable. At any time in the process you feel you much go back a step do it. I still cry and am sad though infrequently.
I can’t change what was done but I can benefit and learn from it taking the lessons that I have learned and using them positively.
Total Members: 
