PATREON EXCLUSIVE: The Impact Of A Toxic Mother On Your Development

"I'm just a 13 year old boy, haven't I done enough?" That triggered me so hard, I had to start taking deep breaths. I hovered between crying and breaking something in rage.

Thanks for this video. My mother is alive but I do not have a connection to her. In fact she is selfish and that mixed up with a simple mind. Not a loving and caring simple structured soul but a selfish structured soul that seeks validation from the outside, while being manipulative in an "cringe" kind of way. When I was younger, I was seen and used as a substitute for my father not in an acting way (no work, no money) but she would use me for her resentful emotions. Now this is the other way around: she wishes to have contact, to get a few words or a phonecall. I have no connection, so even if I do enoy it a little bit that it COULD BE understood as revenge, that is not my intention. She is simply almost a stranger and a stranger does not get much of my expensive time, except conciously (stranger will see me on the street, my mother will see me when I visit my father). If she ever needs help to live I will not use a finger. The state will have to pay and she will get a place at a home for old persons. This doesn't make me, never, project old emotions into female lovers or girlfriends. It just makes me bitter on the inside from time to time and I gotta overcome it always to keep on going in the daily life. Works good! So my toxic mother did me one favour: She brought me to the light of the day. I also look like a genetical copy of my father, so it was pretty easy for her as visual, non-deep, simple structured person to be superficial and see my dad in my persona although i am different (intellectual and look a bit different). I would agree that a toxic mother can be a tragic experience as can lead to different problems. I also have seen male narcs that not only were narcs but learned this behaviour from their toxic mother to compensate.

I can relate. Really relate. My mom is narcissistic af and put so much responsibility and blame on me ( i shouldn’t be like that pos my dad) and my dad wasn’t equipped for the utter combative insanity of it all, even being around and married to this day. I know i have been emotionally and physically battered into form by my mom snd that is ultra unattractive to women But at the same time, engaging in my masculine is so hard. I also think i should resent my folks, but im over it i hope. Or i haven’t gotten there yet. Its A horrible fate that it has left me in in all honesty it broke me and ruined my life out of an object stand point. But again I don’t actually feel any resentment I am doing the work but hell it takes so much time and work and I don’t know at what point I am on this journey

