holidays, narcissists

Christmas time is coming… you know what means, right? Here’s the best Christmas gift…

Before I get started… this isn’t going to be a super lighthearted post. It might be funny or interesting to some readers who know our story, and it could be helpful and informative to others… I just want to warn anyone who’s here looking for festive glad tidings that this post ain’t it.

Still with me? Mmm’kay…

When I was really young, I loved Christmas. I loved the food, the music, staying home from school, and getting Christmas presents. I loved being with my family, too. As I got older, Christmas became more of a burden. I found out that Santa isn’t real, not that I was ever a big believer in Santa… I recognized my mom’s handwriting on the packages. Then I felt like I had to buy gifts, and I never had any money. I also realized I didn’t know the recipients well enough to get them something they really wanted, so it felt like I was wasting money that I didn’t have.

As time went on, I came to realize that Christmas had lost its magic for me and filled me with apprehension and stress, rather than the touching family moments depicted on the Hallmark channel. It wasn’t until I married Bill and swore off family gatherings that I started to enjoy the holidays again. So… from about 2005 onwards, Christmas became fun for us… I now enjoy Christmas. I like shopping for Bill, because I know what he likes, needs, and wants. And we don’t try to make Christmas what it isn’t. It’s just a day. We enjoy the day and all the good stuff that comes with it. He is the one person I can count on to love me for exactly who I am. That is a huge blessing. I, in turn, love him for exactly who he is.

But that doesn’t mean I can’t see drama about to erupt from other sources. Most of it stays away from us in the most personal sense. However, because Bill and his daughter have reconnected, he’s hearing about drama from afar. It occurred to me that this is the time of year when narcissists usually become completely insufferable. And based on what I’ve seen from Ex lately, I think it could hit a fever pitch this year.

Behold:

On the surface, this sort of seems like a “cute” post, right? She’s putting up her Christmas tree, and oops! She forgot to add one of the middle sections! She must now get on social media to show everyone her “mistake” and ask for advice.

Ummm… I know for a fact that Ex knows how to put up a Christmas tree. And I think she knows how to fix this problem. That tree has just four parts to it. It’s not even like the trees of yore, which had dozens of individual limbs and color codes that had to be put on one at a time. It takes two minutes to put up a tree like the one pictured, even if you put the wrong section on the lower part. On our tree, the top part wouldn’t even fit on the bottom section. And why in the hell would you put lights on before you assemble the tree?

But then I notice at the end of her post, she writes “On the 1st day of Christmas, my true love gave to me… no help on the Christmas tree.”

Uh huh. That was a dig at #3, who is apparently checked out. After twenty years of this kind of shit, I can’t really blame him. It took Bill half as much time to withdraw from Ex’s craziness. So when he ignores her, she hits up social media for attention.

Some of you who might be reading this are probably thinking… “How do you know all of this? And more importantly, why do you care?”

The fact is, I don’t actually care, except to the extent that it upsets younger daughter. She lives in another state, true… but it’s the holiday season, and narcissists are typically a nightmare during the holidays. They just can’t help themselves. They have this image they desperately want to project, and they expect everyone else to buy into the image. The trouble is, even if other people are cooperative, the reality never lives up to the perfect image in Exโ€™s mind. That causes her a lot of stress and gives her excuses to stir up drama.

The holidays are also a time of year when people are expected to be kind, grateful, and happy. Narcissists aren’t naturally kind, grateful, or happy people, even if that’s the image they try, and sometimes manage to project, to strangers. BUT– they expect YOU to be all of those things and more. If you protest when they criticize you, there will be hell to pay. “You can’t win for losin'”, as my sweet husband likes to say.

So… Ex decides to “spread the wealth” that comes with being upset during the holidays. Instead of sending warm wishes in a Christmas card or a lovely present, she sends hateful private messages full of rage, accusations, and guilt. Instead of making a phone call or starting a video chat, she drops a load of psychic angst via Facebook messenger. And then, when the response is anything other than groveling or mea culpas, she “shares the wealth” of misery to other people who care enough to listen to her complaints. Ah… holiday stress. It’s the narcissistic gift that ripples across generations, right?

I’ve been in Bill’s life for over 20 years, and I have seen Ex spoil MANY holidays. She usually craps on Christmas, but I’ve also seen her fuck up birthdays and Easter. Since one of her daughters and a granddaughter were born on July 4th, you can bet that day will be messed up, too. It’s a double whammy– Independence Day and a birthday for two family members. She hates it when the attention isn’t focused on her, so she’s got to do something to get into the limelight.

