The Power of Spackle

spackle

Spackle is a coping mechanism that allows us to overlook the worst qualities in a partner. A little bit is fine in a healthy relationship, but with a cheater, spackle can be denial, or hopium, that this person isn’t abusing you.

Do you ever wonder now what you ever saw in your cheater?

Once they lit the moon, and now you’re mortified to recall your life with them.  WTF?

After infidelity, it’s not uncommon to feel like you never knew who that person was at all. That you loved a holographic projection of a loving spouse, but really some sicko was behind the projector. Or maybe you still cling to the idea that they were once a good person, but got abducted by aliens and replaced with an amoral jerk. Who WAS this person and how could they have deceived me?

Well, folks, maybe part of it was you.

Maybe you spackled.

Spackle is filling in the gaps and creating a smooth surface from what was once an unsightly blemish. Add a little sanding and paint — and voila! A normal looking surface!

Relationships all possess some spackle to one degree or another. For instance, I look past my husband’s penchant for “Polka Pimp” t-shirts and dressing like a teenage refugee. If anyone asks, I’ll tell you he is the most handsome, brilliant, wonderful husband on the planet, and not a flaming dork. Conversely, when I enter the house, I take my shoes off in the most inconvenient traffic paths imaginable.

I don’t know why. No one can break me of this. It has driven everyone who has ever lived with me crazy. My father used to punt my shoes down the hallway or hide them from me. If you ask my husband, he’d tell you I’m a delight to live with. I know I’m not. I know that my shoe habit among other idiosyncrasies (snoring, complaining about Texas weather, organic food snobbery) make people want to strangle me, but my husband is nice and looks past my insufferable qualities.

A little spackle is kind. Necessary, if you want to remain happily married. Too much spackle, however, is dysfunctional — delusional even.

What does bad spackle look like?

Making continual excuses for bad behavior. Creating a positive narrative from spotty evidence. Constructing “underlying issues” that explain destructive choices.

Spackle examples: He isn’t really a cheater, he just has “bad coping mechanisms for stress.” She isn’t really a failure because she hasn’t kept a job in 20 years, it’s because she intimidates her bosses. They can’t handle how clever she is and so they undermine her. He isn’t a mooch. He has a lot of potential and is going to stay at home and write that screenplay for a few years.

Sparkly people (narcissists, Cluster Bs, whatever you want to call them) are really good at maintaining an air of being All That. They so believe it, that you do feel a little crazy around them if you don’t believe it too. And face it, most of us want to believe that we chose the smartest, best looking, most fabulous person as our spouse. Because that reflects well on us. We spackle out of self interest, as well as love.

The problem is that a lot of cheaters are frauds.

They really wouldn’t look normal to the outside world if anyone knew their true selves. So, we are there to spackle and smooth their image to the world. We are of use to them – we polish and finesse and build them up. And we are so invested in that image that we do this work gladly, sometimes unwittingly. If the cognitive dissonance between what IS and what we want it to be, is too great, then we stuff that down. Until there comes a point at which you can’t pretend any more.

Infidelity is liberating in a sense because the true person is revealed.

You weren’t going crazy. The emperor really didn’t have any clothes. But damn it, if you weren’t one of the idiots saying he did.

And why is that?

1. We want to believe.

We have a vested interest in thinking our world is normal and safe and we chose a good spouse who reflects well upon us.

2. They really do believe they’re better, and so we buy it too. 

Why would someone act smarter than me, if they didn’t possess the accomplishments to go along with that air of superiority?  Wow. They must actually be smarter and more accomplished than me!

3. We don’t look at the evidence.

If you pay attention to actions and not lip service, it’s pretty easy to spot who is sincere in our lives and who is a waste of space. But often, those conclusions are painful to draw, and so we’re sucked in by pretty words and attitude. We construct realities based on spackle and no substance.

When I went through infidelity, I constructed all sort of reasons why my cheating ex was really a good person and not a freaking abusive wing nut. He had an “inferiority complex” for growing up the son of a coal miner; he had mommy issues; he had daddy issues. The problem was really the Other Woman, he needed to feel needed and she was just manipulating him! You name the delusional excuse, I had it.

Spackle.

Lesson learned: If you’ve got a little ding in your wall, spackle is good. But it’s nothing to build the foundation of your house out of.

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Roxie
Roxie
11 years ago

I think I fell into the ‘I want to believe’ category.
Everyone always told me what an amazing guy that ex was. He was smart, handsome, helpful. He carefully cultivated a persona of the guy that would come help you with anything, help you move, help you with that remodeling job, (“Help you out of your panties, M’am?”)
People would constantly tell me what a great guy he was, and what a lucky girl I must be to have him in my life, with the implication that he was really too good for me and I should be grateful that he lowered himself to earth, from the heavens above, to be with me.
I know I stayed with him much longer just because of how crazy I felt that I didn’t see this fantastic guy that everyone else saw anymore. What I saw in him initially was his potential and I took that to be the reality, when it wasn’t.
I was dealing with a man that was jobless during our marriage for 8 years, while I struggled to keep us afloat. through our marriage he had been fired from 4 different jobs, cheated on me with a minimum of 3 different women, never helped out at home, and spent money recklessly while somehow convincing friends and family that I was the one that was irresponsible with money.
I’m ashamed at how long it took me to realize what he really was, instead of what he liked to project to others. He was nothing BUT spackle!!!!!

Nena
Nena
10 years ago
Reply to  Roxie

Oh Roxie, I totally understand. 🙁 The ex that tried to kill me was exactly like that. I am glad you were able to escape from that. They are really good at PR to make everyone you know think they are God incarnate, but in reality they are demonic inside.

I really, truly feel for you on this.

