For quite a long time i kept being surprised by the extent of his malignant narcissist and psychopathic traits.
It took quite a bit for my brain to hold onto the idea that this was not something he periodically showed up as but who he is through and through all the time, smiles or dagger eyes, either way he is using everyone in his vicinity for his own ends.
It is a painful realisation.... also that he's not the only one. There are arseholes extraordinaire out there in the world and may they all steer double clear of me before one of them cops the wrath intended for this particular brand of loser.
We are all very lucky to be free of him now, it IS over. at least for us and we have a whole lot to be thankful for moving forward.
It's impossible to have empathy for him, as you say, a trap or default tendency I went to often before I got enough facts together to understand that he doesn't care AT ALL and has zero capacity to care.
It's laugh or cry territory, some days it goes either way. Lately the absurdity of it all does tend to make me laugh. Sure it's black humour but it also diminishes him in my mind, which i enjoy. The fact that the most self serving person i can think of had somehow persuaded me and countless other premies that serving him was equivalent to serving a higher power. Thats absurd and ironic and funny from this distance, although not in the beginning of course.
The years spent healing are worth it, there is a part of me that he never could reach, I guess she just exited stage left until I was ready to understand. Now that he is in his rightful place the part of me that really does know, my inner knowing I had before I got caught in his web is back and enjoying the process of balance that comes from starting to make sense of all that took place.
