I feel you. I got Narcs for Father, Mother and Step Mother. I absolutely hate both women and not sure what to think of my Dad. I feel so lucky (Sarcasm Intended)
Timestamps: 1:19 The Reactor 7:01 I Just Work Here 11:28 The “Safe” Parent 17:22 The Monster 22:01 The Method Actor 28:38 The Child 36:47 Final Thoughts Have a nice day/night.
Be more than marginally proud you survived!! You are seeking out healing and to make sense of the senseless in order to live your OWN BEST life by coming here. Lots of ppl "forget" or stuff away their injury/pain/trauma to pretend that this is possible bc it's so hard to deal with but you are a BRAVE survivor. Be proud of that and yourself
omg you nailed it, good term It's wild how we can hold on to an idea and cling to it as "no no this is the reality, one day my dad will see what my mom is doing to me", so hard, that it becomes almost as solid as reality itself, and the longer you believe that idea, the more the rope seems real. On a clinical level, I wonder if it's the same part of our brains that the placebo effect hits.. 🤔 it's like we manifested a reality that made it possible to stay at home where at least you had a bed and probably cup noodles. I dunno about you but I have a terrible time trying to sort through my memories, and realizing now that most of them were transposed with a thick veil of hope. Like watching snow melt and being like "Oh yeah I forgot that tire was still blazing in the back yard"
When I found out my mom abused my much younger sister, whom I was not raised with and never had verification it went beyond being verbally hard on her - and I came home during a visit from out of state, to have my mom scream at me and find out she'd done the same voice to my sister, a monstrous scream - reducing my sister to hiding her red, swollen cheeks behind her hair; I asked my father why he had not intervened. He claimed he did not hear her. It was BS, it was loud enough for the whole house and outside to hear, Well, what I'm trying to say, is that I saw suddenly why the safer / enabler parent is no less toxic than the reactor / narcissist parent. All he ever did was come to my room after and tell me it was my mom's depression, that she loves me, that I should forgive her etc. I saw him do the same for my sister when she went above and beyond in cruelty. But a non-toxic parent would confront the reactor, or remove the children from them if needed. They would not enable. My father was complicit in the abuse. He will never again be the safer parent to me..just the wolf in sheep's clothing, who allowed the abuse and it's trauma to continue. I hate him as much as I hate her now.
A lot of my friends growing up in the 90s had one monster parent coupled up with a safer parent. As an adult I can see what a perfect description that is. As a kid, I thought that’s kind of what a two parent household looked like, and at the time, I was grateful for my single mom and rotating stepdads.
Thank you for shedding light on this important and personal issue. I think it is nore taboo than other problems like PTSD after war or SA because it's your parents "you're supposed to love them". Your videos are very valuable and eye-opening. Thank you for taking the time to make them
Boy, did I have the "I just work here" parent. I know she felt she was doing a great job and I am grateful for having my body fed, clothed and for being sent to school, BUT the confusion of this type of subtle abuse (the lack of connection to you as mattering) creates denial for years. It wasn't well into adulthood that the truth surfaced but I still just couldn't accept it. I still question myself: I am an ingrate. As Patrick says, my relationships in adulthood have been with people who are not involved with me. Again, I feel they treat me this way because they see my defects. I also experienced the 'safer' parent issue. How many of us experienced more than one type of parenting?
Mine was reactive or I just work here depending on if the situation. If I came to her (which mostly I didn't) she either made it worse by getting angry because I did something wrong and now it's her problem or worrying too much which made me feel bad for making her feel like that. Or she'd be indifferent or claim she didn't understand. So I could never come to her.