Peter

😭 damn this cuts deep

Peter

I would like to tell my story. It starts with my grandmother. She was a teacher, one of the really strict ones. She was tough mother for my mother, she didn’t do any hugs and cuddling, only formal kind of care with lots of expectations. Little emotions, stoic as fuck. But grandfather was kind and sweet, my mother loved him deeply. Unfortunately, he died in car crash when she was twenty or something. This loss heavily impacted both mother and grandmother, they were living like ghosts for some time, their days were dark and meaningless. After years it got better. My mother and father fell in love. It was obvious as hell that he was not going to be a good father, but mother and grandmother couldn’t see that, they were blinded by loss of my grandfather and urge to fill the emptiness, to get the MAN ENERGY back in the house. Very traditional mindset. The time in Russia after USSR collapse was tough, so it also had some impact. As the result, my mother and father married and I was born, but he had zero interest in being father, so he left the family and they divorced. My only memory of my father during my early childhood is him picking me up from the bed and accidentally bumping my head at furniture. He was THAT unfit to be a father, damn. So I was raised with mother and grandmother. And it was some crazy shit. They didn’t beat me, they didn’t shout at me, they were not alcoholics or whores, but they really-really controlled every step of mine and not only step, but also every thought and emotion. Of course they did classic things like telling me that men are evil and my father is Satan himself, that women have it tough and so on, of course, but what was really outstanding is that they were constantly brainwashing me to become the HUSBAND-like creature, the protector they needed since death of grandfather. I was getting excellent marks at all subjects all my life because they were constantly telling me that I have to be their shield, their protection, the MAN-in-the-HOUSE, to study, to make money, to do career, to ignore girls until I am like in my 30s or something. The last one is really crazy. After many years of struggling they both fell into religion. Really orthodoxal puritan shit. Whenever there was a kissing on the TV screen, my mother shouted to me to close my eyes. Until I was like 16. But this is only a half story… When I was seven, my mother got married again. The reason is same: urging to bring the man energy in the house and for me. My younger brother was born and we moved from my grandmother’s flat to my stepfather’s one-room flat. It was really hard for 3 people and infant to live in one-room flat. The stepfather also didn’t beat me and didn’t shout at me, but he did the shit the other way: he was trying to MAN ME UP. For example, one day he decided to lecture me on the anatomy of penis (he used his one as the example). Damn, that was some traumatizing experience. He also sent me to aikido, which was really hard for a fat feminine glasses nerd. We used to play chess together, but he never allowed me to win. For him and mother I was always not enough in everything. I was also attending religious school, which was a hell-like experience. Priest children gangs were bullying normies. For example, one girl in fourth grade kissed another boy, so the priest’s kids have started calling her a whore, until she had mental breakdown. She changed school after some time. Lots of shit, damn. One of sparse good memories is when he took me to the cinema once. The movie was called “Night at the Museum”. It brings tears to my eyes now as I write it — it was like the only day in my life when I felt like I have father. But this is the only one. He was nuts and alcoholic. After some years my mother and my stepfather got divorced. After that me, my mother and my younger brother moved back to my grandmother’s place and I changed school. The new one was also terrible, I was bullied by boys and girls alike. Our class had multiple bully gangs. My only friends were the fat redhead guy and the anime nerd guy. Damn. It was really dark. After school it got better. Since my mother and grandmother were forcing me to do carreer, I really had some good results, so working and making money was some natural stuff for me. That’s it. After school I went to another educational place which can’t be properly translated into English. And since then I was working. I didn’t get higher education like college or university. Not because I was poor or something — I got job in software development with good salary, so I felt like I don’t need it. I was working since I was 19 years old. Now I am 23. A year ago my boss told me that I had to go get some therapy, since I was acting unstable over my mistakes and mistakes of colleagues. And I did. And you can’t imagine how much it helped me. But my anger was immeasurable, when I started to understand the shit my family did to me. I left them. I went to Moscow, the capital, to live there alone far from them. I was living in small poor border city before. And I am really happy that I did this. It really helps to live freely, to think my thoughts, to feel my emotions, to not be constantly told what I should think, feel and do. They were crazily dramaqueening pretty much every step of mine, if the step was in the direction they didn’t like. And it’s gone, now I am myself. That’s it. I am still attending therapy after one year by the way. Feeling better with each week. The funny thing is: by constantly pushing me to study, to compete, to get only excellent marks, they really forged me to become crazy successfull for my age, I am 23, but working as manager in software development and getting a lot of money. But… the girls are the problem. Not ashamed to admit that I am still a virgin, I get zero female attention. It is crazy hard for me to talk to girls. I fell in love many times, tried dating apps, confessed my feelings multiple times, but it didn’t work out. One time I even had strange experience which I considered dating and acting like boyfriend and girlfriend, but it ended. Well, it bothers me to have little success in relationships, but I am not going to sit down and cry. For anyone who have read this: thank you. This story has a sad beginning, but now I’m fine, I’m alright. I feel good, I go to gym to train with dedication, I do hobbies, attend a club to discuss economical stuff, trying new things all the time. And I rarely speak to mother and grandmother. Life is beautiful, I just really need to figure out that last part — relationship with girls. You really help on that one, Alex. And damn you have a cool name — Alex Grace :)

