The Importance Of Valuing Your Spouse

Recently, I came across a video that spoke about how some men are afraid of their wives learning to value themselves & leaving them.  To prevent this from happening, they tear these women down by criticizing them so they will think that they can’t do any better & stay with them.  I believe this is a common behavior & that men haven’t cornered the market on it – women do this too.  Today, we will talk about how to avoid such behaviors & how to value your spouse.

Tearing someone down is never a solution to any problem.  Criticizing your spouse only hurts their self-esteem & damages your relationship.  The root of such behavior is often insecurity.  When you are insecure, you tend to feel threatened by your spouse’s success or growth, which can lead to controlling, manipulative, & abusive behavior.  Therefore, it is essential to recognize the signs of such behavior & acknowledge that your spouse’s success or growth does not diminish your worth or value in any way.  Instead, it is an opportunity to support & encourage them to become the best version of themselves.

The first step towards having a healthy, happy relationship is to take a step back & reflect on your behavior.  Ask yourself why you feel the need to tear your spouse down.  Once you identify the root cause, it’s time to work on yourself.

Prayer is powerful.  God will help you overcome the problem.  He will provide you with the strength & wisdom to recognize your weaknesses & improve them.  He also will help you communicate with your spouse in a healthy & respectful manner & build a healthier relationship.

Reflecting on your behavior also can help you identify areas where you need to improve.  It can help you become more aware of your actions & how they affect your spouse, which can help you become more empathetic & compassionate towards your spouse’s feelings & needs.

If you find yourself being judgmental or critical of your spouse out of fear of losing them, try wooing them instead.  Wooing your spouse means making them feel cherished, loved, & desired.  It also means prioritizing them over anyone else in your life.  You can do this by expressing your love & appreciation for them, listening to them, supporting their goals & dreams, & being there for them when they need you.  You can also surprise them with small gestures of kindness, like preparing their favorite meal or buying them a thoughtful gift to show them that you are thinking about them.  These things help build trust, intimacy, & a stronger emotional connection, while making your spouse feel valued & appreciated.

Accept your spouse.  In other words, don’t try to change them or mold them into the person you want them to be.  Instead, embrace their uniqueness & support them in their growth & development.  Acceptance helps build trust, respect, & a stronger emotional connection.  

Offer grace to your spouse.  Offering grace means being patient, kind, & understanding towards your spouse.  It means recognizing that they are human & that they need your support & encouragement to become the best version of themselves.

Valuing your spouse is essential for building a healthy, respectful, & fulfilling partnership.  

“You Should Just Leave”

Being in a relationship with an abusive person is incredibly hard.  The routine changes daily, so what was good yesterday is suddenly bad today.  There is also constant belittling, invalidating, crazy-making, & so much more.  Seeing someone suffering like this, many people’s first thought is, “you should just leave.”  When someone doesn’t “just leave” in a timely manner or doesn’t want to leave at all, people often become disgusted with this person.  They either lose patience with the person & end the relationship or they think this is a sign the abuse isn’t so bad.  They may even doubt the person really is being abused at all, since they won’t leave. 

What these people fail to realize is that there are many very valid reasons a person stays in an abusive relationship for too long.  Today we are going to discuss some of them.

Victims are often terrified of their abusers & for good reasons.  Their abuser may be physically violent, or has threatened violence.  Or, he or she may not have threatened violence specifically, but instead has done things like punch walls, break things or hurt the victim’s pets.  Such behaviors show that this person is capable of violence, & no threats need to be spoken to instill fear in someone witnessing these behaviors.

Abusers annihilate their victims’ self esteem, which convinces them they need their abuser.  A person with no self esteem doesn’t believe in themselves in any capacity, which means they don’t know that they don’t need to depend on another person.  In fact, the thought of living without their abuser telling them what to do, think & feel often instills blind panic in a victim.

Abusers convince their victims that can change, & this won’t happen again.  Everyone has heard a story of a woman whose husband beats her, she leaves, he promises it’ll never happen again & she goes back to him over & over.  This is a common scenario.  Abusers panic when their victims leave.  They shower their victims with love & affection, & they make all kinds of promises to lure their victims back, including the promise to treat them better.  Abusers can appear very believable at this point, which is partly why their victims give them another chance.

Victims rarely have any real support to help them leave.  Abusers isolate their victims from friends & family so they can abuse their victims without interference.  Victims are often completely alone by the time they are ready to leave.  Leaving is hard enough with support, but without?  It’s so much harder.

