On July 8, 2025, Mark Anthony Stephens shared a meme explaining what a narcissist supposedly means when he says:

“My ex is crazy.”

According to the meme, what he really means is:

“I gaslit them daily.”
“I cheated repeatedly.”
“I lied pathologically.”
“I manipulated them emotionally.”
“I destroyed their self-esteem.”
“I isolated them from their friends and families.”

It is the kind of post designed to require almost nothing from the person sharing it. No names. No dates. No examples. No documents. No acknowledgment of their own behavior. Just a villain, a victim, and an audience invited to decide which role belongs to whom.

And normally, it would be nothing more than another recycled Facebook meme.

But Mark has a history.

And once that history is placed beside the words he chose to publish, the post stops looking quite so profound.

It starts looking like a mirror.

To be clear, this is not an attempt to diagnose Mark with narcissistic personality disorder. A Facebook post cannot establish a psychiatric diagnosis, and neither can I.

What we can do is take the behavioral standard Mark himself chose to publicly endorse and compare it with the documented history.

That comparison gets uncomfortable very quickly.

“My Ex Is Crazy”

This is the first line of Mark’s meme, and perhaps the most astonishing one.

Because years before Mark reposted advice warning everyone about men who call their exes “crazy,” the subject had already appeared in our own communications.

In an August 2020 email concerning Liam’s health, I wrote about the boys connecting depression with being “crazy” and specifically stated that Mark had referred to Melissa that way. Tori disputed our interpretation of what the boys had heard, but her response didn’t exactly establish that mental-health commentary about Melissa was foreign territory. She wrote that Mark may previously have discussed Melissa and her family in connection with a “mental institution.” Liam’s Health.pdfPDF

That makes Mark’s later meme rather remarkable.

Apparently, according to Mark’s own Facebook wisdom, when a man starts explaining that his ex is crazy, the rest of us are supposed to become suspicious of the man making the accusation.

Okay.

That’s Mark’s rule.

We didn’t write it.

He posted it.

“I Gaslit Them Daily”

“Gaslighting” is another term that gets thrown around so casually that it can become meaningless.

So forget the label for a moment.

Look instead at the pattern.

For years, when concerns were raised about what the boys were hearing, medical treatment, food fears, medications, inappropriate adult subjects, or behavior occurring during Mark’s parenting time, the response frequently became some version of:

That didn’t happen.

That’s not what was meant.

The child misunderstood.

You’re exaggerating.

You’re controlling.

You’re angry.

You’re the problem.

Our 2020 email exchange captures that conflict in real time. And it also captures something important about Melissa and me: we weren’t particularly pleasant about it anymore.

I was blunt. I was angry. I was accusatory. Tori called my tone controlling, and anyone reading the complete exchange can make their own judgment about that. I don’t think those portions should be erased to make us look prettier.

We were exhausted.

But even in that angry email, I explicitly wrote that everyone involved needed to examine how their own household affected Liam, including Melissa and me. I wrote that we would make adjustments where necessary and follow Liam’s professional providers rather than assuming we knew more than they did. Liam’s Health.pdfPDF

The more important question is what happened as the years went on.

Eventually this was no longer just two angry households arguing by email.

A treating child and adolescent psychiatrist began documenting the same general problem.

Dr. Nikhil Rao described his interactions with Mark as challenging because of “alternative health beliefs, accusations, and misrepresentations.” He documented Mark’s claim that Kartini Clinic had essentially invented ARFID for profit. He described portions of a November 2023 “contract” concerning Liam as ranging from false to distorted. He said Liam told him he had been forced to sign it. Dr. Rao also wrote that Kartini staff reported Mark attributing a list of medication side effects to him that he said he had not provided. Dr. Rao.docxDOCX

At some point, “Russ and Melissa are just angry” stops being an adequate explanation when independent professionals begin describing accusations, distortions and misrepresentations too.

“I Lied Pathologically”

I would not call Mark a “pathological liar.”

That would be adopting the same careless language his meme uses.

There is no need.

The documented contradictions are damaging enough without giving them a psychiatric label.

Dr. Rao documented that Liam was severely growth-restricted, medically considered failure-to-thrive and in one of the most severe chronic cases the psychiatrist had personally treated. Liam’s bone age was approximately three years behind his chronological age.

Yet Liam reported that Mark regularly called him obese.

Dr. Rao specifically corrected that representation. Liam was around the 1.5th percentile for weight and approximately the 1st percentile for height. Even using an inappropriate uncorrected BMI calculation, Dr. Rao wrote that Liam was certainly not obese. Dr. Rao.docxDOCX

The same letter describes distorted medication claims, misinterpretation of genetic testing, claims about treatment risks that Dr. Rao said were inaccurate, and statements contained in the “contract” that the doctor characterized as false or distorted. Dr. Rao.docxDOCX

Then there are incidents outside the family entirely.

Rob Peters described an episode involving a specialty baseball hat. Peters wrote that a coach later told him Mark supplied three different explanations for how he had acquired the hat and that none of them were true. That portion of Peters’ account is secondhand from the coach, and it should be described that way, but it remains part of the written third-party record. Rob_Peters_Mark_Stephens_Experience.pdfPDF

Again, no diagnosis required.

