Narcissistic mothers can easily damage your happiness. Mothers have an enormous influence on the development and happiness of their children. A primary relationship that can make or break a person. Luckily, the damage that is done in childhood can be repaired, through coaching, processing and learning.
One of the ‘types’ of mothers that are extremely damaging for the healthy development of their children is someone with a Narcissistic Personality Disorder. If you have low self-esteem, no sense of self, never feel good enough or worthy, you might be the product of a malignant narcissistic mother.
How to recognise a malignant narcissistic mother?
- Life revolves around her and not around her children. Unless the children make her look good and important.
- She will always be better, more interesting, prettier, successful than her children.
- As a child, you can’t do it right. As a result, you will walk on eggshells and feel really insecure.
- You have to give her compliments and admiration, otherwise, there might be no food, money or a lift.
- She will take advantage of you.
- You can’t talk to her about your problems and definitely not about emotions.
- You won’t have a close connection with your siblings, because she will have prevented that through lying and manipulation.
- You will not feel at ease with her.
- She won’t do anything to help you.
I left my narcissistic mother behind
My mother is the perfect narcissist – of course perfect. But in honesty, she is one of the worst examples and I have been very damaged. But, the good news is that I have managed to leave her behind. If you recognise that your mother has a Narcissistic Personality Disorder and you want to know how to diminish her influence, I offer a FREE coaching call. I can share what I did and help you to find out how you can make changes. It is all about repairing her damaging influence and creating a safe distance between you and her. We can discuss how you can change and taking ownership of your life, without your mum.
Sadly, this describes my daughter instead of me. This was how she treated me from an early age. I wish I knew how it happened. Our roles seemed to be reversed.
Wow that’s some real psychological projection there Patty
Right?? XD
Aint foolin nobody but herself!
Spoken like a true malignant narcissistic mother.
Indeed! She sounds so much like my mother scapegoating me
Patty, you are the worst kind of narcissist. You make me sick. My grandmother is like you and watched two of her sons die by being this stupid. YOU are the narcissist. Your kid did not mistreat you, your little narcissistic brain didn’t let her have a sense of self
Took me 36 years to understand what my mother did. Could there be anything worse than a malignant narcissistic mother? I’m so damaged and messed up, isolated from family . The anger and rage I feel is a level 10. It was suicide or no contact. I went no contact .
Hello. I am in the same situation as you. I’m starting to realise the monster she is now that I’m 38 😂 I’m so messed up by her as well, and also isolated from my family… She’s left me on the verge fearing for my life. I get you. Well done for choosing no contact x
First try working on finding your identity.It may help starting with Briggs personality test,just to get an idea.Then understand your moral code so that it may be easier to go back to painful memories and embrace and speak to your inner child as though you are fathering him the way you would see fit if he was your own child.Tell him the amazing worth that he is and how caring and sweet and thoughtful he is. Tell him he didn’t deserve to go through this pain.Tell him what you would have done for him if you were his father.Tell him you won’t abandon him.Tell him you love him.Tell him he’s not alone anymore and that he’s coming with you.Acknowledge his interests and encourage him.Give him permission to say how he felt and the dreams he wanted to fulfill.Pull him to where you are now and walk together in life. Don’t invalidate what he went through.Instead stand against child abuse and raise awareness because he deserves it and you deserve it.Walk together.Fight together against child abuse because no child should suffer.You do not have to forgive your abusers.Abusers see forgiveness as permission to keep abusing.Hate is not bad.It’s what you do with hate that can be bad.Hate is the disapproval of abuse.It’s the boundary you set against abuse.Check out Dr. Ramani on YouTube.She’s awesome.
Thank you for your words of wisdom and healing. No one has ever explained the steps to heal the inner child in a way that I could relate to until reading your post.
Hang in there. My malignant narcissistic mom spent a lot of time hurting me and my children. She’s dead now and I am finally free from her abuse!
So happy you are free…wish mine could die.
