Anyone who has tried to “co-parent” with a psychopath or sociopath or narcissist, if there is a difference, knows that this is an unending battle. The challenges are overwhelming at times. Having just dropped our daughter off
today with her narcissistic father, I’m more frustrated than usual. While I try to enjoy my alone time, and often do, I am left with frustration that his parenting style is harming her and there’s nothing I can do to stop it. I have said little so far in this blog about the kinds of things that she comes home saying that her father has said about me, etc., but suffice it to say that his remarks are verbally abusive to her. He HAS to know it, doesn’t he?! I’m so frustrated and horrified that someone who APPEARS to care so much about her (the crying when she leaves, the over-zealous parenting, over-protecting, etc.) can say such things to her and not know that these remarks are damaging. Counselors can’t help. I’ve resolved myself to learning all I can about narcissists and learning how to out-manipulate the manipulator. The co-parenting psychopath cares not about the child involved, or can not see that his actions could cause harm. I think that this is what is going on in “my” narcissists case. I think that he thinks that whatever he says is justified or that what he says can’t hurt her. And, maybe I’m giving him too much credit here. The coparenting psychopath is concerned only with how he can use his daughter to get to you. I don’t care enough about him to even talk about him to her much, other than the usual “did you have a good time at Daddy’s?” It surprises and frustrates me to know that after having been separated for 2 years, and divorced for 1, that he still cares enough to try to turn her against me. He still sees it as a battle and I believe that he thinks that he’ll get her to want to live with him so it will hurt me. As he said before we were separated, “if we’re not together, I won’t make things easy for you. I’ll get full custody of (our daughter) and you won’t see her.” To which I replied, “you’d take your daughter away from her mother, who has been her primary caregiver her whole life?” “Yes. Because she shouldn’t have to be brought up in this kind of environment.” “What kind of environment?” “You’re a liar!” He could never come up with anything I had actually lied about. This was apparently his justification for hurting me by using our daughter against me. That’s a good reason I think, don’t you?
The coparenting psychopath will not take your child to functions or activities that have anything to do with you. For instance, I let our daughter join a dance class on Saturday mornings for 45 minutes. Even when he lived close,The coparenting psychopath will lie to suit their fancy. There will be 8″ of snow on the ground where there is only 2″. The drive to his house will be 30 minutes when you need to drive it to accommodate him, but its a full hour when he has to drive it to accommodate you. His daughter may never be sick at his house, he may take her to the doctor without telling you that she was “sick” in order to try to prove you unfit. Yes, my N-ex (narcissistic ex) has tried all of these and more. The doctor’s appointment plan was poorly executed, therefore I found out about it, and got all of the medical records, (after I had to drive an hour to the doctor’s office to sign the release to get my daughters records. He, of course, hadn’t put me on as the mother). The medical records showed that he was trying to say that she was “always sick” when she was at my house and that her condition cleared up when she was with him. It was, of course, unfounded, and he couldn’t use it for what he wanted, which was part of his battle to get the threatened full custody. Some of the lies are comical, if you can stand to sit back and take it into perspective. It would be much easier to do so if your precious child wasn’t involved and being hurt by his lies. Unfortunately though, this was the case, so I couldn’t laugh at him at the time. At the time, I was scared as hell of what he might try to pull. I still am, though I’m starting to doubt that he can get anywhere without help. Still, he has time to devote to
nothing but my demise, which is frightening. While I’m out trying to make a living so that I can one day not live with my parents again, he’s sitting back, taking it easy. Since he lies about his income (self-employed) he pays $112 a month child support. That pays for one session of counseling to try to help undo his damage and the damage of the divorce itself.
My daughter has stopped saying she wishes her dad and I were together. Instead, she now says, “I don’t think Daddy loves you anymore!” Then says, “why did Daddy stop loving you?” to which I simply reply, “I don’t know.” What do you say to that? The co-parenting psychopath will say or do anything to turn your children against you, even, of course, at the expense of the child. He/she will keep you from getting what you deserve, what is rightfully yours, what is your child’s, etc. I made a shadowbox for our daughter when she was a tiny baby. It was an imprint of her feet and hands in plaster. He kept it and refuses to give it to me. I made it for her. A real man would logically give it whom it rightfully belonged. Because I was nice and let him live in our house, as he had nowhere else to go, I got screwed over for it.he refused to take her to participate. Well, I take that back. He did take her once, but he saw my sister there. Her dance recital and rehearsal falls on his time this year. It is only 20 minutes from his house. I’m going to have to worry whether he is going to take her again this year. (It fell on his time last year too. He only took her because I told our-previous-babysitter/his girlfriend/whatever when it was going to be so that our daughter’s dad would know that the babysitter knew if he didn’t take her to the dance recital. Narcissists want to look good at all times, so we can sometimes use this to our advantage. Hey, they’d do it to us in a heartbeat! Hopefully she’ll get to go. She loves dance, and even though she’s only 4, she still will notice if she doesn’t get to go to the recital like her cousin and the rest of her dance class.
You’ll see many more posts in the future about the co-parenting psychopath, I’m sure. This is my biggest challenge! Feel free to add your comments below, and please “like” me on Facebook 🙂 God bless!
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