I grew up with a single mother who was a reactor with a dose of child. I was parentified and the emotional support-giving has extended into my adulthood too. It made me extremely sensitive (and gave me some emotional intelligence superpowers I think, tbh) but now I constantly scan my partner, trying to read his moods. I try to anticipate or assume what his “problems” are in the day and try to fix them, and can’t deal with it if he’s grumpy or upset or even hurting. I also desperately want validation from him at times and need a lot of reassurance. I don’t find that it extends too much to other people except my partner, which I’m thankful for, but it’s done a number on my internal world. ie my mother used me as her diet buddy as a young child, and as an adult my relationship with my body is purely negative. These things are so hard to course correct but working on it, and even just seeing it, has really helped.
oh my goodness Why did I never make the connection between having to be my mom's diet partner and the massive body dysphoria I now have. I'm positive that's a huge contributor to a great many body image issues. They're so deep seated we hardly even question where they came from
Realize there isn't a single human on the world who isn't mentally, emotionally, physically, and spiritually dysfunctional. We all are. When did it start? Who knows. But, we all are. Everyone should be working on healing.
Your videos are so painfully accurate. I’m in tears right now. I can see how my difficulties expressing my feelings and setting personal boundaries affect my relationship with our daughter. Emotionally distant/passive(me) married to an extremely reactive angry man-child. Wow.😢
The reactive parent … the first and last time I ever asked my father to help me with my homework, he threw things if I couldn’t understand the math problem. He told me to have a problem done when he returned but I was so scared I couldn’t think. I snuck out to find my sister to help me md he saw me. He held me up against the wall with his hands around my neck…. I don’t remember what happened after that. 😢 He was crazy! During my elementary school parent teacher open houses, he would go and give the teacher permission to hit me. No adult ever helped me nor my sister. The safe person was my mother, who was negligent. Not even comforting. Classic. The monster …
I wonder how many fathers would fall under the category of “I just work here” parent. It seems to me that being removed from your child’s daily needs is just as culturally accepted as being a controlling father. But that assessment might be my own trauma talking 😅
My dad is an interesting mix of both "the reactor" and "I just work here" parent. Controlling, neglectful and invalidating at the same time. We viewed him as the safer parent growing up, but I now see how much he contributed to my complex PTSD. His behavior just wasn't as noticeable as the behavior of my mother figures.
This was very helpful because it also shined some light on some bad tendencies I have or that are creeping up from childhood trauma. I want to work on eliminating those. Learning about toxic parents was great but it was insightful to learn about the why and when I get triggered I may do some of the same self-sabotaging things (and not good to others) my family did. I got to work on myself to break the cycle of generational trauma and prevent myself from becoming a toxic parent to my future children.
Whoa. Recognized myself in the child parent. Maybe not all the examples but enough of them. I did the best I could with what I had to work with and improved 100% over the elves who raised me, but I see now that I still skipped a beat here and there. I was aware of a few things I did wrong that my child probably doesn't remember but now I see there may have been more. Something to reflect on.
I mean everyone messes up. Literally everyone. It doesn’t mean you didn’t do as well as pretty much anyone and usually if you’re worried about it at least you cared. Like my parents were young and had some of this but weren’t what I think of as bad parents. I had things to do anyway! We say “parent” like it doesn’t come necessarily along with “human”. 😅
The safer parent in my parents was the one that was the physical abuser while the other was narcissistic. What I realize that they way I saw the abuse was extremely unbalanced. I relaize this when people began to feel sorry for one and shaking their heads at the other. Not true. They were both abusive. highly abusive. I'm still learning to place their abuse at the same level. I'm so grateful for having validation as an adult. Spent so much time in life diagnosing myself as the one with the issue, it is so amazing to put things together in the proper place then look at the whole picture. Years waisted being taught I can't make it on my own, and feeling so guilty and ashamed. Now all I want is to heal, continue no contact, and because the entire person I'm meant to be. People don't unstand that as a survivor of toxic family one has so many triggers and trauma responses, it's difficult
My mother was very busy running from my alcoholic father and cleaning up his messes. I was always self posessed and made myself invisible as to not make more difficulty for mom who was being beaten. Then she remarried a man who resents my very existence..cheated out of a dad twice. Depression and anxiety are my life.