My situation is a little weird. So my mom being the wonderful person she is decided to heal me when I was very young. I had a diagnosis of Autism and she worked with me on it, changing my diet, feeding me supplements and praying. Thank the grand graces of heaven, I can now say I’m through with Autism! But this loving journey is an emotional heartstring she uses to her imminent advantage. Essentially my mom is overly masculine in her actions and uses astrology and her own past trauma to justify it. My father is the breadwinner, but he’s demotivated and very feminine as a role model, someone I find it very hard to even muster up the desire to look towards for an example. My mother dominates my father, especially once she cracked down on a secret he was hiding from her and everyone else. Once she found out, she lost all respect for him and made him work very hard to please her and get back in her good graces. Meanwhile from the age of thirteen until now, my mother has vented to me over how she was treated and abused by the world... I’m eighteen - all I want to do is leave them. Am I in the wrong to desperately want that?

does he really read every comment

I came to terms with the kind of woman that my mother was much later in life. As a child, I didn't fully understand the actions that my mother took, but reflecting back on them now, I can see that there were certainly issues. My parents divorced when I was 3 years old, and I never asked for any reasons why. As an adult, my father explained things to me (when I asked, it's not information he gave to me unsolicited, he didn't want to ruin my opinion of my mother). Apparently my mother was very promiscuous, and cheated on my father multiple times. So much so that my father has doubts about being my sister's biological father (she's 1.5 years older than me). While I can't remember my parents relationship to each other (I was too young), I do recall the handful of relationships that my mother had with other men since then. There was the family man who wanted kids of his own. My mother left him because she was unwilling to have more children. Then came the married man. My mother played the role of "the other woman" for a time. I didn't know that this is what was happening at the time, but again, reflecting back on this as an adult, it is clear that this was the situation. She left this relationship when she realized that he was never REALLY going to leave his wife for her. Then came the single dad. He was a nice enough guy, but my sister and I (who were high-school aged at this point in time) really did not get along with his kid, who was 9 years old. She eventually cheated on him with another married man (this one was at least in the process of a divorce, unlike the last one). And they're still together to this day. All-in-all, I'd say that my mother qualifies as a low-quality woman. And while I feel that I made it through childhood largely unscathed, I worry about the values that she instilled in my sister.

Just joined today and am watching back - You are killing it with great topics. Anyways, this one hits home as the oldest of three brothers. I had and still have a good relationship with my parents, but my father is extremely masculine at work (CEO of a mid-sized company) and extremely feminine in his personal life. He is a "happy wife, happy life"-er, which is a saying I generally abhore. My mother was incredibly passionate about none of us dating seriously until we were at least 25, and my father only echoed the message. As she aged, my mom started developing narcissistic tendencies and generally began to make everything about her. When I challenged this in my teenage years, I would generally be told by my father that my mother had been good to me. The entire time I lived with my family, I found myself unable to be intimate with another women because while I understood what masculinity was, applying it to relationships felt unreachable for me. I felt completely unattractive to the opposite sex and knew what I was doing wrong, but found it incredibly difficult to be assertive or decisive around other women. I never quite felt like their social equal because of this, so all of my romantic advances were rooted in my own shame. I continued to have a good relationship with both parents throughout all of this, so in my early twenties I was in conflict with myself over the resentment I was building up for the example they set for me. It took many years of self work, introspection, and therapy through multiple mediums to learn to address this. Today, I'm much more comfortable balancing these demons, but I would be lying if it didn't impact my viewpoint on how attractive I am (especially on my bad days).

Having to help my mom take care of my three siblings. I got a taste of what it was like to take care of kids. Long story short I didn't like it at all and that stuck with me for years which resulted in me saying/ thinking/ believing that I didn't want kids at all. Because raising kids (or in my case helping my mom raise my siblings with finance as well) while living in poverty showed me the reality of poor responsibility of the parent(s) who choose to bring kids into that type of environment. However I do wish to have one maybe two kids only one day only if the partner and myself are financially, healthy, and mentally whole. I refuse to even consider bringing in kids into poverty at all. NOPE

SnowDragonCQC

Okay you got it, just give me until the end of the week and you’ll get your page.

