13 Ways a Narcissistic Mother Sabotages Her Daughter's Life

Most daughter’s see their Mother as a trusted source of advice, comfort, and unconditional love.

But what happens if your Mother is none of those things? What if she is the exact opposite – a narcissist.

You want to have a good relationship with your Mom and you have given her dozens of chances to prove herself, but she only seems to wreak havoc on your relationship and your life!

You have come to realize that everything in your relationship is one-sided. From the moment you were born, everything was about her!

Your whole life, your mother’s toxic presence in your life has damaged your self-image and overall sense of security.

Do you feel like this perfectly describes your life right now?

Below are 13 ways a narcissistic mother sabotages her daughter’s life.

1.) She Takes Responsibility For Your Achievements

Every time you achieve something on your own, she happily takes full credit!

Even when you work hard for something, you don’t really exist because what you achieved belongs to your mother!

“I taught her everything she knows!”

“She got her skills from me! If it wasn’t for me, she wouldn’t have accomplished this.”

This either leads you to feel resentful of your mother or to not feel capable of dealing with issues in their own life without her.

You may start to question your own abilities? “Can I really make it on my own? I can’t accomplish anything great without my Mom beside me.”

The narcissist LOVES this co-dependency!

Taking credit for all your accomplishments not only makes your mother look good in front of other people, it also helps to create an unconfident, dependent daughter.

Related Article: 11 Signs You Have a Toxic Parent

2.) She provokes you, then plays the victim when you respond

It’s like a cat and mouse game, something that really amuses her.

She provokes you until you respond emotionally, and then she can respond by playing the victim and blaming you for disrespect and ungratefulness.

It’s a brilliant way for her to get her narcissistic supply.

She may respond with anger, tears, blame, guilt-tripping, lies, manipulation, etc.

Your narcissistic mother will accuse YOU of being the bad guy after being the one to provoke you to responding.

All of a sudden, your request for justice or respect makes you the villain and her the victim.

3.) She Is Unbelievably Intrusive

Ever since you can remember, she has never given you privacy or let you create healthy boundaries with her.

Every time you try to set a boundary with her, she completely ignores it.

She demands full access to every area of your life – no questions asked! And if you deny her this “right”, she will violate your privacy without permission.

She may be known to search your room, look through your phone, listen in on conversations, read private messages, ask incredibly intrusive questions, and demand personal information about yourself.

This behavior doesn’t just happen during your childhood. It goes on well into your adulthood, as well.

If she doesn’t get her way, your mother will respond with anger, guilt-tripping, confusion, tears, blame, the silent treatment, and any other tactic to make you give in to her toxic demands.

Related Article: 11 Things Narcissists Say to Manipulate You

4.) She Acts Jealous and Competitive

Most mothers are their daughter’s biggest cheerleader, wanting their kids to go farther than they did accomplish greater things than they ever imagined.

Unfortunately, a narcissistic mother views her daughter as an extension of herself.

When she looks at you, she sees her own youth, beauty, and potential.

However, she is very aware that her own youth is leaving her as her daughter blossoms into a young woman.

This makes her jealous and envious of her own child, making her feel the need to compete!

This jealousy will cause her to actively attempt to destroy her daughter’s self-esteem.

Unfortunately, the competition will start at a very young age.

Example: If the child’s father gives the little girl more attention than he gives the mother, she will become very jealous and punish the little girl.

Why? Because she never wants her daughter to do anything better or achieve anything more than she did!

She will stunt the growth of her own daughter so she never outshines her mother.

5.) She Never Loves Unconditionally

Nothing is more confusing to a little girl more than the realization that her mother doesn’t really love her.

It seems inconceivable! How can someone be so heartless and cruel?

Normal mothers love their children, no matter what. Through thick and thin, their love is consistent.

With narcissistic mothers, they don’t have the ability to love their children fully. Their love is completely conditional!

Her love is given when you are succeeding at something or she can brag about you (and make herself look better).

However when you embarrass her or defy her opinion/demands, she will withhold all love from you.

Just like that, she doesn’t love you anymore.

The only way that she will show you love again is if you come back grovelling and give her what she wants OR she misses the attention and narcissistic supply you gave her.

When a mother’s love is unconditional, it teaches the child that they have to EARN the love and approval of others because they are not worth it on their own.

This is one of the reasons so many daughter’s of narcissists are chronic people-pleasers.

6.) She Intentionally Undermines and Embarrasses You

She does this for two reason:

To make sure you never look better than her
To destroy your self-esteem and independence

When you were younger, she may have told embarrassing stories about you to her friends, family, and acquaintances. You would sit there blushing, embarrassed, and deeply hurt.

But over time, you learned to deal with it. It’s just what Mom does, right?

WRONG! Your narcissistic mother is deeply troubled and vengeful.

As you get older, you will start to notice that she is attempting to undermine your relationships, happiness, personal growth, career, and every single point that makes you look good (without her).

She will give unsolicited advice and won’t stop pushing her own agenda and interests in your life.