Hi, another great video. Reactor = Histrionic/Bordeline. A walking raw nerve who is dumping on their kid and not just simply meeting their needs. Definitely should not be a caretaker of kids. Should not be hired, their emotional acting out harms productivity at work. The emotional acting out never seems to land on an authority figure like a judge or policeman, it rolls downhill and they feel comfortable acting out on their kids, coworkers or dependents. Really dangerous.
Holy crow Patrick. Your description of children of Monster and Safer parents is me and my brothers. I really value how much you get it and help us understand what our behaviours are and how to fix them. Mom was the safer parent and a method actor. Dad was a monster, reactive, child and method actor.
In my therapy: I have to let the obsessive focus on how s* my parents were, cuz it’s all memories and they don’t act like “that”now… “they were not great parents cuz they had crappy parents. If I don’t want to talk to them now, I don’t have to.” Mom used to be the reactive type parent, and masked to care and being energetic- but at home: kinda a stick in the mud, over stimulated, unhappy, highly reactive to anything I brought up (therefore I was scared to talk to her about a bad-neighbor. I did bring it up to her, she did tell, I called her out for screaming and yelling and she calmed down) Turns out- I find out as an adult that S.A. occurred in her family, and my info triggered her.) Insight: Her mother was reactive, so she was, too. My dad grew up with unhappy parents, (I’m willing to bet some s.a. occurred- that everyone Doesn’t want to talk about/take to the grave, and I don’t have a right to pry/assume). I recall feeling left-out, unimportant, and let down, a lot. But! I called them out when they were crappy, and - if they want to deny what’s brought up, the proof is in the pudding. I was the messed up kid. Where were yall (my parents)? It’s up to them to fix themselves.
I just took your online toxic family test and scored a 71% My dad would ask: “What happened to the other 29%?” And he would’ve laugh at his cleverness as my mother scowled at my “C” grade with contempt. Now that I think about it, I probably went too easy on them in the test. Had I been more honest I probably would’ve been a lot closer to perfect.😮 😊
I did this excercise about two of my colleagues, let's call them Gail (she really is from accounting :D) and Gary, and what I wrote down was exactly what I wanted to say to each of my parents. I feel like I've never said it so clearly than when I thought I was speaking to completely different people, how strange! Thank you for a fantastic podcast episode once again!
Having been the safer parent, having left 7 years ago, the monster ex now spends time unsupervised with the kids. I'm here to be better for my kids Is there any similar channel that covers parenting kids after the abuse so they don't carry it into adulthood?
kid with learning issues that has a superteacher parent literally made me gasp, i didn’t see that coming. but later on i outright laughed when the “i just work here child safer parent” and the “highly religious method actor who becomes reactive” descriptions went back to back because if that ain’t my dad and my mom exactly ☠️
"Safer" parent - it's not the kid's job to coach them on what to do, to leave etc. That's a way to create a kid who in their adult life is always trying to help and coach others to the exclusion of their own interests and needs. If a parent is in a relationship with someone who is harming them and their kid, they should just leave on their own in the best interest of themselves and their kid. If they don't or won't do it - if they can know their child is being harmed but still stay, there is something wrong with them. They should be abandoned by that child when they are old enough to leave and be on their own. Also, when they accept "coaching" from their kid, that's not ok. It's borderline emotional incest and parentification/adultifying their kid who should just simply be free to be a kid.
I could relate to most of these but my parents had a weird dynamic where my mom was the raging narcissistic religion holier than thou child parent and my dad was the usually submissive child parent who was the one who beat me with a belt if I did something wrong. My mom never hit, but she hurt me with her neglect and manipulation. My dad was usually more reasonable but then these episodes would occur when he beat me. My mom would feel bad afterwards and bring me comfort food but I was always in meltdown mode for many hours after that and wanted to be alone. I lived through a hell where my sisters also manipulated me and emotionally abused me. I had no one to save me so I suppressed my needs until I myself believed I didn't have them. And through all this , I still wanted to please them, though that, I now know, is an impossible task.
Patrick, to what age are we children in this context? We are parentified and adultified. It feels like I was old enough to be my mom's therapist when I was 15.
