How is it possible for a parent to hate their children?

[Concerned One]

I still don't get this. How does a parent see that child as an object or an inconvenience?

For the first time in my life I took out a baby picture of my self and put it on my mantelpiece along with a series of pictures as I grow older. That baby is cute and beautiful. How could someone be jealous or want to rob them of their confidence and self-esteem?

How does that work?   

[Adrianna]

I still don't get this. How does a parent see that child as an object or an inconvenience?

For the first time in my life I took out a baby picture of my self and put it on my mantelpiece along with a series of pictures as I grow older. That baby is cute and beautiful. How could someone be jealous or want to rob them of their confidence and self-esteem?

How does that work?   

The tough thing about trying to understand personality disordered behavior is it makes absolutely no sense to those of us without that disorder.

I used to think it was some sort of malicious intentional behavior but I honestly think they know no other way to behave. That's not giving an excuse, because they are responsible for the damage they cause, but understanding they don't necessarily wake up every day with the intention of destroying others is key. This is of course separate from someone with sociopathy/psychopathy who I believe can be sadistic. Even some with severe npd can be sadistic at times. They are all in the same Cluster B disorder group.

Again this is not an excuse for their behavior. You can see for most of us the only peace we have is going no contact when possible. The damage they cause can not be overstated. It's severe and takes a long time to recover from, especially when you were groomed and raised to see this behavior as normal. Many of us had to learn self care, validating ourselves and getting to the point where we understand the abuse wasn't personal. Anyone in our shoes would have experienced it. It really had nothing to do with us at all. Don't look for understanding from people with healthy, supportive parents. They have no idea and will make you feel worse by making excuses for the parent's bad behavior. They won't see your reality because it's so foreign to them. They can't understand that not all parents are loving. Even some others who are still in the fog themselves with their own abusive parents will make excuses for your parent, because accepting our reality would also mean accepting their own. I know someone who makes excuses for my grandmother's behavior because it mirrors that of her dead father, who was also abusive. Problem is she never accepted it as abuse and thought it was normal but it's not.

It's a maladaptive way to boost their own needs at the expense of others, no matter who that person is. Child, partner, friend, etc. no difference. Someone with true narcissistic personality disorder for example lacks empathy and the ability to emotionally bond with others. Without that, their behavior can be cold and indifferent, because deep down, they really don't care. A child will feel a lack of connection with this parent for good reason. It's not there.

Hard to wrap your brain around that type of mindset but until you do, the questions and frustration will linger.

Getting this knowledge has changed how I view humanity as a whole. I didn't know there were so many people walking around without empathy on the planet. It's a real problem and the dysfunction is carried down from generation to generation until someone breaks the chain.

[Concerned One]

That's like the Philip Larkin poem I just read today:

"They fuck you up, your mum and dad.
They may not mean to, but they do.
They fill you with the faults they had
And add some extra, just for you.

But they were fucked up in their turn
By fools in old-style hats and coats,
Who half the time were soppy-stern
And half at one another's throats.

Man hands on misery to man.
It deepens like a coastal shelf.
Get out as early as you can,
And don't have any kids yourself."

[Concerned One]

Although I'm not convinced she didn't know what she was doing or that it was unintentional.

Mother always refused to discuss what the obvious underlying problem was in our family. Little wonder if it was because she was systematically and consciously destroying her children's confidence and self-esteem to serve her own interests.

[all4peace]

Damaged parents don't have the tools of self-sacrifice, patience, unconditional love, affection, honesty, humility...needed for good parenting. It's such a tragedy that creates so much damage. You can most definitely heal and choose differently. I'm so sorry that this was your experience in your parent.

[Concerned One]

Damaged parents don't have the tools of self-sacrifice, patience, unconditional love, affection, honesty, humility...needed for good parenting. It's such a tragedy that creates so much damage. You can most definitely heal and choose differently. I'm so sorry that this was your experience in your parent.

I should have known something was up when she gave me the book 'Flowers In The Attic' to read as a young boy.

It's like she was laughing in my face.

[Thru the Rain]

My uPDM seems to always need a "target" to project negative feelings and hate toward.

I was that target from the time I was a pre-teen until I moved away at 21. And a few times after that period as well.

Pretty much everyone in our family has been the object of her hate campaigns. And she wonders now why everyone stays away. 

[Adrianna]

Although I'm not convinced she didn't know what she was doing or that it was unintentional.

Mother always refused to discuss what the obvious underlying problem was in our family. Little wonder if it was because she was systematically and consciously destroying her children's confidence and self-esteem to serve her own interests.

Some do know, what they are doing, yes.
It's all about them. Lacking empathy, what's stopping them from ruining people, even their own children, to boost themselves up? Nothing. The ends justify the means to them, whether doing it consciously or doing it automatically.

