Escape Artist: Part Two: The Secret Rebellion Begins
How I Broke Free from a Narcissist’s Cage
When you’ve spent your entire adult life walking on eggshells—dodging landmines just to keep the illusion of peace alive with a narcissist (spoiler alert: it’s impossible, but we’ll unpack that in a future rant)—the idea of freedom can feel terrifying.
And your brain, bless its traumatized little heart, will do this fun thing where it downplays the narcissist’s cruelty and shines a blinding spotlight on your supposed flaws. You know, the very same ones your abuser has been drilling into you since day one.
Welcome to self-gaslighting, friend. It’s a hell of a ride. Five stars for psychological gymnastics, zero stars for actual healing.
The thing is—I knew I wanted out. I’d tasted the fire. I’d had flashes of daydreams where I could just exist without being interrogated, humiliated, or treated like a glorified maid with no opinion and no paycheck. I could feel tiny sparks of excitement imagining my own space. My own peace. A life where someone wasn’t flinging dirty laundry across the room like confetti and expecting me to “serve joyfully.”
And yet… the doubt started creeping in.
Was I being unreasonable? Maybe I was too demanding. Maybe my childhood had ruined my expectations for love. Maybe it really was my fault. What would happen to my dog? How would I afford anything? Who would even hire me at my age? Maybe I’d waited too long. Maybe I was too old, too tired, too broken.
If you’ve been in this place, you already know: our minds will work harder than the narcissist to keep us stuck. But that’s not sabotage—it’s survival. It’s our brain saying: “Danger ahead. This will piss off the predator. Retreat.”
And honestly? My brain wasn’t totally wrong.
Because leaving a narcissist is dangerous. Mine wasn’t just angry—he was calculating. Cold. Smarter than I’d given him credit for, and more paranoid than I ever imagined. Years earlier, in a failed escape attempt, I learned he had installed hidden cameras—everywhere. Overhead HVAC vents? Bugged. Outlet covers? Spy devices. He tracked my car. Took my phone at night and swapped the SIM card so he could download every message, call, and site I visited—even the ones I thought were deleted.
Let me be clear: never underestimate your narcissist.
If they’re obsessive, controlling, or tech-savvy, assume they’re monitoring everything. A quick Amazon search for spy cameras is enough to make your stomach churn.
But even with all that… I started planning again. Because I had to.
I started by writing.
I needed to reclaim my own voice—to remind myself that I wasn’t crazy. That this wasn’t normal. That staying was destroying me.
So I wrote like my life depended on it. Because honestly? It did.
I wrote in Google Docs saved under burner email accounts. I posted in secret forums using fake names. I poured thirty years of pain into words, and once the floodgates opened, I couldn’t stop. It felt like lancing a wound that had been festering for decades. Finally, the poison had somewhere to go.
And then I started planning. Quietly. Strategically. Like the rebel I was becoming.
I began building a financial lifeboat.
My abuser made sure I paid all the bills, while he hoarded cash, hid assets, and made damn sure I had nothing left. If I so much as hinted at saving money, he’d find a way to make it disappear. So I had to get creative.
I opened a secret online-only bank account with a debit card that got mailed to my workplace, not my home.
I stashed the card in a locked desk drawer at work.
I rerouted $50 from each paycheck into this secret account and explained the smaller paycheck with a casual, “Oh, insurance rates went up.” (He didn’t ask—he never really paid attention to my struggles anyway.)
I started an Etsy store and created digital products in the early morning hours before anyone else was awake. I picked up Instacart and Shipt deliveries and funneled small portions into the secret account. Just enough to stay off his radar.
And I got crafty with cashless rewards apps like:
Crowdtap (surveys + opinions = gift cards)
Shopkick (scan products in-store)
Ibotta (rebates and bonuses)
All of them linked to a separate PayPal account tied to my escape fund.
It wasn’t much at first. But to someone who’d been told for decades she was “bad with money,” every dollar was a middle finger to that narrative. Every silent deposit was a whisper: You’re getting out.
I didn’t want much.
I didn’t care about furniture or electronics. I wanted my photos. My books. My laptop. The mementos of my babies’ childhoods. Everything else? He could have it. I didn’t want the fight—I just wanted out.
But I knew I couldn’t just run. I needed a job, a car, a safe place to go. And I needed to be mentally and emotionally strong enough to endure the storm that was coming.
So I kept building—inside and out.
Coming Soon: Escape Artist, Part Three
In the next post, I’ll walk you through:
How I rebuilt my credit from scratch
Starting my business in silence
Burner phones, digital safety, and staying under the radar
Creating the ultimate Escape Plan Checklist (you can download my free checklist here!)
If you’re in the middle of your own silent rebellion, keep going. You’re not crazy. You’re not alone. And you can get out.
💥 Stay ready. Part Three drops soon.