Living with a narcissistic parent is an extremely difficult and complex situation, to say the very least. Parents who display narcissistic tendencies, expose their children to emotional, mental, and sometimes physical abuse. Sadly the child will get wrapped up into the parents twisted sense of reality, and often will know no other way of life.
The narcissist parent will have an inflated sense of their own importance, a deep need for attention, and a lack of empathy toward their children. Behind this inflated sense of importance, lies a fragile and vulnerable person, who is unable to accept responsibility or cope with the slightest piece of criticism. Their priority is themselves and feeding their own ego. The child will never be a priority, they are simply only there to serve their selfish agenda, and often the child will be subject to love bombing, gaslighting, guilt tripping, shaming, blame, manipulation and many more narcissistic tactics.
Identifying narcissistic parenting can be difficult, as the child is subject to this behaviour from birth. However, as they get older and gain life experience, often they will begin to realise that their childhood wasn’t as ‘perfect’ as they first thought. This may lead to feeling of confusion, sense of violation, anger and anxiousness.
The narcissistic parent will also tend to have two personalities:
1.External personality: This is their fake self. Ever been told how amazing your mum or dad are? How social they are? Maybe that they’re the life of the party? Narcissists are masters at switching on the charm. They will portray themselves as outgoing, friendly and easy going to the outside world.
2.Home personality: This is their true self. Behind closed doors, narcissists are spiteful, angry, envious, manipulative, self absorbed and incredibly controlling.
A child witnessing this behaviour may be left confused, anxious, develop people pleasing tendencies or trust issues, go into their shell, and take on others emotions as if they were their own.
How do parents become narcissists?
Put simply, narcissistic parents have suffered trauma during their childhood. They have developed ‘coping strategies’ to protect themselves from abuse. These ‘coping strategies’ no longer serve them as adults, but because of their low self-esteem, they feel the need to control how others regard them, fearing that otherwise they will be blamed, rejected or exposed.
It is extremely important to note here that there is no excuse for narcissists to subject their children to abuse.
How do narcissistic parents see their children?
Narcissistic parents see their children as extensions of themselves. Their children are purely there to serve their agenda. Therefore, children who have grown up around narcissists are often confused and unable to be their authentic self. They have been brainwashed on what to say, how to act and what to think by their parents. As long as the child does what the parent wants, they will continue to keep them around. But the moment the child doesn’t meet their needs, standards, expectations and stands up to them, the child will become a problem. At this stage, the abuser will either ramp up the abuse, or it might be easier to ‘wash their hands of it’ and walk away.
Golden child vs. scapegoat
Another common trait for narcissistic parenting is pitting their children against each other. Often when there’s two or more children, they will create family roles such as the golden child or the scape goat.
Golden child: The golden child is seen as the extension of a narcissist parent, they are seen as perfect – Just like the narcissistic parent sees themselves. They simply can’t do anything wrong, and the child will be the best at everything. The narcissist parent will project all their supposed superiority on to this child.
Scapegoat: Narcissists believe they are truly perfect, they have an inflated sense of self importance. Typically they will create a role in the family called the scapegoat, the scapegoats role is to take the blame for everything, to never get anything right. This is a common family role for narcissists as if things don’t go that well, it will be someone else’s fault.
Often these roles can switch over time, this is so that the narcissist parent can stay in control of the family dynamic. They will often pit their children against each other for their own gain, and won’t accept their children being ‘friends’ or doing anything without them. These dynamics will change depending on the overall goal of the narcissist.
Fake self vs true self.
Narcissists are experts at displaying their fake charming self when they need to for their own personal gain. Outside the home they are overly confident and social, they will brag about their golden child or their own successes for attention. However, if you challenge them or don’t provide them with extreme amounts of praise and admiration, they will create false stories or arguments with you in their head. This will result in them going cold, washing their hands with you and making the situation awkward.
On the other hand, they have a true self that they display at home. This is where they are comfortable and can be their true narcissistic self. They will emotionally abuse their children to gain power and make themselves feel in control and feel better about themselves. They will look to solve all their ego driven problems by taking it out on those around them at home. This is when the child feels there’s no right or wrong way to behave, and starts to develop coping strategies to protect themselves from the abuse. Such as, treading on egg shells, reading body language, people pleasing and self sabotaging. They revert inwards as the child is aware that they will be punished for not doing what the Narc wants them to do. Abuse may come in the form of silent treatment, physical abuse, guilt tripping, gaslighting and intense control.
