I Wasn’t The Only One Suffering
I was in a long-term marriage with a covert narcissist, and I wasn’t the only one suffering. Our two beautiful daughters were also deeply suffering from their father’s covert narcissistic emotional abuse. Unfortunately, I did not understand who my husband was, as a covert narcissist, until six months AFTER he moved out of our family home. So while we were married and living as a family, I witnessed my children’s suffering and pain, while completely confused by my husband’s behavior towards them – at times it appeared loving, and at other times, neglectful and deeply hurtful. It was heartbreaking for me to see, and I constantly struggled with understanding his behavior towards our daughters.
I was also overwhelmed as a parent, doing double duty by picking up his slack, as he was increasingly emotionally and physically absent as a parent, and covering for him by making excuses for his behavior. Furthermore, I was afraid to speak up and say anything to him about his behavior towards our daughters, as I was emotionally abused and in a constant state of anxiety and fear. In many ways, I was so focused on my pain and trying to shield my daughters from any pain that I didn’t realize the damage being done to them until much later on in their early teen years, after their father moved out.
Now, in hindsight, knowing that their father is a covert narcissist and was emotionally abusing us all, his behaviors make sense. If he had been verbally or physically abusing them, I wouldn’t have ever mistaken that behavior for something else. But emotional abuse, when you are not even aware it exists, let alone that you are a victim of it, slowly poisons you. I knew something wasn’t right, but I could not figure out what it was. It was so confusing and painful watching my girls suffer from their father’s emotional abuse.
Becoming Parents
My daughters are one of my greatest blessings in life. When my first daughter was born, I finally understood what real, unconditional love was. I loved my husband, sister, parents, and German Shepherd, but THIS LOVE I had for my firstborn child was so profoundly deep. I knew in my heart that I would sacrifice my life for her life in an instant, even if there was only a one-hundredth of a percent chance it would save her. And because I felt so much love for my first child, when I was pregnant with my second daughter, I was so afraid that I had used up all of my love for my first daughter. I was assured by other experienced mothers that that wasn’t going to be a problem, and of course, they were right. I had more than enough love for my second daughter. The love I felt for my children, and still feel, was, and is, life-altering.
I assumed my husband felt exactly the same way. And in his behavior as a new father, it appeared to be how he felt as well. My husband routinely worked sixty-hour workweeks, and I was uncertain how involved he would be as a father, but he ended up being very involved. He changed his baby daughters’ diapers, sang to them, bathed them, cuddled them, rocked them to sleep, and enjoyed spending time with them. As busy as he was in his career, he started taking Sundays off to be together as a family.
When our daughters were infants and toddlers, they were easy to manage, and my husband appeared to be an attentive, loving father. But as our daughters grew up and developed their personalities, it seemed that their relationship with their father was changing. He was no longer the same attentive and involved father.
The Heartache of Favoritism
My older daughter was an extremely sensitive, quiet, introspective, and shy child. My youngest daughter was the opposite in so many ways. She was easygoing, not as sensitive to criticism or corrections, and was an extroverted social butterfly. I loved and appreciated my daughters’ uniqueness, and I always tried to make sure they both knew they were loved for who they were.
But, for my husband, over time, it became increasingly apparent that he favored our youngest daughter. He would constantly tease our older daughter by answering her honest, inquisitive questions with silly or completely incorrect answers. He enjoyed coming up with clever incorrect responses to her questions. She did not find them funny, and it got to the point that she would then ask me if Daddy was telling her the truth. I am sure she felt that her questions were not good enough to deserve a truthful response. He did not do this to our youngest daughter.
On another occasion, when the girls were dancing in a Nutcracker ballet performance, my husband purchased two toy Nutcrackers. I had assumed he purchased one for each of them. I was so surprised to find out that he had bought them both for our youngest. I could not believe that I had to explain to him that our eldest would find that very hurtful and that it was better to give the second nutcracker to her. He did agree, but I was shocked that I had to even make that clear to him, considering how sensitive our oldest daughter was. Unfortunately, over time, the favoritism became more obvious and painful for her.
Battlefield – Family Meals
Family meals in our household became a battlefield. For years, while the girls were around five to seven years of age, they would verbally argue over who had to sit next to Dad for supper. At times, they would yell at each other, “It’s your turn to sit next to Dad, I sat next to him yesterday,” and argue in front of him. Neither of them wanted to sit next to him. Why? Because, instead of asking them how their day went at school, or talking to them about anything, dinner became a battlefield of table manners. He became the table manners police and mercilessly corrected their table manners. It was always sit up straight, elbows off the table, stop wiggling around, close your mouth while you chew, don’t talk with your mouth full of food, etc.