Steph, you CAN be FREE! Dr. David Viscot advised his listeners, that YOU have to end the madness! He said, “ If everytime you went to someone’s house, they’d open the front door & punch you hard in the face, would you keep going over there?” That’s what we’re doing, when we continue to interact with a toxic person, MOTHER or NOT! I took his advice; no going over for holidays ( I started my own, with people I CHOSE!) She never called me to say hello anyway, so that wasn’t a thing…I WAS FREE! YOU can do it! PLEASE, be strong💙
Ah thank you for sharing this. Im 54 and decided 8 months ago to let my Mother (who I believe has full blown NPD) go. My brother (golden boy, no contact from me for 12 years or so) has the same disorder. Thing is 3 weeks ago my mother lied about my brother having terminal cancer, I guess to reel me back in, she was successful. It has been hellish, I have developed the ability not to be drawn into her lies and have called her out. Her rage has reached new heights! I have blocked her now. I’m left confused and bewildered, but better from no contact. They (mum and brother have spread so many horrible lies about me to wider family, for as long as I can remember …it’s all so cruel
Narcissism by Proxy…
My story is practically same as you. Same age same situation…same story. I’m wanting to write a birthday card to her to say thankyou for all the damage & pinpoint it all out, but I guess that breaks No Contact? There’s some great Facebook groups for support if you need it. Adults with CPTSD.
Well done 👍 You’ve gotten over the most difficult herdle, now you have to be very careful not to mix with the flying monkeys; they can be more dangerous than your family, and be supportive ( LIES) and then run back to family! The best thing about this is, once the narc realises they’re of no use to them, they will drop them like a hot rock. So that one point of comfort for you.
I hope this helps you in some way. Keep smiling 😊 and if their name ever enters into a conversation, just ask
I’m sorry WHO!?
Amanda, I love that term, “The Flying Monkeys”! That’s EXACTLY what they are! Thank you*💖
You poor darling. But at least you have the clarity now. I’m in the same boat. It’s very important to look after yourself. Kind regards from Mrs Darley in UK
Damaged Son, I feel you 100%…though I was raised in luxury, which made childhood dreamy, I had everything I wanted but my mother’s love & affection. My other siblings did, but I was ostracized. My dad was great, but was somehow oblivious to the entire dynamic! I was told at 6, that I’d never be as pretty as her, or have any of her physical attributes…it took me 30 years to begin emerging from her slander. Yes, she slandered my character to my siblings, & it still holds up today, however, her warped opinion of me had no place in my life as I turned 30! I’m 69 now, & I actually do have her physical attributes! I forgave her after she passed from Alzheimer’s in 2014. I lived in a cycle of rage until spiritual deliverance in 2015.~ Thank you for helping others with your story.~
Im so glad you were delivered. I’m in my 60’s too and it’s interesting how our perspectives change as we age. I’m not afraid of my momster anymore. She’s old, alone, bitter and nasty. And she’s going to stay alone.
Same here , she’s causing division in my own family, I am an only child, I have four children.
I started therapy yesterday and went no contact after the last attack.
I was no contact until she sprained her ankle, she milked that for five months , we were running around like idiots , you would have thought she had had a leg removed .
She went on a vile nasty tirade about my son and his four year old daughter ,on her birthday , four weeks ago , it was shocking .
I want this out of my life for good,she’s 94 , I wish she would just die .
Today she rang my husband and started with the nastiness , cutting me out of her will ,
made it all about her, , she has nothing else to give, no attributes of good in her , she uses her money like a carrot and stick, she’s a horrible, nasty , malicious woman .
