Narcissistic females are thought to be rarer than their male counterparts. In fact, 75% of narcissists are male. Recently, however, studies have shown more and more covert narcissists are women. The covert narcissist mother, being one of the most malignant of the group, can cause some of the worst damage as well.
You would be surprised just how much damage is done to children with covert and dangerous mothers. Yes, I said dangerous because later in life, this upbringing can cause mental health problems and even suicide.
So, what does this type of mother do to her children that’s so heinous? Maybe you will understand the serious nature by delving into the effects of the narcissist.
One thing the covert narcissist type of mother does to her child is devaluation or triangulation. This means she uses one child as a scapegoat and the other as the perfect child.
This creates competition within the mind of the flawed child. This sibling tries desperately to please their mother which is almost impossible. In the meantime, their mother is doting on the golden child and offering praises day after day.
This sort of covert and venomous narcissist mother can leave her imprint way into her child’s adulthood. The effects surface by not being good enough and always comparing themselves to other people.
One way the covert style of the narcissistic mother affects the children is by the utilization of two faces. What I mean by two faces is that the mother is loving to her children when presenting them to the outside world, but behind closed doors, she is quite the opposite.
She shows off her children, then punishes them for small things later on. Sometimes she passes her duties as a mother to other people when no one from outside the home is around to see her true actions.
One of the most horrible things a mother can do is invalidate the feelings of her children and make them feel like they are the crazy ones. This type of mother does negative things and blames the actions of her children as the cause of her negative actions.
She doesn’t validate the feelings of her children as real concerns. This is because the covert narcissistic moods of the mother show no empathy. If something occurs that’s obviously the fault of this mother, she resorts to gaslighting to defend the truths of actions.
A narcissist’s children are not individuals in her eyes. They are simply a part of her being, created by her, and under her control. She dresses her children in certain ways to represent herself, otherwise, she will have a reputation she does not want.
In public, she brags about her children, but in private she pushes them to be better – she tells them to lose weight or to dress better.. Her children are possessions, or better yet, extensions of herself which must represent her and not an individual person.
The covert version of the narcissistic mother will cross strange boundaries with her children. These are boundaries that are extremely disturbing sometimes.
If she has a female child that is developing and maturing physical, the mother will compete with her daughter’s youthful looks. She may try to dress more provocatively than her daughter and even try to steal her boyfriends or seduce them.
She crosses these boundaries because she is aware of her aging and no child of hers will be better than her in any way.
A covert narcissist will always find greater pleasure in providing for herself over the need of her children. For instance, she rather purchase new clothing for herself than for her children, even if they need new school clothing.
She is a selfish person and doesn’t care how her children see her. She will buy them the bare minimum and then again, show her children off to the world in their few new outfits. If you pay attention, you will notice the covert mother has more new clothing than her children.
A covert and intrusive narcissistic mother will always break boundaries when it comes to her child’s privacy. Yes, you should, as a mother, be able to check up on some of your children’s actions, but not constantly. Sometimes it is best to let them have some privacy and figure out things for themselves.
An unhealthy relationship with your child will turn into unhealthy relationships when they grow older, destroying future relationships and causing others to resent them for their intrusive behavior.
Look within and ask yourself, do you fit any of these indicators of being a parent like this? If you relate to any of these things, please try to change as much as possible for the sake of your child’s future. The treatment they receive now will be the foundation of their adult lives.
If you know someone who is a covert narcissistic type of mother, please provide help for their children if you can. Remember, you cannot break boundaries either or the mother will only punish the children for that as well. If anything, get anonymous support or help.
I hope these indicators and words of hope have helped you as well.
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It sounds like my mother. I remember her yelling at me and my sisters, then answering a phone call from a friend all sweetness and light! She treated her friends. better than her family. And nothing I did was ever good enough. My older sister has become like her, so I finally wrote her off after one final outrageous incident. I said I put up with Mom because she was my mother, but I don't have to anymore with my sister.
