Six Signs of Narcissism in Parents

We talk about narcissism a lot in modern culture, often quick to accuse self-righteous, entitled or selfish people of being narcissists. A narcissist is someone who has an inflated sense of self, they demand attention, they have no cares about how they affect other peoples lives, they don't handle loss of control well and they are prone to manipulative behaviours.

Having a narcissist around is hard enough, but when it's a parent it's even worse, trust me I know; coming from a home with a narcissistic mother. Our parents are supposed to be our best friends, they are supposed to be there to pick us up after we fall and dust us off. They are supposed to want us to grow and learn and start our own lives as healthy and happy individuals. Narcissistic parents do not share this sentiment. Here are six signs that your parents might be a narcissist.

Infantalization

Infantalization occurs when the narcissistic parent removes responsibility, expectation and independence from their children. This is the term used to describe that mom who never lets her kids cook or do their own laundry. Basically the parent will keep the child from performing certain tasks and making the child dependent on the parent indefinitely. The child will not know how to do anything without their parent, or will doubt their every step they take alone. The child will be weakened and molded by their need of the parent.

An example in my own home is my older brother who was born with epilepsy and a mild autism. He can speak, read, write, do maths, he seems perfectly average, not issues unless something suddenly changes in routine or he's faced with a bat. My mom coddled him all his life because he was her miracle baby, she hadn't thought he would live as she had a high miscarriage rate where only 3/14 pregnancies survived.

She never expected anything from him, didn't expect him to get good grades, do chores, share with me or my sister, or in any way shape or form do anything that would make him independent of her. Now as a 26 year old man she still controls him like this. Any time he looks at a job offer he asks her first if it's right for him and lets her make his life choices because he was never empowered to do it himself.

Parentification

This means that the parent makes the kid responsible for the care of the adults and possibly other offspring. This can be by using the kids as outlets for their personal troubles like financial or relationship problems the parent is having. The parents expects the child to listen and possibly try to help the parent in the small ways kids can, like making the parent tea every now and then or cleaning the house without being asked.you can see how this can get ugly can't you?

In my case my mother made her childhood my problem, guilting me out of depression with her own sob stories of how poorly she was treated as the only girl in the family. She would tell me how much financial trouble she and my father were in, to make me feel bad for asking for things, like a new jersey in the middle of winter when my old one had returned to its former state as a ball of yarn, or for asking for a bit of extra food since she never dished me quite enough.

I wouldn't ask for things I needed because they costed money, I wouldn't complain about my depression because she had it worse, I never breathed a word about moving out because she would act like I was hateful and didn't care about how she felt. My mother accepted no responsibility for her own feelings or words, expecting us to act like adults when we were just kids.

Triangulating

Triangulation is when your narcissistic parent teams up with a sibling or the other parent against you. This is truly the most awful abuse I think any child can experience. The feeling that you are not a part of a relationship with your parent, seeing your parent having a seemingly better relationship with another sibling is crushing. You feel there is something wrong with you because your parent doesn't seem to care about you as much as your other sibling or the other parent. This is a tactic used to try and control you, it's all about control with narcissists.

My mother tells my father frequently about negative experiences she had with us which never happened. She will tell him how she asked my sister to make her a cup of tea and my sister was rude and said no because she was busy. This is her trying to triangulate. My father is on to her bull so it doesn't work for her and my sister and I both see her for what she is.

It's just my brother who is dependent on her there's no way out for him. She used to use her relationship with him to control us by saying things like "your brother is really upset you aren't hanging out with him so much anymore, but I tried to explain to him that you're going through something, I tried to get him to back off your case." so she looks like the hero.

You are Ego Food

Does your parent ever use you to lie to outsiders? Do they sing your praises in public and demean or ignore you in private? Do they use your life to spark up their Facebook page? Do they have expectations on you they don't emulate? If you said yes to any of these then you are ego food. Which means you are a pawn in their quest to gain adoration, respect and attention from outsiders. You're part of a facade.

I know I'm using references to my life a lot but it's all valid and might just be relatable and clarify the concepts for you. So my mother home schooled us from when I was eight, she taught us to read and write and after that we were on our own really. She never taught us anything after that and when she tried to teach us things like Afrikaans (our second language) she would purposely make it impossible to do anything right and she would tell us were were stupid and it was easy and we were being lazy. In public she would, and still does, tell people how she taught us all our classes right up until we matriculated, and outright lie and if we ever dared say she was lying we would be in huge trouble and she would say we wouldn't lie and we were embarrassing her. I remember replying to that and saying that if she really taught us all the way through, as she said, then our lying was simply a reflection of her as a parent and it wasn't something she should be boasting about. I was in big trouble.

Another example of being ego food is being forced to do activities the parent decides you will do and you have to excel and be the best. I had to do ballet, I'm not fat by any means but I'm stocky and athletic and not at all ballet material, I hated it but my mother wanted me to have the body, the talent, the experience, the status and a good spot in the dance class hierarchy. I didn't care but she did, she was using me to not only live out something she wished she could have done but she also wanted the social status she would get from having her child in ballet looking perfect and better than everyone else; only time my mother ever overestimated my abilities.

They make you wonder if you are going mad or if you have encountered a glitch in the matrix

"I would never have done or said anything like that!" "That never happened." "You are exaggerating what happened, it was long ago and you were little." These are the phrases that make us question our very existence. The parent tries to act like none of their negative behaviours or words ever happened and that you are just making up stories or imagining things.

My mother took it a step further with "I didn't mean it that way, you just misunderstood me." She felt she was on another level and no one could reach it to understand her, and she felt any failure in communication was the fault of those around her. She was never to blame and never said anything mean.

You felt your parent never noticed the effect their words or actions had on you, and they never let up until you broke down and "needed" them again.

Imagine you have been holding it all in for months, your parents says or does something and you snap, they snap back harder and you break because it's too much. You just want your parent to understand that they are hurting you buy they are so self absorbed and think so highly of themselves that they don't notice. When you start to cry they stop and you let them comfort you because it's all you wanted. When it's all said and done you're complacent, dependent and under their control once again. They broke you to keep you under thumb and make you feel like it was your own fault.

BONUS SIGN

You can't have your own life when you have a narcissistic parent. The idea of you stepping out, doing whatever with whoever and wherever you want irritates them. They don't want to lose control of you so they try to manipulate you.

My mother did this when I moved away for college. I was accepted and was packing my bags, two days before I left she came to my room and said that I don't need to move away to study, I could study via correspondence and stay at home. I said a flat no, that the money was spent and I wanted to go, my particular training required hands on work and I couldn't do that without going to the school I'd chosen.

This was just one of many ploys, others being about her being dreadfully ill and needing me to drive two hours from my flat in one city, to pick her up and take her to a doctors appointment; the doctor in question was in my city. Then to drive her back two hours to her city and return to my own, total of 8 hours of driving in one day.

Conclusion

Children of narcissists feel like they are messed up, they feel like everyone else had a better childhood, they feel their parent rejected them, they feel like they aren't satisfactory and they live with that doubt in their hearts all their lives. I'll tell you what to do about your narcissist parent, using my 23 years of experience I have learned the following; the less you react to their guilt trips, manipulations, bullying and overall nastiness the more angry you will make them. The angrier you make them the more they lash out, the stupider they look. If you're like me and your normal parent doesn't like seeing the kids get steamrolled this is perfect, just let mom blow up at you, because you aren't letting her control you, in front of dad. It'll be dealt with quickly and peace will last until he's out of sight.