Yeah man, feel free to send it to me over DM. If you can, try and keep it to just 1 page so I can use it for a video :)

Alexander Grace

Alex, I can not stress enough upon the fact that we need to talk and I need to send a email to you for a YouTube video on this. I want to share so you can learn more about what it is like to be the youngest of three with two older sisters, and a single mom. I don’t ever share my story because it is not relevant most the time but for you and your platform I think what I’ve gone through can help a lot of people and I believe many have gone through what I’ve experienced. I want them to understand that they aren’t alone. Some context about me. I am 23 years old, I have divorced parents, my Dad was abusive and is in jail now, for reasons I will not share for that would be too personal for me. I do not wish for a pitty party I just want you to use what I say as an outlet for others and you can be 100% honest with your thoughts about my situation as well, hearing no bullshit commentary helps me better understand myself and I like how you structure your thoughts and how you portray your truth. If you want I will start compiling my story and send it to you. For I have a lot to speak upon with this. Thanks for your time and your videos. Lastly, if you want to you can pick my brain as much as you want, I wouldn’t have a issue speaking with you on my story.

That hit the spot and I almost cried. My mother would come home more or less drunk and complain everytime single time she had visited whoever - most of the time she'd mumble for her self in the kitchen. She never owned a spine. She told me once, that she would hit me and my brother if we cried while she changed our diaper, and that we wouldn't breastfeed. In our teens we hit her a couple times in frustration after the usual hour filled with insults when we were hiding in our rooms. Before those episodes I remember me sitting in my room next to her and I provoked her and then she hit me for the first and only time since infancy. Immediately as a reflex I hit her back. I've felt sorry for my mom bc her life seemed to be not worth living, so for 10 years or more I wished her dead for her own sake primarily. In my adult life I've considered myself a feminist, but I didn't take shit from women either. Never been violent though - just cold with no anger. The latest years I've wondered if I ever were a true feminst, so I don't use that word anymore.

Is it nuts that i want close friends that get me those emotions and say that is all ok in the process? I have friends that call me out constantly. Even my girlfriend is like that and i'm also like that. I am caring when i need to be but i only accept negative emotions. I cannot respond to positive reenforcement actually. I get compliments as something weird and i can only correct myself with the negative positions. I had an overcaring mother and rarely saw my father so i had no development. I had it all and people think it's strange to have it all and become screwed in the process. Well here i am. The last decade was about healing myself and i couldn't figure out a lot of stuff since i have some nasty side effects from a desease that shits itself literally in my brain. I was diagnosed with MS last year and let me tell you. It was the best moment of my life. I finally had something to blame for a lot, not all, of my behaviour in the past 30 years. And a reason to live. Found my 42 in a weird turn of events. I lack some masculinity sure, that's being treated, but i also believe men nowadays won't have masculine traits as well. I see that in 20's and women going beserk since they don't have what men should have. No one bats an eye. It's sad that it's not discussed more often but i guess being with a Self human decision making mindset knowing, as Nietsche said, that we killed God and there's nothing awaiting for us, niilishm is an escape. A really bad one. I don't know where i was heading with this now. But it's a comment. Hope it helps

Your childhood.. I'm so sorry brother, sounds criminal :(

Alexander Grace

You hit the nail on the head. I had a mother who turned my brother into a surrogate father until he left the house, then it was my turn until I was old enough to leave myself. I would say that my experience didn't just stop at surrogacy but went deeper as she is mentally ill. Whenever she had something personal to talk about we had to go to the soccer field near us or to the beech and go into the water because 'the house is bugged and the neighborhood is trying to destroy us'. You can imagine how damaging this was to deal with. Best I remember it started when I was 12. I am sure it was occurring by the time I was 13 because I remember vividly having to burry a 'bugged' phone to keep my dad from getting to it and removing the tape....Anyway, fast forward a few years and I see women as angels. Fast forward a few years after that when I joined the Marine Corps and I hate women. Thankfully I have moved past both of those trains of thought. My struggle now is knowing how to socialize. I feel so far behind in so many aspects of my life that it is almost crushing. I find myself taking extreme measures (risky financial investments, very strict diets, etc) to make up for perceived or evident deficiencies compared to my peers. I follow Jordan Peterson as well and I logically agree that it is better to compare yourself to who you were yesterday than to who someone else is today, but I find it difficult to change my default pattern, especially when I am overwhelmed with a feeling of inadequacy/caring too much. Right now I am working to recognize that everyone who hasn't dealt with their past is fucked up in some sort of way; some people just hide it better. Anyway. Those are my thoughts. Great video and I appreciate you approaching the subject.