Dani
Dani
11 years ago
Reply to  Roxie

Amen sister! My ex sounds similar to yours (smart, handsome, charming, handy etc…) I was always told he was such an AMAZING guy. Everyone just loved him. And what a father!!!!!! He was a stay at home dad for 4 years while bartending at night to keep us financially stable. What a sacrifice for his family… EXCEPT, he was hooking up with women while he was at work. Yes, what a father indeed, to sacrifice his career track to become a bartender and get paid to indulge his narcissistic side (for his family, of course)! All the while, I was the one with the stable job, the benefits, the everything. But all i ever heard was, “Oh, you are soooo lucky to have a man who is willing to be so involved with his daughter!” Yes, yay me!!!! Don’t be too hard on yourself Roxie… most of us go into our relationships with good intentions and just assume that our partners do the same. And when they fall short we see it as our time to be supportive and “help them along”, because that is what we assume they would do for us. Expect they are a little to focused on themselves to really be bothered with what we might need.

Nord
Nord
11 years ago
Reply to  Dani

All very true. I was the supportive one, the one who always took care o things, who made the excuses for whatever went wrong in his life. Then, the last year of our marriage I was in a serious funk – which has since been diagnosed as depression. His response? Instead of what he had been (I now know) doing all along, having affairs, he went nuts, screwing around all over the place, including with one of my friends and then ‘fell’ for a young co-worker. His excuse? I wasn’t there for him emotionally and she took care of him that way (also with sex and naked pictures, but, you know, that didn’t really matter).

So after years and years of me holding him up and being there for him the one time I really needed him he bailed. Why? Because it was no longer about him. My therapist pointed out, very aptly, that if something was wrong with me it was his job as my husband to be there for me, not look elsewhere for attention, and the fact that he wasn’t says it all: he’s completely self-absorped and seems to truly believe that his needs come before anyone else’s.

His behaviour since I booted him shows that he has not changed one iota.

Alley
Alley
9 years ago
Reply to  Nord

This is exactly what happened to me… After a decade of taking care of everything, him, his family, our home, shopping, finances, business, and cleaning up after his messes when he f*cked up, I went into a freaked out/depressed state over the fact that we were still struggling (mainly due to his laziness). I was tired of being married to a man-child. But he always had so much POTENTIAL. A rock star with a zillion friends/connections, super talented.

So I stopped enabling. I asked him to step up. I asked what he was going to do to contribute more. I asked what his goals were and where he wanted to be in 5 or 10 years. He kept dropping lines to friends and family about wanting children, so how was he going to make that situation happen (we didn’t have health insurance at the time and he made poverty level income)?

Did he step up and try harder? Did he try and comfort me? Discuss the issues like an adult? Make a 5 year plan? Go out and hustle for more work?

No. He proceeded to get wasted everyday and become a ‘gigalo’ (his words), and carry on multiple affairs while lying to me (and the other women, telling them he was separated or divorcing). All the while supposedly supporting my efforts to find a new job in a new city to better OUR situation. (Again, me working hard and making all the efforts, for US).

Of course, once I found out about the one affair (the one OW that got super needy and attached), I soon found out about the other booty calls. Then about the previous OWs throughout the relationship. Then about the occasional Craigslist call girls.

For a while I was able to blame the drinking, until I realized that he was a compulsive liar, and it was clear he knew exactly what he was doing.

I may never had known ANY of this, ever, had I not sunk into a funk.

Even now I notice that our conversations are all about him. He never asks how I’m doing.

MamaMeh
MamaMeh
23 days ago
Reply to  Alley

AS CL says … so hard when only one is doing the adulting. Of course he never asks … just doesn’t occur! Hope you’re doing fine ((((hugs))))

nottoobright
nottoobright
10 years ago
Reply to  Nord

This is me. All the way. I have dumbed myself down for so long and made everything about him. He has even resented the children for the amount of
attention they needed. For a number of years, I was depressed and asking daily
for help. I figured that the one time in thirty years where I needed him to step up, it wouldn’t be too much to ask. It was and all he could think of to do was hook up with a howorker. Wow. I think I’m awake now.

Dani
Dani
11 years ago
Reply to  Nord

Well, good for you for having the strength to BOOT him. It is so very hard. Mine is booted as well, but it’s a struggle to figure out the line of having contact with him re: our kid and letting things slip back into “too familiar” territory. Maybe as time goes on, it will get easier (we’ve only been apart for a month).

Kristina
Kristina
11 years ago

More amazing insight, CL.

I think I would add a 4th point, though. 4) You are prone to Spackle.

As you have said, all of us spackle a little, or at the very least we learn to live with the minor cracks. we all have our own quirks, in fact, Ishare the shoe habit CL describes. LOL. But I think there is a spackling continuum, and some of us spackle very little, some of us spackle a bit more, and some of us come with bottomless buckets of spackle, and we spackle everything, all the time. Where you sit on that continuum does not make you bad, but I think it does make you vulnerable to the sorts who need lots of spackle. People who have a limited tolerance for spackling will not attract, nor be attracted to, spackle hogs.

I havebbeen around narcissists before…I have gone out with actors and musicians once or twice. I could smell the entitlement on them, so I never was that impressed, there was just no hook for me. They would have required much more spackle than I personally carry in reserve. I have just about enough to spackle over the cracks of emotional nitwits in order to make them appear to be worth the effort it takes to get them to open hp. This is probably why I never attempted reconciliation. That would have taken a waterfall of spackle. Just did not have it in me.

Nena
Nena
10 years ago
Reply to  Kristina

Ooooh. Musicians and actors DO have that sense of entitlement and think that everyone wants them. This lead singer of a band pursued me. Red flags popped up and I ran away! Funny thing is, he still whines and says he wants me back and that he loves me. DUDE! I only went out on ONE date with you and found out weeks later you have a wife and kid. If I knew who his wife was, I would tell her so that he won’t kill her with AIDS.

crazy cajun
crazy cajun
11 years ago
Reply to  Tracy Schorn

Ok, so I spackle too much also. Why? How do you fix that, so you quit or are you destined to keep getting played?
I’m over the XW, but dammit if I still don’t defend her at times. I think maybe we cover up other peoples flaws because we see ourselves as flawed? A form of insecurity in ourselves, if you will. Or maybe, it’s not spackle we are applying but, neosporin and a band-aid, thinking we can heal their flaws. A spackler can fix anything and it makes us feel sooooo good!
Problem is, no amount of ointment can cure what is wrong with a cheater, that particular ailment is at their core.

nottoobright
nottoobright
10 years ago
Reply to  Tracy Schorn

I definitely have a bottomless bucket of spackle and have been with a hog for most of my life. I am a spackling addict.