Victims also rarely have any money.  Abusers take their victims’ paychecks or make sure they can’t work so they are financially dependent on the abuser.  It takes money to move out so without it, they are stuck.

Victims stay to protect their children.  Many victims will tolerate the abuse as a way to protect their children.  Their abuser won’t hurt the children as long as he has the victim to hurt.  Or, maybe the abuser said if the victim leaves, he or she will hurt or kill the children.  Staying seems like the safer alternative.

Victims are shamed & chastised by so called “religious” people.  So many people twist Scripture around to make the victim look like the problem for ending an abusive marriage.  These people also refuse to acknowledge the seriousness of abuse, help the victim in any way & abandon the victim in their time of need.

The law isn’t always on the side of victims, & is no help.  If you have proof of physical abuse, your chances of help are pretty good.  However, not all abusers abuse physically.  Other types of abuse are either legal or hard to prove.  Emotional, sexual, financial & spiritual abuse all fall into those categories.

As you can see, leaving an abusive person isn’t easy.  If you ever think of saying, “You should just leave” to someone in an abusive relationship, I hope you will consider these reasons why it’s not so easy to “just leave.”  Or, if you are the one in an abusive relationship & someone tells you that you should just leave, I hope you will fill them in on why that is not possible at the moment.

What Can Happen When You Initiate Divorce Rather Than Your Spouse

People treat people getting a divorce very differently.  Often the one who didn’t initiate the divorce gets plenty of support & sympathy.  Those close to this person often shun the spouse who wanted the divorce & may even try to fix up their friend with someone new. 

The spouse who initiates the divorce usually gets no similar treatment.  This person is not only on the receiving end of rudeness from their soon to be ex spouse’s friends & family, but they receive very little support from those close to them.  It seems to me that most people think if divorce was your idea, then it isn’t hard on you.  In their mind, you’re simply ending your marriage & going on with your life as if nothing happened.

The truth however, is whichever side of the divorce you’re on, it can be incredibly painful.  Since there is very little information available for those who initiate divorce, I’ll be addressing them today.

I have been in your shoes.  My divorce to my first husband was my idea.  I was miserable, & as I wasn’t a Christian at the time, I had no hope.  I also was falling in love with my current husband who I was friends with at that time, so divorce was the only logical option in my mind.

I sincerely tried to be as good as I could be to my ex as we worked towards our separation, but it was pointless.  I was labeled the ungrateful, cheater who was leaving a great guy for no reason whatsoever.  People who had been our mutual friends suddenly got a snide attitude whenever they saw me, if they spoke to me.  Only one mutual friend of ours & his wife stayed friends with me while the rest abandoned me. 

My scenario is pretty typical, sad to say.  If you have experienced something similar because you opted to divorce your spouse, I want to let you know that you are NOT alone!  There are many of us out there!

I also want to give you hope today.  When you go through that situation, it hurts.  You feel so lost & alone.  You have doubts about your decision.  Even if your spouse was abusive like mine was, doubts are normal.  Divorce is a big decision & creates so much change.  All those feelings are normal, & you need to remember it.  You’re not overacting, crazy or whatever else people act like you are. 

You also have every right to be upset about getting a divorce!  Just because you initiated it doesn’t mean you have lost that right!  Clearly there was something bad going on to make you decide divorce was your only option.  Whatever that was clearly was bad, & you have every right to be upset about that.

You also have every right to be upset about your failed marriage.  It’s a loss, & loss is tough even when it is necessary or unavoidable.  The divorce being your idea rather than your spouse’s doesn’t negate that fact.  Nothing does. 

Never forget, that you have a Heavenly Father who won’t desert you like people have.  He will love you no matter what, & help you to get through this painful time.  He certainly did me.  I became a Christian a few months after my ex & I separated, & I am so grateful to God for helping me through that terrible time!  Not only did He offer me comfort & wisdom for healing, but He sent me new friends that were wonderful.  Much better than the ones I had originally.  Truly, I came out much better off without my ex & with God in my life.  What He has done for me, He can do for you too!  All you have to do is lean on Him & trust that He will help you however you need.

When You Feel The Only Way To Save Your Marriage Is To Sacrifice Yourself

Not long ago, something crossed my mind.  I thought it may help some of you who follow my work.