Apart from saying I want her to go , sorry about that , truth hurts I guess , we deserve some peace in our lives , I can’t carry on with this , it has happened so many times
I am literally having a mental breakdown this past week I got to the point of 100% isolation from the world siblings family at 27 years about a week ago it became clear that my mother is extremely sick and toxic because I am so isolated I came to see she constantly gaslights me she will steal my things making me think it’s someone else and she’s literally been doing this for probably 10 plus years well I finally see that it’s her she literally broke into my car twice with my key when I was sleeping and destroyed it she’s takes stuff out of my room and then puts it somewhere else or puts it back months or over a year later it has crushed me and idk how to cope with it I literally thought my mom was my rock my “perfect mom” now I see she is extremely sick
First try working on finding your identity.It may help starting with Briggs personality test,just to get an idea.Then understand your moral code so that it may be easier to go back to painful memories and embrace and speak to your inner child as though you are mothering her the way you would see fit if she was your own child.Tell her the amazing worth that she is and how caring and sweet and thoughtful she is. Tell her she didn’t deserve to go through this pain.Tell her what you would have done for her if you were her mother.Tell her you won’t abandon her.Tell her you love her.Tell her she’s not alone anymore and that she’s coming with you.Acknowledge her interests and encourage her.Give her permission to say how she felt and the dreams she wanted to fulfill.Pull her to where you are now and walk together in life. Don’t invalidate what she went through.Instead stand against child abuse and raise awareness because she deserves it and you deserve it.Walk together.Fight together against child abuse because no child should suffer.You do not have to forgive your abusers.Abusers see forgiveness as permission to keep abusing.Hate is not bad.It’s what you do with hate that can be bad.Hate is the disapproval of abuse.It’s the boundary you set against abuse.Check out Dr. Ramani on YouTube. She’s awesome.Get in touch with a social worker.They have great resources for going through trauma and being out on your own.Google for info for your city and state.Don’t give up. Life gets better.It takes time to heal.
Please hang in there Lys. From am early age, my mom hid and damaged my possessions. Recently, after her death, I have found a lot of angry messages that make me
think the some accidents that she was responsible for were in fact not accidents. People were jnjured and could have died. This is not your fault but she will probably continue to act this way. Is it possible to limit contact or go no contact. I moved overseas for other reasons but it was the best thing I ever did. Good luck. The abused community is routing for you. Pam
It’s taken me 63 years to finally understand that I had a toxic narcissist as a mother. I lived in constant fear from the time I can remember. I was scared I would disappoint/displease her, embarrass her, incur her vicious wrath and censure. The sentence ‘walking on eggshells’ describes my whole life. Everything was her way or the highway. Holidays which should have been fun were always a nightmare for the family – DRAMA DRAMA DRAMA. She would get ‘sick’ if any of us angered her and then we would all tiptoe around her, for fear of making her sicker. We were made to believe that she had a bad heart condition – which actually wasn’t true. But here she is at 94 still going strong.
When we started growing up, we were not really allowed friends home, boyfriends. In short she did not welcome anyone – they were all made to feel unwelcome, so they never came again. I used to lie to friends to shield her reputation. When I decided at 27 to buy a place of my own I was shunned for months until she realised that it was going to happen. But she still maintained control – called early in the mornings, brought her cleaner to ‘clean’ – but really she was coming to snoop.
She heaped pressure and abuse on our father to his dying day, belittled him for forgetting things to the point where he was sure he had Alzheimers – he was perfectly fine. Now that we are taking care of her we realise that the ‘Alzheimers’ was in fact just her being absolutely vicious. She turns us all into forgetful, bumbling idiots with her demands. The sad thing is – that at 94 we can’t abandon her because now she is alone and helpless. BUT……. is STILL calling the shots – with her frailty and loving every minute of her attention seeking and our attention giving.
She is really good at re-visualising the truth – or should I call it what it is – liar. Takes credit for things that others have done, still belittles our father to anyone who will listen. Yet she will sit and ‘cry’ to anyone who will listen about how lonely she is now that he is gone and make out that we do nothing for her – in spite of the fact that she stays with me every weekend and my sister runs backwards and forwards all week, cooks and freezes all her meals. Yet if I say I have invited my cousins – she gets huffy that they are coming. ‘Lonely’ but STILL won’t welcome anyone. When they come she always acts up – cries in ‘pain’ and loneliness. She just expects us to be there 24/7 – as if we have no lives/homes of our own. In short she is evil personified.
My poor father was desperate Christmas 5 years ago – telling me how frail and ill she was and that he didn’t think she would last for a few months – boy how she played him. Now continues to play my sister and my husband in the same way, fainting spells, pain etc. She doesn’t do it to me because I think she knows/senses I know.
