Right by Your Side

The narcissist in your life may have turned to you and said,

“You are the one true constant in my life,” or words to that effect. Of course, when this sentence was said to you with faux sincerity shining in our eyes it was intended as another love bomb that rained down on you from up on high. What we were actually doing was engaging in a rare moment of truth.

We require a constant in our lives for a variety of reasons. To begin with it is because when we are seducing you, you provide us with all that delicious positive fuel and we cannot get enough of it. You are shiny and sparkling and that fuel tastes so glorious. We want to be with you all of the time to drink deep of your fuel but also to ensure that you become addicted to us as we love bomb you. We want you constantly with us so that you are exposed all the time to our charm, our wit and our affection so that as we drink up your fuel, you become addicted to the euphoria you feel by being with someone so wonderful as us. We also want you constantly by our side to isolate you from anyone who may just have the knowledge and temerity to shatter the fantasy world that we have created so you wriggle free from our grip. After expending time and energy in trapping you and clamping our jaws around you, the last thing we want is for you to be able to escape us.

Inevitably you let us down and your supply of positive fuel lessens in quality and quantity. Your dereliction of duty means we must draw fuel from other appliances. A normal and healthy person might think that if a person tires of the other in the relationship one might look at ways of rekindling what first drew those people together. Well, you know what? We do that, only we do it in our skewed manner. We have no interest in working at the relationship, that requires too much effort. We will however rekindle the golden period in order to enable our vacillating between devaluing and idealising to have the maximum effect. You may also consider that if someone no longer has any interest in the other person in the relationship and especially if that person is looking elsewhere then he or she would do the decent thing and end the relationship and move on. Not us. We need you. You might question why that should be the case since if we are treating you so badly, why on earth would we want to remain with you? If we are committing acts of infidelity with other people, why do we remain in a relationship with you? The answer is because we need a constant appliance. You are that constant appliance. We have decided that you would supply us with delicious positive fuel and although you would let us down and reduce that supply, we could keep you around as we drew negative fuel from you. You are the mainstay. There is no logic to us in having a relationship then ending it and moving on to another person some time later. That would not provide us with enough fuel, nowhere near enough. We need someone who will always be there so that he or she:-

  1. Provides positive fuel to being with;
  2. Provides negative fuel thereafter;
  3. Represents a good return on our investment (we are not going to throw away such an asset that readily);
  4. As a constant enables us to use others in our manipulation to draw more fuel from the constant and the other people (triangulation, smear campaigns and so on)
It is only when we have drained you of most of the fuel that you can supply us with that we shift to a new constant. Usually we have had them lined up for a while. Of course we do not let you go. You still serve a purpose for fuel once you have replenished your levels after a period of time and then it is time to hoover. In some instances we switch back to you as our constant and the most recent person becomes the discarded individual. We will switch back and forth between the two of you, for as long as you allow us to do this. This saves us having to hunt out new supplies as we rotate your roles in your obligation to provide us with fuel.
This is why you are kept despite the many affairs that we have. You are the constant and you may keep that role for years since much of it is dependent on how much you will take before deciding to try and escape us.
We also deploy you as a constant (yes I know you only deploy machines and it should be employ, but you are an appliance remember) because we like to compartmentalise our lives. We are the business ace at work, the champion sportsman on the field, the caring husband and father at home, the wild man on a night out and the sexual Olympian with our mistress. We like to show the world we have a steady wife who does not cause us trouble, one who runs the home and cares for the children. See how successful we are? We can attract someone who wishes to remain with us and provide that visage of stability and domestic bliss. The rest of the world does not need to know about the chaos we unleash on you behind closed doors.
Mentioning chaos identifies a further reason why we like you as our constant. Much of what we do generates chaos – the affairs, the gambling, the driving offences, the cheating and the lying – it is therefore a source of great comfort to us that we can return to you and find you waiting as usual. We have experienced so much upheaval and chaos when we were younger that this constant presence on your part provides us with a degree of reassurance. Of course, we abuse this by unleashing our chaotic nature on you as well, but we know you are not going to go and leave us and that is of great importance to us. Not only does this show the world somebody wants us it also means this appliance will remain and churn out fuel for a good while yet.
For all the other variables we introduce, the other women or men, the threatened departures and the bouts of silent treatment, we need you as our constant companion.

7 thoughts on “Right by Your Side

  1. Maddie says:

    I will shine always… but You would still get bored, wouldn’t You?

  2. The convalescent codependent says:

    This is it, this explains it all for me, I was the constant that escaped. Well written, hits home to a “t” for me!

  3. I spent quite some time writing a comment to this timely post today…I’m not sure if it posted. I recall it saying something to that effect. I tried twice. I believe such things happen for a reason with electronics with me. If I posted it correctly and it is yet to be moderated that is all good. If not, then perhaps I was not meant to share of myself.

    1. malignnarc says:

      Hi CE, no, nothing has come through, perhaps you can try again.

      1. Thanks for the reply H G

        1. malignnarc says:

          No problem

  4. nikitalondon says:

    What can I say to this. Thanks for the awareness again. Very well explained….
    I have to say HG. Scary 😢.
    Sleep well.

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