When you first learn about narcissism and you learn how people become narcissists, you can form a lot of empathy and compassion for them. It is really sad to see they became the way they are because of the things they have been through. It is okay to have compassion for them but what is important is to have compassion with boundaries, meaning feel but don’t try to help to fix them. Your compassion can not override the reality of the situation. These people are mentally unhealthy and there is no getting through to them. So it is okay to understand why they are the way they are but understand no matter what they will always be like this and there is nothing you can do to make them better nor is it your responsibility. With that being said, let’s go into how narcissism develops.
Narcissism starts in childhood, it all starts with attachment. When you’re an infant and if you have insecure attachment where your parent is sometimes there, sometimes they’re not, they’re very neglectful where they’re not there at all, it will lead you to have either anxious attachment or avoid an attachment. You now learn that you don’t have someone to consistently rely on and the world feels unsafe now because of that insecure attachment. That infant doesn’t learn how to emotionally regulate or doesn’t have a secure bond or a sense of security. Psychologists say that narcissists are more likely to have a fearful avoidant insecure attachment which that means they’re more likely to suppress their emotions and fear/avoid deeper connections with others because as an infant and a child they didn’t experience sensitive responses to their distress or to their needs.
That in itself is not what causes narcissism, that’s just the start. Let’s go into their childhood. When you’re a child, naturally this is kind of when nature versus nurture comes in. Naturally, there are some children that are just more difficult. They have a really hard time self-soothing, they will cry more often than other kids that are able to just go with the flow. Those kids are the kids that other kids don’t want to play with or like or maybe their siblings don’t want to play with them and kids don’t like them or other parents won’t really like them. That creates more insecurity within themselves because they don’t understand why doesn’t anyone like me.
So then they will throw more tantrums or they’ll act out more because they don’t understand why they’re not getting what they want or they’re not getting what they need. Since these kids don’t have anyone to help them or guide them they don’t know how to regulate though they don’t know how to work through it and they don’t know how to fix it.
Now, let’s talk about the dynamic between an abusive parent and their child. Every single thing that you’re taught as a child comes from within the home (until you experience the outside world.) When you have an abusive parent or a narcissistic parent usually the parent will pick one of their kids to be just like them. The parent does this subconsciously, where they’re trying to fix all their inner wounds flaws, and shame through that child. This is what is known as the golden child or the favorite, the one that can do no wrong. The golden child is usually more submissive and easier to control.
Now if there is another child or other children in the home, these kids will all play different roles. If you’re an only child usually you’ll play all the roles but generally if one of their kids or kids stands out, has a mind of their own, is a little bit more rebellious, and possibly reminds that parent of their flaws, that will cause them to reject that child and blame that child for everything. This is known as the scapegoat.
The narcissistic child is usually the one that’s the golden child. What happens with the golden child is they are put on a pedestal and are given conditional love. So when they do something well which is exactly what the narcissistic parent wants, then they will get praise and love and the narc parent will be front and center at their concerts or their performance. They’re a performance parent and they will give the child everything they want when that child does exactly what they want but when the child does not do what the parent wants, they then completely abuse the child.
They put them down they shame them, and they make them feel very insecure and inadequate. So then the child then learns that they need to do exactly what the narcissistic parent wants them to do in order to gain that love and that validation. The child was never praised or validated.
When they did something like maybe they drew a picture or something they were genuinely proud of, if it didn’t benefit their narc parent in some sort of way, they just pass it like oh here’s another picture okay whatever. But when the child did something the parent wanted, that’s when they got the praise. These kids were never really taught how to genuinely feel proud of themselves or feel accomplished. When you’re a child where you have an unhealthy parent or you have a narcissistic parent, there’s always constant inconsistency.
There’s sometimes when your parent will be there for you and they’ll cheer you on and they’re giving you everything you want. Then there are other times when they’re shaming you making you feel terrible making you feel worthless and unlovable. This creates a lot of shame, a lot of negative feelings, and a lot of feelings of worthlessness, and the child doesn’t know how to deal with those emotions. So they internalize it, bury it deep and then they project it out onto others.
Usually when you’re the golden child, your parent sets extremely high unrealistic expectations for you, and when you are not that child that they are trying to make you to be then you will be completely tormented. So you are taught to be an extension of your parent.
Also, another thing when they were children they were completely invalidated. When they go up to their parent and share how they’re feeling “hey mom I’m sad.” or “hey mom I’m feeling this type of way.”, if they had a selfish or narcissistic parent, that parent would then say “It makes me sad when you’re sad.” or “I’m upset too, you know we all have feelings.” When that happens the child then feels like they’re not allowed to have feelings. It also makes them not understand the difference between their feelings and their parent’s feelings which is why it’s very common for narcissists to see others as extensions of themselves.
From the time they were young, they were taught to feel a lot of shame and feel like feelings are incorrect. So then when they see someone else expressing feelings, the narcissistic children also will shame others, they’re projecting themselves onto others.