Thanks. This is a great segment. My other comment was for a chiro video (UA-cam is glitching) that I watched next lol, but I won't take away the algorithm's tucker (food in Australia) because comments feed the algorithm... nom nom.
5 місяців тому+1
Hey there, İ found this video praising a very resolute father: ua-cam.com/users/shortsLDDTgtC4lNI?si=dJGXIc3Oqh9yittS Daughter bullies, gets kicked off schoolbus. Father continues punishment of daughter for the same offense, unannounced, and makes her walk 5 miles to school while recording her from his car.
Wait what if one is the reactor/child and the other is the safer parent 😭 Things are cool with most people in my life. I just feel untrusting of others despite loads of evidence that people are nice and safe. And I get homicidally angry around my partners really really nice and functional and cool family 😭😭😭 imagine wanting to murder someone who made you a birthday cake and made you a teddy bear from scratch....
So are we all supposed to blame our parents and go no contact with our parents because they had these toxic parent problems? This is generational, correct? If we know our parents did this, and we realize we are prone to and have triggers to this ... do we just stop having children so we protect the next generation?
According to my own journey and understanding, what you do is spend however much time you need focusing on yourself and overcoming your own difficulties. That starts with learning how to regulate your nervous system, which was damaged for you as a kid growing up in these terrible conditions. Relearning (or learning for the first time for many of us) to regulate our nervous systems automatically and discharge the stored survival stress is the greatest thing we can do for our future children. Try checking out some videos from Irene Lyon on nervous system health and trauma. There’s actually a whole lot of science surrounding these things that’s less about blaming or controlling yourself and more about relearning to inhabit your own body and release trauma in a way you were never able to before because of your upbringing. As for going no-contact, that’s completely up to you. But confronting them about the abuse is usually not a great idea. I believe Irene also touches on this as well. She’s the most comprehensive person I’ve found for this information/practice so far. Hope this helps.❤
Both going no contact and choosing if you want children or not is just that, a personal choice. You have to evaluate if the relationship is worthwhile or bearable and is something you want to continue or not. As for having children you can both be traumatized but aware and healing as to not continue the cycle, nobody is perfect but so long as you are aware, keep yourself accountable and your child/ children safe and have an overall healthy relationship without falling into these archetypes it's perfectly fine to start a family. I think it's important to understand some people are aware of their behavior but make the choice to continue on that path but you and others do not have to choose it because it is a decision, it's 2024 we know therapy and other resources exist to heal and help us.
wow my parents managed to collect them all! how good for them for achieving so much
Ok I thought this same thing 🫠😂. Hugs and healing being sent to you dear 💞
Gold stars all around, right… ❤🎉
haha hugs and healing to us all, hopefully we will get all the trauma recovery ⭐ too!
I feel you. I got Narcs for Father, Mother and Step Mother. I absolutely hate both women and not sure what to think of my Dad. I feel so lucky (Sarcasm Intended)
I would say this needs to be an Olympic category, but that's because my mother carefully taught me hyperbole and unspoken competition lol
“Needs get you into trouble”
Thank you so much for helping me understand what happened to me
Timestamps:
1:19 The Reactor
7:01 I Just Work Here
11:28 The “Safe” Parent
17:22 The Monster
22:01 The Method Actor
28:38 The Child
36:47 Final Thoughts
Have a nice day/night.
I feel like I scored the bad parents bingo board. I don't know whether to be horrified or marginally proud I survived.
Be more than marginally proud you survived!! You are seeking out healing and to make sense of the senseless in order to live your OWN BEST life by coming here. Lots of ppl "forget" or stuff away their injury/pain/trauma to pretend that this is possible bc it's so hard to deal with but you are a BRAVE survivor. Be proud of that and yourself
I would also call the safer parent the mirage parent. That "safety" and "trust" that they'd understand and do the right thing was all an illusion.
omg you nailed it, good term
It's wild how we can hold on to an idea and cling to it as "no no this is the reality, one day my dad will see what my mom is doing to me", so hard, that it becomes almost as solid as reality itself, and the longer you believe that idea, the more the rope seems real.