During my first marriage, I was so dysfunctional I wasn’t sure exactly why it wasn’t a good marriage, but I still knew something was wrong.  My ex said it was fine, but I didn’t buy it.  I took my vows very seriously so I spent a lot of time reading marriage books & trying to figure out what I could do to fix these problems that I couldn’t identify.  It was always my job to fix things in relationships, as is often the case of those who have narcissistic parents.  Plus, it seemed logical at the time that if I was the only one who had a problem, I should be the one to deal with the problem.

After my reading & contemplating things, I came up with a solution that I was certain would fix everything.  If I could just ignore any of my own identity, needs, wants, opinions & feelings in favor of his, I just knew that would fix everything. 

Obviously, this didn’t work.  Although I was successful at doing this for a while, even that wasn’t enough.  By the time we got a divorce, I felt like an utter failure & carried the guilt & shame of that for quite some time.

I mentioned this to my best friend recently who admitted she had a very similar experience when married to her ex husband.

If you are married to a narcissist, I would love to help prevent you from going through this pain.  Please, listen to the voice of experience when I tell you that although it seems like simply giving in to a narcissist in every way is an “easy” way to keep the peace, it’s not. 

Losing yourself in this way is a lifetime job, not something you do once & it’s done.  When a narcissist sees you are willing to do this, he or she will expect you to do it over & over, every single day of your relationship.  It makes you miserable & erodes you into a shell of your former self.  As the saying goes, it’s like a death from a thousand cuts. 

Narcissists also are like endless voids when it comes to things that provide them with their narcissistic supply.  Nothing is going to fill that void.  You simply can’t give a narcissist enough supply.  Even when you give everything to a narcissist, it isn’t enough.  I was basically a robot that my ex could control, & it still wasn’t enough to please him.  He still wanted more even though I had nothing left to give, & was angry when I wouldn’t give it.  This is typical! 

Also, behaving in this manner enables the narcissist to be the abusive monster that he or she is.  There are no consequences when someone tolerates abuse, so abusers naturally see no need to stop.  In fact, they often step up the abuse because they know they can do anything they like without fear of repercussions.  In the end, this will destroy you.  It may not physically destroy you, although the stress of living this way certainly has the potential to create an overabundance of health problems, but at the very least it will emotionally destroy you.  By the time my ex & I separated, I lost so much of my identity.  I had no idea who I was, what I really liked, wanted, felt, or needed.  I was well aware though that I carried a great deal of guilt & shame for being entirely at fault for our failed marriage.  If I had any doubt, his friends & family were glad to remind me that everything was my fault.

Dear Reader, if you are in this unenviable situation of being married to someone who wants everything from you while giving nothing in return, please don’t give that person everything!  It doesn’t help the marriage & only creates problems!  Learn from my mistakes & don’t give in.  Instead, take good care of yourself.  Question everything your spouse says about you & demands of you.  Surround yourself with healthy, functional, caring & supportive people.  If your spouse has isolated you from friends & family (as abusers do), there are online support forums full of amazing people who can help you.  And most of all, stay close to God.  Lean on Him, & let Him help you in this painful situation.  I wish you all the best!    

Common Hoovering Tactics

After ending a relationship with a narcissist, the narcissist will NOT take it well.  No one likes rejection, of course, but narcissists take that dislike to an entirely new level.  Many have been known to stalk & harass their victims to punish them for rejecting the narcissist.  Most however, do something known as hoovering.  Hoovering is when a narcissist tries to lure a victim back in to the relationship.  It is yet another very good reason to have nothing to do with the narcissist once you end the relationship.

Narcissists have many ways they try to hoover in their victims.  All are sneaky & confusing for a victim unless the victim is aware of what the narcissist is up to.

Often, they will have their flying monkeys talk to you.  They will explain how sorry the narcissist is & how miserable life is without you.  When I broke my engagement to my now ex husband, several people told me I should get back with him because he was miserable without me.  No one cared how I was without him, only about him.  The guilt I felt was intense, which obviously was the goal since it made me return to him.

The narcissist may “accidentally” run into you at the coffee shop or grocery store, & use this supposed chance meeting to tell you how much they miss you as an attempt to hoover you back.

