9 Signs Of Emotionally Abusive Parents + What To Do About It, From Therapists

"Emotional abuse is any nonphysical behavior or attitude that is designed to control, subdue, punish, or isolate another person through the use of humiliation or fear," intimate partner violence experts Günnur Karakurt, Ph.D., LMFT, and Kristin E. Silver write in the Violence and Victims1 journal. "It targets the emotional and psychological well-being of the victim, and it is often a precursor to physical abuse."

Emotional abuse can look like a lot of things, but according to relationship therapist Ken Page, LCSW, it can be defined as anything devaluing, demeaning, or neglectful to another person's feelings or experiences, "which leaves them feeling less-than, ashamed, incapable, and not valuable."

Another subtle sign of emotionally abusive parents that's harder to spot is inconsistency. As Page notes, inconsistency based on how the parent is feeling any given time (aka something is OK today, but the same thing gets the child terribly punished tomorrow) can leave a child without any sense of clarity or control.

Page says a parent consistently ignoring their child's bids for attention can be another subtle form of emotional abuse. The idea of "bidding for attention," in this case, would be a child trying to get their parents' recognition, attention, and/or validation.

Gaslighting is a telltale sign of emotional abuse. It involves psychologically manipulating someone to question their own reality, feelings, and experiences of events, in order to maintain control over that person. It can sound like, "I never said that—you're making it up," or "You're being dramatic about this."

Parents are certainly not immune to gaslighting their children, and as therapist Aki Rosenberg, LMFT, previously told mbg, "Gaslighting at its core is always about self-preservation and the maintenance of power/control—namely, the power/control to construct a narrative that keeps the gaslighter in the 'right' and [the other person] in the 'wrong.'"

Lastly, emotional incest, also sometimes called covert incest, is another form of emotional abuse and involves a parent using their child for emotional fulfillment. As clinical sexologist and psychotherapist Robert Weiss, Ph.D., MSW, previously wrote for mbg, "The child is forced to support the abusive adult by serving as a trusted confidante or an 'emotional spouse.'"

Just as emotional abuse exists on a spectrum, so, too, do its effects, which can range from mild to severe, depending on how much abuse a child endured.

Taking a look at the research, one paper published in the Pakistan Journal of Medical Sciences2 concluded that psychological abuse is tied to a variety of problems, including but not limited to post-traumatic stress disorder, depression, anxiety, substance abuse, personality disorders, low self-esteem, aggression, emotional unresponsiveness, and neuroticism.

As Page explains, children with emotionally abusive parents may suppress themselves, or alternatively, act out on their feelings and impulses. He also notes that as humans, we mirror what was done to us if we haven't processed it. "And that's why the Buddhists say when you heal a family lineage wound like this, you heal seven generations past and seven generations future," he says.

And when children replicate these behaviors, either in the form of negative self-talk or lashing out at others in the way their parents lashed out at them, they're carrying on that family chain. "It keeps the experience of emotional abuse alive in your body, in your heart—because when you talk to yourself that way, your body takes it as truth. And so you are actually replicating the pain of the abuse you experienced in your childhood," Page explains.

Before we get into how to handle emotional abuse from a parent, it's worth noting that no parent gets away without some behavior that causes pain to their child, according to Page. "If you were a perfect parent, you would be cursing your child because they would never be able to free themselves from your perfection, to rebel and break away," he says, adding, "Your child needs to see your brokenness so they can dis-identify with that and say, 'I want to be different.'"

It's inevitable that at one point or another, parents are going to unintentionally harm their children emotionally, he explains. They key, however, is parents recognizing when it's happening, listening to their children, and making adjustments.

The first step to healing from growing up with emotionally abusive parents is recognizing that it happened (or is still happening) in the first place, which can be tough.

Once you've pinpointed the behaviors that need to be worked on, and if you think your parents will be open enough to hearing you, you can try having an honest dialogue about the way you've been hurt. Page says family therapy can be a really helpful tool in this case.

If family therapy doesn't seem like a real possibility, individual therapy (such as cognitive and/or dialectical behavior therapy, EMDR, or brain spotting) can also be useful. In fact, it may even be beneficial to see a family therapist and a one-on-one therapist, if possible.

And because emotional abuse can wind up bleeding into our other relationships, Page explains, it's also so necessary to find friends who you feel genuinely supported by and safe with. "People who don't replicate that kind of abuse to you are so important because if this is being replicated, you won't be able to heal it," he notes.