The final, most painful truth you need to know is that even if you catch him, even if you have evidence, even if you have all the proof in the world—a picture in front of him—he’ll never admit it. He’ll deny, deny, deny. He’ll double down on gaslighting. He’ll flip it back on you until you’re apologizing to him—until you’re the one saying you’re sorry for even looking at his phone.
Why? Because admitting it means he has to take responsibility. Narcissists don’t take responsibility; they rewrite history. They change it up so they don’t have to be accountable to you. Think about it: the last time you confronted him about something, did he admit it? Did he acknowledge the pain he caused? Or did he bring up all the ways you failed him, even if it was years ago? Suddenly, he’s remembered something you did, and now it seems like, “Well, you never fixed this.”
He turns the entire conversation around. By the end of it, you’re crying, apologizing, questioning and doubting yourself. It’s not a coincidence; it’s a strategy he implements to keep you stuck. If he admits what he did, he has to face the fact that he is the problem. A narcissist would rather burn everything to the ground than admit he was the problem.
That’s why even when you show him evidence, he still denies it. Even if you have the receipts, pictures, and all that evidence, he’s still going to blame you. Even when you know deep down he’s lying, you feel the need to argue with him to force him to tell the truth. But he’s never going to tell the truth because truth is not what he cares about—control is. As long as he keeps you playing this game, confused, and trying to get him to admit what you already know, he still has control over you.
So, let’s talk about the real question here: how long are you going to let this affect your life, your confidence, your business, your kids? How much longer are you going to wait for proof that you already feel you have? Because if you keep waiting, here’s what’s going to happen: he’ll keep draining you mentally and emotionally, keep draining your energy, and keep you in a rhythm of doubting yourself. He’ll get away with it long-term, and you’ll keep losing time—the one thing you can’t afford to lose.
You can always make more money. You can always rebuild your confidence. You can always restart; you can always heal. But you can’t get back the years you waste waiting for him to change, waiting for something to be different because he’s not going to change—not for you, not for the marriage, not for the family, not for anything. To change, he has to be honest. And if he’s not willing to see that, he doesn’t want to.
That honesty and vulnerability feel awful to him; he’ll always run away from it. If you’re waiting for the moment he finally wakes up and realizes everything he’s lost, you’re waiting for something that’s never going to come. The longer you wait, the more of yourself you lose.
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