Manipulation
Here are the signs to look out for:
- Shaming: “You could never get a job like that” “your unsocial” “you are too skinny” etc
- Comparing you to the golden child: “Why can’t you just be like your sister” or constantly being told how perfect he golden child is in a way to put you down.
- Blaming: “It’s your fault for not doing what I said and now your dad and I argued.”
- Guilt: “I’ve put a roof over your head, you’re ungrateful.”
- Punishment: “If you do that I will up your rent” Even threaten to “cancel christmas” or take away gifts if the children are young.
- Emotional: “you look so beautiful, just like your mother”, “you’ve got my eyes”. This type of love bombing is used to control you.
- Manipulation: “You don’t want to do that do you?” or “You’re not hungry are you?”. These statements mean we aren’t doing that thing you want to do, and I’m not cooking/buying you food.
- Upset: “We used to be so close” or “You’ve changed” or “I don’t know who you are”. This is usually used when you don’t do what they want and are trying to guilt you in to doing it.
Neglect
Neglect is a massive trait for narcissistic parents. The parent is so self absorbed in themselves, they have no care about those around them, so the needs of children are often left unattended.
Superficial Image
This falls under the two personality types – one at home and one outside the home. When out of the home they will switch to the charming, super friendly and social image. This is where they will show how proud they are of their children and how successful and rich their life is. In reality, they are extremely envious and insecure, their aim is to display a false sense of reality for attention and to put others down for their needs. At home this is very different, the parent will be jealous of their children, and it’s simply unacceptable for their child to do better than them and adopt any type of independence, otherwise they will be losing control.
Superiority
Many narcissistic parents have an inflated self ego. Often those around the narcissist are treated as weapons or tools to be used for personal gain.
Marginalisation
Narcissistic parents tend to put their children down to make themselves feel better. Narcs are extremely insecure and will find happiness in other peoples weaknesses and vulnerabilities. You will hear phrases such as “What’s wrong with you”.
Emotional control
Children who grow up with Narcissistic parents, can often feel neglected, devalued and emotionless. They are unable to determine their own thoughts, beliefs or values as they have constantly been told how to think, act and behave.
Jealousy
You will find most narcissists are extremely envious of other people, they are insecure and need to be the centre of attention. They will also believe that everyone is jealous of them as they believe that they have an inflated sense of importance. They will have this view on life, that the world is against them and it’s everyone else’s fault. This is no different to their child, they will become severely jealous of their child growing up and showing independence. They simply won’t be able to cope with any type of change such as; puberty, friends and career paths. They will see this ‘change’ as a threat to their control, and will do everything in their power to control and devalue the child.
How do narcissistic parents abuse and punish their children?
- Emotional blackmailing
- Excessive control
- Lack of healthy boundaries
- Claiming their success
- Extreme punishments
- Don’t follow through on promises
- Silent treatment
Traits of a narcissist parent:
- Constantly needing the conversation to be about them
- Ignoring achievements at home
- Never asking the child what they want
- Self absorbed
- Bragging about achievements to others in public, but rarely acknowledging the child
- Guilt tripping children when the child doesn’t do what they want
- Outspoken and uses a lot of energy on gossip and current affairs. For example, has a lot to say about the topics on the news
- Holds grudges
- Uses things against the child from months or weeks prior
- Uses weaknesses of other people for personal gain
- Everything is always someone else’s fault
- Charming in public, and totally different at home
- Making the child feel like they owe them
- Making their child engage in activities, events or sports that they are not interested in, to benefit the parents image or gain attention.
- Not allowing their child to have independence, I.e not allowing them to go to their room, they must sit next to them.
Ways narcissistic parents abuse their children are:
- Control
- Untruthful to the child
- Creates uncertainty
- Hot and cold emotions
- Puts their needs first
- Neglects the child’s needs
- Ignores the child
- Puts the child’s emotions down
- Ignores the personal boundaries
- Makes sure the child becomes dependent on them
- Manipulates situations to gain control
- Punishes the child to feel better about themselves
- Inconsistent rules, don’t know right from wrong
- Putting the child down to knock their confidence
- Gaslighting
- Make the child feel that they are lucky and owe them
- Makes the child feel anxious at receiving gifts, forcing them to overly thank them.
- Using the child’s weaknesses against them
- Holding onto issues to use against them at a later date
- Tells the child what to do, think and act
- Doesn’t keep to promises or takes back gifts to punish them
- Blame the child for their mistakes
- Never allows their child to voice an independent opinion
How can this effect children of narcissists later in life ?
