Varg was one of seven children– 2 boys and 5 girls, each with a unique personality. Quirky, odd, but mostly nice–with one exception, his youngest sister. I’ll call her Ubel, which is German for “bad.” I chose it because it sounds like the name of an evil witch, which she was. Think of the Mean Girl from Junior High. The gossipy ring leader who bullied everyone else. I don’t think I have met a more grating, irritating, conniving, manipulative person than that sanctimonious, self-righteous do-gooder phony. She was a force to be reckoned with. Varg once told me that of his five sisters, she was the one who was most like their mother and it wasn’t a compliment.

Ubel is another type of narcissist, one who falls under the heading of “communal narcissist,” the kind of person who gets validation from the good deeds she does for others (under the pretense of “serving the Lord)  and makes sure everyone knows. For instance, the care of their elderly father fell mostly on her and on an almost daily basis, she’d send ridiculously epic emails to the entire family documenting every granular detail of her time spent with him. General updates informing the family that she took him to his doctor’s appointment and what the results were would be welcome and expected, but she also provided exhausting accounts of how she sewed a button on his shirt and combed his hair. She clearly needed constant praise and attention.

At first I viewed her as an annoying and sometimes comical nuisance until her self-aggrandizing behavior became a problem when she started injecting herself into our private family matters. That, combined with her malicious, triangulating gossip, was highly disruptive and destructive.  I can’t say that she was the main cause of the demise of our marriage, but she certainly contributed to it. It is a welcome relief that I no longer have to deal with her ever again. Part of my healing process has been to learn how to stop internalizing other people’s behaviors and instead, observe, rather than absorb, and recognize them for the sad sacks they really are. I used to loathe Ubel, but now with some time and distance between us, I just feel sorry for her.  She was clearly a very troubled and unhappy person.