u/Extra_Comfortable365

When I was 8 or 9, my mom fell head over heels for an LDS man. Problem was, he was still married. She was still married to my dad who was in the Navy and stationed out of state. My parents weren’t members, just the new man. He convinced my mom he could give her a better life.
My parents divorced, a year later she married the new guy, a few years later she was baptized.

I was more hesitant about the church because at that point the only members of the church I knew were his family, and I did not like him or his family. I started coming around to ask questions when I was 16 and needing some direction in life. My stepdad jumped on the opportunity to have the missionaries over to begin the discussions. I had also started becoming friendlier with my stepdad’s son and his son’s friends who were members and fun to be around. The boys were cute too. I got baptized when I was 16. Not exactly a rock solid foundation.

But I did everything a good Mormon girl does — went to BYUI, married after sophomore year, 4 kids before I was 30.

Stepdad started revealing himself as a malignant narcissist over the years. He’s an awful person. My dad on the other hand, most Christlike man I know.

As I got older, I started putting the pieces together on how my mom met her new husband — adultery. I got introduced to the church through adultery. And my “example” of the church has turned out to be evil and my mom has filed for divorce from him after 25 tumultuous years of marriage. How does my stepdad who holds a bishopric calling feel about his adultery? Last year he told my mom, “You’re so lucky you ended up with me and not that Navy guy.” My mom regrets her decision to leave my dad every day of her life, and I know she has repented. Stepdad? No remorse, just bragging about it over dinner on a Tuesday night.

I just feel gross about it. On top of the adultery, I feel a lot of guilt about my dad too. I joined the church that the “other man” belonged to. My dad didn’t get to see me get married. He wasn’t a witness at my sealing, my stepdad was. As for my mom and stepdad, they “eloped” to get sealed seven years ago. That destroyed me.

Since my mom filed for divorce, my stepdad has been writing these horrible things to my family members including my husband about my mom, calling her mentally ill, damaged goods and how she has no hope of being healed in this life but in the eternities we will all be a happy family. Ew, if that’s what’s waiting for me in the eternities, I don’t want it.

I just want nothing to do with the church now. Does that make sense? It doesn’t bring me peace, it makes me feel sick to my stomach. When I hear “Families Can be Together Forever” it makes me sad. When people ask me about my conversion story, I’m hesitant to share because it really grosses me out now. It also paints my stepdad as a good man/missionary. People in the church often mistake him for my dad. I just hate it. I want out, but I found myself the most True Blue Mormon man to marry 15 years ago so it will never happen.

At this point, I don’t even have a desire to gain a testimony because it feels so tainted for me, I’m in too deep not to have one. I feel like a fake at church. I just feel so unsteady and alone in this. If you’ve read the whole thing, thank you. 🫶🏻

2.5 weeks ago my mom texted me and my husband that she left her abusive, narcissistic husband. It shattered my husband’s heart. My stepdad, let’s call him Craig, is one of his best friends. I won’t get into all the awful things Craig has done for the sake of keeping this concise, but just know Craig is a homewrecking, chaos creating, triangulating, malignant narcissist. He ruined my parents marriage when I was 9 and has zero remorse. He is a wolf in sheep’s clothing. He pretends to be this bumbling idiot who’s just trying to be a good Christian when in reality he is manipulative, calculating and honestly evil.

When my mom broke the news to us, my husband called Craig to check on him before talking to me or my mom. After that phone call, I felt compelled to warn my husband that Craig will lie and twist the truth to get my husband on his side. My husband responded by turning around and shutting the door on me.

That has basically been how our relationship has been for the last 2.5 weeks. Craig would call my husband on his way to work to spew his drama and play victim (we’ve all been deceived by Satan and he’s not really a narc) and discuss the divorce case (which legally he should not do), text him throughout the day while he was trying to work and call him on his way home from work. In 14 days they racked up 8.5 hours of conversation per the phone call logs.

By the time my husband came home, he was too mentally drained for my emotions. We were able to have a few conversations but they were heated because my husband was standing by Craig and dismissing me. My emotions were put on the back burner. I begged, I pleaded, please stop talking to Craig. I explained how mentally exhausted I was by Craig. I explained how it was giving me PTSD that he got between my parents and now he was getting between me and my husband. I tried to get my husband to understand that Craig is a narcissist and he’s manipulating my husband to be on his side instead of mine. My husband would defend Craig on stuff that I knew were lies. I had proof for some from my mom but it made no difference. My husband looked me in the eyes and said he would continue conversing with Craig.

Craig crossed so many lines. He started a smear campaign against my mom. He texted my husband “Your mother in law, the grandmother of your children is mentally ill.” I said that’s it, you need to cut him off. The, what I now call, emotional affair still continued. I told my husband our marriage is now suffering because your loyalty is torn between me and this awful man who has hurt everyone I love, who has hurt me.

Finally on Saturday my husband texted Craig, “After long emotional discussions with (me) the last 2 days, I have been asked to stop talking with you through texts and phone calls. I love you very much. You have been a best friend for years. You are my brother.”

Well not only did the text totally throw me under the bus and completely lack balls, but the only way I could see the proof was by my husband trimming the screenshot of it and texting it to me. I noticed there was another text under it that was cut off and illegible. I asked my husband what that one said and asked to see it on his phone. He reluctantly showed me his phone, and that text was not showing. I asked where it went. He said, “Hmmm. I don’t know. It’s not there anymore.” I said, “Yeah, I can see that. They don’t just poof away, you deleted it. What did it say?” He tried to stick to the story of the magical self deleting text until he admitted it said he was “so sorry Craig.”

He also refused to show me the rest of their texts. I said I spoke to our church leader and he said I am entitled to see his texts anytime, anywhere. My husband said a firm no, I cannot see his phone, it would get me too heated. Well THAT sets off alarm bells.

And when I said this goodbye between them was long overdue and now we’ve got marital issues, he had the nerve to say, “Well you didn’t ask me to stop talking to him until Friday. Up until then you were just saying you didn’t like it.”

🚩🚩🚩🚩🚩 What the actual hell? I asked multiple times, I guess when I said that our marriage was now suffering was what got his attention.

I went on to say, “We are married, we’re supposed to be a team. My faith in you is shaken because you were much supportive to Craig than me even though he’s the bad guy here, and I needed you these past couple of weeks. How will I know you will be there for me next time there’s an issue? How will I know I have your support?” He said, “Well giving you my support isn’t so simple, there can be issues where that gets complicated, there are conditions.” He also continued to restate how much he loves Craig and has empathy for him and because I don’t, I’ll never understand.

I was just beside myself, I could not believe what I was hearing. I really thought I knew my husband, but it’s almost like my husband has picked up some narcissistic pointers from Craig.

My question is where do I go from here? Therapy is the obvious answer, but I look at my husband so differently now. I’m trying to have a bit of compassion because I believe he was manipulated, but he hurt me in the process. I don’t trust him like I used to. I don’t respect his opinion like I used to.

And I’m so mad at fucking Craig. I’m sure he has gotten off on the fact that he got in between me and my husband and now we’ve got issues between us. All I can do at the moment is thank God he’s not around to hurt me, my family anymore or manipulate my husband, but unfortunately the damage has been done. Now what?