- PTSD
- Anxiety or depression
- Self sabotaging
- Defensive over their parents behaviour
- Burying memories and taking the trauma out on other things
- Trauma holds them back in areas e.g careers
- Never feeling good enough
- Anxious about what people think of you
- Put the needs of others first
- Trust issues
- Develop unhealthy relationships that resemble childhood
- Becoming narcissistic yourself (especially if you are the golden child)
- Feeling violated and lied to
- A sense of loss, grieving your “perfect” childhood or parents
- Unable to think for themselves, after being controlled their whole life
How to Deal With a Narcissistic Parent
Confronting a narcissist is a losing battle, no matter what you say or do, the narcissist will never back down. Here’s how you can help yourself:
1. Educate yourself
A narcissistic parent thrives on their sense of control, and you are expected to meet their demands or else. The narc will always put themselves first – family, care and love are not even on the list of priorities, you are simply there to serve their selfish agenda. The first step to healing is understanding what is happening, know that it’s not ok to be treated this way and it is certainly not normal behaviour.
2. Accept and move on
You will never change a narcissist, this is why most people have to go no contact. Trying to change them will only cause you exhaustion and ramp up the abuse. Remember that you are an extension of them, therefore anything they say or do isn’t personal, they are just deeply insecure, fragile people.
3.Avoid Gaslighting
Narcissists use gaslighting to control their children. They confuse and manipulate until the child loses sense of reality, and gets wrapped up into their parents warped and twisted ways. It’s important to identify the gaslighting attempts, and focus on yourself.
5. Self care
You’ve been through a lot of emotional abuse, it’s important to take time for yourself to heal. Learn to self-soothe, and understand what you’ve been through.
6. Therapy
Therapy is an excellent way to master your healing journey. Talking to an unbiased professional, will help you obtain the skills required to heal and move on with your life.
8.Well-being
If you don’t have people around you, try listening to well-being podcasts, this will give you exposure to the real world and you can put some of their best practices in place. People talking about real life situations and perspectives can also help you to not feel alone.
8. Boundaries
Narcissistic parents have huge egos, they will test your boundaries to simply to prove that they are ‘important’. Often they will show up at your home, work or event uninvited. Understanding what you want, your values and what boundaries you want to put in place is key, stay strong and don’t allow anyone to overstep. Consistency is key.
10. 3 Strike rule
Put a 3 strike your out rule, if the Narcissist oversteps 3 times, then go no contact for a period of time. Sadly it’s like training an pet to behave.
11. Walk Away
Be prepared to walk away from them. In most cases with narcissistic parents, they do more harm than good, and for you to move on with your life, it’s likely you have to leave them behind. Make sure you’ve thought this through, tried other avenues and spoken to a therapist beforehand. Often if you go no contact, they will also walk away from you to protect their ego, therefore it tends to be a permanent situation, so be sure it’s for the right reasons.
Self-recovery work
Here are 4 common emotions that children who have been raised by narcissists will experience, followed by how to overcome these emotions and start your healing journey
Denial
Denial is a defense tactic, something you needed to develop as a child to survive. Humans require love and narcissistic parents are incapable of providing this to their children. However, denial no longer serves you as an adult, you need to learn, accept and move on from the situation to allow yourself to properly heal.
Hope
Children sense neglect and narcissistic tendencies. You will find that you’ve spent your whole life taking on the responsibility to make your parents happy. Everything you said, did, or acted, would have been unconscionable to what your parents wanted of you. Avoid setting standards for your parents, seeing them for what they are. When you emotionally detach and don’t need their approval, is when you will start your healing journey.
Anger
As time goes on and you begin to realise your parents weren’t as ‘perfect’ as once thought. You will experience a sense of violation, anger and confusion. This is because you’ve been manipulated your whole life to think it was normal. Seek therapist support here and self reflect on what you’ve been through.
Depression
Children who have been raised by narcissistic parents, often go into their shell. They protect themselves by not saying or doing anything to o avoid any type of conflict. This leads to depression. They are unable to express opinions or be their true authentic self, they possibly do t even know how to be themselves as they’ve lived a life of control. Begin to write down what interests you, your thoughts, how you feel and start creating a plan or bucket list.
Conclusion
Living with narcissistic parents is extremely exhausting and damaging to your emotional state. Also, realising you have grown up with narcissistic parents, is a difficult situation to comprehend as an adult or teenager. Fortunately, there ways you can begin the healing process. It often helps to firstly educate yourself on why narcissist behave the way they do. Once you have an understanding, there are tools you can begin to use to heal and move on in life.
Something that helped me hugely on my journey, were these resource videos. Gaining an understanding of narcissists and how they behave, was extremely helpful in my recovery process.