7 Toxic Things Parents Do To Their Child

Do you often wonder if your parents truly love you, or are they just being toxic? Toxic parents can be a toxic mother who helicopters you, or a toxic father who expects too much achievement from you. Even if parents do not want to be toxic, sometimes, they unintentionally are toxic. Does your parents downplay your achievements, set expectations too high, control too much, treat you like a child, close off communication?

Writer: Chloe Avenasa
Script Editor: Vanessa Tao
Script Manager: Kelly Soong
Animator: Chantal Van Rensbur
YouTube Manager: Cindy Cheong

References:
Dunham, S. M., Dermer, S. B., & Carlson, J. (2012). Poisonous Parenting: Toxic Relationships Between Parents and Their Adult Children. Journal of Family Psychology. Routledge, 2012.
Hoobler, J. M., & Brass, D. J. (2006). Abusive supervision and family undermining as displaced aggression. Journal of Applied psychology, 91(5), 1125.
Jurkovic, G. J. (1998). Destructive parentification in families: Causes and consequences.
Strayer, J., & Roberts, W. (2004). Children’s anger, emotional expressiveness, and empathy: Relations with parents’ empathy, emotional expressiveness, and parenting practices. Social development, 13(2), 229-254.

[Raghav-txym]

0:40 They downplay your achievements.
1:05 They set their expectations too high.
1:35 They’re overly controlling.
2:10 They treat you like a child.
2:38 They taught you self blame.
3:08 They close off communication.
3:52 They’re emotionally unavailable.

[hirowow]

Some parents genuinely love their children but don’t know how to show it and then affects their child’s mental health so much.

[grammarnazi]

I think it's really important to remember that people can be both loving AND toxic at the same time, both for the giver of the toxicity and (of course) the receiver. Character improvement is _always_ possible, no matter what's been done in the past; the difficult part is finding it within yourself to either gather the courage to change (and let others know of your goal too), or be forgiving/compassionate towards those suffering from toxicity within their own hearts. Breaking off contact is oftentimes the most beneficial choice, to be sure, but sometimes sympathising with the person and trying as best you can to understand their misled motives may just help too :)

[Camoucrimson]

I feel like body shaming and putting your children of diets constantly could also be a part of this, they mean well out of concern for your health but it causes an insane amount of self hatred and doubt

[LMBOatU]

Very true. Sociologically speaking, the family household is one of the only places in society where authority can go unchecked and often leads parents to getting away with toxicity and abuse of power. We tend to think it’s inappropriate to get involved in what decisions ppl make in their homes with their own kids and often leaves children at the mercy of their parents and parents free to reign over their home in any way they’d like even if in any other setting (work, school, etc) it’d be unethical for an authority figure to act that way, somehow we find it awkward to address toxicity when we see it in parenting.

[morgandouglas]

I can relate to this. My mom seems to be a loving person but at the same time she’s toxic. Thank you for posting this.

[angel]

My mom has all these seven traits. Whenever I achieved something I thought was good enough (might not be the best) mom would say things like "why only this much? It's not enough"
And I used to cry a lot when I was a child, I was timid and shy and really reserved and sometimes kids picked on me a lot. Whenever I went to my mom crying, she'd immediately say "it's not a big deal, stop crying. learn to be strong and stop bothering"
Other times I would always be tense when someone pisses her off, because I just knew that she'd eventually blame me or take it out on me and say it's all my fault things are happening and that I brought it upon myself.
I honestly know she cares and loves me, but it's suffocating living with her sometime and I want out so bad, but then I feel so selfish and guilty sometimes.

[lienLe-hqyq]

Having parents who love you but are toxic is difficult. Because even when they are hurting your feelings, you still understand that they love you and only want you to do things they thought are the best. Because of that, you normally can't talk back. It will be hard to express your true emotion. Because you will feel guilty. You know what "self-blame" is very well, and that will be the first thing you do if what you said upset them. You feel like you got only two options to choose. Hurt their feelings or hurt yours.

[khalilahd.]

Being overly controlling and closing off communication were staples in my childhood and have been difficult things to let go I’m my adulthood. This video validates my feelings so thank you 💜

[neofulcrum]

Kids are very impressionable at a young age. You don’t want to spoil them too much but you also don’t wanna make them feel worthless.

