A narcissist, whether they were in childhood or adulthood, will pretend to be a support person. They will feign being one of the metaphorical legs on a person's table. They will give signals, signs, and words that indicate reliability and care. This is to not only gain the trust of the target, but also to hone their image as a good person to others. 

So when it turns out, time after time, that they don't really have interest in the target's well-being, physically, mentally, emotionally or otherwise, it can be very hard to accept and grasp. This was one of my supports, I can't just remove it, I'll fall down! This was one of the legs of my table, the legs of my chair, the pilings on my pier. This was one of the load-bearing walls of my home. One of the wheels on my car. How can I take it down? I can't, I'll fall.

It's not actually true, of course; when one of the legs on a table is broken, we hold it up ourselves so it doesn't fall. When we sit on a broken chair, we put our weight only in one corner, balancing it on the three good legs. When the load bearing wall cracks, we place jacks to bear the weight. WE did it, we've been doing it all along. We've been supporting our own weight all along, they were just standing there pretending. We CAN do this, and we know it because we already HAVE been doing it for a long time. We just need to let go of the illusion that made us feel better, that we have been hold onto. We don't have to kick them out of our lives, unless we want to, we just need to look again at that support column. It's not them holding up the table, it's us, and it always was.--

Sanctuary for Awareness and Recovery