I'm sorry that things turned out this way for you. But if at all possible, I encourage you to make amends with them. Yes, they may have severe problems, yelling is verbal abuse, but I grew up in similar circumstances with my father, and I regret not making complete peace with him, now he is gone. No, you don't have to take the abuse, you are an adult who can get away from them when you want, but please, keep loving them and occasionally, check on them. No matter what they say about you, you know who you are.
"While most narcissists are men.."
Bollocks!
You can check this study that confirms that the prevalence of narcissism in men is higher than in women:
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/18557663
And almost every man I've been with intimately was. So, it's higher odds. I think it's worsened by testosterone. I say this because the strange behavior started in one of my children as he entered puberty. My son has episodes himself and I check him immediately about his behavior, he's now 16 and better. When he is grown, and I hear about this type of behavior, I will go to his house and confront him. I will do this until I am dead. I hate narcissistic behavior, and yes, I hate it in women just as much. I just haven't known but one female that exhibited this behavior toward me.
Just out of curiosity, how many women have you been with intimately? I think just the simple fact that you are a woman and would therefore have intimate relationships more often with men rather than women could and would leave you with an unintentionally biased Outlook. Mind you I'm making the assumption that you are heterosexual. And while you are right in that more men have narcissistic personality disorder then women. More women have borderline personality disorder then men. For anybody that doesn't know what borderline personality disorder is it's a disorder that shares a lot of traits with narcissistic personality disorder the only difference being that borderlines are capable of feeling remorse for their actions whereas narcissistic are not. The only reason that I'm replying to this comment. Is because it bothered me a little bit. It lightweight carries the connotation that men are bad whereas women are always the victim. I'm sorry that almost every man you have been with intimately is narcissistic that sucks. But I promise you that not every man is a narcissist. As far as your son's symptoms getting worse after he reached puberty. That could simply be caused by the fact that he started to realize his body was getting much bigger and stronger. So therefore he could more easily impose his will upon whoever happened to be his victim of the time. But since you are able to check him on his behavior perhaps rather than being narcissistic he is like me a rare case of a male being borderline personality disorder. Because if he was narcissistic I dont think he would let you check him. Why should he? Narcissist only care about what they want. Since a narcissist cannot experience remorse you would not be able 2 check your son in his perception he wouldn't be doing anything wrong so therefore would not accept you checking him. Would you accept being checked if you weren't in the wrong? So I'm thinking he is probably borderline. Like I said I'm borderline and the bare minimum that you give about his behavior reminds me a lot of mine. Have a good day and I hope you someday have a relationship with someone that isn't narcissistic.
assalamuallaikum...
you know what the scariest part of the mother by being narcissistic to their children??
2 things (as far as i know)
1. public-sided blaming
public will "don't care/don't know" what happens to you but when you snap to your mother, public will like thinking you're the one who mean to your mother
2. god's like power
in islam religion, as the parent who leading the child into what they want, allah allows any women who become mother/wife to wishing anything they want "best" to their family... but unfortunately the "power" of wish of hers is guarantee-ly granted in LITERALLY HER WAY possible... meaning if she wants to wish "something" for their children IN HER WAY, that will be granted... like she wish you to be smart, YOU WILL! she wish her husband to be success, HE WILL, she ask allah to make you dumber, get a accident, not solving your problem or anything else and YOU WILL... even she wishes YOU or her HUSBAND to die... just slip of the tongue OR slip of the wish and POOF that happen HER WAY...
3. you can't fight her even you want it to
Quran : al-isra verse 23-24
23 : And your Lord has decreed that you not worship except Him, and to parents, good treatment. Whether one or both of them reach old age [while] with you, say not to them [so much as], "uff," and do not repel them but speak to them a noble word.
24 : And lower to them the wing of humility out of mercy and say, "My Lord, have mercy upon them as they brought me up [when I was] small."
yeah basically (in general) even narcissm parents can't be fight back even though they the one who "ugh" us (23) and (in general) the parents is assuming or totally obligatory to take care of the child
and you just say this in the article :
1. She devalues her children
One thing the covert narcissist type of mother does to her child is devaluation or triangulation. This means she uses one child as a scapegoat and the other as the perfect child.