My parents had a loveless marriage, and my domineering mother substituted me for my emotionally absent father. We had an inappropriately close relationship and she poisoned my mind with lies about female superiority and eternal innocence. At first I believed her lies about men and hated my dad, and blamed him for the state of their marriage. I had a real white knight tendency and thought that the way to a woman’s heart was to be her eternal defender and provider. As I got older and grew apart from her, the scales fell from my eyes, and I realized that she had been feeding me a steady diet of lies. I also resented how, after their divorce, she made me responsible for her emotional well being and constantly nagged me. Gradually, I began to hate her. This hatred spilled over into all my relationships with women, and I’m still working through it in therapy to this day. There is way too much attention given to abusive fathers and not enough given to abusive mothers.

This topic reminds me of a video I watched of a dominatrix saying that narcissistic mothers create submissive boys who gravitate towards female-domination fantasies. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1LVSXU0lnzs

My mom and dad married at 18. Divorced at 26. My mom remarried at 28. She married a man who had sole custody of his son from a prior marriage. My step brother was 4 years younger than me. His birth mother was bipolar and he suffered at her hands things that were insane (hence why my stepdad got custody). My mother hated my birth father, always spoke bad about him, and that anger fueled her to manipulate and passively aggressively berate my step dad and brother. On top of that, over the years my step dad’s ex physically attacked my mother and made her life pretty hellish. My mom ended up taking that fear and anger out on my step brother and step dad. She turned to religion in a very cultish way as a means controlling the family. We went to family therapy for a few months as a kids. My step brother went alone for maybe a year - but they stopped taking him. He is probably close to MENSA level in IQ, almost scored perfect on his SATs but barely passed high school. He ended up joining the military and was on a nuclear for sub for a few years before he was discharged for reasons I am not 100% certain of. Now he is in his late 30s, divorced with a kid, living in a really messed up situation, potentially on drugs, and barely making by as a Lyft driver (although I can’t entirely trust my mothers accounts of him and haven’t seen him in over 10 years myself).

I had a strong mother and a strong father, no brothers or sisters. My mother was strong of will, liked to tinker and fix things, took care of the month to month bills and finances (my father did the yearly income taxes), wasn't scared of much, athletic in her day and all that shaped my favorable outlook on feminism for most of my life. She was not toxic, very nurturing and is still the most dear woman to me. I think some of that was actually too good. My view of women was based solely on her. When it came to dating and relationships, I expected to have a strong woman who would turn right around and nurture me like a mother. I am now at 55 y.o. only just realizing that women who are love interests don't want to mother me, will not love me unconditionally, and want me to lead with even trivial things like what restaurant to go to and such (I struggle with trivial decisions yet I show no hesitation with important decisions, go figure). My late father let my mother manage a lot of things as she was better at juggling things while my father was just pure concetration. When it came to intellectual things my father was very alpha, but in other ways not. My mother always drove the car, for instance, because he just didn't care to - very unusual. So, I find myself learning now about the importance of male-female polarity in intimate relationships, but I find myself and my personal history a haphazard mixture of alpha and beta qualities much like my father.