Years ago, Dr. Tara Palmatier, the Shrink4Men, wrote an excellent article about high conflict individuals during the holidays. If you have one of these in your life, I highly recommend that you check it out. Narcissistic exes who routinely act even more like self-centered idiots during the holidays is a real “thing”. It’s not all in your head. Dr. T also wrote a hilarious gift guide for the high conflict person in your life. Yes, it’s tongue in cheek… and maybe it’ll make you smile as you figure out how to get through another holiday season… and maybe consider if you really want to spend the rest of your life dealing with this kind of ridiculous nonsense.

A few days ago, younger daughter told us a bit about a recent conflict she had with Ex, who berated her for her supposed shortcomings. Younger daughter, to her credit, attempted to stick up for herself. She actually told Ex that she was being abusive. She hoped that Ex would see the error of her ways… but sadly, Ex didn’t get it and simply heaped on more abuse and blame. I couldn’t help but shake my head. I could totally relate.

I once made the mistake of thinking one of my own family members was mature enough to have a discussion about some abusive behavior from a Christmas past. Sure enough, she turned into a victim, and I was the bad one for bringing it up. The crazy thing was, I was actually trying to be positive. I was trying to tell her that her tantrum during the last Christmas I spent with my family of origin had strengthened my resolve not to tolerate that shit from anyone else, including and especially Ex. Saying “no” to this particular relative had led to my having the strength to say “no” to Ex the following year, when she “invited” Bill and me to Bill’s father’s house for Christmas. Instead of looking back on that incident objectively, she claimed I was being mean to her. She turned into a pathetic victim.

Younger daughter is more mature than I was when I was her age. Hell, she’s probably more mature than I am now. ๐Ÿ˜‰ As she was talking about this dramatic exchange she had with Ex, she got this wizened look on her face and said, “It just totally blew up in my face.” And I knew that she realized, then and there, that there is no point in trying to talk reasonably with personality disordered people like this. They can’t see your viewpoint. They won’t consider your perspective. They have no empathy. That’s part of their disorder and, sadly, it won’t ever change. The best you can do is minimize how that shitty nonsense will affect you. Learn to either diffuse it or ignore it, or better yet, go no or minimal contact.

Then last night, we heard from younger daughter again. She was very excited about and thankful for a birthday gift Bill had sent her. And she told us that she had decided to apologize to her sisters for all of the things Ex claimed they were angry at her about. She also sent them copies of what Ex had sent her in her private message of doom. To that, I say, BRAVO. Ex is a world class triangulator. She has perfected to an art form the skill of telling people different things to get them upset at each other. They don’t speak to one another, so whatever they know has been filtered through Ex, who naturally spins it so that it’s completely twisted and totally askew. She said that older daughter was “nice” and wrote “I accept your apology.” I could see by the slight flash of snark on younger daughter’s face that she could tell it was bullshit that older daughter felt owed an apology for anything. It was quite hilarious.

But what I’d also like to tell her is that it’s a brilliant move to send transcripts of Ex’s diatribes to her sisters. Why? Because then they can see for themselves what was actually communicated. Thereโ€™s less opportunity to take it out of context. And, there’s a LOVELY side effect to taking this action. Once Ex knows that her secrets aren’t being kept, she stops writing things down and sending them.

Back in 2006, when I wrote to Ex for the first and only time, I ripped her a new one because she had sent Bill an email with all sorts of nasty bile about me, and how the kids hated me and didn’t want us in their lives. She then asked Bill not to tell me what she’d written. She claimed she wanted to “spare my feelings.” Nope… that demand wasn’t about sparing anyone’s feelings. She wanted to drive a wedge between us. She is Olympic class at doing this; I’ve watched her do it for over twenty years. She was hoping Bill would resent me for being an obstacle to having his daughters in his life. It backfired, because Bill could plainly see that I had nothing to do with stopping him from having relationships with his kids. Moreover, the (now adult) kids are free to think whatever they want about me. That’s not something I can control, nor would I want to try. BUT… I will not tolerate Ex telling my husband to keep secrets from me and interfering in our marriage.