She caused a lot of issues with her sister-in-laws over the years – pitting them up against one another. She tried to drive a wedge between my sister and I, BUT she didn’t bargain on the fact that my sister (5 years older) looked after me so well and we formed a strong bond. Though she did try and nearly succeeded – she would ‘tell stories’ to us about the other. But we are still tight – we almost only had each other growing up. Sadly my sister has no personal life as she was not able to stand up to our mother and actually forge a personal life – so instead she excelled at her professional life. Making mom immensely ‘proud’.
Our mother foisted religion on us from an early age, she would act all holy and reverent around priests and nuns. But wow didn’t enact any of the good that they taught.
If my self-respect and decency would allow – I would walk away – in fact it is all I want to do right now. She acts frail (and at 94 is not strong) but believe me she is not going anywhere soon. I choose to stay because I promised our dad that we would look after her. I do this not for her – but for me, for Dad (who was one of the kindest, brightest, gentlest of men and didn’t deserve the treatment at her hands).
I have no kids and am really glad as I would NEVER have wanted to be like her and would have been fearful of turning into her. This abuse stops with me.
Thank you for allowing me to say things I have NEVER said to anyone, much less put down on the paper/internet.
My mother belongs in jail. She stalks my family and my daughter’s family. She moved to north Carolina to be close to her, I’ve been told she tried to kidnap her. She allowed a sexual predator to spend the night at our house (when I was 14), when I wasn’t even allowed to date normal guys, and she denies having any responsibility, which she knew she was consciously putting me in danger, and I was (assaulted. ) she acts entitled extremely full of herself and gossips about ppl behind their backs, and called cps behind my back to sabotage any chance of my being a mother. I gave up my rights to keep her safe, and shes with my daughter’s father’s cousin, with a sister too, and shes doing great in north Carolina. Then my mother moved there, obviously to be close enough to try and contact her any chance she gets. I was told she tried taking her, I know she made her adoptive family very frightened and will make sure she’s kept safe from her, but shes determined, keeps saying shes still her granddaughter, like no way. You shouldn’t have been allowed to be a mother, I didn’t have cps to protect me. I am distraught about this 24/7, and I need some advice on what I can do. Thanks so much any advice would be extremely appreciated:).
Omgg you sound IDENTICAL to what my horrible narcissistic gaslighting mother, susan..is that you ma..? Haha only a malignant narcissist would blame the innocent child, which is exactly what my biological narc mother(f*****, lol had to), would do. Allowed me to be sexually assaulted by a predator she allowed to SLEEP OVER, and I wasn’t even allowed to date, she also forced the cult, jehovah’s witnesses, on me from age 10- adult, and denies everything, says I need to “grow up “.
This is all so so familiar. Why don’t more people recognise malignant narcissists? It took me 38 years and I am gaslighted even now not just by my mother but by all the people she has fooled to feel sorry for her. I would write my story but it has already been written above. In short, my mother is evil.
I have a malignant narc for an Adoptive Mother…..she’s gaslighted me over a property I’ve always known I have a share in, and has recently been freezing me out of news such as my Sister and Nephew being removed from each other, has been particularly upsetting for me
because I DARED to move 2 hours away to live with my Boyfriend.
Admitted she would rather I was in London and miserable than Bristol and happy (presumably for her convenience) this has been particularly harsh to hear….although sadly nothing I haven’t already figured out over the years.
Adopted my Sister over some weird inability to say no to a colleague. She didn’t want to adopt another child, said as much to me, said she felt she couldn’t manage her needs. Tried to get me to give her permission or some sort of validation rather than a simple “actually I’d rather not”. I suspect this is to look good to someone, as her role was in social work (adoption). I was 10.
I didn’t give her what she wanted, I said she had to think hard before she made any introductions to my Sister. Didn’t ask me how how I felt about the prospect of another sibling (tried to force me to say no by adding a juicy nugget of info I didn’t know at the time, which was a must was for me to be an only child) as I was severely delayed in most areas. Thankfully I had enough emotional intelligence to see dodgy behaviour and leading questions at a fairly young age.
Slammed a massive lever arch file full of every single bit of my childhood before 7 which included abuse. I was 12. Visited my Birth Father in jail for years and gave him pictures of me. Just to get information. To get me to talk about her obsession (adoption). And to batter me in to submission.
