Psychologists and relationship experts offer insights into behaviors that reveal a narcissistic mother.
The narcissistic mother often feels entitled, manipulates and belittles others, and lacks empathy. You may be exposed to abuse and volatile behavior from her. And you feel like you have to give her the attention she wants as a narcissist.
A mother like this cannot give her child the attention and validation that leads to emotional security. Often, her children will not feel loved, affecting their mental health, behaviours, mindset and development. It interferes with the family dynamic and causes problems among other people in the house.
If you have a problematic relationship with your mother, it is helpful to learn more about the narcissist’s behaviors to discover whether or not this is the problem. Learning about a narcissist’s behaviors can help you identify the situation and find ways to overcome its effects. This will help you understand that the experience is unreasonable and that you deserve more than the way you are treated.
While children should be able to look to their parents for their emotional and physical needs, not everyone can. Those who have a parent with narcissistic personality disorder (NPD) usually don’t have the opportunity.
NPD is a personality or mental health disorder that manifests itself in interpersonal relationships in a variety of ways, including harmful behaviors and symptoms.
Some NPD symptoms to watch for include:
She feels entitled and believes she should get special treatment
Exploiting her children for personal gain
Have every conversation about her
Control in private but act courteous in public
Criticizing or belittling others
Frequent guilt tripping
- Bragging about your accomplishments without recognizing them
Believing that it is more important than others
She talks about how much she does for you
React negatively to criticism
Blame others
Lacks empathy
To receive a diagnosis of borderline personality disorder, a person must meet five diagnostic criteria. These standards include these behaviors:
Greatness or merit
Exploiting others for personal gain
Lacks empathy
Arrogant behavior
Believing that others are jealous of them or are jealous of them in return
Exaggerating achievements or status
Fantasizing about power, success, or wealth
Need constant attention or admiration
Lack of empathy
A narcissistic mother tends to be emotionally neglectful in raising her children. You may prefer to invalidate feelings, which has many consequences for children. Some effects of this include not meeting the child’s needs or considering their feelings. She will not acknowledge her child’s feelings or try to understand them, instead thinking only of herself.
You may also notice that self-focus affects overall family dynamics. It can cause a lack of loyalty, support and understanding in your home. This situation also interferes with developing healthy relationships.
Excessive focus on status and appearance
The narcissistic mother wants to appear perfect and overemphasizes status and appearance. She will be image-conscious and status-oriented, doing whatever it takes to look her best to those outside the home. A woman like this also focuses on materialism because she believes it is one of the best ways to show her status.
She will talk about her parenting skills and her children’s accomplishments to the exclusion of disappointments or shortcomings. Typically, a narcissist will not care how things are going at home, but she wants others to think she is doing a great job.
Image-conscious behavior negatively affects children, including not learning how to be themselves. These children may also believe that they can only be valued for what they can offer to others or their appearance.
Manipulation and control
Manipulative behavior can indicate narcissism, and often involves controlling tactics. A mother like this may control your hobbies, activities, and who you spend time with. Plus, she wants you to dress, act, and talk a certain way.
She will use fear to fuel her psychological manipulation of you and undermine your opportunities if she doesn’t like her. Some examples of manipulative behavior to watch for include:
Give the silent treatment
Guilt-tripping
Blame others
Mind manipulation
isolation
blackmail
The narcissistic mother loves to play the victim
The narcissistic mother often has a victim mentality and engages in guilt and blaming others. He will manipulate situations to get sympathy and attention from others, making them feel bad about it. You may notice that she enjoys the drama and complications of negative events.
Mothers who do this often think they can gain something from making people feel bad about them. She will portray herself as a victim to gain attention from those around her and other benefits.
Children who grow up with a mother who often plays the victim tend to feel incompetent. They tend to struggle to maintain and enforce boundaries. If you grew up in this situation, you may have trouble expressing your needs as an adult.
border violations
The narcissistic mother does not respect boundaries and often engages in invasion of privacy. It shows disrespect because it indicates that her need for control trumps your boundaries. This behavior also shows that she cares more about what you want than what makes you uncomfortable.
She may ask inappropriate questions or make uncomfortable comments. When you set your boundaries, you may get angry and reject it. Even though it crosses the line, continue to put it in place and implement it to protect yourself and your safety.
Nepotism and scapegoats
Your mother may be a narcissist if she creates family roles, including golden child and scapegoat. The golden child is the favorite and receives more attention and praise than others in the family. The scapegoat, on the other hand, is blamed for everything and often faces emotional rejection.
Nepotism and scapegoating can cause tension between siblings. It can lead to physical and emotional abuse and create a toxic environment. Other effects may include:
Decreased self-esteem
Unhealthy relationships
Emotional trauma
The narcissistic mother engages in emotional exploitation
Narcissistic mothers engage in emotional abuse that causes long-term effects on the child’s health. It may make you feel insecure or nervous because you don’t know when to get angry or break boundaries.
Gaslighting is a common tactic for narcissists, and involves making you question your reality. It is a form of psychological or emotional abuse that can make a child feel crazy with his or her thoughts and feelings. An example of this is saying something mean or hurtful, and when called out, they claim it was a joke or say they never said it.
Other examples of gas lighting include:
Give the silent treatment
Trying to change your memories
Blaming others or situations
Denying things that happened
Ignore the needs of others
isolation
Making sarcastic comments
He lies
If you have a narcissistic mother, she will also likely engage in emotional abuse by criticizing and belittling her children. Sometimes, he will focus on what he thinks are failures and shortcomings, and constantly bring them up. You may belittle yourself and diminish your value in the presence of others or in public.
A mother like this may also engage in emotional blackmail, especially of her adult children. She will do this to maintain control and use pressure, threats, scowls, and blocking to get her way.
Children who experience this from their mothers deal with long-term effects on their well-being, self-esteem, and behavior. It often makes you feel like your feelings aren’t accurate or dramatic, and you may think you’re imagining things. This situation leads to self-doubt and feelings of inferiority.
Emotional abuse can also lead to an unhealthy entanglement or blurring of lines between your identity and that of your mother. It’s an emotional rollercoaster about control and manipulation.
Seek professional help if you grew up with a narcissistic mother
Growing up with a narcissistic mother can cause long-term problems for children, including:
Insecure attachment with their mother
Lacks emotional intelligence
Sacrificing their needs to keep others happy
Undeserved self-blame
Struggling to set and maintain boundaries
Dealing with this experience is difficult, but it can make a difference in your life because it improves your well-being. While you can’t control your mother, you can take care of yourself and get help. Seeking professional help from counseling, family therapy, and support groups can help you overcome and reverse problems.
You can find support groups for victims of narcissistic parents or visit a therapist for individual counseling. It helps you recognize and process trauma so you can begin to heal.
A professional can help you learn how to replace the negative thoughts your mother left with positivity that allows you to move forward. Some other things they can help you with that will help you deal with the situation include:
Identifying narcissism and its subtypes
Finding social support
Stop blaming yourself
Improve self-esteem
Stay calm when provoked
Enforcement of boundaries
Prioritize yourself
Minimize contact with your mother when necessary
Final thoughts on narcissistic mother behaviors
Recognizing the behaviors of a narcissistic mother can help you protect yourself and heal from its effects. Seek support and prioritize your mental health so you can live a fulfilling life, free of the repercussions caused by the narcissist in your life.
Getting through growing up with a narcissistic mother frees you and helps you make sense of things. You can reflect on your past and see situations for what they are rather than how your mother handled them.
Growing up this way is not your fault, and you deserve to live a happy and fulfilling life. Getting help will allow you to recognize your worth, protect yourself, and heal from past damage caused by the narcissist.