She could see that I know all about her and that Bill is loyal to me. Sending him nasty emails simply gives me more evidence of who and what she is. I’m not going to keep her secrets or accept her abuse. So, when that fact became clear, she stopped sending Bill emails! Blessed be! She also never called him again! The last we directly heard from her was, unfortunately, when she sent many boxes of Bill’s possessions restricted delivery, along with an itemized list marked “confidential” and a toxic little story book Bill used to read to the girls… HA! There was a nasty letter about what a horrible father and husband Bill is, along with paperwork for Bill to sign that would allow #3 to adopt Bill’s daughters. Of course he wasn’t going to sign the papers. Even if he did that, she wouldn’t have to file them, and he would have to keep paying child support. And then she’d have a paper with his signature on it to use as an alienation tool. That nasty little delivery occurred just in time for Bill’s 42nd birthday. Another special day ruined!

Bill still has all of that stuff. He’s kept it for the day when he needed to explain it to one of his daughters. Sure enough, that day recently came, and he told his daughter about what Ex had done. He did that because, in her recent little tirade, Ex told younger daughter about how Bill hadn’t wanted to pay child support and “offered” to let #3 adopt them. So younger daughter asked about what had actually happened… or even just Bill’s side of the issue. She’s figured out that her mother lies and twists things to suit her agenda. She knew there was more to the story and she wanted to hear it. So Bill told her his side, and offered to show her the stuff Ex sent anytime she wanted to see it. He told her about how he went next door and spoke to our neighbor at the time, who is a lawyer and is still a dear friend. ๐Ÿ˜‰

But, I think what really made me PROUD of younger daughter and impressed by her smarts was when she looked into the camera and said, “Now I can see things from both sides.” She said she remembered how Bill recently explained to her how, when she was still a kid, Bill would call and try to speak to his daughters. At that time, younger daughter was always “unavailable”. She was in the bathtub, or had a headache, or otherwise couldn’t come to the phone. Gradually, former stepson and older daughter also quit speaking to Bill. Ex turned the ringer off of the phone, so he’d call and no one would answer. Younger daughter became more and more hostile, and for a long time, I didn’t like her. My dislike was because of the image she was portraying. But that wasn’t really her. It was a facade spackled by Ex, designed to turn off anyone who might influence or assist her daughter, whom she sees as solely her “property”. Ex can’t share, and she resents anyone who takes what she thinks belongs to her. That includes other people, especially those who have passed through her birth canal. ๐Ÿ˜€

Since younger daughter now lives in another state, and has her own family, she is now seeing things the way Bill used to see them when he and Ex communicated. Now, she gets it! It’s a beautiful thing that she finally understands– although I am very sorry that she’s now on the other side of her mother’s abuse. Being on one side is bad enough. I guess we can take comfort in knowing that this is how she treats everyone eventually.

In any case, I strongly suspect that the holidays are causing an uptick in drama at Ex’s house. But I also suspect that her husband is about to ditch her. And this time, she might not land on her feet. So that will cause her to act up and act out, and try to pull other people into her crises… to include strangers on social media whom she asks about how to put up her stupid Christmas tree as she slides in a little dig toward #3, who clearly isn’t paying enough attention to her during this holiday season. Too funny… and it couldn’t have happened to a more deserving person, huh?

What I’d also like to tell younger daughter is that I’ve learned not to be too hard on anyone who has to live full time with Ex. For a long time, I didn’t like people who seemed to be on Ex’s side. But now I realize that Ex makes people miserable. She’s a toxic person, and having to live with a toxic person is unpleasant. Toxic behavior is contagious, especially if you live in the FOG (fear, obligation, and guilt that comes with living with a high conflict person). It’s not really personal. They’re literally living in an environment that makes them “sick”. I have observed people leaving Ex’s sphere and becoming completely different, happier, healthier people. I also observed my own mother becoming a different person after my toxic dad passed eight years ago.

So, when her sisters are snarky, rude, or clueless, or #3’s mother says something thoughtless or insulting, it might be helpful for younger daughter to remember that they live in a toxic place, and they are affected by Ex’s toxic bullshit. Misery loves company, so they’re inviting her to join in their little miserable soiree. That might help her feel more sympathetic when they say shitty things to her. Actually, in her case, it probably would have that effect. In my case, it probably wouldn’t. I’m not as nice as younger daughter is, and I have never had a “loving” relationship with the people involved in this situation. In fact, I barely know them at all. So… I guess I could muster empathy, because they’re fellow human beings, and I don’t like to see fellow human beings suffering.