On a clinical level, I wonder if it's the same part of our brains that the placebo effect hits.. 🤔 it's like we manifested a reality that made it possible to stay at home where at least you had a bed and probably cup noodles. I dunno about you but I have a terrible time trying to sort through my memories, and realizing now that most of them were transposed with a thick veil of hope. Like watching snow melt and being like "Oh yeah I forgot that tire was still blazing in the back yard"
When I found out my mom abused my much younger sister, whom I was not raised with and never had verification it went beyond being verbally hard on her - and I came home during a visit from out of state, to have my mom scream at me and find out she'd done the same voice to my sister, a monstrous scream - reducing my sister to hiding her red, swollen cheeks behind her hair; I asked my father why he had not intervened. He claimed he did not hear her. It was BS, it was loud enough for the whole house and outside to hear, Well, what I'm trying to say, is that I saw suddenly why the safer / enabler parent is no less toxic than the reactor / narcissist parent. All he ever did was come to my room after and tell me it was my mom's depression, that she loves me, that I should forgive her etc. I saw him do the same for my sister when she went above and beyond in cruelty. But a non-toxic parent would confront the reactor, or remove the children from them if needed. They would not enable. My father was complicit in the abuse. He will never again be the safer parent to me..just the wolf in sheep's clothing, who allowed the abuse and it's trauma to continue. I hate him as much as I hate her now.
A lot of my friends growing up in the 90s had one monster parent coupled up with a safer parent. As an adult I can see what a perfect description that is. As a kid, I thought that’s kind of what a two parent household looked like, and at the time, I was grateful for my single mom and rotating stepdads.
Thank you for shedding light on this important and personal issue. I think it is nore taboo than other problems like PTSD after war or SA because it's your parents "you're supposed to love them". Your videos are very valuable and eye-opening. Thank you for taking the time to make them
Boy, did I have the "I just work here" parent. I know she felt she was doing a great job and I am grateful for having my body fed, clothed and for being sent to school, BUT the confusion of this type of subtle abuse (the lack of connection to you as mattering) creates denial for years. It wasn't well into adulthood that the truth surfaced but I still just couldn't accept it. I still question myself: I am an ingrate.
As Patrick says, my relationships in adulthood have been with people who are not involved with me. Again, I feel they treat me this way because they see my defects.
I also experienced the 'safer' parent issue. How many of us experienced more than one type of parenting?
Mine was reactive or I just work here depending on if the situation. If I came to her (which mostly I didn't) she either made it worse by getting angry because I did something wrong and now it's her problem or worrying too much which made me feel bad for making her feel like that. Or she'd be indifferent or claim she didn't understand. So I could never come to her.
I grew up with a single mother who was a reactor with a dose of child. I was parentified and the emotional support-giving has extended into my adulthood too. It made me extremely sensitive (and gave me some emotional intelligence superpowers I think, tbh) but now I constantly scan my partner, trying to read his moods. I try to anticipate or assume what his “problems” are in the day and try to fix them, and can’t deal with it if he’s grumpy or upset or even hurting. I also desperately want validation from him at times and need a lot of reassurance. I don’t find that it extends too much to other people except my partner, which I’m thankful for, but it’s done a number on my internal world. ie my mother used me as her diet buddy as a young child, and as an adult my relationship with my body is purely negative. These things are so hard to course correct but working on it, and even just seeing it, has really helped.
oh my goodness
Why did I never make the connection between having to be my mom's diet partner and the massive body dysphoria I now have. I'm positive that's a huge contributor to a great many body image issues. They're so deep seated we hardly even question where they came from
@@hanabanana8127 yep!! Being an adult’s diet partner when you’re a child is a form of parentification and super inappropriate. 🩷🩷
Omg my mom was a total monster. Jeez you were a fly on the wall in my childhood! You've pretty much described everything.
Realize there isn't a single human on the world who isn't mentally, emotionally, physically, and spiritually dysfunctional. We all are. When did it start? Who knows. But, we all are. Everyone should be working on healing.
