It is very sad to see your children being emotionally manipulated by their narcissistic parents. It’s a complex situation and difficult to know how to respond to.
How can you help your children when one parent is a narcissist and they are being raised by you and that type of parent? Here are some suggestions on how to overcome this difficult situation.
1. Give your children the gift of honesty.
Talk openly with your children about the reality of their lives, respectfully and realistically. Don’t play the “let’s pretend everything is normal” game. Don’t contribute to your children’s feelings of cognitive dissonance by acting like “the emperor has no clothes.”
2. Teach your children how to manipulate and emotionally abuse.
Try to keep it as age-appropriate as possible. This can be difficult, but you know your kids – what can they handle? Keep it simple and keep it real. Teach them how not to get caught up in drama.
3. Be a good role model.
Show your children how to break away from the narcissistic web of destruction by maintaining your composure and sanity. Show self-compassion and empathy. Show them how to “observe and not absorb” when they are in the presence of the narcissist. Show confidence and strength.
4. Learn how to manage your anger.
Since a parent is already angry at your kids — even if they’re secretly angry — make sure you don’t hold a grudge, express your anger appropriately, and keep accounts short. Learn how to take a deep breath and walk away when you feel like expressing your anger in a harmful way. You can learn how to control yourself when you get angry.
5. Let your children know: “I see you.”
Think back to your children about the truth of their feelings. Let them know that you truly see their pain and struggles. Look into your children’s eyes and be with them. Connect and tune in to their hearts.
6. Grieve with them.
It’s heartbreaking to realize that you have a parent who only sees you as an object, who can never truly be with you or see you as the valuable human being you are. As the other parent, who knows what this means, you can provide a comfortable place for your children.
7. Validate their feelings.
When people spend a significant amount of time with a narcissist, their reality, feelings, and intuition are constantly invalidated. Let your children know that what they are feeling and experiencing is happening.
8. Provide them with a safe space.
Your children need at least one safe parent; After everything they go through emotionally from having a narcissistic parent, gaslighting, emotional abuse, double standards, and invalidation, they need a parent who can provide solace, warmth, stability, and resilience.
9. Teach your child what love is.
Since narcissists do not know how to give or receive love, they teach their children that love is a performance-based commodity that must be earned. Narcissists view others as objects or resources, rather than as intrinsic value based on the interpersonal relationship.
They don’t know how to care about others or offer any kind of compassion that isn’t self-serving. As a non-narcissistic parent, you must teach your children what love is.
10. Take care of yourself.
By relaxing, reading, maintaining close friendships, enjoying life, forgiving others, and finding humor. Build your life around healthy activities and communities.
At the risk of sounding alarmist, I must warn that narcissistic parents are harmful to children.
It is recommended that time spent with any narcissist be limited as it breeds confusion, separation, brainwashing, desensitization to abuse, emotional dysregulation, and destruction of one’s sense of reality. It also contaminates the child’s developing internal working model of how relationships work.
When a parent is a narcissist, you should take whatever steps you can to minimize the harm to your children.
