What else did he distort?

In thinking about how distorted my ex-husband's view was of our relationship as it went bad in his eyes, it made me wonder how much he did the same with other relationships and whether the stories he told me were as accurate as I had once thought.

One story that stands out was this woman at his first professional job.  I think she was in some sort of mentor role to him.  According to him, she was a "witch" who he found ways to blame for his struggles.  She wasn't clear.  She wouldn't help him or answer his questions.  She was demanding.  She expected him to work too fast.  She was mean.  

And then at one of the company picnics, I met another co-worker of his and her husband.  We got to know this couple fairly well and would socialize with them from time to time even outside work events.  What stands out most about our interactions with them was the way the husband and I would just roll our eyes and turn to our own conversation every time the two of them would go on and on about how awful this "witch" was.  They even had really mean jokes about things like her riding a broomstick.  It seemed every time we met with this couple, they focused on this woman for far more than they should have.  If the husband hadn't been there to talk about other things, the gatherings would have been extremely painful and uncomfortable to sit through.

This was in the first couple years of my marriage and so I didn't even consider that my ex-husband could have been distorting things.  Plus, the fact that another co-worker seemed to back him up, I thought gave credibility to what he was saying.  But maybe my ex-husband just gravitated towards the one person who had her own reasons for not liking this woman and thus was a source of the validation he craved.  I imagine he liked having someone who would help him avoid accountability by shifting the blame.  Just maybe, this woman who they called a "witch" wasn't the toxic one and instead it was the ones who hated her - my ex-husband and his co-worker.  From what I could tell from work gatherings I attended, she seemed to be well liked by everyone else in the company.

I wonder what version of that story he told in interviews when he had to job search after losing that job.

Sometimes I wonder what version of the story of our marriage and divorce he is telling others.  I mean it doesn't really matter to me.  It's more a curiosity at how he might be twisting it to fit what he wants from whoever he is telling the story to.  I wouldn't be surprised if the new girlfriend got a different version than his mom got which was probably still different than the one he told some of his old co-workers.  His barber used to tell him how lucky he was to have me, I wonder what story he told his barber!  

I realize now that he tells people what they want to hear so that he can get the validation, admiration, etc. that he craves.