Anyway… Bill told his daughter that she doesn’t need to apologize to anyone for living her life on her own terms and being as healthy as she can be. One of the best things about being an adult is that you have the ability to make choices like whether or not you’re going to show up for people who behave like jerks. Children don’t often have a choice in whether or not they tolerate abusive behavior. Adults do. And younger daughter is well beyond the age of majority, so she really doesn’t have to tolerate this crap anymore. Better yet, she has young children of her own to protect from this toxic, narcissistic fuckery, which is an even more important reason to tell Ex to “zip it” and kick her to the curb.

For you, Ex.

I’d say that realizing that she doesn’t have to put up with ruined holidays and acting accordingly is the best Christmas present a person could ever get. I know it was a life changer for me when I stopped showing up for dysfunctional family holiday drama. ๐Ÿ˜‰ So… Merry Christmas! And have a happy, HEALTHY, new year.

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controversies, Duggars, religion, sexism, wingnuts

Creepy men who are obsessed with getting some “young stuff”…

The featured photo is a screenshot of part of Patrick Weaver Ministries’ post.

There’s so much I could be writing about today. So much, in fact, that I’ve been sitting here for almost two hours, trying to decide which comments to make regarding the vast array of potential hot topics. Ukraine has been invaded by Russia, and who knows what that is going to lead to on a worldwide scale. Whatever happens will probably affect my husband’s work.

Then there’s the arrest of the guy who killed my former colleague, Matt. I could write more about that, but I don’t know how interesting that is to people other than me.

Then there’s the evergreen issue of COVID-19, but who isn’t sick of hearing and reading about that? I know it’s a tired subject for me.

And then there are the Duggars… another wedding is on the horizon, and apparently, another baby is allegedly on the way. This time, it’s John David and Abbie who are reportedly expecting. And next month, Jeremiah Duggar is going to marry Hannah Wissmann– just ahead of Josh Duggar’s sentencing. Yeah, I could write about that, but I’m not going to… because this morning, I saw something that really creeped me out.

Someone in the Duggar Family News group shared this post by Patrick Weaver Ministries. It’s calling out a youth pastor/filmmaker named Joshua_Wesely, who posted a picture of his girlfriend, Isabelle, on her 18th birthday, back on November 17, 2020. That means she was born the day after Bill and I married, on November 16, 2002. Have a look…

Eeeww…

Perez Hilton has an article about this couple, in which it is revealed that apparently, the two started their relationship when she was 14 and he was 20. He’s now 24 and she’s 18, which sounds slightly less icky… until you realize that he’s been working on her since she was in puberty! Mr. Wesely and his wife have made their Instagrams private, but the front page does reveal that he and the young lady are now married, and have been so since August of 2021. He also has a YouTube channel, at which I am currently taking a look. Interestingly enough, it turns out that he is German, and his content on YouTube is all in German. Also, in Germany, the age of consent is 14. I suppose I’m not surprised, given the attitudes about sex here. Still, it does seem kinda gross. ETA: Yikes! He is from Mainz, which is 20 minutes away.

It’s not their age difference. It’s the fact that he’s been chasing her since she was fourteen… and he’s a “youth pastor”.
So, I guess what Mr. Wesely did was technically legal in Germany… but yucky to Americans.

I remember what I was like when I was 14. I was in no way ready for sex, or a committed relationship. I know there are exceptions. Loretta Lynn married her husband, Doo (Oliver Lynn), when she was somewhere between 13 and 16 years old, and he was nineteen. They had six children, and were together for fifty years, until he died at age 69 in 1996. However, Loretta Lynn’s husband was a violent alcoholic who beat and cheated on her. If it hadn’t been for Loretta Lynn’s extraordinary talents as a musician, who knows what would have happened to her?

Hell, I was barely ready for sex when I was 30, which was when I finally started having it, two weeks after my wedding day. This isn’t to say that my situation is the norm. It isn’t. I just think that kids shouldn’t be engaging in serious and sexual relationships. Isabelle is not a child now, but she was for several years before she and Joshua got married. I know that if I had a fourteen year old daughter, I would not look too fondly on some 20 year old guy wanting to date her. That sounds like a dangerous situation to me. There’s a reason why so many fundies like to marry young– especially when the female half is young. It makes them a lot easier to “mold”. Fourteen year olds tend to be more submissive and less worldly.

