How To Stop Seeking Love From Your Narcissistic Parent
You don’t have to be codependent forever.
More often than not, even when we have identified our parents as narcissistic, we still seek love and validation from them.
If that’s your case, please don’t feel guilty. It’s natural to want to be loved and accepted by your parents. Besides, we all know that as adult children of narcissistic parents we’re essentially programmed to seek acceptance and external validation all the time — especially from our family.
Learning to separate ourselves from our parents is not easy when we’ve spent years trying to please them and meet their needs. That’s what narcissistic parents do: they condition us to neglect ourselves to a point where we have no idea who we are or what we want.
The good news is that we don’t have to be that way forever.
Why You’re Conditioned To Seek Love And Acceptance From Your Narcissistic Parent
Attachment theory tells us we’re all wired for attachment. It tells us that we need to feel loved and accepted — especially by our caregivers — to have a secure base in life.
This means love and acceptance are healthy human needs.
Why am I telling you this? Because I want you to know that you are not asking for too much when you expect love from your parents.
You’re asking for something you should have been given since the day you were born. Something you should have been given consistently and unconditionally.
Because you are not the problem. They’re the problem.
Narcissistic parents don’t know how to love their children. In the best-case scenario, they give you crumbs of love and affection now and then. These crumbs are supposed to make you feel like you have finally earned their love, but they’re just that: crumbs. Sooner or later, their narcissistic self comes up to the surface.
Besides, narcissistic parents have enmeshed boundaries with their children. They don’t support your individualization because they don’t want you to be a separate individual from them — instead, they want you to blindly follow their rules and meet their expectations. They want you to be codependent.
Every criticism, every manipulation tactic, every judgment… Everything has the same goal: making you feel as miserable as possible so that you don’t feel worthy of standing up for yourself.
That’s exactly why the first thing you need to do is claim your worthiness.
You need to realize that you are worthy of love and acceptance.
You need to embody the belief that you are worthy of having your needs met.
As I wrote in You Can’t Change People, But You Can Change Your Boundaries:
“As ironic as it sounds, the truth is that once you begin to prioritize yourself, most of your relationships improve. And those that don’t improve are simply not meant to stay in your life.
However, you’ll only be able to prioritize yourself once your feel worthy of being your top priority. And you’ll only be able to set boundaries once you feel worthy of setting them.
If you still carry subconscious beliefs like “my needs don’t matter” or “I don’t deserve to set boundaries”, then you won’t have what it takes to set boundaries — because you’ll sabotage yourself every time you have to do it.”
Once you see yourself as worthy of love and acceptance, you will want to protect yourself from people who drain you and disrespect you.
You will want to set boundaries that allow you to stay authentic and be loved for who you really are.
You will want to do what feels right for you — not what your parents want you to do.
You will want to give yourself the unconditional love and acceptance that your parents never did — because you will know that’s exactly what you deserve.
Growing up in a narcissistic family conditions us to stay stuck in codependent patterns.
But we will only stay codependent if we associate our self-worth with our ability to please others.
When we realize that it’s not our job to make others feel comfortable and that our worth is inherent… Magic happens.