[CPS/Narcissistic behavior] Looking back on some serious life lessons I've learned

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I was not prepared, as I believed in the good cause: doing what's best for the children

I have explained before that in the period in Holland dealing with CPS I could not believe that in my situation they were there to help my ex achieve his threats to me of taking away the children. I was convinced that a loving mother that packs a few bags to knock on the door of a women's shelter to run away from domestic violence will be helped to make sure the children will be safe.

And when I look back on it now I see that I had the wrong attitude all the time (until the last caseworker we got, but he came too late, the harm was already done, and his words of understanding and I believe sincere attitude towards me, was worthless by the time he was put on the case).

I was not prepared at all for what was to come in the next few years, and I could not get my head wrapped around the fact that this was happening to me. I should have noticed sooner, but every time I had a clear view on something, there were already 5 new problems lined up again that needed my instant attention. And of course my ex and CPS / social work were more than happy to send disturbing e-mails / letters to upset me again, so that I would not be at my best during the time I was preparing those meetings/hearings in court that I needed to appear at. They got an eye for this, and also sending a letter for an appointment last minute, arriving at my house at friday afternoon. All weekend stress guaranteed.

They use techniques globally, and they know as soon as you respond to it, how you deal with those used tactics to, but I guess most people (like me) realize this way too late in the process.

Let's look back on how independent and confident I was before I got CPS in our life

In the few years before I decided to leave my ex, I finally was doing well again personally. The years before I looked for jobs, got rejected time after time, I was either too old, or it was because another candidate of 18 years old was cheaper, you name it. This was a bit depressing for me, because I am blessed with a good skill set, and before this time I was always blessed to get the job when invited for an interview. This was a bit hard on me, when I became a mom and was a few years older than the last search for a new job.

But the creative soul inside me never leaves, it may have been put to sleep for a while, sometimes even for maybe a year, but it always finds a way back to me. As my firstborn was a beautiful red-headed girl with the most gorgeous color red you can imagine, and was blessed with a head full of hair when she was born, I was in need of hair accessories soon. And so began my joyful start of a new journey in life, being an entrepreneur. I got so many good responds by showing the stuff I made myself for her, that the question came up more often to make something for them on request. It turned out to be a big success. I worked my way up from investing only several euro's, where I made some stuff from, sold them, and from that profit I bought new stuff. This increased while the orders were getting higher in volume, and after a few years I could finally say with pride: I did this myself, on my own! Nobody was there to help me with building my client base, nobody helped me with anything, I did it all on my own with no experience and when I didn't know something I used common sense, and did my research online to find answers.

And I turned out to be great at this, I could even say after a year that I was passing my biggest concurrent where I bought my supplies at the beginning of this journey. I had a good nose for what the clients wanted, and I had many returning happy customers that were building their own shops with their handmade creations too. They were doing well because I offered a competitive price and gave them the best deals. I knew how to make this business grow, and I did it with no investment capital. I finally felt proud of myself again.

Until my ex left me when I just gave birth to our son (this was the second time he left me that year, the first time I was still pregnant) and instead of letting myself get depressed about being left alone again, I decided to work my ass off for the children. I worked until in the late hours, to get all the orders done. I made enough money to pay the bills on my own, but I also had to be realistic about the situation. It was no guarantee that my income would keep increasing every month like it had been doing the last 9 months before this moment of insight came to mind. It could easily happen that one month I would have had just a few orders because clients were not doing so well themselves, what would happen then? I was working my butt of every moment I could, but I also had to be there for the children, because they had seen their dad leave again for the second time in about 6 months.
I decided they needed their mother to be there in this hard period. I went to ask for help at the municipality to get some decent advice in my situation. To find out if I had any options.

The guy actually said to me after a short introduction of what I did, and how I ran the shop, how much do you need to be sure you can keep going for let's say six months? I wasn't expecting this question, so I was a bit blown away actually. I thought about it, and gave him a number of the amount that I thought I would need at least, when having just a low number of orders in a bad month. He said ok, I can give you this to help you out, this will be no problem here. And then I started to realize this will come with terms of course, what if something happens to me or one of the children and I will be out of business for a month? From one question in my head, came the other, and I came to the conclusion that my children needed me to be there. Not only physical there, but when they were sad I needed to be able to be there 200% for them as their dad wasn't. I needed to do this on my own now, and the children don't care about how many orders you have, they can get sick or sad any day and at any time.. This was a reality check for me. I didn't want to do this now, I prefer being there for them now, and when things would be calm again, I could always start the business again, because I was not forced to stop with this shop.

And then the moment came that I let my ex come back

Because I was a firm believer of having a family for the children, I believed in fairy tales. I should have listened to my gut feeling, though. But back then I didn't trust it that much, and I'd rather believed in having a family together for the children. He told me it would all be fine, not to worry about the income missing (because I had already closed the shop).
I was back to being dependent on him again, and I did not like it at all. I felt like I had lost a child with closing the shop and now being in the same relationship again, but without the purpose of making my own money.

