I receive emails almost daily from victims of narcissistic abuse. Every one of these victims looks exactly like me twenty years ago. My heart aches for each one of them because I know what awaits them: the fight of their lives. Time and time again, victims question themselves, afraid to face the harsh truth. How can it be true that the person you married does not love you and more than that, has become your worst enemy?

I remember Danny Silk once said at a conference that if your loved ones don’t know you love them, you don’t know them. This quote hit me hard. He was talking, of course, about the act of love. If the people around you don’t feel like you love them, you don’t actively love them. But there is a darker warning to this that I hope all victims of narcissists know. If the person you love is acting like an enemy, then they are.

Before I list what I would like to address this warning to some readers who have not lived through this personal tragedy. I

Victims are not pro-divorce. But I am pro-person which means I believe people are more important than institutions like marriage. Like Jesus’ enemies who condemned him for his healing on the Sabbath, people can focus too much on the rules and ignore the victims. Living a life free of fear and abuse outweighs the obligations of marriage in my opinion.

And this is what I would like to say:

I can’t tell you whether you will get divorced or not. no one can.

But I can tell you that if you’re afraid, you probably have a good reason to be. Choosing to divorce my first husband was a journey for me. I had to face the specter of parental rejection and the certain knowledge that I had to provide my children alone. And divorcing a narcissist seems dangerous. They are threatening and play the ball aggressively. They generally pull out all the stops to win. My ex even brought my prayer notes to court to try to prove that I was the unstable one.

However, my biggest regret is not leaving sooner.

I would save myself and my children a lot of grief if I stopped denying the depth of the problem. My children had to face a lot of unnecessary trauma because I stayed when I should have left. Me too. We often lie to ourselves about how much damage we can take. We think we can “take it,” but my friends, you are meant for better things than being someone else’s punching bag, whether physical, emotional, or verbal.

Your abuser does not have all the power.

He just feels that way. Your abuser has been cultivating power over you for a long time. Narcissists lie, hide their victims’ money, threaten, intimidate, and seek to isolate their victims from their friends and family. One day, the Lord showed me how he saw my ex compared to the way I saw him. I saw him as a giant like Goliath but God saw him as a small giant over a woman and four little girls. It has shown me that I am much older in spirit. I was more than just a conqueror, and I had God on my side.

God fights for the exploited and the exploited. I have seen him time and time again saving people from evil abusers when they call on him. He makes a lot of promises about this, and believe me, I demanded every single one of them.

This is not your fault. At least not in the way you think.

I was recently attacked by a woman whose husband was treating her very poorly. She said that she took responsibility by admitting that she had made a mistake and accused me of not taking responsibility. But the truth is that we victims fall into the trap of blaming ourselves all the time. God had to specifically tell me that I was not responsible for any of my ex-husband’s evil. We marry with good intentions, but narcissists don’t.

My main mistake was not acknowledging to myself and my family the seriousness of the abuse. But even that is tempered by my ex’s constant distortion of the truth. I couldn’t always tell what was true or not. Eventually, I realized he used confusion as a weapon. If I wasn’t sure, he had the upper hand. If you ask yourself whether you are the one suffering from the problem or not, you are not. Abusers are almost always 100% sure that the problem is their victim, although they will show remorse long enough to prevent their victims from leaving.

Surround yourself with good advice.

I would not have been able to do this without the help of my pastors and my family. If your church is not supportive, find another church. Obtain professional advice, whether in the form of lawyers or consultants. Get your children into therapy. Document everything your spouse says and does to you and your children. One of my biggest regrets is that I didn’t tell the judge everything that happened. If that were the case, I would have won much more quickly. I wish I knew enough to insist on professional psychological evaluations from someone who specializes in narcissistic personality disorder. If you are divorced, do your best to prove her mental incapacity. It will change the game in your favor.

Find people who will hear you and believe you. I cannot stress this enough. The narcissist’s first fear is exposure. Shine as much light as possible on the darkness in your marriage. I was terrified and you will be too. But facing the truth of what happened was the most liberating decision I’ve ever made for me and my children.

I have so many other things to say, but no matter how terrible your circumstances are, you are worth saving. You can be free from fear. If you fear for your life, find shelter to hide you. Ask for help from people you trust. You may not have any control over the person who abused you, but you do have control over your decision to stay or leave, to live in fear, or to fight for your life.

Listen carefully to what the Lord is saying to you, whether directly or through people who truly understand Him. Not everyone truly understands the depravity and degradation involved in narcissistic abuse. I can’t even write the words my ex said to me “as a joke” because the internet filters will label my post as offensive. Your life is precious in the eyes of the Lord. He will save you as he did me. and I know. Leaving a narcissist feels like walking on water. But I’m here to tell you that life after narcissism is worth fighting for. So worth it.