A Lack of Support
We don’t provide support. We are too concerned with ourselves and our daily hunt for the fuel that we need to be concerned about you. We are engrossed in our own world and have no interest in yours. The only time we pay attention to you is when you are providing us with fuel or you stop providing us with fuel. Everything we do is focussed around us. This is because we have to obtain fuel, as without we will disintegrate. The hunger for this fuel is never ending and accordingly all of our energy must be applied towards obtaining it. This leaves us with nothing left over for anyone else.
Being a caregiver yourself, you would like to think that the person who you share your life with, or who you work closely with, would be amenable to providing you with support. That may mean giving you emotional support when you are experiencing a difficult time or taking the strain allowing you to lessen the burden on yourself. You give and you are happy to do so, therefore why should they not do so as well? That is the outlook of someone normal operating by the norms and rules of your world. Those do not apply to us. We cannot provide you with support since we have nothing available to do so.
Added to that we do not know how to provide emotional support. Yes we can see how chores can be done and the like. We also have observed the ways that you provide emotional support to other people and we know the phrases that are used, the expressions that are formed on people’s faces and the gestures that are made. We have seen all that and we could trot all that out. In fact we have done in the past. We did this when we were seducing you. When we wanted you to divulge about your weaknesses and vulnerabilities this will have invariably saddened you and upset you. It may even have caused an episode where you need emotional support. We were happy to go through the motions then because we were at the stage of investing in your in order to get our fuel. We were content to make the right noises, give you a hug and make the panacea that is the cup of tea. All of this was learned from others. We did not feel anything for you. We could not put ourselves in your shoes (heaven forbid that would ever happen) and we could not empathise with what you were experiencing and nor can we ever do that. Yet again, we conned you into thinking that we are a caring and selfless person. We demonstrated such an approach when we were first together and that attracted you to us. This raised expectations that you could rely on us and turn to us when the need arose. It is all false.
Furthermore, when you need support and expect it from us, you are showing to us how you are weak. We despise weakness. You will find that our kind is rarely found near children, the infirm and ill and the elderly. This is because they are all weak and want support regularly. We do not want to be reminded of that fact. We cannot be bothered with you cluttering up our route to fuel. An exhibition of weakness infuriates us. A normal person would see someone in a position of weakness and deign to help and assist. We have seen how this is a natural reaction in normal people. It will not happen with us.
If you are fortunate, we will absent ourselves from the situation in an instant. We will generate some urgent reason; find a pressing engagement we had forgotten about in order to ensure we can get away from you and your ailment, woe or injury. You probably will never see us move as quick when it comes to getting away from somebody who needs help. If we are unable to exit the situation then we may just stand and look at you. You could be reaching out to us, eyes filled with tears of pain, asking for help and we will just give you a blank stare. We know we ought to be helping you, convention and observation has told us this, but we cannot do so. We are unable to leave but we are also unable to help you. This requires compassion and we do not have any. It requires us to us our energies to help you out and we are forbidden from doing so.
Our ultimate reaction where you need support from us is to go on the offensive. The uncomfortable feeling that you have generated inside of us makes us feel less powerful and smacks of inferiority. We know of only one way to banish such a sensation. We need to reassert our power and that means we must lash out at you. It becomes necessary to subject you to further insults and denigrating comments, at a time when you are feeling hurt and vulnerable.
“What are you crying for? I have had worse happen to me.”
“I am sick and tired of you being pathetic. Deal with it.”
“I bet (insert name of triangulated individual) would not make such a song and dance about it like you do.”
“It’s only a dog, you can get another one. Seriously, what a display over a dumb animal.”
“You are hysterical, you need to get help.”
“Stop crying or I will give you something to cry about.”
“That’s right; make it about you on my special day.”
We will lash out at you with these words in order to make you feel worse and ourselves feel better because that is all we care about. We fooled you into thinking that we care about you. That is a fallacy. Do not expect us to support you.
Demonstrating our legendary hypocrisy we will expect you to always be there for us. When we have a need you must attend to it straight away, even if you are experiencing difficulties yourself. When we have a scratch we expect you to make it better even though you might be bleeding to death before us. As with so much of our behaviour we do not regard the way we act towards you as meaning you should behave the same way towards us. If you chopped us in half you would most likely find this stencilled through us like lettering on a stick of rock
“Do as I say, not do as I do.”
21 thoughts on “A Lack of Support”
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This is soooo true. Crying was def not allowed. Ex. If an animal was hurt it meant it needed to be put down not nurtured back to health. Very sad
My narcissist takes care of me publicly if I am unwell most people think he is the perfect man also when my children say something that they have noticed his behaviour changes I always know that they have said something to him because of the timing and they mean well but it doesn’t solve the problem just a bandage it also takes away my opportunity to address it I don’t want to be alone in my relationship anymore and I cannot leave besides I will probably just find another narcissist
I have to disagree with this article. My husband, who is a full blown Narcissist, has taken care of me when I have been ill.
I have also seen him take care of orphaned and injured Animals.
Likewise, I have also been on the receiving end of gaslighting, triangulating, hours of verbal abuse and all of the other behaviours that the Narcissist engages in, such as the lies, the manipulation, the deception.
I think that there are a huge number of traits that ALL Narcissists have in common…..but there are also certain traits that are personal to them, and we can not adopt a one-size-fits-all approach to this complex mental disorder.