MovingOn
MovingOn
11 years ago

My ex also wants me to continue to spackle now that our M is over. You know, he’s still this “great guy” in every other way, so there’s no need to discuss the A with anyone.

Yeah, except that I threw out my putty knife and canceled my subscription to Spackle Of the Month Club.

I was definitely a spackler; so many people asked me what I saw in him after they learned about the A/end of our M, and when I look back, I can see how I spackled his behaviors for others: “Oh, he’s just having a bad night… he’s not feeling well… he’s worried about…” No, maybe he’s just a douche that I keep covering in spackle. That sounds about right.

TryingToMoveOn
TryingToMoveOn
10 years ago
Reply to  MovingOn

I’m right there with you MovingOn. First off he won’t even admit the affair even though I found both their cars at his apartment at 2:30am (we are not divorced yet) and put a note on each saying “I Know”. But he doesn’t want me to speak to any of his family and friends. I spent years spackling his behavior to them.

“We can’t come for dinner mom, he’s working” Not! I would lie for him to anyone and then console him for having to work so much. He’s such a narc that he even encouraged our children to lie to his mother about things like a trip to an amusement park. I never liked it, but went along with it b/c I spackled his reasoning as mommy issues.

Well, I have now sat down with both our children and told them that we were wrong to encourage them to lie and that they should never feel like they have to hide things in their lives from the people they love. I also called and told his mother the highlights of how I know he cheated.

I have thrown my spackle away and won’t be getting any more for quite a long time.

Nord
Nord
11 years ago
Reply to  MovingOn

Ha! My STBX is FURIOUS that I won’t spackle anymore. He wants to go with ‘the marriage was crumbling’ story and I’m instead going with ‘I discovered that he had been cheating for years, including with a friend of mine and during some pretty key moments in our life’. This makes him angry because it’s forcing him to deal with the truth and it means I will no longer be his protector. He doesn’t like this at all.

B12yankee
B12yankee
10 years ago
Reply to  Nord

I’m dealing with the same thing. He would not even tell our neighbors why were we were selling the house. He told them we were looking for another house. We were, just not the same house!

He was appalled that I was speaking with friends during this time. I was told that our marriage was no one else’s business and that no ones understands our special bond. Apparently I didn’t understand it either!! If you consider lying, cheating, being on the brink of bankruptcy for hiding and not paying bills, frequenting happy ending massage parlors, bullying, threatening and trying to get his way by whatever means necessary at the end, a “Special bond” then so be it. Amazing the things they can hide from you all the while being the life of the party and everyone’s friend.

But I’m the one with issues?! Apparently being honest, trusting and having morals are all character flaws in his narcissistic world.

MovingOn
MovingOn
11 years ago
Reply to  MovingOn

I also spackled his behavior for myself, big time.

Arnold
Arnold
11 years ago

These folks hate it when you will no longer cover for them. Thing is though, that I was covering for so many years, that getting the truth accepted was not terribly easy.
Add to that the the NPD types are fabulous actors, playing to outsiders, while I was not all that good at it , and it was tough.
Best thing you can do is just accept that some folks will see you as the bad guy, no matter what.

MamaMeh
MamaMeh
24 days ago
Reply to  Arnold

Also, they’ve had the jump on you. They’ve been planting untruths for years about your unreliability – amongst other made-up failings – so people are primed to doubt you.

Samsara
Samsara
23 days ago
Reply to  MamaMeh

Agree — the opposite to our spackle campaign is the cheater’s smear campaign which begins even before they are ready to monkey branch! Instead they prep all the people (including chump family members!!) whom they perceive they need on their side and lace the narrative with poison so the chump has no chance of either allies or support.
It’s so deliberately toxic.
It’s textbook bullying
It’s using third parties to triangulate and dominate the chump.
It’s so calculated.
Its aim is total annihilation of the chump and total exoneration of the cheater.
Our spackle is no match for their smear

MamaMeh
MamaMeh
23 days ago
Reply to  Samsara

Too true, in the end, it’s just old-fashoined bullying. Before we ever figured out gaslighting, triangulation etc, we at least knew bullying. Exertion of power over another. Simply levels of spoghistication.

MamaMeh
MamaMeh
23 days ago
Reply to  MamaMeh

oops sorry typo. Levels of sophistication.

Snarkula
Snarkula
10 years ago

Oh, I LOVE this post. I recognized myself immediately – I’m the Georgia O’Keeffe of Spackle, the Frida Kahlo of the Spackle arts. Seriously. The huge elaborate works of spackle art I’ve produced fill a giant interior art museum, and how I’m enjoying these works, now that I know what they really are. Not just with my mega-cheater XH, but with the lovely and extensive galleries of narcissists I’ve deal with over the years. I’ve been restructuring these Sparkle art works using giant buckets of spackle remover and an ice axe. It’s the biggest fun ever. I’ve been doing this for a while, without really knowing what was happening. This post illuminated the process.

Chump Lady, you are a righteous babe. Thank you one million totally real times just for being here. ‘Spackle’ is a concept I find immensely useful in getting on with my life and digesting the wisdom that lies within the pile of shit my cheating XH handed me. Because you got two choices with the buttload of manure the cheater dumps on you: you can wallow, cry and stink, or you can use it to fertilize your new garden of beautiful wisdom blossoms. I did both, and the garden is better. And I didn’t do it alone, I had many graceful and generous people to help. I’m pleased to say that Chump Lady has joined that treasured group.

Nena
Nena
10 years ago

Oh shit, man. I was the freakin’ Spackle QUEEN! Oh boy did I spackle the hell out of my exes. I am glad that I learned how to stop that. I am glad that I now realize that I should trust that fearful feeling in my gut and get away instead of saying “Nena, you’re being a bitch! Nobody’s perfect. Why are you so judgmental?” That almost got me murdered.