I think my father and grandmother know what they do to others but they honestly don't care, as long as their needs are met. 

[MamaDryad]

I think it depends on the PD. My own mother is uBPD, with alcoholism as a complicating factor. She is deeply traumatized by events in her childhood that I have known about intuitively for a long time but only recently had confirmed by an outside source.

In her case, the reason she hates me is very simple: she hates herself, for the wrong reasons*, and she sees me as an extension of herself. That's what I always was to her, and that's how she still sees me, even now in my 40s. The same person who confirmed her trauma for me also told me this (paraphrased): "As long as she is unable to separate your identity from her own, she will keep hurting you. It's a compulsion. She cannot and will not change." I was her secret-keeper and her shame-eater, the part of herself that she could abuse and reject. If all the things she hated about herself were embodied in me, then she could live with what was left.

None of this is to make excuses for her. I feel terribly sorry for her, and she is absolutely unsafe for me to be around, much less the family I have built. Both things are true.

* She's done plenty of hateful and shameful things. But she carries around such a huge burden of undeserved shame from what was done to her that it's like she can't absorb any more. So she has to make it so she's never wrong. So she can never heal and grow.

[Maxtrem]

In my family it's more about conditional love than hate. But there's a very thin line between the two.

[Adria]

In my situation my narcissitic father knows darn well what he does. He eats people alive and thrives on it. He so much knows what he is doing,and hones in on his craft, that he is lawyered up to the hilt so as not to go to prison for his machinations.  They are pros at playing the victim and acting like they "just don't understand what you are talking about."

I'm sorry, but I believe, earlier in their life they made a choice, just like we did. They chose evil.  Unless they have a true mental illness, they know exactly what they are doing and have now turned themselves into a mental illness.We were abused just as much if not worse than they were and we chose a much different path. 

My sister when we were little, started out normal, and because she was allowed to get away with terrible things and was applauded for it is now a bonified sociopath.  It starts small and grows into something more sinister as they get older.  We were raised by the same parents. I made the hard choice, and was abused for it, not to go down their ugly path of destruction. 

I don't want to sound harsh, but either you are an abuser or you are not. Only you can decide. What I saw was a skilled craft practiced to perfection, and they are proud of it. 

It is up to all of us to face facts about our lives good and bad, and to fix the ugly parts. That is what life is about.  They have refused to fix their problems and thus thrust them on others, and in order to live with themselves, the have to act like they don't know it.

[Adrianna]

Adria I totally agree some are absolutely sadistic and go beyond narcissism to the sociopathy/psychopathy scale. No remorse. No empathy. No conscience. No feelings for anyone. It's disturbing. These are the ones who know what they are doing and don't care. In fact they take great pleasure in tearing people down. Breaking rules. It's a thrill to them.

I think even garden variety narcissists have a bit of a sadistic streak, but it's on a whole other level with these types.

Malignant narcissism is the term for those on the verge of sociopathy/psychopathy. They are dangerous and best avoided.

[Adria]

Adrianna,

Yes, it is very sad and scarey stuff.

[carrots]

I think it depends on the PD. My own mother is uBPD, with alcoholism as a complicating factor. She is deeply traumatized by events in her childhood ...

In her case, the reason she hates me is very simple: she hates herself, for the wrong reasons*, and she sees me as an extension of herself.

MamaDryad, this is pretty similar to my case too, without the alcohol. I have cptsd, I think my mother probably does as well possibly combined with BPD. Certainly enough happened in her childhood to traumatise her. She doesn't accept herself as a person, or as a woman in fact. She spews contempt, hate, anger etc in all directions but more on me, her daughter, than on my brothers or my father. I even recognised as a child that she was criticising me so much (for anything and everything) in order to feel better about herself.

... she carries around such a huge burden of undeserved shame from what was done to her that it's like she can't absorb any more. So she has to make it so she's never wrong. So she can never heal and grow.

I myself have been carrying around a huge number of fleas for years. I know that there came a time in my mid to late teens when I just couldn't hear any criticism any more, especially at home. I felt like a piece of blotting paper that couldn't possibly take on any more ink. Not being able to hear any criticism any more meant I couldn't even take on board constructive criticism or helpful suggestions or anything like that, from people outside FOO I mean. FOO didn't 'do' constructive criticism. That was an unknown entity. Fortunately I didn't wait too long to go into counselling but it did take me a good number of years to learn not to lash out at people verbally who criticised me and even longer to be able to apologise when I'd done something wrong. ime not being able to apologise to other people contributed to a build-up of hate and other bad feelings in me that had nowhere to go. I turned a lot of it inwards but others will spew it all outwards.