Narcissists may use special days to their advantage, such as sending you a lovely card & gift on your birthday, or reminding you that today would have been your anniversary.  This is to make sure you think of them favorably & give them an excuse to talk to you

Narcissists aren’t above using a crisis to their advantage either.  If you have had a serious problem & the narcissist learns of it, he or she may try to contact you claiming to be concerned about you.  Or, if the narcissist has had a crisis, he or she may let you know, saying they thought you would want to know.  These are only about getting their foot in the door.

Items also can give a narcissist an excuse to contact a victim after the relationship is over.  They may ask if you have some item of theirs, even knowing you don’t have it.  It’s merely an excuse to reach out to you.

Sometimes narcissists may use technology to hoover.  They may text you, claiming it was for someone else, then try to start a conversation.  They may call you, asking if you called them, then when they say they look at their phone, they mistook your number for someone else’s, but since you’re talking, how are you?  Some will even send a message, then ignore your response.

If they can open the door of communication in any way, they absolutely will do it.  Doing so probably means they will tell you how miserable they are without you & how much they have changed.

When things like this happen, don’t be foolish as I was with my ex!  Be aware of what is happening.  They are only trying to hoover you back for their own benefit, not because they love you.  Remind yourself that they don’t miss you, per se.  They miss how you made them feel.  They miss how they could control & manipulate you.

Never forget that the primary interest of any narcissist is that narcissist.  No one else really matters to them.  This means they only want you back because you can benefit them in some way.

Remember the tactics & why the narcissist is doing these things.  These things are done only to manipulate you back into the relationship so the narcissist can abuse you further.

After The Divorce

Today would have been my ex husband’s & my 28th wedding anniversary.  Naturally, realizing that made me think about our relationship.  I thought I’d share my random ponderings with you, since many of you who read my blog have been divorced as well.

When I decided to end my first marriage, although I wasn’t yet a Christian, I still felt terrible for breaking my vows.  I took them very seriously.  I also felt like a total failure for not being able to make that marriage work.  No matter what I did, that marriage was still not good & he was never happy with me.  I was never good enough for him.  I also felt incredibly guilty.  Guilty for not being able to fix the marriage, for never being able to please my ex, for doing everything wrong, for wanting the divorce & more.  I felt that intense guilt for a long time, for at the very least, a couple of years after we separated.

Looking back now, I realize how wrong I was.

While marriage vows should be taken seriously, they should be taken seriously by both partners, not only one.  If one doesn’t take them seriously & mistreats or even abuses you, there is nothing wrong with breaking the vows to protect yourself & your children if you have them.  There is nothing good or holy about tolerating abuse from anyone, period!

One person also can’t save a relationship.  It takes two to make any relationship work.  It’s impossible for a relationship to work when only one person is trying to make that happen, especially if the other person is a narcissist.  They will do their best to sabotage your efforts & refuse to give you what you want or need.  So, if you couldn’t fix your marriage, welcome to the club!

Although I still don’t like that I hurt my ex, there really was no other choice.  He hurt me plenty as well, which is why I wanted a divorce in the first place.  I certainly didn’t decide to divorce him because things were going well!

Does any of this sound familiar to you, Dear Reader?  If so, I want to encourage you to change your thinking like I did.

Remind yourself that did the best you knew to do at that time.  How can you be mad at yourself for not knowing then what you know now?  It doesn’t even make sense.  That would be like being angry at a year old baby for not knowing multiplication.  We all learn as we go, even as adults.

Narcissists are also fantastic actors, so even if you knew about narcissism & married this person anyway, you still can’t beat yourself up because of what fantastic actors they are.  We all can get fooled sometimes, no matter how much we know about narcissism.  It doesn’t mean you’re stupid – it just means they are ridiculously good actors!

Don’t forget – if you grew up with narcissistic parents, you also were wounded because of your upbringing, which means you didn’t have the ability to make the best decisions. Unfortunately, this happens!  You’re learning, growing & getting healthier now & that is what matters most.

Also, never hesitate to go to God.  Ask Him to tell you the truth.  Were you stupid to marry that person?  Are you a failure for your divorce?  He really will answer you & you know what He says is the absolute truth.  Let Him help you!  He will do so & gladly!

And never, ever forget – while you may not have been the perfect spouse, that doesn’t mean the divorce is absolutely, completely your fault.  Narcissists would have their victims believe that, but it’s not true.  Wanting to escape the torture & abuse isn’t a bad thing!  In fact, quite the opposite.  It shows you love yourself enough to know you don’t deserve this kind of treatment.