When I think of hoover, my first thought is of a vacuum. This makes sense because hoovering is essentially sucking the life, happiness, and soul out of someone. That was my experience anyway. I had never heard of this term. Throughout my marriage I did not know it even existed. But now, two years post-separation, I see how hoovering ran rampant in my daily life.
Hoovering is the type of emotional abuse a narcissist commits when they feel they are losing control over their victim. This type of manipulation is used to suck their victims back in.
During my marriage, there were moments where I brought up separation and divorce. There were also times where I completely disengaged, stayed silent, and did not give him the attention he sought. In each of those moments, his responses were to hoover. At first, the hoovering looked similar to love bombing. He would talk about how we were destined to be and that I was the most important person in his entire universe. He would make monumental promises about how he was working so hard to make all of my dreams come true. I guess he forgot about the dream of a kind, happy, and respectful marriage!
After some time though, his hoovering shifted to making accusations about me from before we were married, pretending like he didn’t do anything, and the worst one…making statements about killing himself. He would repeatedly tell me how he just wanted to die. And then he would bawl his eyes out. And I would let go of what he did, feel bad, and try to console him. And then we went on repeat. The number of times we went through this cycle is mind blowing. And I went along with it each time because he played on my guilt and hope.
I thought the worst of this was happening while we were living together. But I had no idea: he was just getting started.
Once we separated, and by separated I mean he was arrested and a restraining order was put in place, he brought out the big hoover guns. I received texts non-stop. He would tell me over and over how sorry he was and that nothing like this could ever happen again. He asked other people to contact me and plead his case. He would send me pictures of us. He told me he was homeless and unable to eat. Here are just a few examples of the barrage of messages:
“You are my whole world, soul, and being. All of what I want to do in life is for you.”
“I am thinking of our family every moment of every day.
“I made a gift to share with you one day. My heart is yours.”
“I am doing all I can to survive all alone. I do not have a home and am living in destitution all alone. Please, I ask you from your heart, if you can understand what I am going through being away from you.”
“You are my life, for us to be together as one with love and happiness forever is my only dream. I’ll devote everything to you.”
“You are my soulmate.”
These messages are nice. They sound kind and loving. But here’s the thing: they were all lies.
Here are 12 signs you might be getting hoovered.