Men spackle too, I know. I think that maybe we want something so badly that we try to gloss things over. Or maybe we were abused growing up and therefore our gut feeling had faded away from being talked out of so much.

I wish that I ran into this site waaaaaaaaaaaaay sooner back when I was going through all of this.

Oh well. I have a good man now. And I can finely tune that my red flag system for other situations with people.

Chizcag
Chizcag
10 years ago

SpackleMama here, after 30 years of playing Spackling The Flag without my soon-to-be ‘HAS-BAND’ even realizing I was doing it (of course he’s so delusional, he thinks he’s smooth as silk and I’ve been just telling it like it is)!

Mine’s not a cheater, just a workaholic with fits of very serious verbal abuse (horrible) who is bizarrely, literally incapable of empathy. SO WEIRD! I thought he was perhaps autistic (spackle!) but he’s not — just textbook Narcissist? Unless he really is sociopathic, w mental cruelty. Not an actor, just a professor AND, get this: he is the Big Cheese of one of those Politically Groovy organizations dedicated to a “more just and compassionate world.”

OMG. If you knew this guy’s mind’s inner workings in the freakin’ bedroom, what misogynistic sick scenarios he’s fond of, woah. But My Spackle habit was so bad, HE had to leave me! Waited til both kids left home & I was diagnosed w/ degenerative disc disease, chronic pain; he convinced me to quit my job & career in Dance, took me to Hawaii & told me there we were through. Wouldn’t leave our house so I lost that too. But there, in the basement, I think I left my pail full of white spackle… and bags and bags and bags … a 30-year supply!!!! GOOD RIDDANCE.

Patsy
Patsy
10 years ago

Wow, this hurts. It hurts!

I overlooked that ‘my’ friends didn’t really like him. So what did this chump do? Drop those friends and pick up with his friends (some of whom are lovely).

The friends we have made since, are my friends. Becuase he had made NO FRIENDS after the age of 16. Maybe one (that he is envious of, because he has just bought a flat in Kensington London costing £millions which he can because he has no kids).

I overlooked his social akwardness. I overlooked the ‘pattern of selfishness’ identified by my IC in the second session.
I bleated and whined about his endless buying of stuff, but accepted it when he ignored me. I have just put away his reels and kit from his time when fly-fishing was going to fill his inner void. I mean, how many reels does one person need? Why are they all top of the range?
I overlooked some seriously red flags. But the truth is? I really did love him a lot. He wasn’t all bad. Just when I got boring and he wanted to look for someone else, ie the last 10 years of our marriage – who am I still kidding!!!

MamaMeh
MamaMeh
24 days ago
Reply to  Patsy

Be careful there Patsy. About the friends you’ve had as a couple.

It was the same in my case, he refused to be friends with any of the people from my life before him. I now realise that a narc can’t cope with the idea that they might like me more than him, or that he would be second best. He ranked EVERYTHING, and assumed everyone else did too (grew up in a family where everyone knew who was the favourite child, grandchild etc etc)

In the nearly 7 years since Dday I learnt (very painfully) that the friends he “chose” – or at least tolerated – for us as a couple are not really that lovely after all. I think narcs have a talent for finding each other.

I hardly have anything to do at all with them any more. Even the woman who was with me when my daughter died. To the world, she’s an amazing, selfless social worker – except after Dday all I heard were crickets.

The people I spend time with now are either friends from “before” – ie have known them for 30+ years – or “after” – nice to make new friends in my 50s!

ariesk
ariesk
10 years ago

I tell my family that I was my husband’s “beard”. That’s a term gay folks use for the wife of a gay man…she’s his “beard”. As long as he’s married to her, he’s legitimized as a heterosexual man. Similarly, as long as my husband was married to me, he was legitimized as a successful family man. Even though no one could figure out what he did for a living (he’s constantly unemployed), even though he was sometimes socially awkward (just wouldn’t talk to people when he didn’t feel like it), and even though he hadn’t done anything of substance since college (he was the man then, though!).

Being married to me, a successful and (if I must say so myself) charming woman, legitimized him. Like: he must be doing something right if she’s with him.

Barblicous
Barblicous
10 years ago

What is amazing, is how all that spackle crumbles off when you wake up to reality. And look at this person you once thought the moon of, and go, “Who the hell are you? – Do I even know you?” Certainly changes the scenery when that spackle is gone.

Watermelon
Watermelon
6 years ago
Reply to  Barblicous

Uh, yeah. I’m self-amused at it since I’m going through this very phase now, the crumbling off. I’m realizing how much much spackle I did since the very beginning of our relationship, almost to the point of feeling shame of myself for being so naive. As you say, the change of scenario from being spackled to seeing it all crumbling down as it is in reality, is appalling and, to be frankly, surprising. Was it really THAT different all this time? I’m defying temptation to run to my spackling viscose solution again, a big part of me still wants it to work. But what am I thinking! Some things just can’t be unseen, I just long for better times when the spackling scenario looked so fine and comforting. I’m sad… but I will not wear sunny glasses again.

Jamie Haman
Jamie Haman
10 years ago

Yep. I’m definitely a spackler. Thank you so much for shining this light on chumps, cake eaters, and spackle.

Frannie
Frannie
10 years ago

As soon as I quit the spackle he said he wanted out of the marriage. He found someone else to spackle him before saying he wanted out. Just goes to show that its all about him and the ego. Can’t function on their own. JUST GOT TO BE SPACKLED! Shows you just how weak they really are.

TryingToMoveOn
TryingToMoveOn
10 years ago

So after reading “The Power of Spackle”, I have decided that I am going to use my power of truth to despackle my stbxh.

Now when anyone asks, I simply tell the truth. Them: “Why are you getting divorced” Me: “Because he cheated on me” Them: “How do you know” Me: I then review the highlights of the litany of lies that I have uncovered. They usually come to the same conclusion.

Also, on FB I no longer hide my venting posts from his family. Last night when he decided to have OW and her kids over to his apt. for pizza and games with my kids, I was very upset. I posed the question on FB “Why do people think it is ok to play house with another woman, her kids, and your kids? When you aren’t even divorced yet!”