[mellowbluesmusic]

No matter what you're going through, be strong. Nothing is permanent, everything is temporary. Everything will pass and at some point in your life, it will improve.
Do not get depressed, take advantage of your days, live them, smile, overcome your fears, cry if you have to, but never give up, because in life you will not have such
a great burden that you cannot bear.🙆💜💜💜

[vigilant]

it's uncanny how well timed in my life this came. i just had a breakdown an hour ago because i feel myself getting dumber every day. i got a stupid thing on the homework wrong and at that point i just had it with myself and broke down. my dad got pissed and told me it was a simple problem as he angrily walked out of the room, and my mom saw me sobbing and told me to say sorry to my dad. i've been going through a lot of things in my life such as depression (medically diagnosed), social paranoia, and a lot of self loathing to the point i can't stand looking in the mirror and often cussing myself out or screaming at myself, but when i try to tell my parents these problems, they treat it like a mistake they need to correct. i constantly turn to friends for help but often have a lot of trouble putting everything in me into words. there's just so much going out at once that it feels like i'm ranting, which i probably am.
my parents keep putting aside these problems i have and treating me like one of those teens who act dramatic and act like no one understands them, and at this point i'm scared i might actually be. i don't know what's going on with me anymore. i'm at a dark point of my life and i feel my parents are just kicking me while i'm already down.

[thomaslevy]

I describe my parents as, "The Ice Queen who married the Village Idiot." Although my mother especially tried to be a "good" parent, she was guilty of doing all seven toxic things at one time or another. Much later in adult life, I learned (by YouTube psych sites such as this one) that my mother most likely suffered from depression and my father was probably on the autistic spectrum. That explained their behaviors, although it can not do anything to change the suffering I felt as a child growing up over 60 years ago.

[widowkeeper]

When your abusers genuinely love you it's an agony of grief that is hard to put into words, but one that direly needs to be discussed more often in our society. You really can love each other but the dealbreakers cannot be simply forgotten or excused. Those scars are as real as the smiles. I am glad you put this video up. Above all, I strive to be fair to my parents for my own peace of soul.

[lillylupton]

I had a fight with my mom tonight. it was so dumb, but she started discounting me and questioning how I was cooking ( I literally am a professional line Cook at a Bar and Grill), and I've been trying to hard to stand up for myself more (she always finds a way to make me feel bad, manipulate me, and make me think she knows best. ) I finally stood up for myself, loudly, and kind of won but she's just angry now, banging things around in the kitchen.
Oh Guess I'll send a card at Xmas after I move out and keep it at that🤷

.
.
Side note, this is all really hard for me, because my whole teenhood I had a terrible drunk step dad, and we finally got her to kick him to the curb... And yet this house still doesn't work the way it It's so hard for me to realize just how toxic my mother is, especially after trauma bonding with her over my now ex step dad ( he abused our whole family, her and I got closer). What I thought was a mending, close knit mother daughter relationship is Well a toxic person had a baby and now I'm here 21 gears later 🤷 idk anymore. Sorry for rant, thanks for the read if you did

[cloudminingqueen]

hey psych2go, just wanna say, thank you for the videos! they really help me so much, i cant get therapy because of my toxic parents - and i really appreciate y'all doing a great job! :D

[loomonda]

I really think there needs to be emotional classes for parents on how to raise their kids... Too many adults are dealing with childhood trauma

[Jackal_El_Lobo]

Yes. My Vulnerable Narcissistic mother fits all of these descriptions.

She always told me that she loved me but never reciprocated such affection.

Instead, she displayed the patterns of toxicity mentioned in the video for almost decade to point where my father went through years of legal battle to get custody of me.

The process certainly wasn’t easy as my mom (without a hint of irony) had made it her personal mission to make me regret wanting to leave her through a series of psychological manipulation, tantrums, and bullying.

Now days, I’m uncomfortable with speaking to her given how she has continued her attempts to take advantage of me even though I’m no longer living with her.

[mikyeediaz]

I remember when my friend said I'm a momma's boy because I was obedient to her. I meant like... Don't you just want to make your parents happy but sometimes it isn't enough?

If you're a Malaysian, you might know what's SPM. I got 3 A's and the rest are B's but I remember my mom just stared at the results and didn't say anything. A few days later, I remembered she told some people I did terrible while I was there.

The same thing happened again but this time I failed to graduate diploma because I failed one paper. My parents kept telling me that they didn't sleep because of my failure. I was hurt knowing they only look at my failure and not my efforts. I got A and B during the time I failed the semester.

Whenever I wanted to cry, my parents said "It's stupid that you cry for nothing." Slowly, I feel like I'm this close to lose myself while trying to stay strong.

[LunaLovegoodehehe]

*Time stamps*

0:39-they downplay your achievements
1:06- they set their expectations too high
1:36- They're overly controlling
2:09- They treat you like a child
2:38- they thought you self-blame
3:07- They close off communication
3:51 - They're emotionally unavailable