In addition, people are expected to not only know the narcissist's needs, wants, desires, opinions and problems – and anticipate them – but to create an environment that successfully manages all of these things for them as well, the way parents do for very young children. For someone to fail to do this is considered by the narcissist to be a failure of the relationship, and even of the other as a person. It is often characterized as a slight of the highest caliber, and/or as abuse or neglect of the absolute worst kind. It is the job of every person around them to manage things so that they can function and anyone who does not succeed at this – which is literally everyone who tries – will be punished.

Over time, this creates an environment where people don't feel safe to express or even feel needs, feelings or a sense of identity – because they're not. If someone is attacked, degraded and abused; if they are punished every time they do something, eventually they learn to stop doing it because it isn't safe to do. If someone struggles with codependency and similar challenges anyway, this is likely already a bit of an issue for them, which makes it even more difficult for them to advocate for themselves in these situations. They may already have been conditioned to believe that they are required to push their own needs aside to please others, or that it is their job to manage other people and make them happy or fix their problems.

Even without already-existing challenges, after so long of being forced to focus solely on the narcissist's needs, feelings and opinions, people can start losing their own. They may find attempting to focus on them difficult or even frightening. They may be literally unable to define themselves as a person or to identify their own needs. This can be especially problematic for people who were raised by narcissistic parents or within oppressive environments.

One of the most important things about recovery from abuse is getting to know yourself again. You might even end up knowing yourself better than you ever did before. One of the few blessings of these relationships is that they show us exactly where we need to heal.