Your videos are so painfully accurate. I’m in tears right now. I can see how my difficulties expressing my feelings and setting personal boundaries affect my relationship with our daughter. Emotionally distant/passive(me) married to an extremely reactive angry man-child. Wow.😢
You hit the nail on the head with the safer parent being the mind f. I used to idolize my father but at the end of the day, he didn't protect me.
6/6 A+ Parenting!
As someone with bpd this video triggered me soooo hard despite already knowing these things.
Mine is definitely the I just work here parent! I never heard it put that way before.
The reactive parent … the first and last time I ever asked my father to help me with my homework, he threw things if I couldn’t understand the math problem. He told me to have a problem done when he returned but I was so scared I couldn’t think. I snuck out to find my sister to help me md he saw me. He held me up against the wall with his hands around my neck…. I don’t remember what happened after that. 😢 He was crazy!
During my elementary school parent teacher open houses, he would go and give the teacher permission to hit me. No adult ever helped me nor my sister. The safe person was my mother, who was negligent. Not even comforting. Classic. The monster …
I wonder how many fathers would fall under the category of “I just work here” parent. It seems to me that being removed from your child’s daily needs is just as culturally accepted as being a controlling father.
But that assessment might be my own trauma talking 😅
I think you are correct. Many workers probably do just bring home the paycheck and see the wife as responsible for parenting.
Modern American culture itself is quite toxic. That's how so much abuse just goes completely unnoticed.
My dad is an interesting mix of both "the reactor" and "I just work here" parent. Controlling, neglectful and invalidating at the same time. We viewed him as the safer parent growing up, but I now see how much he contributed to my complex PTSD. His behavior just wasn't as noticeable as the behavior of my mother figures.
@@Courtney-pn5lr I really relate to what you said and here I was thinking how strange my father was such a mix 😅
I'd be interested to see a small study done on this, but then it would focus on how bad at parenting a lot of guys are, and we can't have that 😮💨
I has two monster parents. I hear the breaking down the kid part. I wasn't safe until I found my husband.
Okay, sure, but is there a secret 7th one for all of 'em in one?😄 my mom has all the toxic parenting infinity stones
This was very helpful because it also shined some light on some bad tendencies I have or that are creeping up from childhood trauma. I want to work on eliminating those. Learning about toxic parents was great but it was insightful to learn about the why and when I get triggered I may do some of the same self-sabotaging things (and not good to others) my family did. I got to work on myself to break the cycle of generational trauma and prevent myself from becoming a toxic parent to my future children.
Same.
Whoa. Recognized myself in the child parent. Maybe not all the examples but enough of them. I did the best I could with what I had to work with and improved 100% over the elves who raised me, but I see now that I still skipped a beat here and there. I was aware of a few things I did wrong that my child probably doesn't remember but now I see there may have been more. Something to reflect on.
I mean everyone messes up. Literally everyone. It doesn’t mean you didn’t do as well as pretty much anyone and usually if you’re worried about it at least you cared. Like my parents were young and had some of this but weren’t what I think of as bad parents. I had things to do anyway! We say “parent” like it doesn’t come necessarily along with “human”. 😅
The way the first 3 describes my mother, my father, and my stepmother IN THAT ORDER
Thanks for your wonderful channel, you’re such a blessing.
The safer parent in my parents was the one that was the physical abuser while the other was narcissistic. What I realize that they way I saw the abuse was extremely unbalanced. I relaize this when people began to feel sorry for one and shaking their heads at the other. Not true. They were both abusive. highly abusive. I'm still learning to place their abuse at the same level. I'm so grateful for having validation as an adult. Spent so much time in life diagnosing myself as the one with the issue, it is so amazing to put things together in the proper place then look at the whole picture. Years waisted being taught I can't make it on my own, and feeling so guilty and ashamed. Now all I want is to heal, continue no contact, and because the entire person I'm meant to be. People don't unstand that as a survivor of toxic family one has so many triggers and trauma responses, it's difficult
My mother was very busy running from my alcoholic father and cleaning up his messes. I was always self posessed and made myself invisible as to not make more difficulty for mom who was being beaten. Then she remarried a man who resents my very existence..cheated out of a dad twice. Depression and anxiety are my life.