Image is all important to him and truth is all important to me. He won’t give me the truth and I don’t give a damn about his image.

Despackle them all!

mo
mo
9 years ago

my XH was like that, he would put himself down. say he wasnt good enough, say he was a loser. i was always telling him that he was a good man, that he just made a bad choice or decision. that everyone makes mistakes. and to be fair, he never really ever made the same mistake again.

maybe i am just a fool but i really thought we had a good thing going. maybe my situation is a little different since my XH did not serial cheat or cheat with the same woman for 10 years. but ya, i still make excuses for him.

it is hard for me to let go after 14 years. it is harder for me to believe that i mean nothing to him. but we are still just beginning our journey. divorced for 2 months. i am just waiting for him to come back and tell me he made a mistake. YA, You did!!!

anyway. it is good to read this

Chump-Domain Cleric
Chump-Domain Cleric
26 days ago

I spackled from the get-go. Immediately. Intensely.

If I was honest with myself, I would have saved myself so much trouble and dumped him within the first three months. But then I wouldn’t be a chump, would I?

susie lee
susie lee
26 days ago

Well to me you would have still been a chump as you were played unknown to you, but of course you would have been a chump for a lot less of time.

I spackled for quite a while, because I didn’t know he was lying and deceiving, but once I found out for a short time I went into fetal mode; then I got my senses about me and did fairly well.

We just can’t be blamed for what we didn’t know.

Chump-Domain Cleric
Chump-Domain Cleric
26 days ago
Reply to  susie lee

That’s true, but for me, I found out early on. But he promised it changed and meant nothing and it was my fault anyways, and due to recent FOO issues at the time I was primed to believe it.

I got better, but I’m embarrassed now, sometimes.

susie lee
susie lee
26 days ago

I really wish I had picked up on it earlier, first I could have gotten away earlier; and also if I had found out before his last promotion, there is no way he would have gotten it. He got demoted, but he still got to keep the raise because the mayor couched it as an organizational demotion. I get why he had to do it, still…

But, main thing is I did get away while still young enough to create a new life.

Hell of a Chump
Hell of a Chump
26 days ago
Reply to  susie lee

Relationship abuse can unfold in so many different ways. Now that seen lists of the subtler red flags that can show up years before someone commits categorical abuse, hindsight is obviously clearer. But none of that stuff was searchable on the web back in the day. It wasn’t in self help books. If I mentioned any of it to my most kick-ass friends, they would say, “Really, that’s it? Count yourself lucky.”

The weirder red flags for men with narcissistic tendencies I saw early on that, d’oh, now shows up on current Reddit red flag lists (if you read the entire threads) are things like:

–Checks out and becomes childishly passive rather than defend you from their toxic relatives. Check.

— Accidentally loses or breaks things that have meaning to you. Check.

— Drives faster than your risk-tolerance, becomes defensive about their driving if you ask them to drive more cautiously. Check.

— Resists stopping at places you want to stop or shop at on drives or strolls.

— Overly picky about women’s makeup (normal guys don’t have much to say about it, won’t notice). Check.

— Cries more than average men. Check.

— Leave little messes behind them, “bad” at housework (weaponized incompetence). Check.

— Always uses affectionate nicknames for you rather than your real name. Check.

— Over-the-top displays of anxiety about your safety going places alone or at your job, etc., that, over the years, ever-so-gradually and insidiously nudge you to isolate yourself. Check.

But even now most of this stuff would often be dismissed as regular guy-isms.

mehflower
mehflower
24 days ago

HOAC, my fuckwit ex displayed every single one of these red flags. How did you compile this list??

I also felt validated and unsettled about what you put forth in your previous comment about the double-edged sword of escalating abuse, and how it affects both the perpetrator and victim of abuse. Your example almost precisely mirrors my own experiences/responses. I also saw scarier, more out of control seeming responses from my ex either after there was undeniable evidence of him lying/being an objective POS — and/or when he was physically abusive in clearcut ways (not the “subtle” ones that I volves following me, blocking me, “restraining” me, trying to pull me out of the car, etc.). And once those boundaries had been crossed, there was no turning back, and I also finally began to recognize the danger that had been staring me in the face for many years. There definitely needs to be more research and more education/outreach around this.

-b&r

itsme
itsme
25 days ago

That’s good- I notice dirty dishes when I ask how he’s washing or show him the right way… still happens.
I find old cigarette butts in the DRYER because they were in his work pants pocket and have asked multiple times to empty pockets prior to washing. I’ve also asked not to wash towels with his work clothes and apparently he doesn’t care. It’s been a long time since dday and although there’s no cheating- I haven’t been the same. I’m preparing for the next steps and learning how to take them

OHFFS
OHFFS
25 days ago

“Checks out and becomes childishly passive rather than defend you from their toxic relatives. Check.”

Oh, big time. FW’s mother was a lunatic who would call me up to yell insults and then hang up. He did nothing about it.

“Leave little messes behind them, “bad” at housework (weaponized incompetence). Check.”

Another check for me as well.

Last edited 25 days ago by OHFFS
susie lee
susie lee
26 days ago

“Overly picky about women’s makeup (normal guys don’t have much to say about it, won’t notice). ”

and “Over-the-top displays of anxiety about your safety going places alone or at your job, etc., that, over the years, ever-so-gradually and insidiously nudge you to isolate yourself. ”

Those two I definitely see in hindsight. He didn’t like make up, but I did wear light make up, because I like it. And the concern for my safety of course was couched in care. In hindsight he didn’t want me going out at night because that was his catting around time.

