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Quotes tagged “Toxic Parents”

“You know, that's the burden of having a parent. They haven't a clue what they're doing. And every mistake they make chips away at us. As we get older, we got to glue the pieces back together. And we can blame them. But here's the thing. They're human. They make mistakes.”
— Pray Tell, POSE, Season 1: Mother's Day
Tagged: Parents, Having Bad Parents, Toxic Parents, We're All Just Humans, Trying Our Best
“To be a child of snobs deserves its own taxonomy, treatment and pathway to health. Part of this involves overcoming anger towards one’s carers – and realising that snobs are not evil, merely wounded.”
— Alain de Botton, The Children of Snobs
Tagged: How To Think, Empathy, Toxic Parents
“I love the way she survived. Survival looked good on her. There were no dark marks under her eyes. Maybe deep inside, but I liked the way she looked through them and laughed at life. She did it gracefully. She’d walk over glass and through fire, but still smiled. And honestly, I’m not interested in people who haven’t yet had their heart ripped out, or know what it feels like to lose everything.”
— J Raymond, Survival Quotes
Tagged: Toxic Parents, Toxic Relationships, Toxic Half
“I often wonder why I carry all this guilt When it's you that helped me put up all these walls I've built Shadows stir at night through a crack in the door The echo of a broken child screaming "please no more”
— Christina Aguilera, I'm Okay
Tagged: Toxic Parents, Abuse, Toxic Relationships
“It's not your fault. ”
— Robin Williams, Good Will Hunting
Tagged: Child Abuse, Emotional Abuse, Toxic Parents
“Unfortunately, because emotional abuse is often tolerated or because the abusive parents are very secretive in their abuse (hiding their true selves when in public), emotionally abused children will assume that how they were treated at home was natural. They have no frame of reference. And so, the child will develop a skewed sense of what a healthy relationship is.”
— Veronica Jarski, For Adult Survivors of Emotional Child Abuse
Tagged: Emotional Abuse, Toxic Parents, Toxic Relationships
“Some scars don't hurt. Some scars are numb. Some scars rid you of the capacity to feel anything ever again.”
— Joyce Rachelle, All the Lines: Poems
Tagged: Toxic Parents, Toxic, Abuse
“The greater a child’s terror, and the earlier it is experienced, the harder it becomes to develop a strong and healthy sense of self”
— Nathaniel Branden, The Six Pillars of Self-Esteem: The Definitive Work on Self-Esteem by the Leading Pioneer in the Field
Tagged: Toxic Parents, Relationships, Toxic, Abuse
“Abuse manipulates and twists a child’s natural sense of trust and love. Her innocent feelings are belittled or mocked and she learns to ignore her feelings. She can’t afford to feel the full range of feelings in her body while she’s being abused—pain, outrage, hate, vengeance, confusion, arousal. So she short-circuits them and goes numb. For many children, any expression of feelings, even a single tear, is cause for more severe abuse. Again, the only recourse is to shut down. Feelings go underground.”
— Laura Davis, Allies in Healing: When the Person You Love Was Sexually Abused as a Child
Tagged: Toxic Parents, Abuse, Relationships, Toxic Half
“Many toxic parents compare one sibling unfavorably with another to make the target child feel that he's not doing enough to gain parental affection. This motivates the child to do whatever the parents want in order to regain their favor. This divide-and-conquer technique is often unleashed against children who become a little too independent, threatening the balance of the family system.”
— Susan Forward, Toxic Parents: Overcoming Their Hurtful Legacy and Reclaiming Your Life
Tagged: Toxic Parents, Toxic, Abuse
“You have had such a deep hunger for real human contact for such a long time that when it is offered, you consume it ravenously. Such clinging and highly dependent behavior eventually forces the other person to reject you, and you take this as further proof that you are unlovable.”
— Steven Farmer, Adult Children of Abusive Parents: A Healing Program for Those Who Have Been Physically, Sexually, or Emotionally Abused
Tagged: Toxic Parents, Toxic Relationships, Toxic
“You isolate yourself to keep others from finding out about your abusive past.”
— Steven Farmer, Adult Children of Abusive Parents: A Healing Program for Those Who Have Been Physically, Sexually, or Emotionally Abused
Tagged: Toxic Parents, Letting Go, Moving On, Acceptance
“Fighting became a way of life and seemed perfectly normal for your family.”
— Steven Farmer, Adult Children of Abusive Parents: A Healing Program for Those Who Have Been Physically, Sexually, or Emotionally Abused
Tagged: Toxic Parents, Relationships, Toxic Half, Toxic, Parents
“There was little respect in your family for your personal belongings, either, which are an extension of our personal boundaries. Our parents may have sold, thrown out, or given away without your knowledge or consent things that belonged to you. This lack of respect left you with an unstable sense of identity, an uncertainty about where to draw the line between yourself and others.”
— Steven Farmer, Adult Children of Abusive Parents: A Healing Program for Those Who Have Been Physically, Sexually, or Emotionally Abused
Tagged: Toxic Parents, Abusive Parents, Toxic
“Adult children of toxic parents have an especially difficult time with their anger because they grew up in families where emotional expression was discouraged. Anger was something only parents had the privilege of displaying.”
— Susan Forward, Craig Buck, Toxic Parents: Overcoming Their Hurtful Legacy and Reclaiming Your Life
Tagged: Toxic Parents, Toxic, Parents
“You must let go of the responsibility for the painful events of your childhood and put it where it belongs.”
— Susan Forward, Craig Buck, Toxic Parents: Overcoming Their Hurtful Legacy and Reclaiming Your Life
Tagged: Toxic Parents, Toxic Relationships, Toxic
“You are an adult and can withstand your discomfort for the purpose of becoming your own person.”
— Susan Forward, Craig Buck, Toxic Parents: Overcoming Their Hurtful Legacy and Reclaiming Your Life
Tagged: Toxic Relationships, Toxic Parents, Toxic
“As long as you continue to react so strongly to them, you give them the power to upset you, which allows them to control you.”
— Susan Forward, Craig Buck, Toxic Parents: Overcoming Their Hurtful Legacy and Reclaiming Your Life
Tagged: Toxic Parents, Toxic Relationship, Parent Relationships, Abuse
“The truth is, if we rebel in reaction to our parents, we are being controlled just as surely as if we submit.”
— Susan Forward, Craig Buck, Toxic Parents: Overcoming Their Hurtful Legacy and Reclaiming Your Life
Tagged: Toxic Parents, Abuse, Relationships
“Direct control usually involves intimidation and is frequently humiliating. Your feelings and needs must be subordinated to those of your parents. You are dragged into a bottomless pit of ultimatums. Your opinion is worthless; your needs and desires are irrelevant. The imbalance of power is tremendous.”
— Susan Forward, Craig Buck, Toxic Parents: Overcoming Their Hurtful Legacy and Reclaiming Your Life
Tagged: Toxic Parents, Abusive Parents, Tough Relationships

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This page was created by our editorial team. Each page is manually curated, researched, collected, and issued by our staff writers. Quotes contained on this page have been double checked for their citations, their accuracy and the impact it will have on our readers.

Kelly Peacock is an accomplished poet and social media expert based in Brooklyn, New York. Kelly has a Bachelor's degree in creative writing from Farieligh Dickinson University and has contributed to many literary and cultural publications. Kelly assists on a wide variety of quote inputting and social media functions for Quote Catalog. Visit her personal website here.

Kendra Syrdal is a writer, editor, partner, and senior publisher for The Thought & Expression Company. Over the last few years she has been personally responsible for writing, editing, and producing over 30+ million pageviews on Thought Catalog.