Tag: Finances

IF YOU’RE STILL WITH A NARCISSIST, KEEP A SECRET BANK ACCOUNT IN YOUR OWN NAME. AND KEEP YOUR CHARGE CARDS SECRET, AND IN YOUR NAME ONLY…the rules are very different when you are still with a narc. Let me tell you what happened to me.

I had built up a good cash reserve in our joint checking account. We had a 401k and a separate retirement account as well…at the time we split up. I had cancelled all the charge cards that had my name on them, since she was so irresponsible, but she opened accounts in her own name.

When she gave me the divorce papers, I went to the bank shortly thereafter, since I needed to hire an attorney. ALL the money in our checking and savings accounts was gone, except for $24. The 401k and retirement accounts were zeroed out. She had tried, I found out, to take out a second mortgage on our home, but couldn’t without my signature.

I bought that home and 6 acres of land for cash, using my own money. The car she was driving I bought her for cash, so nothing was owed on it. Now, in my 50’s, I literally had nothing, except for a pension that would start in a about 5 years, which she could not claim any of, at all, as I earned it before we married.

If I knew then what I know now, I would never have imagined that she’d be fair about our assets and split them evenly. Instead, I would have started a separate account at a different back, about which she knew nothing (so she didn’t hound me about it), and gradually moved half or more of our assets to that account. I WOULD INSURE FAIRNESS in that way.

How many of you have had everything stripped away from you by the narc? My ex, when she moved, literally took everything she could get into a large UHaul, including my tools, my electric razor, my vintage camera collection…you get the idea. What was left was an oak entertainment center that was too big and heavy to put in the moving truck, some antique furniture in pieces (restoring them was my hobby), and a futon. THAT WAS IT.

All our possessions and all our money was what she took. If I was smart, I would have used some of the money I would have put in my own account to rent a place, and move half the furniture and possessions, my tools, and my personal possessions, to my new place to live. But, instead, i was in my 50’s and starting all over again with NOTHING.

To make matters worse, she had run up nearly $80,000 of debt in her own name, including over $50,000 in student loans, even though I had paid per tuition, books, and expenses, her car, gas money, etc, myself. So, I ended up having to give her the title to the home as well.

Narcs are often parasitic. She used me to get an education to the Master’s Degree level, then divorced me. However, the divorce, at least, gave me a huge sense of relief emotionally.

I hope you learn from my experience, and from the experiences you see in the comments section, below. And, I hope the end result, in the long run, of that divorce is also a lesson. I met my now wonderful, loving wife three years later, and we’ve now been married 15 years. Since I negotiated the divorce settlement in a way that I left the marriage with no debts, I am happy to say that my now wife and I are doing fine financially, and we have a wonderful relationship with each other, or kids, and our grandkids.

It was hard for a while, and it had been hard for my now wife, too, post divorce. But, together, we build, whereas with my ex, I would build, and she would destroy. A relationship with another empath can change everything, including changing your life.