FreePic Image
All parents are flawed in some way, but they can still be good enough and safe enough to give you a secure start to life. However, when you have one or more main carers who are Emotionally Unsafe, your mental wellbeing can be negatively affected as a child or at any age.
Being in an unsupportive, chronically stressful environment, can lead to strong feelings of anxiety, depression or anger. Without being taught healthy ways to express emotions or regulate overwhelm, you have to learn your own ways to survive and cope.
While these survival defenses can get us through abusive and neglectful childhoods, they can also limit our lives and cause further distress as we re-enact the situations, feelings and behaviours we experienced as children.
- If you find yourself resonating with this list you may have grown up with abusive, narcissistic or pre-occupied parents who couldn't adequately meet your needs for emotional support, security, stability and protection for whatever reason that may be. You can heal and process the past. Recognising its effects on you is the first step -
50 Signs Of Emotionally Unsafe Parents
1. They compete with you and display jealousy when their fragile egos feel threatened. From birth you are in a power struggle rather than being encouraged or supported to grow up.
2. If you ask for help you end up feeling worse and learn to keep some problems a secret.
3. They make everything about them and how it affects them.
4. You are made to feel responsible for their emotional wellbeing and become the ‘parent’ while they are the ‘child/children’.
5. They ruin celebrations and devalue achievements as they can’t bear anyone else’s successes or positive attention.
6. They are dismissive and invalidate your concerns or feelings. You are shamed for emotions or behaviour the way they think you should.
7. You feel like you are bad and that you have done something wrong.
8. You have been programmed since birth to adapt to them and change yourself in an effort to please and be liked/loved.
9. They are very controlling and respond to perceived criticism defensively.
10. When confronted they gaslight and confuse you, leaving you feeling guilty, while they act the victim.
11. Your first instinct is to deal with most things on your own as you couldn’t trust or rely on your parent’s support as a child.
12. They only give you attention when it suits their own agenda.
13. They ignored you, or neglected your needs and gave you silent treatment for long periods of time if you got angry with them.
14. Home life was chaotic due to your parents’ behaviour/lifestyle. Your care may have been shared by the wider family, leaving you feeling vulnerable to the whims of others from a young age.
15. They are violent or threaten physical abuse as a punishment overtly or covertly to control you.
16. Your basic needs may have been taken care of, you were clothed and fed, but you still suffered abuse. From the outside everything looked fine; You behaved at school, got okay grades and no one ever asked about home. Your parents never addressed any problems either, so you were brain-washed into believing that what went on was ‘normal’ until you got older.
17. They are a walking contradiction - Sometimes acting like they are a helpless child unable to control themselves, but then ruling over you, though not parenting – dictating.
18. They demand you admire them, give them attention and be grateful for all they have ‘done for you’ and ‘given up’.
19. You felt as though you were trapped as a child, and perhaps suffered with mental health issues that were ignored, minimized and made worse by their actions.
20. You had a parent that enabled and supported the other in mistreating or abusing you.
21. You had to keep secrets about the abuse and were scared that it would be found out.
22. You felt guilty and ashamed for being sexually abused and having to keep it a secret.
23. You coped by avoiding, numbing your emotions or dissociating and sometimes slip into these survival strategies as an adult.
24. One parent was jealous if you received attention from the other
25. They didn’t support your attempts at independence and still seem to undermine your achievements and the confidence you have in yourself.
26. They project their issues onto you and refuse to take responsibility for themselves, making you their caretaker.
27. They are self-absorbed and narcissistic. Any needs you had as a child were treated as though you were being too demanding.
28. They were passive-aggressive and manipulative.
29. You witnessed or were aware of domestic abuse and if you voiced concern it was either flat out denied, met with annoyance or dismissal.
30. You use coping mechanisms you developed from a very early age to make up for the lack of safety, empathy, reliability and warmth you didn’t receive.
31. You find it hard to make decisions as you were never offered choices, or your decisions were always criticized.
32. You are told that you are the problem and that there is something wrong with you, while their behaviour is unchallenged/accepted. As such you find it hard to know if you can trust your own perception and judgment.
33. Your parents were very critical of you and you now have a toxic inner critic.
34. You are afraid that people would not like you if you showed them your ‘true self’.
35. One or both of your parent’s mental health and wellbeing were the main focus and responsibility of your family; and it was implied they would be upset, and might leave, die, hurt you or themselves if you ever stood up to them or called their behaviour out.
36. Your mother or father never showed any interest in your life and only gave attention to you if you talked about something you knew they would be interested in (such as school results or their hobbies).
37. You felt very uncomfortable when they were physically close to you.
38. They created an atmosphere wherever they went; days out and holidays were a survival exercise, and you felt like a hostage.
39. You are hyperaware of other people’s moods, and this often triggers a sense of threat and anxiety.
40. You have learnt to repress your anger as it was not allowed in your family.
41. You try to be perfect and work hard to ward off feelings of low self-worth and feelings of never being good enough.
42. Your parent’s acted like you were a disappoint to them or even embarrassed to be seen out with you.
43. There was a real or sensed threat of danger to your life or existence.
44. You were expected to have no needs or emotions and just do as you were told robotically.
45. Any time you had a problem or even made a small request, your parents acted as though it was completely overwhelming for them and blamed you for bringing them ‘trouble’.
46. You are or were used by one or both parents to dump their problems and your relationships and friendships repeat this pattern.
47. You use dysfunctional coping strategies to deal with your pain such as self harm, drink or drugs and risk taking behaviour. You feel a deep sense of shame in the core of your identity and worry that if you are noticed you will be exposed in some way.
48. You experienced dangerous and damaging situations as a result of your parent’s actions or inactions, which caused you to be physically hurt or traumatized. Your distress was either minimized or ignored and it was ‘brushed under the carpet’.
49. One parent defended or ignored the others abusive behaviour leaving you feeling abandoned, helpless and alone.
50. You had no privacy or ‘safe space’ in your home, and often retreated to cupboards, corners on the floor and behind the sofa.
What Is Cptsd?