Just documentation.

“I Manipulated Them Emotionally”

This may be the ugliest portion of the meme when compared with Liam’s medical history.

Dr. Rao documented that Liam said his father was increasingly trying to convince him to stop taking medication.

Liam wanted to remain on the medication.

He believed it had helped him successfully complete treatment.

The doctor also recorded Liam reporting that Mark called him obese.

Dr. Rao wrote that Liam understood he wasn’t obese, but that the stressful nature of his interactions with his father was directly negatively affecting his ability to cope with eating. Dr. Rao.docxDOCX

This wasn’t an abstract parenting disagreement.

Liam was severely malnourished.

His growth had stopped.

His puberty was delayed.

His doctors were racing against a narrowing developmental window to restore sufficient nutrition.

And according to his treating psychiatrist, Liam’s own understanding of his illness and desire for treatment became “diametrically opposed” to his father’s position. Dr. Rao.docxDOCX

The doctor also documented a recurring pattern of increased anxiety around visits with Mark and reduced appetite following them. On multiple occasions, Liam, staff and Dr. Rao observed increased anxiety and difficulty tolerating feeds after weekends at his father’s home. Dr. Rao.docxDOCX

Call that whatever you want.

But it seems a little strange to publicly lecture everyone about emotional manipulation while refusing to confront that history.

“I Destroyed Their Self-Esteem”

Again, “destroyed” is Mark’s meme’s language, not mine.

But imagine this situation stripped of all names and all custody conflict:

A teenage boy is so underweight that his body has essentially stopped developing.

He has an eating disorder.

He is growth-arrested.

His physicians are urgently trying to restore weight.

And one of his parents repeatedly tells him he is obese.

Would anyone sharing Mark’s meme consider that psychologically healthy?

Would they consider it supportive?

Would they dismiss it as merely a difference of opinion?

Probably not.

That’s the problem with morality memes.

They are incredibly easy to understand when someone else is supposedly the villain.

What About the Rest of the Meme?

The meme also mentions repeated cheating and isolating someone from friends and family.

I’m not going to simply paste those accusations onto Mark because he happened to repost them.

The documentation being discussed here doesn’t establish every allegation contained in the meme, and responsible criticism shouldn’t pretend otherwise.

That distinction matters.

Because this isn’t about assembling the ugliest possible description of Mark.

It’s about applying his own published standards fairly.

And there is already enough documented material to make the point without inventing anything.

The Genius of the Vague Facebook Accusation

This is where Mark’s social media becomes particularly interesting.

He doesn’t have to write:

“On this date Melissa did this.”

He doesn’t have to provide the conversation.

He doesn’t have to explain his role.

He doesn’t have to include the medical records.

He doesn’t have to show the court documents.

He doesn’t have to acknowledge the professionals who disagreed with him.

He doesn’t have to explain why a severely underweight child reportedly said his father called him obese.

He doesn’t have to explain why the treating psychiatrist described accusations, misrepresentations and treatment interference.

He doesn’t have to explain any of it.

He just shares:

“When a narcissist says, ‘My ex is crazy’…”

And lets Facebook do the rest.

People hit Like.

People hit Love.

People share it.

Everybody agrees narcissists are terrible.

Everybody congratulates themselves for recognizing toxic behavior.

And nobody has to ask the inconvenient question:

What actually happened?

That is image control in perhaps its purest form.

Not proving you’re the victim.

Just giving the audience enough emotional material to assume you are.

The Difference Between an Image and a Record

This project has never depended on Melissa or me being perfect.

We weren’t.

Read the emails.

There are moments where we are patient.

There are moments where we are compassionate.

And there are moments where we are absolutely fed up.

I became blunt.

Melissa became angry.

There was sarcasm.

There was distrust.

There were times when diplomacy had clearly left the building.

That is part of the record too.

But our irritation doesn’t erase what happened afterward.

It doesn’t erase the psychiatrist’s findings.

It doesn’t erase Liam’s reported statements.

It doesn’t erase documented treatment interference.

It doesn’t erase third-party witnesses.

And it certainly doesn’t transform an evidence-based disagreement into “my ex is crazy.”

That is the difference between an image and a record.

An image says:

I’m the good guy. Trust me.

A record says:

Here are the documents. Read them yourself.

So Who Was This Post About, Mark?

That’s really the only question left.

Because Mark chose this standard.

Not us.

According to the message Mark shared, calling your ex crazy while engaging in lying, emotional manipulation and reality distortion should make people suspicious of the person making the accusation.

Fair enough.

Then apply it fairly.

Apply it to Melissa.

Apply it to me.

Apply it to Tori.

Apply it to the doctors.

Apply it to Mark.

Apply it to everybody.

And then compare what each person says with the documents.

That is where this Facebook post becomes fascinating.

Mark appears to have intended it as a warning about somebody else.

Instead, with his history sitting beside it, it becomes something much more useful:

a checklist he voluntarily handed everyone for evaluating his own behavior.

And perhaps that is the greatest problem with spending years trying to control the image.

Eventually you publish something that asks people to look in the mirror.