I am over simplifying it, he was more subtle with it, still it was there.

itsme
itsme
25 days ago
Reply to  susie lee

Susie it’s Shann- so good to see your name here- it’s been so long.
I haven’t been here much since the site changed but still read every email… had to drop by. Listen I stayed thinking he was going to take some big steps with me and some profound d healing journey would take place and it has- just not so much together. I’m still in therapy, going to college at 48, working full time, and trying to stay sane and afloat mentally and keep things moving. But I do realize- that although he SAID he’d do ANYTHING- he just isn’t. I’ve emailed him marriage retreats, articles, videos and counseling ideas- he doesn’t respond. But expects me to be ok without all those things I feel we need and I also think I’m worth doing. But he’s not taking initiative and when I say I’m not ok with how we are- he gets frustrated and says “guess I’m not your person” or “I’m just an asshole” and I have t said either of those so – hmmm

susie lee
susie lee
25 days ago
Reply to  itsme

Hope you are doing better. I know going to school at an older age while working is hard. It is what I did, heck even after I married it took me another few years to finish my degree.

Hang in there and do for you, you deserve all your efforts.

Chump-Domain Cleric
Chump-Domain Cleric
26 days ago

This is a super interesting list! A lot to chew on here. I can verify a few of these from my own experience. Resisting stopping places I wanted to go was a big one. I never thought of it being q commonality! Makes sense, though, selfish behavior.

Honestly, I prefer partners who cry a bit more, but I’ve dealt with a lot of toxically “emotionally repressed” people and “toxic chill” behavior. Ex/FW was definitely ashamed of the few times he cried. However, that’s only if it’s genuine crying. I know some people cry to avoid anyone catching onto their BS. Sometimes I suspected that ex/FW planned some of his panic attacks for similar reasons, but I don’t feel right accusing him of that. I know he had serious anxiety issues. Yet somehow, most of them seemed to occur when we were invited see my family in the later stages of the relationship. A quick way to induce chaos and guilt someone to stay at home. I can totally see it being a red flag.

I’m also big on pet names and nicknames, but only when talking to loved ones or babies. Should I rethink this?

OHFFS
OHFFS
25 days ago

There’s nothing inherently wrong with pet names. I think that in isolation, it’s not indicative of anything. It’s just in combination with other traits and habits that it’s a red flag.

My FW almost never cried either. To me that’s a bigger red flag than crying more often than average.
After he started cheating, he lost all ability to cry. He was using porn and cheating to numb himself, so he wouldn’t have to feel bad about his inadequacies, and it worked all too well.

Last edited 25 days ago by OHFFS
Chump-Domain Cleric
Chump-Domain Cleric
25 days ago
Reply to  OHFFS

Yeah. That makes a lot of sense. I’m so terribly sorry that happened to you!

Bluewren
Bluewren
26 days ago

I had the caterer’s pack of spackle and used it liberally.
He even TOLD me he was an asshole when we met up again after 20 years.
Nope – spackle spackle.
I uncovered considerable debt he hadn’t mentioned – spackle spackle.
I cleaned that mess up and eagerly waited with my mop and bucket for the next disaster- spackle spackle.
Barely functioning alcoholic?- oh well he had a bad event happen in early childhood- spackle spackle.
Disrespectful towards me?- oh well that’s what his parents modeled to him… spackle spackle.
Lie upon lie?- spackle spackle.
I could have been the Spacklers Anonymous poster child.

Chump-Domain Cleric
Chump-Domain Cleric
26 days ago
Reply to  Bluewren

I was also a spackle addict. Can we get matching t-shirts?

Bluewren
Bluewren
26 days ago

We certainly can! 😊

Hell of a Chump
Hell of a Chump
26 days ago

Yes, discovering cheating can be liberating in a sense. Someone I worked with in advocacy described the moment when abuse manifests in identifiable form as similar to finally being able to identify the spider in your room that, for weeks or months or years, you’ve seen only fleeting glimpses of but never clearly so that you never knew the breed, how poisonous or deadly the thing was nor how seriously to take the threat and whether to call in the exterminators or cavalry.

But this advocate also pointed out that, once someone identifies the spider as poisonous and worst fears are confirmed, the “Phew, I’m not crazy after all” moment is short lived and quickly replaced by the specter of all the coercive threats (that had formerly seemed vague and obtuse, maybe imaginary) that the spider-in-human-form has been weaving around you all along suddenly springing to life in the form of paralyzing, thought-muddying fear. This time it’s clear the threats aren’t silly and fictitious but realistic and that the spider-abuser has now been confirmed to be sufficiently callous and fully capable of carrying them out.

Not to mix metaphors but that “Woah, I’ve got a tiger by the tail, not a little house cat!” epiphany is why confirmation can be double edged. I’d like to see some serious research into cheaters’ use of coercive control as part of the gradual web-weaving, frog-boiling preface and build-up towards more “identifiable” and overt forms of abuse.

susie lee
susie lee
26 days ago

 but my husband is nice and looks past my insufferable qualities.”

That is how I thought it was with my ex. I was aware we were both flawed, but I loved him and did for him because I loved him. I thought despite his flaws he was doing the same. He was not.

However, I do believe in a solid marriage it does take some spackle and lots of love and devotion.

I believe I have that now, and I won’t short change my H now for the snake-ish behavior of my ex. At almost 30 years and our old age, I don’t foresee any change, except for health and I know he will take care of me and vice versa as best we can. We already have.

Bluewren
Bluewren
26 days ago
Reply to  susie lee

It’s fine for everyone not to be perfect- and no one is.
We all go off the rails a bit sometimes and aren’t always our best selves on every occasion.
But we didn’t lie to, steal from or cheat on the one person we said we loved most.
That’s the difference.
I’m so glad to hear you’ve traded waaaaay up.

susie lee
susie lee
26 days ago
Reply to  Bluewren

Oh I agree. I never lied and for the last year when he was getting increasingly nastier and blatant, not once did I consider cheating. Never even thought of it.

I remember reading something put on FB a while ago, some idiot woman put a meme on there that your H won’t cheat if you treat him right. Then of course hundreds of agreements from women that I assume have not been cheated on (that they know of). I mean I get it, you want to believe that because if you can be a decent spouse and get cheated on, well that is scary.

Though I really wanted to educate them, I just let it go and hid the person who posted it.