This creates competition within the mind of the flawed child. This sibling tries desperately to please their mother which is almost impossible. In the meantime, their mother is doting on the golden child and offering praises day after day.
This sort of covert and venomous narcissist mother can leave her imprint way into her child’s adulthood. The effects surface by not being good enough and always comparing themselves to other people.
well... damn great... while she freely "devalues" me and "golden" my "perfect" sibling, in quran says I MUST TREAT MY PARENTS PROPERLY...
and you said :
2. She has two faces
One way the covert style of the narcissistic mother affects the children is by the utilization of two faces. What I mean by two faces is that the mother is loving to her children when presenting them to the outside world, but behind closed doors, she is quite the opposite.
She shows off her children, then punishes them for small things later on. Sometimes she passes her duties as a mother to other people when no one from outside the home is around to see her true actions.
yep... i remember when i was little i was watching tv at night where my maid is with me... AT NIGHT!?!?
I mean, that was like 10 pm and i like... idk... toddler??... sleeping on the matress with my maid while crying "where's mom"... while my other sibling is WHERE THE HECK HE GOES!?!?
i'm alone with maid sleeping in front of tv at night and my sibling is god-knows-where AAAAAND WHERE'S THE MOTHER IN THE MIDDLE OF THE NIGHT IS NOT WITH THEIR CHILD INSTEAD ASK OTHERS TO TAKE CARE OF ME !?!?
oh boy i hope allah bring justice to my life at here and at afterlife judgement
*astagfirallahaladzim
A narcissistic mother’s favored child is not really favored. She talks up her golden child to others, but belittles them behind closed doors. Golden Child must dance attendance on Narcissist and is kept in a constant state of losing favor. Narcissist is never satisfied with the child’s achievements because meeting a demand just makes mom raise the bar. (“See how easy that was? I knew you were just holding out on me. You are a lazy slacker.”)
My narcissistic mother would call her friends and read my grades to her friends with less-successful students to gloat - and then tell me how much it sickened her to tell them I had gotten a B in math or finished in second place at a spelling bee.
Relationships with siblings are poisoned because her children are encouraged to spy on each other and rewarded for reporting infractions.
She turns on favored child without warning and favors a sibling for no apparent reason. She will often ignore rule violations by multiple kids and punish only one of them.
Favored child is often punished for something a sibling did “because this would not happen if you were setting a good example” - while the rule violater is not punished at all.
The favored children aren’t always favored at all. They are the narcissist’s toy.
My Golden Child sister was always given the special privileges. She would lie about my other sister and me and my mother would always believe her so she grew up to be a pathological liar. My mother supported her as an adult so she didn't have to work while raising her 4 kids. She wouldn't even loan small amounts of money for short periods of time to my other sister and me. She was raised to be a selfish, entitled narcissist who doesn't care about anyone but herself. She's so used to being treated like she's "special" that she can't handle life. She's convinced she's a superior genius better than everyone else and she is always surprised when people let her know she isn't. Golden Children aren't as special as they are raised to believe they are.
Very scary...
My sister is a narcissist.
Showered with undue praise as a child, she has not been able to hold a job for 50 years, adopted 2 beautiful girls from China ( my dad paid for adoption fees), she has blown through my dad’s estate over 4 million, feels entitled and has one golden child and 1 who takes all the abuse. I had to complete cut ties 30 years ago, dad is now 97 and needs help so I stepped back into this chaos. Mentally my mind is blown too but now it’s know her ailment after all these years. My dad has cut her off now too. Very sad. She can’t keep friends and is toxic too.
My sister is a narcissist and she blew through my father's retirement assets while she spent years not working, sending her 4 kids to private school, college, buying them cars, trips around the world, parties in Vegas, shopping sprees, ballet lessons...Now he is incapacitated and broke. All the funds he had saved to live on have been spent by my sister on her kids and especially her oldest daughter, who is also an entitled narcissist. She just got her first job at the age of 30. I tried to warn him that she was using him as her personal ATM but my sister is the Golden Child and he gave her everything she ever demanded.