Our eldest daughter had trouble breathing through her nose, and I reminded him on many occasions that it made it impossible for her to chew with her mouth closed when she could not breathe through her nose, yet he continued to chide her to chew with her mouth closed. Our youngest was also a sensory-sensitive child, and sitting still was close to impossible for her. She wiggled around, but probably not any more than any other young child. So my husband was kept busy throughout the meal, policing their table manners. Family meals were not peaceful.
I could not understand how he wasn’t bothered by his children fighting about whose turn it was to sit next to him, and he didn’t seem interested in changing that. If my daughters were fighting about who had to sit next to me for dinner, that would have broken my heart, and I would have found a way to immediately correct that. But for years, the arguing went on. Eventually, the arguing stopped as the girls learned their table manners, and my husband slowly accepted his eldest would not chew with her mouth closed.
A decade later, I now understand what was going on during our family meals. Being a covert narcissist, my husband needs fuel – he was receiving external, albeit negative validation (narcissistic fuel) from his daughters as they visibly fought over who had to sit next to him. It made him feel important. Narcissists generally don’t care if the attention is negative or positive, so long as it is attention. Looking back, I wish I had spoken up on many occasions and just asked him to go eat in the dining room and leave us alone in the kitchen. Of course, I never did say anything, as I was too afraid to speak up, other than to remind him that our eldest couldn’t breathe through her nose, so eating with her mouth closed was nearly impossible for her.
Homework and Bedtime Routines
The arguments between our daughters continued beyond meals to homework and bedtime routines. Neither of them wanted Dad to help them with homework, as they found his style of homework support not helpful. As for bedtime routine, although my husband and I took turns putting the girls to bed and reading them bedtime stories, they continued to want me to put them to bed instead of Dad. It was heartbreaking to see their disappointment when it was Dad’s turn to put them to bed. It wasn’t every time, but it was often enough to notice.
One particular moment stands out to me. When I arrived home with my girls and my parents from a vacation, my eldest wanted to know who was putting her to bed that night. She was seven years old. She had just been away from her Dad for a week, so I told her that Daddy was putting her to bed that night, and she had an emotional meltdown. She was so upset that her Dad, whom she had not seen in a week, was putting her to bed that night. That broke my heart.
It wasn’t that he did a terrible job at helping them with homework, or getting them to brush their teeth before bed, or reading them bedtime stories. It was his energy behind doing these things that hurt the girls. It was his lack of real interest, patience, and genuine care that the girls felt. It seemed that it was more of a “task”, or “job” for him to do, instead of an opportunity to connect with his children.
Hiding From His Faults
A strange behavior my husband exhibited was during particular family movies that were about a deadbeat dad, learning to become an involved father. When it came time for the father in the movie to apologize to his family for not being the dad he should be, and promise to make up for it, my husband would shut his eyes and plug his ears during these parts of the movie. I really hoped that he did that because he felt guilty.
As a covert narcissist, I guess the reminders of how a father is supposed to behave were too painful for him to witness, so he hid from it. It was always my hope that he would wake up like the dads in the movies and make that same realization, but he never did. The interesting thing is that my girls loved these kinds of movies! Their favorite part was seeing the dad in the movie realize how much he loved his children, and promise to be a better father. I believe they secretly wished for the same thing I hoped for. Unfortunately, we were all disappointed.
A Problem He Didn’t Want to Fix
The pain of the favoritism that my eldest daughter experienced, and the ongoing battles about who our daughters sat next to for dinner, who helped them with their homework, and who put them to bed, was very confusing and painful to witness. I felt completely helpless in the situation, and I didn’t know how to fix it, and clearly, he didn’t want to fix it either. He never seemed bothered or upset by his children not wanting to sit next to him, help them with their homework, or put them to bed. And what was more difficult was that as our daughters grew older, their father simply became more emotionally unavailable and neglectful as a parent.
In Part Two of “My Children’s Pain in my Covert Narcissistic Marriage”, I share how his increasing emotional unavailability and neglectful parenting made my daughters constantly question his love for them and how it ultimately broke their hearts.