Just today my psychiatrist explained that I had obviously been a huge projection board for my mother from day one. I was about 10 yo when she accused me of "causing all the problems in the family" by being born   . Everything was fine and dandy in FOO and for her with her in-laws until my birth. Not even true. She had problems with the ILs long before I was born. She made many hateful and completely untrue comments to me throughout my childhood and teen years and on into adulthood.

Intellectually-speaking, she's an intelligent, educated woman, but emotional IQ is way, way, way below average. But I do agree with Adria that it is a choice: you can choose to get help (e.g. therapy) so that you can start changing yourself and the way you interact with others or you can choose to not improve yourself and in so doing cause other people problems, including your own defenseless children who you ought to love and protect from hateful people like yourself. Even as a child, you can go one way or the other. I cried a lot and tried to explain to FOO what was wrong at home, for which I was punished, ridiculed etc. My elder brother resorted to contempt and hate and long-term, low-grade physical violence, especially towards me, for which hes was not punished or ridiculed. He suffered under our mother too, but he didn't have to pass it on to me his little sister. He chose to.

I also heard the theory that in families (FOO) like mine there's so little love and support to go around that everybody ends up fighting for scraps. Every man for himself, devil take the hindmost kind of thing. The parents feel they don't get enough from each other, so they try to get it from their children instead. They don't give their children enough love and support for the children to survive and thrive never mind support the parents. My M even said something like that. My elder B as about an 8yo was able to give her something (i.e. she was more interested in spending time with him) and I wasn't, partly because I was miserable myself at the time. An M like mine has no time for a miserable child (not even a 6 yo), she wanted somebody to make her happy. I couldn't do that for her, so to her it was simply logical to leave me to myself   She said so herself in later years. Idk if she hated little miserable 6yo me, but she certainly didn't like me or look after me properly emotionally.

[MamaDryad]

This is very familiar to me; I have this flea too. Shame and guilt are both very hard for me to bear. It made me worry for years that I was just like her. What I've come to learn, though, is that the difference is a basic level of honesty. My mother's way of avoiding shame is to lie to herself and to everyone else about what she's done—if she denies it enough, then it never happened. Mine is to actually learn from the things I've done that I feel bad about and... not do them again, to the best of my ability. I still have a lot of baseline shame just for existing, for my body and my way of being and the space I take up in the world. But I'm not as good at self-deception as everyone else in my family of origin, so I have to sit with those feelings instead of setting up my life to avoid all accountability.

I also caused all the problems in my family, from at least the age of three! I was the reason she drank, the reason she couldn't keep friends, the reason her relationships failed. It took me an embarrassingly long time even to begin questioning that.

There are always choices. She is vehemently opposed to therapy, and I understand why, now: she feels like it would crack her wide open and everyone would be able to see the rot inside. I know this because it is the same fear that kept me out of therapy for a long time. I finally got past that fear because my child is more important, and I hope every day that I didn't start too late to be a good-enough parent to him. She was never able to make that choice, for me or for herself.

[DaisyGirl77]

My uNM hates me because I represent a ton of things to her:  Her own anger at the multiple traumas she'd been through prior to my arrival; I represent all of those traumas.  I also represent all the ways her life changed the second she decided she was going to keep me.  Her dream of becoming a marine biologist:  *poof*  Gone.  (She dropped out of college a couple years before I was even a fetus so...)  She married my father instead (childhood sweetheart) a couple months before I was born to make me legitimate.  She expected a doll she could put away when she was done with me.  What she got was a sick, colicky child who only wanted her mother to hold her & comfort her.  She felt suffocated & it turned to hatred toward me cuz I never wanted my father; just Mom.  Suddenly she felt trapped.  She blamed me.  All of it was my fault.  Then she decided I needed a strict routine (after she dragged 5.5 month old me to 3 different houses/families on Christmas Day & I threw an EPIC fit when they packed me back up in the car seat to go to the fourth house...of the 5 houses they were visiting that day).

From the moment I took my first breath & revealed myself to be someone who was going to break all her dreams she had of me (being the perfect child in her mind), that was it.  She may have loved me in her own way, but she does not love me the way she loves my sisters, & it is so completely evident in the way she treats us.  The last time I saw her workspace & her home, she kept only my sisters' photos at her work desk.  Their photos are prominently placed all over her home.  Other than probably 3 school pictures framed & hung on walls, the few she has of me are small & placed in spots that guests would have to purposefully go to in order to see me.  When I was at her job for an after-hours event they were hosting, people constantly expressed surprise that she had THREE children, not two.  It got to the point where it wasn't funny after the fifth person said it, & there were probably 500 people there that day.

So this is just one of many reasons why I'm permanently NC with her.  She wants her favorites; she has them.  I removed myself from the picture 5 years ago.