The Impact of Narcissistic Parenting on Children
Understanding the Long-Term Effects
Written by Narcissistic Abuse Expert and Recovery Coach Randi Fine
What is the impact of narcissistic parenting on children?
The children of narcissistic parents endure high levels of abuse that leave them feeling terrified, rejected, isolated, and abandoned. They are raised in emotionally unstable environments and lack the essential support needed for healthy self-esteem, autonomy, and individuality.
Life at home for these children is loveless, chaotic, confusing, volatile and unpredictable. Boundaries that allow for a separate and independent self are forbidden in this toxic family system as they undermine the extreme control that narcissistic parents relentlessly maintain.
Children living with narcissistic parents understand that their family operates by a set of unspoken rules that are confusing and painful. They are aware that their feelings don’t matter and that stability comes from adhering to the ever-changing and illogical agenda of their narcissistic parents.
Children of narcissistic parents are often viewed as extensions of the parents themselves, with the expectation that they will fulfill the unfulfilled dreams, fantasies, and wishes of the parent. The children not only need to work towards fulfilling the parent's desires but also need to conform to their expectations.
Narcissistic parents tend to see their children as existing solely for their own benefit, dehumanizing them and disregarding their individual rights. The needs and concerns of the children are consistently prioritized below those of the parent, although this perspective is often concealed to maintain the parent's sense of entitlement.
Believing that they have ownership over their children, the narcissistic parent feels entitled to shape them into their idealized image. The children are expected to meet the parent's ever-changing and ambiguous standards.
Any gestures made by the narcissistic parent for their children are viewed as sacrifices, creating a perceived debt that the children must repay. The parent often claims ownership over the child's achievements, attributing them to genetics, persistent pressure, or inherent talent. The child's accomplishments are only deemed significant if they please the parent or allow the parent to boast.
Children often feel perpetually indebted to their narcissistic parents, as their love seems to come with conditions. Rather than being loved for who they are, children believe they are only valued based on how well they please their parents.
This dynamic can be confusing for children because their narcissistic parents may occasionally demonstrate kindness. However, this kindness usually comes with strings attached, leading children to deny the harsh reality of their situation and repeatedly buy into the deception. The painful truth about their parents is often too difficult for children to accept, so they continue to seek love in the only way they know how.
The favor shown by a narcissistic parent is temporary and can quickly change. If a parent becomes displeased with one child, they may withdraw affection from that child and redirect it to another. This constant fluctuation is a harsh reality for children who are unaware that a healthier dynamic is possible. They may not even recognize the mistreatment as abuse, as their perceptions have been distorted and invalidated through gaslighting.
In controlling children, several tactics are employed: codependent control, guilt, narcissistic rage, and withdrawal of love.
Codependent control is used to create a dependent relationship between the parent and child, keeping the parent at the center of the child's emotional universe.
Guilt is deliberately used to leverage the child's sensitivities against them.
Narcissistic rage is employed to make children understand that not adhering to rules, beliefs, opinions, or orders will result in severe punishment.
Withdrawal of love is a form of emotional blackmail. Parents create subservience by showing love, kindness, and indulgence, and then yanking it away at will, conveying the message, "I will only love you if you do everything my way."
Children's feelings, rights, and thoughts are not acknowledged and can lead to much bigger problems for them – rejection, isolation, anger, violence. Children learn to repress their emotions to keep peace in house.
They absorb and internalize whatever their parents tell them: they are at fault, they are not good enough, they are stupid , they are bad. These external impressions become their internal truths and define them for the rest of their lives.
Children raised in these environments never know where they stand with unpredictable, unaccountable, inconsistent parents. They are emotionally and developmentally unequipped to process their turbulent home environment. Without healthy coping mechanisms being modeled or taught to them, their subconscious minds take over to protect them. Where boundaries should exist, walls are built to provide internal places to hide. Over time, walls become fortresses. Feelings never dealt with become trapped behind these impermeable constructs. Until these feelings are addressed, the buried emotions will remain there, wreaking havoc in everything they do for the rest of their lives.
Children cannot emotionally exist in a climate of instability and erratic surprise attacks without suffering extremely negative consequences. Chaotic, drama-laden households cause a lifetime of damage to impressionable children. Saddled with lifetime emotional struggles, adult recovery is very difficult.
Dependent, helpless children suffering emotional and sometimes physical victimization are imprisoned until they are old enough to leave home. Even then, paralyzed by insecurity, dependency, and guilt complexes, some find that difficult to do.
Children spend a lifetime desperately trying to get attention. If they receive any favor from the narcissistic parent, it will only be scraps. Still, they never stop trying. Emotional and physical child abuse perpetrated by narcissistic parents is painfully unjust, neglectful, and heartless. Children suffer very difficult lives and become severely damaged as a result. They are changed forever. Until this is addressed and worked through, love will continue to be associated with pain, a condition that will negatively influence and impact all adult relationships.
Randi Fine is an internationally renowned narcissistic abuse expert and coach, and the author of the groundbreaking book Close Encounters of the Worst Kind: The Narcissistic Abuse Survivor’s Guide to Healing and Recovery Second Edition, the most comprehensive, most well researched, and most up-to-date book on this subject. In addition to helping survivors recognize their abuse and heal from it, this book teaches mental health professionals how to recognize and properly treat the associated abuse syndrome. She is also the author of the official companion workbook Close Encounters of the Worst Kind: A Comprehensive Workbook for Survivors of Narcissistic Abuse. Randi Fine is the author of Cliffedge Road: A Memoir, the first and only book to characterize the life-long progression of complications caused by narcissistic child abuse.
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