Welcome to my blog! I am proud to say I am finally recovering from over twenty years in a narcissistically abusive marriage. I have moved from a fog of narcissistic confusion toward freedom and I want to share my stories with you. 

Whether you know me personally, or a friend recommended you check this out, or you just found this blog purely by accident, I’m glad you are here. The more we can educate each other about narcissism and its tragic effects on people, the better I believe this world will become. I am committed to paying my narcissistic awakening forward by helping other abuse survivors become educated, strong and brave enough to stand up to their Narcissist and create a better, safer environment for themselves and their families.  

In my experience, narcissism has left lasting damage on the hearts and souls of the people I love most in this life, my family. The narcissistic abuse I suffered at the hands of my husband was so covert and sneaky that I didn’t know what was happening for years and years. I just knew I wasn’t happy and I was always so confused.

I can now also see the damage our dysfunctional family life had on our kids and it breaks my heart. We should have done better. I should have done better. I just didn’t know. Education about domestic abuse is so important!

The narcissistic abuse I suffered left no visible scars on my body. My husband never hit me. I don’t believe he ever hit our kids, although more information comes out all the time about injuries they suffered. I never had a bruise or a broken bone because of him. Calling my marital experiences abusive was something I initially struggled with and, to be honest, I still continue to struggle with. 

Here’s the crazy thing: Everyone loves my husband! 

The fog I lived in for so many years made me question myself and my experiences. Would anyone believe me? Was what I experienced actually abuse? It wasn’t that bad, was it? Why did he only act that way when nobody else was around? Why was I the only one to see it? Did he actually do those things or was I imagining them? These are just a few of the many, many questions that ran through my head as I began to learn about narcissism and got used to the label of being narcissistically abused. 

To be completely fair, life with my husband wasn’t all bad. It wasn’t all good either. That’s one of the biggest issues I have learned about covert narcissistic abuse. It’s sneaky. It makes you second guess feelings and conversations. It confuses you. It shape-shifts. It makes you feel like you’ve just completely lost your mind and then…

… and then it magically seems to get better for a week or two. The bad mixes with the good and the good mixes with the bad and, before you know it, it’s good for only a few days at a time and then it’s only good for a tiny little bit of time. 

You hold on tightly to the good moments. They carry you through. You somehow get used to the bad and you learn how to handle your abuser better. You make sacrifices. You try to speak up. You learn to keep quiet. Nothing seems to help, so you soldier on. You wake up the next day, and the next day, in the same narcissistic fog and you continue living this confusing and strange life. You try to make the best of it for yourself and your kids, but it hurts deep inside your heart. You’re so confused, but you shake it off. 

I was left feeling like I was the one and only problem in our marriage. Everything was my fault. I was never good enough or thankful enough or skinny enough. Every time I brought up a hot subject with my husband, I left the conversation feeling confused and completely to blame. He managed to turn every hurt I suffered from him back around on me. He was so good at twisting things around that he made me believe all of his excuses. It was me. I was the problem. Finally, after years and years of confusion and emotional pain, I sought out answers to what was happening to me. I actually thought I was going crazy.

The journey I’ve been on to get where I am today has been confusing and painful. It’s also been humiliating and stressful. Yet, I can’t ignore the overwhelmingly beautiful and breathtaking moments or the joys that have brought me to tears and made my heart nearly burst with pride. I’ve been put through the emotional wringer a thousand times over in my forty plus years of life, but I’m still here and I’m so much stronger than I was a year, or two, or ten years ago. 

Full disclosure: I had NO IDEA what narcissism was until the spring of 2024. I actually had to Google it. Kudos to my girl for pointing it out to me and starting me on my path of narcissistic awareness and recovery. Kudos to YOU for being here and wanting to learn more about it. 

Let’s jump in and take a trip down a beautiful Midwestern street where everything seemed perfectly perfect and happy from the outside in. From the inside out, though, it was anything but perfect.