As children, we see what our parents are doing we do the exact same thing we model what our parents are doing. If you see your parent behaving a certain way, you’re going to think that’s normal. You’re also going to want to do that. Or if you learn that the only way to get what you need is to manipulate because you saw mom and dad doing it or you learned from when you would talk to them you couldn’t exactly say “Hey I need this” but instead you would have to manipulate in a way, that’s how you learn that’s how I’m supposed to get my way. So then as that child, you learn that people are tools you’re supposed to manipulate to get what you want.
Also a lot of the time, these parents usually deal with a lot of guilt and shame themselves so then they will try to shield their child from feeling any type of disappointment. When you’re a child that doesn’t go through something or deal with disappointment, you then become very entitled. You learn that the world revolves around you and are supposed to do things to get what you want.
For example, say as a child there was a sleepover and then the child was not invited. That narcissistic parent may go in and complain how their child was not invited and they would berate everyone rather than teaching the child that sometimes you’re not gonna be invited to things it’s okay. Instead, the narc parent is teaching their child to be entitled and to expect to always get what they want and for people to revolve their world around them. They are teaching them to never deal with disappointment.
Whenever something negative happens, mom and dad came to save the day.
Another thing is giving the child whatever they want and never saying no. Whenever they wanted a toy they go it or when they wanted to eat a bunch of junk food, they got it. This constant enabling then causes the child to just feel like they can always get what they want and there are no consequences to their actions. They’re taught that that’s what they’re supposed to do, they’re not supposed to accept no and they’re not supposed to understand that bad things happen and deal with the consequences. These kids are not taught how to self-regulate or deal with disappointments or bad things or they don’t learn how to be uncomfortable or just accept that life just sucks sometimes.
Abusive parents usually don’t want to deal with their child feeling bad and they don’t know how to coach that child through those emotions. So they think the way to deal with it is to shield that child from those bad things and to give them what they want them. Giving their child what they want is really out of selfishness so that way they don’t have to deal with their child’s pain.
Now I’m going to get some comments saying “well my narcissist was never abused that got everything they ever wanted!” Here’s the thing, when you give a child everything they want materialistically or you don’t say no to your child and you make them think they can get whatever they want, that is abusive. Abuse means doing something too much. When you ignore your child too much it’s abusive. Overly punish or overly hit your child, that’s abusive. When you overly give your child what they want, that’s abusive. These children are given everything they want materialistically but emotionally they’re given no guidance, they’re given nothing emotionally.
When you don’t have guidance and when you’re not told no, that’s abusive. Their emotional tank is so low and that’s why they become a shell of a person who just cares about their image and shallow things. They were never given their emotional needs, they were never validated, they were always shielded from things and they were constantly enabled, they were not called out, and they were taught that they can do whatever they want and there would be no consequences. A lot of time is because that parent is trying to fix something within themselves.
They are living through their children trying to live the life that they wish they would have lived. That’s why they will control them to be a certain person. Maybe they want their child to be a popular cheerleader so they will make sure they do nothing but cheer. Its “I love you when you are a cheerleader and if you fail at cheerleading or you don’t want to be this cheerleader then I don’t like you.” or “I want you to date this person and if you don’t date this person, then I am going to give you so much hell but if you do I’m going to love you so much because I have wounds that I haven’t dealt with and I’m just trying to heal them through you.” That’s why the child becomes so messed up, they don’t have their own identity.
Another question that comes across people’s minds and that’s can a narcissist become a narcissist in adulthood or as a teen and the answer to that is no. Narcissism is something that is formed in childhood. Narcissism is a reflection of the way that they were raised as a child even if they had one healthy parent and one narcissistic parent, they’re still prone to that narcissism. Now as an adult there is a defect in their brain. They have lower empathy, which studies show people with more narcissistic traits have structural abnormalities in their cerebral cortex which is the region that involves empathy and self-reflection, not a coincidence.
They also are stuck at the age they were abused at and are more likely to be in a trauma state which also weakens other parts of their brain like being able to use logic and reason. That part of their brain’s weakened. The parts of their brain that are strengthened are the emotional parts that’s why they throw tantrums and they learned to throw a tantrum every time they don’t get what they want.
If you have someone in your life where it felt like all of a sudden they become narcissistic or they’re showing a lot of those traits it’s not because it’s random or something triggered them in adulthood. No it’s that you probably for so long were being a certain way where you were just complying to whatever they wanted and now you put up a boundary or you said no or you called them out for something and now that’s why their narcissistic traits are coming out. Or they’re shifting their supply.
They may have had one person that was a supply maybe it was their partner and then they shifted it over so it’s no longer the partner and now you are now the new supply. They usually will have a target and when that victim is no longer giving them their supply they will go then find another victim and another supply.
So if you have a narcissist in your life that has been very sweet and has been doing a lot of love bombing, it could even last two years because you’ve been compliant for two years and doing whatever they wanted. Then all of a sudden you say no or you stand up for yourself that’s when it turns around that’s the switch. That’s when you’ll see they will start to do a lot of those abusive tactics. The quickest way to really learn if you have a narcissist in your life is to put up a boundary, say no or call them out and you will see all of a sudden that charm’s gone.
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