She’s obsessed with gathering useless bits of info. Highly dubious methods of obtaining information on me which she absolutely should never have been able to access, never mind collate.
She likes to bend people to her will (her own words). She’s a peach! There’s a lot more I could say. I had years of her screaming and getting perverse joy from shouting at my Sister. Wilfully not helping her and winding her up. Tried tactics to get Mum to try and shift her immovable behaviours. Over years of them going hammer and tongs at each other for hours on end. Mostly from what I could figure coming from Mother dearest.
I had years to think about all of this whilst in this quite frankly highly toxic environment. This is someone who could not, would not, will never admit what she perceives as fault..or a chink in her armour. Couldn’t speak to other members of the family about these issues, I’d get slammed down.
In the end my last ditch attempt was to force us all in to family therapy. I didn’t have the strength or knowledge to get outside help. She obviously resisted that, but in the end she reluctantly did because she knew I would out her behaviours to the rest of the family. I see this as admission of guilt. She didn’t care about my Sister’s wellbeing or mine. Always has resented my Sister intensely for her own decision to adopt. A minute spent saying no to a colleague she’d rather not, wasn’t worth it for decades of being inconvenienced by my poor blameless Sister.
Her carefully cultivated calm, sane persona which she has taken years to perfect is slipping now as the nuclear family have been struggling.
She colluded with people being investigated in a safeguarding issue relating to my Nephew..he’s in foster care (and thriving thank god). A desperate last ditch attempt of the usual shirking of responsibility to keep my Nephew out of care with minimal effort, has bitten her on the bum now she can only have supervised contact. Her previous profession as a
social worker specialising in adoption isn’t looking great now in reflection to this.
She used to be on the panel to approve people for adoption. Sounds absolutely ludicrous and hard to believe doesn’t it! My family have not got a single clue…..at least I have my sanity still, and sense of humour, and have the ability to love myself and can focus on simple things or can compartmentalise has kept me in good stead. Plus extensive counselling etc otherwise I’d have cracked a long time ago.
I worry about the future as I have a degenerative brain disease called Huntington’s Disease. Adoptive Mother will not help my stress levels in the future, but I do have support from friends and my boyfriend etc. I’m going to have to make a break from this malignant narcissist for the sake of my health as she will surely be poison for me. Apologies for the diatribe!
I’m a 62 year old adoptee and as I grew up I noticed a pattern that my mum would have with me and her birth children. Just watching her take turns in who was going to be her favourite was something I couldn’t register until much later in life. Now that I’m older she has now started to say ” I’ve done a lot for you!” My reply is always the same ” You’ve done a lot for ALL of us” she never reply’s to this statement and now when I phone to ask her over to dinner, she would say yes then cancel the day before, just to go shopping with my sister or bingo and pub; I always say that I hope she enjoys herself and maybe do it another time, which is several weeks later ( by me).
I’m now tired of all her envy she has towards people who has something she wants.
I’ve done lot for you is a syndrome they all have .
Excellent. Perfect description of a certain person I got to know once I was born into the world.
My mother is malignant narcissist, I then had a child with a clinically diagnosed narcissist, then had another child with a narcissist to try and get custody of the first now my life is a mess and my eldest is told by his Father and Grandmother to not speak to me. She is with cancer and going through treatment will she want to make things right for the damage she did to me? My sister? My sons?
Ive never seen anything as destructive as these monsters.Ive been no contact for five years from my malignant sociopath mother and I’ll never again be the person I once was.I moved away for years but the trama stayed with me.The worst part is they (both parents) are still damaging me by gaslighting my granddaughter to hate me and I see the damage they are doing to her.She is only twelve and threatens suicide, unfortunately my daughter does not understand how severely abusive they are and keeps allowing my granddaughter to be around my mother,I can’t protect her from it ,It’s making me so sick,they are slowly killing me and have everyone convinced I’m just crazy.Ill walk away from my granddaughter if they are gonna gaslight her,I love her to much to put her thru this..there’s nothing i can do damn it.😢