In this period he kept reminding me that he was the only one making the money

And I started to break mentally, I could not take this, I was back to square one. All that I worked so hard for to build up, was now gone, and I felt lost. Him reminding me constantly of the fact that I did not earn a penny, was very humiliating to me, because I hated to be dependent financially. And if he wouldn't have left in the first place, I would still be running my own business.
Looking back, I should have seen the signs of him working through a certain pattern in the "relationship" like many of these twisted people do.
They actually aren't that different from the monsters working at CPS. And of course there are good ones working there, don't feel offended by me saying this. But if you are / know a good one working there, most likely this person will not be able to handle the emotional part of the actual work: "tearing loving families apart". The "good" ones always leave, get a burn out etc.
The ones doing the work without any empathy or seeing what the children do need, those are the dangerous ones, and definitely have similarities to narcissists and psychopaths.

Those people need a different approach so you best do some research

Once I found out that my ex may be a narcissist (what was bad enough at the time, later one this went even further and more twisted) I began to read, and read some more, I knew every Dutch website with information on it by heart. And that was not that hard if you recognize every aspect of a relationship with a narcissist as it is your own story. It seemed like he had had a to-do-list with checkbox in front of it and simple did all these things step by step. But when I read more about it, I also learned some valuable lessons about how to act when they do certain things. And how not to respond when being told something way out of line..

Remember to make sure you always, I repeat always have evidence (best e-mail or letter) of what is said/spoken about with these people, if it's your ex dealing with or those CPS employees, that doesn't make a difference! The reason why they work that great together if you have to deal with CPS and you have a crazy ex, is because they have the same twisted mind set, and don't care about your children. The only thing they care about is: "me, me, me and their ego, getting results so they can have an even bigger ego".

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If they make mistakes and you caught them red handed, play their game

If you ever get in the situation that you can use their own little game to let them feel that you know exactly what they are up to, do it! It may not always be helpful, but I've read stories from many persons where it was. I have had 2 of these situations, where I could show my ex with his own words and his mind game that I saw through him.

Simple example: Not long before I had spoken about something with him about the children's weekend, and I had forgotten to let him confirm by email (because we were on a good level at that time, at least I thought so, so I loosened the ties a bit and became messy) so I only had his "word".
And then the moment came, and he said: "I never agreed, and you know in this world you need everything written black on white, right?" And I could clean up the mess again.
A little while later he had become sloppy, and tables were turned. I saw him in person and he asked me something about the agreement, when I looked at him straight in the eye and said: " I asked you to confirm those things 5 x in a few weeks, and you didn't. So I have absolutely no idea what you are talking about. You know that in this world you need to have everything written on paper right?"

Fire came out of his eyes (if it would have been possible) and he could only stumble: "Are you really going to play it like this? Really? " And I knew I would be punished for it, but his face, priceless.. I will never forget it.
It as least showed him (among a few other times) that I was well aware of his tricks, and two could play that game. But it was not my intention to play games, I hoped I would be one of the lucky ones where that person was stopped after these little signals that you understand what is going on.

CPS is not your friend, not even the very good and nice ones you meet

Remember that the nice ones, that seem to have the best interest for the children, are most likely to be there for only a short period of your time dealing with CPS. It's their way of gaining your trust, and I actually believe these people are just CPS puppet's without realizing why they got hired for the job. Never trust them, always make notes yourself, record things (even if it's only to listen it back yourself to make a 100% correct report of the meeting/conversation) and always let them know you make reports yourself. When you send them YOUR own report of a meeting, they know that you are not easy to be fooled, this is important!
And always double check the "facts" in their reports, because many facts are made up. And when you miss them while you say you read it, and agree on it, this will backfire on you in the future.

It may seem so ridiculous now but you will be happy with it later on in the proces

I have made the mistakes several times, to trust them on their word, to trust my ex on his word. And I paid the highest price for it. I don't want you to be me in the future! Be smarter, learn from my mistakes. Get your document organized, make the time to write a report shortly after a meeting / phone call, let them read it, and important: sign it like they make you sign theirs too!
Show them they are dealing with a person that is aware of what's happening, and not an idiot they can just walse right over. They will try different techniques to break you, but pay attention, and listen to your gut feeling, you have it for a reason.. Being aware of what's happening is a good begin.

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I have made mistake after mistake, to keep trusting the wrong people. But as I can't turn back time, and change that, I do try to learn from those things by looking back on it. And overthinking the situation to analyze what went wrong. It gave (and gives) me good insights. People make mistakes, we all do, sometimes for a too high price, but let's try to turn it into a positive thing, then at least it was good for something.

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