Todd McDaniels

I basically come from a single mother. Though I don’t consider my mother toxic at all. My dad was incredibly abusive when I was really young. When I was 2-3ish he broke my arm, went to jail, and hasn’t come back. I have 2 younger sisters and that’s it. My mom got married to my step dad when I was about 8. He’s very emotionally distant though. I’m 17 now to put it in perspective. Both my mom and stepdad work, my mom runs a daycare and my stepdad an oilfield worker. I don’t know how my mom or stepdad have effect me psychologically, but my birthdad effected me a lot when I was younger. I never told anyone, but back when I was around 10ish I thought that I was going to be like my birthdad. I thought that being an abusive prick was just genetics. That I would be just like him. It effected me a lot, something I remember promising myself in elementary school was that I’d never date, marry, ect. Because I believed I’d do the same thing to my spouse my dad did. Just being manipulative and abusive. A resolution my young mind wen tho was to train myself to be more patient, gentle, ect. And it did. I was a complete doormat with lil self respect and terrified of authority. It was a massive thing that effected me into my preteens and when I was around 13-14 I had actively decided I wouldn’t let him bother me anymore. I started thinking of myself more positively.. I’ve been watching it since. It 100% started with how to pick up girls lol. Through those videos I learned how important it is to have self respect. Since then I’ve become more willing to forgive myself and I definitely feel like a full, robust person instead of just the son of a no show dad, or a doormat that people can use. If I’ve noticed anything about myself it’s that you were right about the saving thing. About 60% of the girls I’ve been attracted to fit what you said. Just just from a bad home life. The ones who did drugs, drank, had family issues, ect. I thought it was just coincidence not that a part of me was trying to save them. The other thing I noticed is that I was 100% a “nice guy” just helping people all time time. I never blew up on a girl because I was rejected. But I definitely feel like I had all the signs of being one. Other than that, I can’t really identify anything else about me

Being guided by external father figures is preferable to having a toxic dad in a nuclear family.

Oliver

Kyle, thanks for your post, I'm very curious about your story! I know a ton of children of single mothers (including myself and my sister) and almost none of them had a father who was in the picture. Those of us who did, it was sporadic. So it's foreign to me to hear such a positive experience. Sincere questions here, I apologize if you are offended and I won't be offended if you tell me to fuck off: Why did the instability of moving each week not have a negative effect on you?  Did your parents live in the same school district? What address did you use on applications or driver's license, mom or dad's?  If your dad was a decent guy, how did you handle mom's boyfriends? Or didn't she have them? Were the family that helped raise you men or women, or both?

Jennifer Coopman

This is why I came here, to hear perspectives like this, thank you so much!  I was raised by a single mother who bad-mouthed men in general and who hated my dad (although she did insist on me seeing him throughout my childhood, thank god.) But I grew up without brothers so I couldn't possibly have fathomed what it would be like for a boy in that situation. I'm so grateful to hear this perspective! My 19 yr old nephew is the product of a single mother and having terrible  difficulty in life already. Hopefully getting insights like this will help me relate to him better.

Jennifer Coopman

I had the opposite experience (thankfully!) and I can attest to the positive effects it had on me when I was growing up. My mom and dad split when I was 2, they were not married when they did so. My mom and dad agreed to 50-50 custody which meant they would trade me every week. My mom, who had the leverage via family courts, decided it would be best if I got to see my dad just as much as I saw her. Through that, I developed the work ethic, perseverance, grit of my father and learned the compassion, kindness, and social skills from my mom. I noticed early on that I was more compliant to structure than my classmates. I had no problem being kind to others and worked hard to make good grades and trained hard for football. I have been successful at most things I have tried and through several failures, I have bounced back well. What I didn’t realize until later was I was blessed with an unorthodox but, decent family that came together to raise me. Thank my lucky stars I got that kind of family and not the “we don’t care about you” kind that some people end up with. It had its flaws, but I am eternally grateful that my mom was able to check her anger after breaking up with my father and let me see my father. Through that, I did see the same flaws that my mom saw in him but, I was able to come to that determination myself. I think that’s important, let your children make their own thoughts about their family and peers, don’t make them think your way.

Kyle Worden