It looks like maybe Mr. Wesely is on the far right. Below is a trailer from a 2021 film he produced called 2025- The World Enslaved By a Virus. The film envisions a world in which communism and atheism have taken over, and meetings, Christianity, and travel are forbidden. Wesely starred in the film, which he also wrote. His brother, Simon, co-produced and co-directed it.

I notice the channel where this is posted is called “Wesely Bro’s”… Apostrophe abuse, too?

This reminds me of something I saw back in the early 00s, when Bill and I were newly married. At that time, a lot of men thought the Olsen twins were super hot. I once actually saw a countdown clock in a bar that showed how much longer it would be before Mary Kate and Ashley turned 18. I know there were a number of Internet sites dedicated to their 18th birthday, which was June 13, 2004. Granted, the Olsen twins are celebrities. They are fabulously wealthy, and apparently, nothing creepy happened to them offline– that I know of, anyway. But still, there were basement dwelling creeps who were actually watching a clock to see how much longer it would be before they were “fair game” for being pursued by horny older men.

Ugh… This is just gross.

I know a lot of people think church is the best place to find a mate. Sadly, the reality is, church is a place where a lot of people wind up victimized, because they are conditioned to trust church leaders due to their role in a religious organization. I think this is especially true in strict, culty belief systems that promote conspiracy theories. In fact, as I have referenced before on my blog, there are even Web sites that encourage “Christian” men to marry young women, so they can be properly “groomed” for submission. The link I provided is a blog dedicated to “Biblical Gender Roles”. I have written about that site before, and judging by my stats, a lot of people are interested in it, as well as “domestic discipline”.

Churches are not the only way older men wind up with younger women. Having watched many episodes of To Catch a Predator, I know that these types of guys come from all walks of life. It doesn’t take much for them to take the bait if an underage woman signifies her consent. A few weeks ago, I was watching a YouTube clip that involved a 48 year old married physician from San Francisco, who came over to a decoy’s location, hoping to score. The physician ultimately committed suicide some years later. Surprisingly enough, he was still married to his physician wife when he died.

This is unbelievable. Obviously, he didn’t care about his career at all…

Bill and I talked about this subject this morning. We are, after all, about eight years apart in age. I had just turned 18 when he married his ex wife. However, Bill and I are a hell of a lot more compatible than he and Ex were. When we married, I was 30, and he was 38. Age matters less when you’re older.

I would say there is a big difference between 18 and 24; however, according to recent scientific research, neither Joshua’s nor his wife’s brains are even fully developed yet. That might explain the bizarre movies he puts out, promoting right wing conspiracies. According to the University of Rochester Medical Center, human brains aren’t considered fully developed until age 25. Bill did say, by the way, that he would have had a serious problem with a 20 year old man pursuing one of his daughters when they were that young. Not that Ex would have given him a chance to intervene.

And letโ€™s not forget the case of Jack Schaap, a former “minister” at Hyles-Anderson College, a Christian school in Hammond, Indiana. He famously delivered a horrifying sermon in which he “polished” a rod, masturbation like, as he spoke about how God finds mates for the faithful. Mr. Schaap later went to federal prison for taking a sixteen year old girl he was “counseling” across state lines for sex. He was sentenced to twelve years in 2013, and is scheduled for release next February.

Part of Mr. Schaap’s defense was that the girl he abused was “aggressive” and had prior “extensive sexual experience”. He also alleged that she was a drug user. Apparently, in his feeble mind, that made molesting her okay. The girl was also reportedly a student at the private school run by Schaap’s former church, the 15,000 strong First Baptist Church of Hammond, since kindergarten. Based on Schaap’s comments, in spite of her religious schooling, she was “experienced”. I’d like to know who gave her that experience. Obviously, the staff at that church weren’t to be trusted. Or, at least that’s what I would think if I were that girl’s mother.

OMG… I would have died watching this.

I don’t understand what it’s like to be a man. I’m sure there’s a scientific reason why so many of them are looking for “young stuff”.

“You should be gettin’ that young stuff!” Eew.

Anyway… I don’t know if Isabelle is happy. She’s certainly young and pretty, and I can assume she married Joshua consensually. And I understand that German laws are different than US laws are, as are the mores surrounding sex. I do think it’s too bad she isn’t still single, though, and enjoying her youth… maybe doing something for herself, instead of jumping into marriage with a man who appears to be drinking some pretty strong right wing Kool-Aid in the name of “Christianity”. But, it’s her life. Still… eeew. Count me among those who disapprove.

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