I'm sorry
Hi, another great video. Reactor = Histrionic/Bordeline. A walking raw nerve who is dumping on their kid and not just simply meeting their needs. Definitely should not be a caretaker of kids. Should not be hired, their emotional acting out harms productivity at work. The emotional acting out never seems to land on an authority figure like a judge or policeman, it rolls downhill and they feel comfortable acting out on their kids, coworkers or dependents. Really dangerous.
Holy crow Patrick. Your description of children of Monster and Safer parents is me and my brothers. I really value how much you get it and help us understand what our behaviours are and how to fix them. Mom was the safer parent and a method actor. Dad was a monster, reactive, child and method actor.
In my therapy: I have to let the obsessive focus on how s* my parents were, cuz it’s all memories and they don’t act like “that”now… “they were not great parents cuz they had crappy parents. If I don’t want to talk to them now, I don’t have to.” Mom used to be the reactive type parent, and masked to care and being energetic- but at home: kinda a stick in the mud, over stimulated, unhappy, highly reactive to anything I brought up (therefore I was scared to talk to her about a bad-neighbor. I did bring it up to her, she did tell, I called her out for screaming and yelling and she calmed down) Turns out- I find out as an adult that S.A. occurred in her family, and my info triggered her.) Insight: Her mother was reactive, so she was, too. My dad grew up with unhappy parents, (I’m willing to bet some s.a. occurred- that everyone Doesn’t want to talk about/take to the grave, and I don’t have a right to pry/assume). I recall feeling left-out, unimportant, and let down, a lot. But! I called them out when they were crappy, and - if they want to deny what’s brought up, the proof is in the pudding. I was the messed up kid. Where were yall (my parents)? It’s up to them to fix themselves.
I just took your online toxic family test and scored a 71% My dad would ask: “What happened to the other 29%?” And he would’ve laugh at his cleverness as my mother scowled at my “C” grade with contempt. Now that I think about it, I probably went too easy on them in the test. Had I been more honest I probably would’ve been a lot closer to perfect.😮 😊
Both my parents were narcissists, he aggressive, she passive and the smarter of the two. He was not safe, at all. But he was the safER of the two.
Thank you for this
I did this excercise about two of my colleagues, let's call them Gail (she really is from accounting :D) and Gary, and what I wrote down was exactly what I wanted to say to each of my parents. I feel like I've never said it so clearly than when I thought I was speaking to completely different people, how strange! Thank you for a fantastic podcast episode once again!
Having been the safer parent, having left 7 years ago, the monster ex now spends time unsupervised with the kids.
I'm here to be better for my kids
Is there any similar channel that covers parenting kids after the abuse so they don't carry it into adulthood?
Now i understand why. Thank you!
kid with learning issues that has a superteacher parent literally made me gasp, i didn’t see that coming. but later on i outright laughed when the “i just work here child safer parent” and the “highly religious method actor who becomes reactive” descriptions went back to back because if that ain’t my dad and my mom exactly ☠️
Thank you for this! Very enlightening, and it makes perfect sense! ❤
Incredibly helpful and insightful Patrick. Really great video 👍
"Safer" parent - it's not the kid's job to coach them on what to do, to leave etc. That's a way to create a kid who in their adult life is always trying to help and coach others to the exclusion of their own interests and needs. If a parent is in a relationship with someone who is harming them and their kid, they should just leave on their own in the best interest of themselves and their kid. If they don't or won't do it - if they can know their child is being harmed but still stay, there is something wrong with them. They should be abandoned by that child when they are old enough to leave and be on their own. Also, when they accept "coaching" from their kid, that's not ok. It's borderline emotional incest and parentification/adultifying their kid who should just simply be free to be a kid.
