The Discard

I keep mentioning the "Narcissistic Discard" and the day I was discarded. I thought I should explain that a bit. Essentially, once the narcissist obtains new "supply" (usually a new lover who gives him attention after his current lover has begun to see through his facade or question him/assert her needs in any way), he will literally "discard" her like one would throw away a piece of trash.

This happened to me one Sunday in March. He had come back from his work assignment 6 days earlier. This time, he said, he was back "for good" and we were finally going to be together, and live together as husband and wife. But a few days in to being back, I noticed that he was quiet and distant. I asked him what was wrong, and he said that his parents were getting older and needed him there, and that he missed his friends and family. I said "Do you not want to be here?" and he said "I don't know." I thanked him for his honesty, but asked him to please let me know more about that as soon as he'd thought about it.

The next day, we got into a huge argument wherein he accused me of wanting a divorce and ignoring him. None of that was true. Also, I had gone for a drink with one of my closest female friends earlier in the week. We'd had it on the calendar for weeks, and I offered to cancel for him. I asked him if he minded, he said "No, no, of course! Go!", I only stayed out for an hour, but when I came home, he couldn't believe that I actually went KNOWING that he was "sad and lonely". I had been looking forward to him being back for the past year, and now he was turning things around to try to make it seem that *I* didn't want *him*, which couldn't have been further from the truth. He stormed out and didn't come back for hours. I thought that we would talk about it the next day, and that like all of our arguments, he would be over it quickly, and I would be the one to be hurt for awhile.

The following day was a Sunday. I got up before he did, and took the dog for a long walk. When I came back in to the apartment, he had his coat and shoes on. I asked him where he was going, and he said he was going to Starbucks to get some coffee, even though I had just made a pot of coffee before I walked the dog. He insisted, and I didn't say anything.

About an hour later, he came back. I asked him if he wanted to talk, and he said "Yes, I want to talk about how I'm leaving you today." Just like that. Casually, coldly, no emotion. He said it as if he was saying that he was going to take the garbage out now. Which, in a way, was what he thought.

In that moment, I shattered. I don't fully remember the rest of the conversation (really more of a monologue, because I literally lost the ability to speak. My voice tightened to the point that I could barely squeak a sound out, and I was reeling so much that I didn't even know what I would say if I could.) He said something about how we had no future together, we had nothing in common, and he didn't want to be with me any more. He said it was for the best. And he began to pack his bags.

I remember physically collapsing. I could no longer hold myself up. Luckily I was sitting at the kitchen table when it happened. I remember punching the kitchen table, asking him to please wait and talk to me and help me to understand how he could say those things. I remember going into the bedroom and screaming and coming out and begging him again to not go, to talk to me, that we could work things out. I was shaking uncontrollably. And then I stopped crying and went numb.

I laid on the couch for the rest of the time he was in the apartment, while he was packing. I didn't move or make a sound. I couldn't. Teardrops rolled out of my eyes involuntarily, but I was no longer crying. Just leaking, I guess. I stared straight ahead for hours. I was frozen.

He came to the living room, with 3 bags packed, and asked me to call him a cab. I told him that I wasn't going to help him leave, and he would have to do that himself. He got angry, and said I was being selfish, and why couldn't I just help him? He then said that he would stay at a hotel until his flight in the morning. I said ok. Then he asked if he could just stay here one more night.  I said "If you are really leaving me, I think you should stay at a hotel." Again, he couldn't believe how selfish I was.

He walked out the door. I found my tears and sobbed again. The dog whimpered and barked. It was over. I laid on the couch the rest of the night, unable to move.

The next day, he called me while I was at work (yes, I went to work the next day, because I couldn't bear the thought of being in the apartment without him, and thought I could maybe focus on something else...I was wrong) and asked if we could talk. I said I had nothing to talk about. He left me, he'd made his choice, I wasn't going to stop him. He begged to come over and talk. I don't remember agreeing, but I must have.

When I got home, he and all of his bags were back in the living room. The first thing he said was "I can't believe you didn't even call to check on me to make sure I was ok last night!" I actually laughed. HE LEFT ME, and he expected ME to call and "check on him" to make sure he was ok?! "I don't know this city well, and luckily I found a hotel, but my parents couldn't BELIEVE you just left me alone like that! In my culture, we would NEVER do that to someone we love, and my mother will never forgive you for that!"

Then he said he wanted to hear why he should consider taking me back. I told him I had no reasons, and that I wasn't going to beg. He'd already made his choice, and all I could do was accept it. Because the truth was, that Sunday was the worst day of my life. Watching him walk out the door was the hardest mental picture I'd ever experienced. The only thing close to it was seeing my Grandpa on his death bed, emaciated from cancer, and hours away from dying. But even that was expected, and I'd made some peace with it before seeing it. This...this was new.

Over the next few days he admitted that he didn't actually have a flight booked. Every day he promised that he did, but then it came down to it, and he didn't. And he realized that he loved me and just wanted to be with me, but needed to go back to his country to "close doors" and "get his head on straight." But what that really meant, I know now, was go back to his supply. Be with her for awhile more. See what else he could get out of her, and then decide if she or I was better.

But I knew in my heart that I would never get over how I felt that day, being tossed away as if I and our 3 years together meant nothing to him. Even if he "got his head on straight," I knew that mine, for the first time, was beginning to be on straight, itself. And the day after he left, I actually woke up happy and relieved that he was gone.