Living with a narcissistic parent can be devastating, complicated, and toxic to children. A home, which should embody a comfortable place of security and love, is like a battlefield where there is only one clear winner.
Furthermore, many of these wounded children grow up mistakenly believing their home life is normal and acceptable. However, they struggle with distressing and painful needs that may seem limitless in their adult lives. Here are seven things narcissistic parents cannot provide for their children.
1 – Harmony with feelings
Children learn how the world works through the capable lenses of their caregivers, and research rooted in attachment theories shows this. When the caregiver is appropriately attentive to the child’s feelings and needs, the child then feels safe and secure.
However, in narcissistic families, children experience frequent incidents of their parents disagreeing with their feelings, contradicting them, or completely ignoring them. The parent does not validate the child’s emotions; The parent validates whatever is in the best interests of the parents.
A narcissistic parent may punish children for crying, shame them for feeling afraid, and even suppress them when expressing “excessive” happiness. In other words? Children learn that their feelings are erratic and insecure. They learn that they are the source of the problems.
Because of this, many children grow up believing that feelings must be suppressed. To achieve this suppression, we see many children of narcissists struggle with substance abuse, eating disorders, self-harm, and other impulsive or compulsive lifestyles.
After all, if they’ve gone through complex years of condemnation for having feelings, why should they feel safe within their emotional selves?
2 – space for flexibility
Children have capricious and moody personalities. One moment they love ketchup. The next moment, they hate it. One day, they want to be artists, and the next, they tell you they intend to sign up for the military.
According to childhood development research, these identity shifts are normal and healthy. As children grow older, they seek to establish their own identities and understand their proverbial place in this world. Thus, they need support and reassurance from their caregivers that they are allowed to participate in this process.
However, in narcissistic homes, this freedom of flexibility is lacking. The child must conform to the parent’s anger – or face dire consequences. The narcissistic parent has a strict view of how their children should act and behave (and is usually a mirror version of the narcissistic person).
This parent cannot tolerate outside peer influence or society. Moreover, this person cannot understand why the child is also “subject” to these influences. Therefore, children grow up without being sure of who to trust or what to believe in.
3 – healthy communication
Simply put, narcissistic parents do not practice assertive or sensitive communication. They do not think about how the recipient receives or understands the information. Instead, they use dialogue as a tool of manipulation – as a means of furthering their agendas.
This rupture affects children in profound ways. On the one hand, they rarely feel safe expressing their feelings. For two people, they struggle to understand the subtle differences between aggression and assertiveness.
That’s because narcissistic parents use a combination of cognitive empathy with aggression to communicate with their children. Regardless, kids tend to experience this dreaded feeling that it’s always their fault because that’s the mantra reinforced over and over again.
Thus, children grow up dancing the tango of constant walking on broken eggshells. In their adult life, they may struggle with healthy communication patterns in their relationships.
They may become passive complacent people, who tremble in the face of authority, always worrying about offending or angering others. Or, they may take on the same familiar communication habits as their parents, and turn into a narcissist.
This is because anything outside the rigid image of the parent reflects poorly on him or her. This is a hollow feeling that the narcissist cannot stand.
In these types of families, parents often use physical or emotional abuse as a form of punishment. However, emotional damage is not limited to criticizing or insulting a child. You have taken a step forward.
The parent continuously abuses the child by making it about the parent. As in, how could you do this to me? Can’t you see how this affects me? It is no longer about the child’s “fault”. It is about the parent’s belief that the child has intentionally “harmed” the narcissistic parent.
5- Conflict resolution skills
We know that narcissists do not engage in conflict on an even playing field. They play in their court, forming their own rules and standards along the way.
The narcissistic parent cannot impart proper conflict management. This is because the narcissist always wins, regardless of the context. It is not a matter of disagreement or experiencing healthy stress. It’s a matter of, I’m right, you’re wrong, and anyone who thinks otherwise is crazy.
When the narcissistic parent is angry, there is no middle ground or healthy processing of the emotions. The entire house transforms into what the narcissist needs at that moment. Many children constantly witness the futile power struggle between their narcissistic parent and their enabling parent. They quickly learn that the narcissistic parent always wins — even if someone else tries to pick a fight.
Again, children in these families will typically struggle with conflict management in their adult lives. Many will try to avoid conflict altogether, often mimicking people-pleasing. These individuals risk repeating childhood patterns and being attracted to narcissistic partners.
Other kids try to regain the strength they never had by emulating the same narcissistic conflict-resolution skills as their toxic parent.
6 – Unconditional love
All children need to experience an inherent sense of universal security and love. They must know and feel worthy and loved – no matter what they do. Unconditional love provides children with a healthy form of bonding with their caregivers, and it also provides them with the self-esteem needed to succeed in the world.
The narcissistic parent does not offer this love.
Instead, they often oscillate between love bombing (when the child acts up to the narcissist’s standards) and complete elimination (when the child behaves otherwise).
In other words, love is conditional. It depends on how the child fits the needs of the narcissistic parent. It depends on what the child does and gives – not on who the child is. It can change instantly.
You can see how this creates a conflicting pattern throughout childhood. Children cannot anticipate their parents’ emotional reactions. They never know if it’s going to be a good or bad day. Moreover, they never know what kind of love (if any) they will get.
7 – responses appropriate to the age
In healthy parent-child relationships, the parent provides age-appropriate responses based on the child’s needs and development. When narcissistic parents interact with their children, they don’t precisely match that child’s emotional needs. They tune in to what they need from the child, not the other way around.
On the other hand, many narcissistic parents raise their children. This means that they treat the child as if he is older than his actual age. Most likely, they cannot understand that children do not operate on the same emotional levels as adults.
Some parents will use the child for “peer support” by dumping their adult issues onto the child and expecting legitimate advice and solutions. Other parents may set unrealistic expectations for their children, such as assuming that the child will take care of their younger sibling (and then get upset if and when the child asks clarifying questions).
As these children grow up, we see these narcissistic parents co-parenting the children. In other words, this parent cannot accept that the child will grow up with their own unique identity and personal adult identity. A parent cannot tolerate the idea of not being needed, wanted, or valued.
Thus, these parents will try to sabotage the normal developmental process of adulthood. Some try to do this in subtle ways (such as making simple decisions for the child). Others will do so in more destructive forms (ignoring boundaries, taking full responsibility for the child’s well-being).
The future for children
Growing up in a narcissistic family can be traumatic for all children. Although narcissistic child needs love, affection, flexibility, and encouragement, they receive a constant message that their needs are unreasonable and demeaning. It’s a disturbing dynamic, and it can affect a child for the rest of their life.
