In the midst of a breakup, and in the time that follows, you have to be brutally honest with yourself. Healing isn’t just about moving on—it’s about learning. If you’re not honest with yourself, you’re not learning. And if you’re not learning, you’re setting yourself up to repeat the same mistakes.

That doesn’t mean everything was your fault. It means asking hard questions:

• What could I have done differently?
• What boundaries did I allow to be crossed?
• What behaviour did I accept when I shouldn’t have?

And just as importantly, it means looking at your own missteps. None of us are perfect.

From the beginning, I tried not to just look outward for faults. I accepted that I’d become complacent, that I could have done more, that I wasn’t always present. I was already working on myself—understanding why I got that way and wanting to grow as a person. Even when the truth came out, I tried to show grace. I could understand how someone might feel emotionally distant and seek connection. But in my view, that connection should always be sought with the person you married, not with someone else. There’s no grey area for me there—you mend the relationship, you don’t destroy it.

But that requires both people to be doing the work. If my ex had looked inward, they’d have seen the reasons for that emotional distance too. The difference is, they couldn’t. When you’re dealing with a covert narcissist, self-reflection isn’t possible. They believe they are flawless, and that your existence is about them alone. They feign empathy, insecurity, even vulnerability—but only to use it as emotional blackmail. Sometimes, the only giveaway is a smirk they struggle to hide. In my case, the mask slipped completely when she laughed at the pain she had caused.

Still, I don’t believe in laying all the blame at someone else’s feet. It’s not healthy to ignore your own part in a failed relationship. You have to be able to admit: I could have done better. I could have acted differently. Relationships take two people to make them work, and two people to break them.

The difference is, I’m willing to learn from it. And that’s what healing really looks like.