When one spouse is a narcissist, it makes the already distressing process of divorce far more emotionally and financially challenging for their spouse, and often for their shared children. Knowing what to expect when divorcing a narcissist can help you to prepare and protect yourself against typical narcissistic behaviors that often make a divorce a high-conflict process.
Is Your Spouse a Narcissist?
Mayo Clinic defines narcissism as a mental health disorder that causes the afflicted individual to experience an “unreasonably high sense of their own importance,” further describing individuals with this condition as unsure of their own self-worth and highly sensitive to criticism. Narcissists may also lack empathy.
Narcissists engage in intentional and unintentional manipulation and have a pathological need for control. Being married to a narcissist often results in a high-conflict marital environment. If you are married to a narcissist, you may find yourself tiptoeing around your spouse’s ego and becoming intentionally isolated from family and friends due to your spouse’s contempt for them. You may also have a diminished sense of self-worth due to frequent insults and belittlement from your spouse.
Narcissists typically demand control of the household’s finances, and often present a twisted version of the facts and use gaslighting behaviors to control their spouse.
How Does Colorado Define a Narcissist In a Divorce?
Colorado is a no-fault divorce state; therefore, no statutes define narcissism in terms of divorce. Instead, spouses may file for divorce only on the ground that the marriage is irretrievably broken. The Colorado courts focus on evidence, facts, and eyewitness testimony. The court’s tools in the divorce process include the following:
- Considering any proof of a spouse’s manipulation
- Requiring mediation through an experienced professional mediator
- Providing protection orders if there has been a threat of violence
- Reviewing documentation that shows financial manipulation or a lack of full financial disclosure
- Court-ordered evaluations for custody determinations
Attorneys and judges often employ a method known as “gray rocking” during a divorce involving a spouse with narcissistic behaviors. Gray-rocking requires keeping matters fact-based and unemotional during all communication with the narcissistic spouse.
What Is the Best Way to Divorce a Narcissist?
Divorcing a narcissist takes extra planning and precautions. To minimize the contention, if you are a spouse seeking a divorce from a narcissist, it’s important to do the following:
- Prepare ahead of time by putting money aside to fund their divorce
- Quietly gather financial documents showing income, expenses, and debts
- Create a strong support system by telling only close family and trusted friends about your plans and allowing them to be there for you throughout the process
- Plan to have a trusted loved one with you when you file for divorce, leave the marital home, or ask your spouse to leave
- Document all communication with your spouse during the divorce process
- Seek protective orders immediately if your spouse threatens violence
- Keep calm and employ the “gray-rocking” method by limiting verbal exchanges with your spouse to facts, dates, and only relevant information
- Avoid engaging in personal discussions or feeding the narcissist’s need for drama and contention
Hire a divorce lawyer with experience in navigating divorces in cases of narcissism. Then, only engage in negotiations for a divorce settlement agreement with your Denver family attorney or a mediator present.
How Narcissism Affects Divorce and Child Custody
Studies show that 60% of marriages in which one spouse has narcissistic personality disorder end in divorce, compared to the normal divorce rate, which ranges between 40% and 50%. The divorce process may become unpredictable when one spouse is a narcissist, due to their tendencies toward deceit, penchant for drama, and persistent need for admiration and attention. A narcissist commonly uses the following methods against a spouse during a divorce:
- Playing the victim in the divorce: Many narcissists attempt to manipulate others into believing they are the victim in the divorce, portraying their spouse in the worst possible light by exaggerating the truth or fabricating untruths to convey the fact that they are the wronged party.
- Unreasonable demands: Narcissists have an inflated sense of importance and may make unreasonable and unrealistic demands during the divorce, including in matters of child custody and the division of their assets.
- Gaslighting: A narcissist may tell a skewed version of true events, subtly or overtly changing the truth in a way that may make their spouse begin to question their own memory or interpretation of events.
Narcissistic people are also more likely than ordinary people to see their money and property as theirs alone, despite the state’s requirement for the fair and equitable division of property during divorce.
How Hard Is It to Divorce a Narcissist?
Narcissists are typically charismatic and charming early in the relationship. They may express their love by initially putting the object of their affection on a pedestal and making them the center of their world. As the relationship continues, however, the narcissist begins to focus on their spouse’s faults, expressing an exaggerated disappointment in their spouse’s perceived failings. This focus often escalates into emotional abuse, manipulation, and gaslighting, while the narcissist has little empathy for the impacts of their abuse on their spouse.
No divorce is easy, but divorcing a narcissist often comes with the following additional challenges:
- Reaching the decision to divorce is often more difficult for the non-narcissist spouse due to the low self-esteem resulting from years of emotional abuse, which may leave them feeling dependent on their spouse and doubting their ability to provide for themselves or attract a future love interest.
- The spouse of a narcissist makes the narcissist the center of their world, due to their manipulation, making separation emotionally painful and traumatic.
- The narcissist often controls the marital finances, making it challenging for the other spouse to find the money they need to separate and hire an attorney.
- A narcissist may threaten or bully a spouse who is attempting to file for divorce.
- The narcissist often resists full financial disclosure and engages in other uncooperative behaviors, such as missing deadlines, failing to appear in meetings and mediation, and making repeated delays.
- Narcissists may view losing some of their assets to their spouse as negatively affecting their perceived status.
- Narcissists often resist sharing child custody and may use children as bargaining chips or to punish their spouse by fighting against shared custody.
A narcissist may also try to alienate a divorcing spouse from mutual friends by engaging in smear campaigns against them.
How Can a Denver High-Conflict Divorce Attorney Help?
It takes unique strength and determination to divorce a narcissist. No one should engage in this high-conflict process without experienced representation. Contact the Denver divorce lawyers at Ciancio Ciancio Brown, P.C. to speak to an attorney with years of experience in Colorado divorce law, including representing the spouses of narcissists through the additional challenges they face.