Impaired Trust in the Narcissistic Family

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My client Brian, 32, tells me, “Growing up, I never felt I could depend on my parents for what you’d call emotional support. That feeling that other people have, that their mom or dad is there for them no matter what? I didn’t get that. I didn’t feel it. It wasn’t there. And there’s no way I could have trusted them to hear how I really felt about anything. Now, as an adult, I still can’t really open up with people closest to me. Even with friends and my girlfriend, I don’t feel comfortable being vulnerable with them, so that gets in the way of real intimacy and causes loneliness.”

Brian’s inability to trust in his adult relationships, and therefore to experience emotional intimacy and allow himself to be vulnerable, can be traced back to his family of origin. Growing up in a narcissistic family, a child learns early on that they cannot lean on, depend on, or have expectations of consistency from their narcissistic parent. This causes impaired trust.

In a healthy family, a baby learns that when they cry, a parental figure will be there to nurture and soothe and take care of them. Every psychologist is well aware of the importance of early bonding and attachment in childhood and the effects that has on an individual’s psychological and emotional development. The ability to trust is key. It should continue with consistency throughout the child’s life, so that they feel safe and clearly have someone there for them physically and emotionally.

What it means to trust

When a child is raised in a narcissistic family, their sense of safety is shaky at best. A narcissistic parent can be unpredictable and inconsistent in the way they respond to the child, thereby leaving the child feeling vulnerable and unsafe. Thus, the child’s ability to trust that others will consistently see and hear them, and care for them, becomes impaired, and this core of distrust can be difficult to repair. A meme on the internet by “Anonymous” says it well: “Breaking someone’s trust is like crumpling up a perfect piece of paper. You can smooth it over, but it’s never going to be the same again.” The trust between a child and a narcissistic parent is weakened over time, but it is hard to identify exactly how and when that happened because it was likely a result of an accumulation of successive events.

A client quoted in Stephanie Donaldson-Pressman and Robert Pressman’s book on narcissism described how she couldn’t rely on her narcissistic mother for emotional support: “I worshipped my mom and I know she loved me, but it was like trying to grab smoke: You see it, but you can’t get it into your hand. I still feel that way.”

When we observe a narcissist interact with other people, we often see these core behaviors: a lack of empathy, exploitation of others to fulfill their own needs, and a grandiose belief that they are always right, which causes them to lack accountability and to maintain a sense of entitlement. Such behavior speaks poorly of a person’s character and cannot help but prevent a child from trusting a parent who behaves in this way. Children learn more from what they see than from what they are told.

Being assured of someone’s emotional strength is knowing that person will not be devastated by our difficulties and will not personalize our issues. We feel a sense of safety that we can lean on them, and they can handle it with strength and maturity.

Impaired trust can affect adult relationships

For children from a narcissistic family, trust issues can’t help but impact their adult relationships. Regardless of the particular dynamic within our family of origin, our relationships with family members tend to influence how we will attach and connect to future partners. Some experts say we are likely to be attracted to the familiar until we engage in our own recovery, which I have certainly seen in my practice.

Adult children of narcissistic families often find they have anxious and avoidant attachment issues to resolve in therapy and in their relationships. Fortunately, developing secure attachments in one’s adult relationships can be learned and worked on in therapy.

Impaired trust can affect self-trust

Not only is one's ability to trust others impaired by being raised in a narcissistic family, but trust of oneself is also impaired. Self-doubt arises when one’s feelings are unheard, unacknowledged, and invalidated, and this wreaks havoc with one’s sense of reality and sense of self. The key to trusting others is learning to trust ourselves and our own feelings. The more we trust in our ability to handle situations and feelings, the less fearful we become. When working with clients, I often have them write the word “trust” leaving out the letter “u.” The result: tr st, because you can’t have trust without u. And you can’t trust others without trusting yourself.

Learning to trust others and ourselves is a huge gift of recovery. Understanding where the impaired trust comes from is half the battle, and then processing trauma to get resolution, is the path to many blessings ahead.

For more, see my book, Will the Drama Ever End?: Untangling and Healing from the Harmful Effects of Parental Narcissism.