OHFFS
OHFFS
25 days ago
Reply to  susie lee

I confront that attitude when I see it. If people make such statements publically, they should be open to hearing opposing points of view. If not, they should STFU.

itsme
itsme
25 days ago
Reply to  susie lee

I haven’t cheated either. I also don’t talk about being married anymore. No one hears anything. It’s hard not to talk but I just can’t. I don’t want to. Because I don’t know what’s happening but it’s a definite shift. I mean he goes off to be every night and hardly ever says goodnight. When I go there and he tries to hang onto me I feel resentment. If you can’t even make a counseling appt or attend a retreat for one day- why are you holding onto me at night? Comfort. I know we care deeply about each other. He’s not willing to take the hard steps. And I wonder why. Really. Is it because I don’t know the HALF of it and he’s have to confess the rest? Or is it just entitlement? Because he’s always wondering why I’m not letting it go-

OHFFS
OHFFS
25 days ago
Reply to  itsme

The thing to explore is why you aren’t letting *him* go. Why he does the asinine things he does is neither here nor there. He does them. He’s not stopping. You have a choice to make between taking a leap towards freedom from this depressing limbo and accepting him as he is, because he is clearly not changing.
Ask yourself how, in fact, you know he cares deeply about you when his behaviour says otherwise. If he cared deeply, he’d take the steps he needs to take in order to make you feel safe. These aren’t even hard steps. Making appointments, attending a one day retreat and treating you with sensitivity are not difficult things to do. They are the bare minimum of what he should be doing. He won’t even do the bare minimum, so you have nothing to work with. I know it hurts, facing that, but putting up with it indefinitely hurts more.

ChumpedAndDumped
ChumpedAndDumped
26 days ago

I think I still spackle and overlook her behavior. It took some time after the divorce to really acknowledge that the affairs truly revealed her poor character. That’s because we reconciled after D-Day and stayed together for 7 more years. Those years were good until… they weren’t and she did a full DARVO breakup. It took lots of therapy to chip away at the industrial level spackling I had applied over the affairs many years before, and see that they were tied to how she would leave in the end without discussion or a second thought to what I wanted, and how she’d make wild accusations and stories about me. It truly was as though she was replaced by another person, and I kept wondering “Who is this?”

Definitely reading this article makes me see that, no, this was the same person and that I was definitely in denial for a long time. Thank goodness for CL and this forum to help me realize this and work towards healing and a better post-chump life.

Viktoria
Viktoria
26 days ago

I spackled for most of my 34 year marriage. First because we lived through some trauma together in our early years together…so I excused his behavior as depression. Then again in later years when he became emotionally checked out, neglecting me. Then again during the last 10 years together when his personality really changed to more overtly emotionally abusive and sexually hurtful. I spackled so much more, because I did not want to face the fact that I did not even recognize his personality anymore (he changed so much), he obviously did not love me and that he held me in contempt. It hurt to admit that to myself, so I chose denial.

Another reason I continued to spackle harder was that I was at the time very confused (and miserable), buying into the fallacy that my wedding vows “for better or for worse” combined with what I was taught about wives and marriage from conservative Evangelicalism (from my young adult years) meant that I really was not “allowed” to leave. (Cue the Divorce Minister here.) I worked very hard to spackle spackle spackle. I stopped spackling on D-day when, in one instant I finally realized that I was being abused, that eX is dangerous and that I absolutely choose to leave him!

OHFFS
OHFFS
25 days ago
Reply to  Viktoria

“Then again during the last 10 years together when his personality really changed to more overtly emotionally abusive and sexually hurtful.”

He started watching porn or watching more porn. I’d bet my life savings on it.

Viktoria
Viktoria
24 days ago
Reply to  OHFFS

And you are absolutely correct!

(I only discovered that fact shortly after D-day, more than three decades into my marriage. )

RedKD
RedKD
26 days ago

So….I was going through some old files from when I was with my FW (we are now totally divorced) and I ran across a database I had been building for his moods, with 1 being low-grade mean and ignoring and 5 being all out raging and violent. My goal was to do a logistic regression on his moods so I could predict them, but obviously, this experiment was a fail because I was missing the data of his latest schmoopie blowing him off, or a rando not returning his call, etc., since I didn’t have all that data. It’s so sad and darkly funny for me now.

HOW I speckled and thought he was a decent human who had some mental illness or abandonment issue that I could solve if only I could find the right predictive pattern and react accordingly. How I tried it all.

If you’re new to this, we’ve all been there, hoping and trying to see all the ways our FW is not just full of suck. But as Chump Lady says….trust that the suck. Don’t be making databases full of crazy making like I did.

OHFFS
OHFFS
25 days ago

Even if you think the FW used to be a good person before the cheating, so what? I guess the idea is that if that is true, then FW could potentially be a good person once again. Why bet your future on that?

Bluewren
Bluewren
25 days ago
Reply to  OHFFS

Yep- there’s no coming back from cheating.
The trust has left the building with no forwarding address.

OHFFS
OHFFS
25 days ago
Reply to  Bluewren

As CL says, chumps tend to get too attached to the potential of the partner. We too easily settle for somebody who theoretically has the potential to be a good person. We need and deserve somebody who already is as fine a person as we are ourselves.

NotMyFault
NotMyFault
25 days ago

For 36 years, I “spackled” so much that I should have been a sheetrocker! I think that they wear you down, you overlook and they also have trained you to believe that you do not deserve better. I will never understand why this was acceptable to me and will forever pay for the damage that this disrespect of me has done to my two sons.

Chumpolicious
Chumpolicious
25 days ago

I realized from reading all these posts is that a lot of chumps suffer from depression. I imagine the depression is situational. Even if you don’t realize on a conscious level your spouse is cheating, the body knows. Then the cheaters use the chumps depression to justify the cheating. Now when anyone tells me they got a divorce because their spouse appliance was depressed I take that as code that they were super A holes and/or cheaters. Also now wary of “Charming” people. That’s a red flag too.

susie lee
susie lee
25 days ago
Reply to  Chumpolicious

Oh I definitely think I was depressed before Dday. I mean I knew something had gone so wrong; but not quite yet there. And yes I am sure my state of depression gave him excuses for what he had already been doing by his own admission for half our marriage. (I submit that he was doing it our entire marriage). He was quite a con man, I give him that.

