The Emotional Battle – Part Three
When you have been discarded, you face three battles in order to secure your freedom. The first is the Emotional Battle which you always lose until you learn not fight it. The second is the Heart V Head Battle which must be fought many times until you finally overcome the powerful effects of emotion and allow your cool, hard logic to dictate. Once that battle has been won, you have managed to navigate a way through the emotional ocean and then you have reached dry land on the other side. This is where the third battle is joined. This dry land provides you with a firmer foundation and just like the discovery of the New World, boundless opportunities. You are no longer prone to the vagaries of the swelling and dramatic ocean of emotions. That is not to say that your emotions have been switched off. Far from it. Instead, the solidity of this land is a reflection of the greater control you now have over your emotions as you ally them with the logic that you have regained. No longer do you feel overwhelmed. You are not beset by anxiety. Fear does not maintain a near permanent grip on your stomach. You were repeatedly drowned as you tried to swim the emotional ocean alone in the first battle. You saw yourself swamped and capsized on numerous occasions as reach time you increased your intellect and understanding as you built larger and more seaworthy vessels until finally you navigated your war through that broiling sea of feelings and now you stand on firm, dry and solid land. Your critical thinking has increased, your sense of calm has bloomed and you have gained greater control.
You stand before a land of opportunities and this is where you are now able to make the decisions. In the previous two battles you were overwhelmed and then often on the back foot. Here, in this final battle, you have the opportunity to seize and maintain the upper hand. You have so many choices available to you now.
You may decide to build a large tower and secrete yourself inside. You have the sturdy foundation now on which to construct this edifice. You are safe and secure high up in this tower. You admit visitors but only those that you know can be trusted. Occasionally you hear a knock in the dead of night. You make your way to the balcony and look down from your towering height to see us stood outside knocking on the door and seeking admittance. You may feel the surge of those emotions once more but you have greater control now. You may call out and wave, issuing a polite greeting and no more. You may decide just to turn around and leave us to our ineffectual knocking. Either way in this battle you have seized control and you are far better equipped to make rational decisions which suit you and prevent you from being wholly governed by those turbulent emotions.
You may decide to forge ahead and seek out new adventures in this land. You meet new people and form fresh and lasting friendships, perhaps even finding someone with whom you can share intimacy and romance. As you trek through this land, gathering new friends and revisiting those who were conned into severing the ties with you, you remain vigilant for out of nowhere we might appear. We might strike, lurching through a crowd hurling insults. You are better armed this time and able to shield yourself before moving away, refusing to be drawn into responding and a war of words like you once might have done. It may be the case, as you embrace these new horizons that we appear, smiling and benign, sidling up to you and taking you by surprise. The risk always remains, for if you are abroad within this new land, you cannot place yourself behind sturdy defences. Thus, you remain exposed to ambush and approach. You remain better equipped than you were, as a consequence of your gathered learning, your increased understanding and ongoing recovery. You are in a better position to rebuff the ambush, refusing to engage and making your departure to safer ground. Sometimes you may be caught and those emotions wash about you as we try to haul you back across the sea to a time when you were alone and going under the lashing waves. This risk always remains.
You may opt to establish an estate where you do not take refuge in some tower, but instead you create a place of familiarity where everyone is known to you and you are known to them. You have your supporters in clear view and whilst you may not tread down the path less travelled in search of new territories you reduce your risk of us appearing out of nowhere. These familiar places enable you to maintain clear lines of sight so that if we do make an appearance you are able to take suitable evasive action.
This final battle takes the form of repeated skirmishes as we seek to catch you unawares and drag you back to an earlier battle where our prospects of success are maximised. Sometimes we succeed. Sometimes one of our devious ploys catches you unaware and we scale your tower and appear on your balcony like that once desired Prince Charming again and your defences are breached. Other times you repel our approaches, turning your back or cutting us down with new learned techniques which force us to withdraw. You may see no action for weeks, months and even years as new reaches you that we are fighting on other fronts, seemingly content to leave you be. At least for the time being. Then out of nowhere you may reduce your vigilance and we are by your side, seeking to snake our tendrils around you once again. In this final battle you now know what to look for. When we march on to the battle field you see and take heed of the red flags which stream behind us. You have learned methods by which you can counter and neutralise our manipulations. You have established safe territories to which you might retreat if the need arises. You have fashioned your own armoury in this new land of hope and promise. You now know how you can wound us and now, exerting greater control, you do so which gives us no option but to disengage from the skirmish and skulk away to lick our wounds and regroup.
This final battle takes place in a land where the battlefield, for the first time, is more of your choosing than ours. You have better equipped to fight this battle and whilst there remains a risk of defeat and you being ensnared once again, it is far less than in the previous two battles. You are battle-hardened and those scars are worn as badges of honour as you stand tall for the first time in, well, you cannot recall when that last happened, but it has happened at last.
Thus, this is the final battle post discard. The battle that takes place on dry land. Should you overcome the first two battles, this is where you will find yourself. Now you understand where you will end up as you deal with the fallout from being discarded. Now you are aware of what will happen, what to expect and how you are in a better position to keep winning the skirmishes in this final battle. This only leaves one question remaining. How long will this final battle last?
It will continue until one of us no longer lives.
16 thoughts on “The Emotional Battle – Part Three”
Vent Your Spleen! (Please see the Rules in Formal Info)
This site uses Akismet to reduce spam. Learn how your comment data is processed.