Btw I love the ad going around of yours of the toxic family show beginning 🤣🤣🤣
I love these, and how you are able to bring a bit of humor in lightness in as you explain it. Amazing!!
So helpful, thanks.
I had them all.
I’m always looking forward to these!
I could relate to most of these but my parents had a weird dynamic where my mom was the raging narcissistic religion holier than thou child parent and my dad was the usually submissive child parent who was the one who beat me with a belt if I did something wrong. My mom never hit, but she hurt me with her neglect and manipulation. My dad was usually more reasonable but then these episodes would occur when he beat me. My mom would feel bad afterwards and bring me comfort food but I was always in meltdown mode for many hours after that and wanted to be alone. I lived through a hell where my sisters also manipulated me and emotionally abused me. I had no one to save me so I suppressed my needs until I myself believed I didn't have them. And through all this , I still wanted to please them, though that, I now know, is an impossible task.
Patrick, to what age are we children in this context? We are parentified and adultified. It feels like I was old enough to be my mom's therapist when I was 15.
Good video lesson thanks
My mom fits a monster & child descriptions. My dad fits the safer one & child descriptions.
Thanks. This is a great segment. My other comment was for a chiro video (UA-cam is glitching) that I watched next lol, but I won't take away the algorithm's tucker (food in Australia) because comments feed the algorithm... nom nom.
Hey there, İ found this video praising a very resolute father:
ua-cam.com/users/shortsLDDTgtC4lNI?si=dJGXIc3Oqh9yittS
Daughter bullies, gets kicked off schoolbus. Father continues punishment of daughter for the same offense, unannounced, and makes her walk 5 miles to school while recording her from his car.
I just work here sounds familiar.
Wow, very interesting for me to resonate with about all of them. Huhh
The child 💀 it's my mother.
My folks always seemed sad I existed. What will become of him ?😅
HELICOPTER PARENT. OMG.!! 😂😂😂
Wait what if one is the reactor/child and the other is the safer parent 😭
Things are cool with most people in my life. I just feel untrusting of others despite loads of evidence that people are nice and safe. And I get homicidally angry around my partners really really nice and functional and cool family 😭😭😭 imagine wanting to murder someone who made you a birthday cake and made you a teddy bear from scratch....
😳 Why do I associate with all of these? 😢
Um, what if your parent is a combination of the monster and the child?
How are my two parents all of these
Hey
😩😩👌🏿👌🏿
Again uh, could you please label reuploads as such?
So are we all supposed to blame our parents and go no contact with our parents because they had these toxic parent problems? This is generational, correct? If we know our parents did this, and we realize we are prone to and have triggers to this ... do we just stop having children so we protect the next generation?
According to my own journey and understanding, what you do is spend however much time you need focusing on yourself and overcoming your own difficulties. That starts with learning how to regulate your nervous system, which was damaged for you as a kid growing up in these terrible conditions. Relearning (or learning for the first time for many of us) to regulate our nervous systems automatically and discharge the stored survival stress is the greatest thing we can do for our future children.
Try checking out some videos from Irene Lyon on nervous system health and trauma. There’s actually a whole lot of science surrounding these things that’s less about blaming or controlling yourself and more about relearning to inhabit your own body and release trauma in a way you were never able to before because of your upbringing.
As for going no-contact, that’s completely up to you. But confronting them about the abuse is usually not a great idea. I believe Irene also touches on this as well. She’s the most comprehensive person I’ve found for this information/practice so far.
Hope this helps.❤
Both going no contact and choosing if you want children or not is just that, a personal choice. You have to evaluate if the relationship is worthwhile or bearable and is something you want to continue or not. As for having children you can both be traumatized but aware and healing as to not continue the cycle, nobody is perfect but so long as you are aware, keep yourself accountable and your child/ children safe and have an overall healthy relationship without falling into these archetypes it's perfectly fine to start a family. I think it's important to understand some people are aware of their behavior but make the choice to continue on that path but you and others do not have to choose it because it is a decision, it's 2024 we know therapy and other resources exist to heal and help us.
Always extremely grateful to see a new upload from you!🩷