NPD is hard to comprehend.

There's a lot of discussion about whether narcissists know what they're doing.

Yes, narcissists are sick.

But the sick part IS NOT that the narcissist doesn't realize their actions.

They know what they're doing, they're not just inhabiting a body that is acting autonomously without the narcissist having a say in it, or being aware of it.

The narcissist knows when they're hurting you, they know when they're lying about specific events and they know when they're cheating.

They know.

Herein lies the problem:

They don't feel accountable for it.

They do not believe that their own actions are their fault.

They can't.

They refuse to accept that they can be wrong, socially unacceptable or engage in bad/ harmful/ shameful behavior, out of their own free will.

Instead they believe that their actions are caused by you.

That they would've never done what they did if you hadn't made them.

And that's it.

That's the sick part.

Nothing is ever their own fault.