This was a great, validating read. What I heard, was a very clear “no contact” message.
hello hello 🙂
there is something I don’t understand about the narcs. I met my narc after his girlfriend “the love of his life” escaped him (she’ve found someone new) and the narc was totally depressed (or he was pretending to be depressed) and he has spent months hoovering her (but she blocked him everywhere). His hoovers were public – desperate love songs, poems, talking about his depresion and therapy, loss of weight and so on.
And what is strange to me is that he was doing this publicily and at the same time he was publicly flirting with other girls. I don’t know this girl but maybe if he wasn’t flirting with others she would take him back. So why the narcissist who spends a lot of energy on hoovering is sabotaging his own efforts at the same time?
I found this piece so beautifully written. To me it portrayed that yes the narcissist will forever Hoover in some form or fashion; and yes the empath will always have an emotional reaction/infection ( no matter how minimal that may be) But we have the choice and power to choose for ourselves as to what to do with those feelings. We don’t have to dwell on them, or do anything about them. We can let it go, we can move on even if the narcissist always re appears. I don’t know if you meant this article to be as such HG, but I find it very empowering!
This is motivational!! Absolute!
I’m building a fortress. (As soon as I get these water-wings off.). I’m not sure I can stop them. That’s -all- I tangle with.. what’s left to do? The more i read, the more i recognize them scattered through my past.. frigging vultures
HG
please tell me, i would appreciate it, ( although it might sounds idiotical) but could it be that sometimes some greater narcissist does not have any other intimate partners?
Sometimes i believe him when he says that he hasn’t any other women…
although i doubt it.
No there will be IPs.
Thank yo HG
But why is he hanging on to me?
Golden period has been destroyed.. intimacy is far.. promises are only words..
we argue fiercely all the time…
we are like 2 psycos… and then he says that cannot live withouth me and that he loves me: the miracle of his life !!!!
This is destroying me because he is so persuasive… but deeds shows me the hellish reality..
why can’t i move on ?
i was a very joyful outgoing being
full of positive energy… now i feel a psyco …
😢
Keep on fighting RealitySetin. You are not there yet. Keep in mind as stated by HG that they believe they own you and the sick relationship you were ensnared into never goes away till until someone loses the life battle. Personally speaking, I used to have vivid dreams we got back together then she would ignore me and cheat in the dream. I remember feeling in the dream that anxiety and sorrow of being let down again. This was happening 10 years after the discard/breakup, no closure, smearing, and hoover situations. I knew something was not right with me for still feeling angry for years until I found information on the internet that led me to narcissism. Made me feel like I wasn’t crazy but that HELLLLL, I was right all along about her and that you don not treat someone like that and everything is normal or right and other people think its normal and that you should just get over it. I do not have those dreams anymore. It took time and a real woman to help me with it all. You will get there.
RJ
Thanks for the encouragement and I’m glad you found a real woman. After what you had with dealing with your ex Narc, you deserve it. Yes I know all about the damn dreams! I met him in 2013 and its been that long that I have had dreams about him. I always think….man….what is wrong with me am I crazy? Why has this man been in my head this long. I understand more now of course and know why. But yeah thank you.
This might be a bit off topic but wow I gotta share this. I know sharing this will make me look bad and probably seen in a lesser light. Today as I set home with the flu and bored, I did something I should not have done and it was out of sheer curiousity. I have not done this in a while. I looked at his last girlfriends fb. There had been no activity from him to her on her fb in six months. However this time when I looked there was one change I noticed and it was a heart added to her fb profile picture. When I saw that heart❤️…..my actual heart started beating so fast and I felt a rush of fear and adrenaline run through me. It’s like for a second it felt like I was scared to death! This reaction caught me wayyyyyy off guard as I have felt that I am over him. So very slowly and with much hesitation….I clicked on the heart to see who’s it was. It was not him! It was a female friend of hers! Then suddenly the fear left me and I was left with relief……wowwwwww! I had no idea he still is so much in my heart or mind. I had no idea I would feel that sudden scary RUSH of emotions! So freaking crazy! I remember awhile back when there had been no activity on her fb from him and then suddenly he hearted on of her pictures and I saw it and my heart sank! Like it was as if someone stabbed me in the stomach with a spear! Like I was bent over and devastated ! That also caught me off guard! That was awhile back though but DAMN!!!!!! Pure insanity!
Thank you for sharing that experience. This exhibits two matters :-
1. How the emotional infection always remains, even at a very low level ; and
2. Your emotional thinking rose to cause you to check the girlfriend’s FB. Logic dictates not to and there was no need to. Your emotional thinking caused you to look and the presence of the emotional infection caused the anxiety and then relief.
Yeah and man it was so intense!
This is also the reason among other reasons that I got rid of my fb. Then out of curiosity I had to look every few months but I used a blank fb. Kinda defeats the purpose….huh! When I had a fb…..I kept seeing him in my suggestions and it was just messing with my head because we were not friends on that fb and no friends in common on that fb and I couldn’t figure out why he kept popping up. So I got rid of it because I didn’t want to go through that all of the time. Back then I was wondering in my head….is fb messing with me lol….anyways!!!!! One time he did however create a blank fb himself and messaged me on messenger…..”hey you….were did you disappear too?” So yeah I got rid of it!💔
If he’s in your phone contacts, facebook have access and will use it to suggest friends. Nothing is private…