Hi Laurie,
If he has a NPD, you may want to ask yourself what was behind his motivation to do those things, if there was some gain in it like something he wanted to achieve for himself, to keep the loving, caring, supportive husband or the nice guy, animal lover façade.
Hello E.B. I believe that it goes much deeper than that. I am convinced that Animals are the only creatures that my Narcissist husband trusts. With Animals what you see is what you get……unlike humans, there is no manipulation, no deliberate cruelty.
An Animal only kills when they need to eat or to protect themselves, unlike a lot of humans, who engage in cruelty for the fun of it.
I can certainly understand why my husband places Animals above people…….his horrific childhood taught him that humans are monsters to be feared.
I believe that his love for Animals is genuine.
The mistake that many people make with Narcissists is believing that they have no feelings at all, whereas they DO have feelings, but as Mr. Tudor himself has stated, their feelings are stunted…..not completely developed, and my own opinion on this is that the horrendous abuse/trauma in childhood that a huge number of Narcissist have endured is the key to their emotional retardation. Basically their ability to love DEEPLY was destroyed along with their childhood.
Don’t get me wrong…..these people are DANGEROUS…….the only reason that I am able to continue living with my Narcissist husband is because he is in the painful process of what I would call the disintegration of the aging Narcissist. He is in his 60s and very ill.
This means that he is no longer the dangerous, cold, calculating monster of his youth.
I take no pleasure in watching his decline……..because behind that monster facade I see glimpses of that horrifically abused little boy.
I am sorry to hear your husband is very ill, Laurie.
HG, sorry but this post is the opposite of what I experienced.
The narc took me to the hospital for surgery, spent many nights there, took off days of work to care for me & my son (cook, clean, deliver my pain meds, shopping). He lives 1700 miles from me & always flew down if I was in need. He never “allowed” me to help when he was sick. He went to another room & cared for himself—he didnt want to be bothered.
He came down for a week when my father died. I’m estranged from my sisters (and now my mother) and he stayed close by my as side as support. He went through the entire line of grievers and spoke also very kindly to my sisters. He ended up being the bigger person than I—I would have nothing to do with them.
Birthdays/anniversaries were always a big deal to him & we always celebrated. When I received my Masters, all attention & celebration was on me. Not once did he try to steal the spotlight, ever (not that I craved it). He’s a mid-ranger. And I’m certain he wanted to be seen as the knight in shining armor. He Pay-Pal’ed me $1000 after he discovered my ‘escape’ to pay for my gas, hotels, food (Hoover already) and kept my son & me on his insurance until I was able to afford my own (Hoover).
HOWEVER, while living with him, that did not prevent the devalue & discard. As “caring” as he was, he was the exact mirror opposite in cruelty and the often sharp tongue-lashings. Since we were in a long-distance relationship, we only saw each other once/mo for 5-yrs prior to my move, I think I was in the golden period ‘most’ of the time (and in the tarnished bronze period many times as well).
When I moved in with him the devalue commensed in EARNEST. Sex came to an abrupt halt. (As HG states, he kept his back to me all night.) I had no idea WHO the hell he was. In the beginning, I even laughed at him because I thought his demands were a joke because they were so off wall. Uh no, he was not joking. And he got damn serious abt all the other “rules.” I still have flashbacks abt boxes, scrambled eggs, paper towels, cold shower water, dryer vents, toilet paper, wine decanters, and multiples of ANYTHING. Ironically, that weirdo still took care of me if I was sick. Twisted f’ck.
Being in a relationship with a narcissist is like having your heart amputated, without anesthesia.
And if you’ve read this post all the way to the end, HG will grant you a very special prize for your endurance.
Are you sure you are not being mindblowingly lazy? By your own admittance, you know what is right and wrong, yet you chose to take the “I’m a narcissist. I’m not responsible.” road. This question from a Super Empath, as defined by you.
No, I know what is regarded as ‘right’ by the majority of society but that is not ‘right’ for me. It is not laziness. Do you seriously think I am someone who is lazy?
No HG, she doesn’t. It was “mindblowingly lazy”! (Is that a word?)
It is two words, MB.
YOU make ME laugh!
Cue Joe Pesci’s ‘I’m funny how?’ from Goodfellas.
Take it from a fairly lazy empath, you are not! I wouldn’t get through reading a fraction of these comments!
I am obliged.
OMG, by the way, I’m being hoovered! I honestly am in shock as I never thought it would happen. We only had a brief 6 week fling, during which I got the silent treatment half the time. I ran into him after about 3 weeks of no contact and he was so fuming mad I was sure I’d never hear from him again! You can imagine my amazement at receiving a text from him, asking me some random casual question as if nothing had ever happened. Stupid part- I responded! Damn my politeness! Well that was the end of the exchange. If he tries again I will not respond.
Change your number and that will lessen the likelihood of a hoover. An electronic conduit remaining open is no contact suicide.
Hi H.G.
I have most definitely observed this in my ex mid range. What I don’t understand is, how can they still consider themselves “good people” or even empaths? It’s mind boggling!
It is because their differed perspective has you viewed as the problem and they as the victim and the decent person. It is difficult for victims to grasp at times because you expect the narcissist to operate to a similar outlook as you, but we do not. When our behaviour does not accord with your outlook, you struggle to comprehend that they see themselves as good because if you can see they are not good, surely they must be able to do so as well? However, the MRN does not look at the world from your perspective, hence the difference.
Perfection @ HG
Marinathemermaid3,
If I had a nickle for every time my ex midranger pulled the “you need to take accountability” card.