Orlando
Orlando
25 days ago
Reply to  Chumpolicious

I haven’t been “depressed” in three years. What a miracle, eh?!
Yet, all I heard was “you’re so mopey”, “gawd are you depressed again?”, “can’t you get some meds or something?” Super A holes is right! My body was rejecting FW! Now, I pay attention to my body’s response to everything! A very under-utilized teaching skill.

2xchump
2xchump
25 days ago

With Cheaters crappy abusive behaviors as well as intimate abuse that I could not even TALK OUT LOUD about. As well as being inappropriate with my daughter, as well as not keeping a job, a car or a motorcycle more than 2 years. As well as raging, emotional affairs all the time, flirting
,comparing. As well as a shopping addiction which preped me for late nights ” at the store”. The list goes on. BUT BUT. he took care of his aging father who was mentally ill until he died at 94. He took me to B&Bs where sady there was intensive intimate abuse which I called ” meeting his needs” which he complained I never did. He drove me on the highway which is a phobia for me..so we went places. Plus he took care of my car and did the oil changes, plus plus I HAD A MAN for 32 years etc etc..etc..This#2 cheater took care of my children and attended every school function( but didn’t care for his own kids???) My point is, when I spackle, I was spackling over BLACK MOLD, and when I did that the mold just grew behind the wall and made me sick with the growing mountain of financial, emotional and physical abuse. I was so sick I almost didn’t live, why? Because i lied to myself, my most precious self. That was my part, believing my lies while the black toxic mold grew enormous. Until I had to run for my life.
CL and all of you CN are like those air boats that float over the Florida swamps. You get to see the disgusting creatures that will eat you alive, but now they can’t hurt you. I’ve had 2 abusive cheaters that seemed nice to everyone else, but they were creatures of the black mold swamp. I’m so eternally grateful to Tracy and you all for helping me to get out and live a safe, happy, healthy life without the heavy duty, mind altering buckets of spackle that pushed the toxic mold away. It never goes away. Save yourself, no one else will.

2xchump
2xchump
25 days ago

Trying to find the comment on spackleing with GRAPHS!! I made a graph on his rages and moods and tracked him just like labor contractions! I believed I had control and could gauge what I had done or said to help trigger him because hey, I had a handle on this. I saw the every 3 to 4 Month abuse pattern drop to every other months and then WEEKS apart. It was UP TO ME to predict and understand his descent into hell and then back to the nice guy. What was wrong with me!!!! I was an RN so a specialist in his bipolar moods and cycles. It was really woman that got him going ..his EA, flirting and arrogance and entitlement. I was dead wrong to spackle so long.

FuckWitFree
FuckWitFree
25 days ago

Major spackling. I will never forget the day he was “demoted” at a job (got in trouble for inappropriate behaviors) and came home so angry and irritable and said he would quit immediately. I told him that bc I was undergoing testing for lupus could he hold off for a new job so we wouldn’t lose insurance. I was spackling as I was trying to calm and placate. His angry response was to say sure—but in exchange I get to openly have sex with whomever I want. Said this in front of young daughter. I spackled afterwards excusing it as his job stress. No. He was a fucking sociopathic narcissist

Chumpcat
Chumpcat
24 days ago

I am ashamed to admit I was the absolute spackle king. I was desperate to believe the trustworthy safe person I knew would come back “any time now.” I spackled, I denied reality and believed the lies. I was like Charlie Brown trying to kick the football, to have it pulled away over and over. Luckily I have since run out of spackle, and will not be getting any more.

One last time
One last time
24 days ago
Reply to  Chumpcat

I was right there with you. She asked for a divorce several times before she finally decided to blow the marriage up. Every time I dutifully waited around, and bought it hook, line, and sinker when she said she was just confused. She thanked me for believing in her. She thanked me for not giving up on us. There was depression and bipolar involved, so that is how I rationalized it. I resigned myself, that this was how it was going to be, but you know what, I loved her, and I was committed and took my vows seriously.
I now see there was Soooooo much spackle

JeffWashington
JeffWashington
24 days ago
Reply to  Chumpcat

I did the same thing. I thought it was a rough patch. That she would get it out of her system. That she would “come home.” Sadly I just fell into the abused thinking that I needed to protect her and then it would blow over. I learned that lesson the hard way, too. I similarly have banned myself from hardware stores concerning future relationships. Stay mighty!

Orlando
Orlando
24 days ago
Reply to  Chumpcat

Great analogy 😏

Darcy
Darcy
23 days ago

I’m trying not to Spackle anymore. I think I’ve been in this drama so long now that I don’t even recognize what is normal at this point. D-day was about a month ago. I cannot leave, we must share the living space. So spackle is sort of seeping in daily, because things are almost the way they were before D-day. I hope I can maintain course and not reconcile because I don’t want to.

SortofOverIt
SortofOverIt
22 days ago
Reply to  Darcy

Darcy,

Having to share space post-D-Day is so hard. I did it and I feel for you. My D-Day was during the Covid Pandemic. His affair was long distance. So my immediate response was to not do anything as nothing major could change right then anyway. And then it just dragged out forever. And by “forever” I mean we are only recently separated and are not anywhere near legally divorced.

I knew immediately that the marriage was over for me. I just could never trust him again and I knew it. But I also was convinced that I would be homeless if we separated.(I was wrong about that, but DDay was such a shock that I just couldn’t think straight.)

When you say you can’t leave, are you sure? I ask because as mentioned above, I thought that was true of me and I was wrong. Obviously everyone has a different situation. I’m not trying to question your judgement, I just know that I spent a long time stuck and terrified and my original thoughts on what divorce would mean for me and my kids was incorrect. So I wouldn’t want anyone else to go through that.

If you are scared and don’t know how to proceed, please know that there are lots of lawyers that will give you a free consult. You don’t have to engage them beyond that, but you might find out some information that is helpful. I found out that I would be able to afford to live without him.

I mostly wanted to comment just because I know how hard it is to navigate this while under the same roof and I want you to know people care.