Why? Because you are not allowed to be happy or successful unless she is fully involved, in complete approval, and in control.

Related Article: 11 Mental Abuse Tactics to Watch out For

7.) She Nurtures A Feeling of Self-Doubt and Insecurity In You

…this goes hand-in-hand with #8.

To ensure that you are dependent on her throughout life, she will nurture self-doubt and a deep sense of insecurity in you from a young age!

Without your dependence on her, she will not be in control of your life. This will result in less narcissistic supply.

Your narcissistic Mother wants you to believe that you NEED her approval to be happy!

Unfortunately, she wants to put you in the unhealthy position of not being able to make a life decision without first seeking her permission and approval.

8.) She Uses You As Her Gossip-Collector

From a very young age, your mother was grooming you to bring back gossip.

When you went to visit other family members or went over to your friend’s house, she probed you for information about what I saw and experienced.

She would dig for any little piece of information that she could twist into a dirty piece of gossip.

To your narcissistic mother, knowledge is power.

Knowing the “latest gossip” about someone makes her feel superior and it also gives her something juicy to talk about, so she can stir up more drama among her family or “friends”.

Unfortunately, your narcissistic mother doesn’t mind lying either! So if you told her about something you overheard, she just may embellish the story and twist the truth to make an even better story to spread about that person.

And in the end, you may get a bad wrap for being the one who gossips! Because your mother doesn’t mind throwing you under the bus either!

“Oh I heard that story from my daughter. She was the one who told me! I guess she must have got it all wrong!”

A narcissistic mother is absolutely TOXIC! In the end, no one wants to be around her – including you.

9.) She Uses “Guilt” to Control You

From a very young age, you will be able to recall many instances where your mother guilt-tripped you into doing things or not doing things.

This form of manipulation is very successful because is fills you with a deep sense of obligation.

However, for your mother to adequately be able to guilt-trip you, she has to pretend to care deeply about you!

Perhaps she will buy you special things, dote on you, or give you special treatment.

Not only will the outside world see her as a loving dedicated mother, but she will also be able to use these things as a manipulation tactic.

If you ever try to break away or make a decision she doesn’t like, she will go straight for the guilt!

“Look at everything I have done for you!”

“I went through 3 days of painful labor for you!”

“You’d be nowhere without my help and advice!”

A healthy parent will never stoop to such low and manipulative tactics to try to gain back a relationship with their child.

10.) She Confuses Your “True Reality” By Gaslighting You

Gaslighting is form of psychological abuse to makes the victim feel like she is going crazy!

Unfortunately, this is something that narcissists are known for!

Growing up, did you ever see or feel things that you were 100% certain of. But then you went and talked to your Mom and she treated you like you were crazy?

“Why would you ever think that? That isn’t how it happened at all!”

“You certainly have an over-active imagination. You must have dreamed all this up in your head.

“Why would you ever think that! I never did that!”

Did you Mom make you feel like you had seen or felt certain things that weren’t true? Did she make you feel crazy?!

In a normal mother/daughter relationship, you are suppose to be able to trust your Mom. And if you Mom says something isn’t true, you trust her.

But if your Mother is a narcissist, she will teach you that you can’t trust yourself and that you have an inability to be honest with yourself.

The problem with this is that she is teaching you to always second-guess your own reality – what you know to be true.

As a result, you will always keep coming back to her for a second opinion and validation.

11.) She is never empathetic

Most mother’s are there to sympathize, support, and comfort you during the tough times in your life.

But your Mom doesn’t have the ability to empathize with your pain – emotional or physical.

She may actually be happy that you are in pain because she can now swoop in and gain attention by “pretending to be the hero.”

Your narcissistic mother literally does not have an empathetic bone in her body.

If she actually does appear to be empathetic, it is for show.

She is either trying to get something out of you or making herself look better to the people around you.

12.) She Always Victimizes Herself

Every time she is at fault, she will immediately make herself look like the innocent victim!

When you disagree with her, you are attacking her!

If you confront her with a lie, she will turn the situation around on you and accuse you of something even worse!

If you distance yourself from her, she will tell everyone who will listen to her that you never visit because you are ungrateful, nasty, and toxic.

On social media, her account will turn into a self-inflicted pity party. She wants the world to know that she is an innocent victim.

All she has ever shown you is love, generosity, and support.

You are the one who needs to come back and apologize. It is your job to fix the problem!

Unfortunately, when things are handled properly, your mother is left alone – without any toxic narcissistic supply.

Related Article: 7 Things Narcissists Are Most Afraid Of

13.) She Sabotages Your Relationships

Growing up, she always said that your friends weren’t good enough if they didn’t immediately warm up to her and give her attention.

As you age, you mother will not stop interfering in this part of your personal life.

She may attempt to tell you who you can and cannot date.

If she is deeply psychotic, she may even try to deliberately sabotage your relationships by telling your significant other bad stories about you and planting seeds of doubt in their minds about your relationship.

If she feels that a relationship is getting in the way of your dependency on her, she will attempt to end it.

This leaves you deeply lonely, un-trusting, and dependent on her again!

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