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A question I get all the time is, “Are my narcissistic parents going to be safe grandparents?” It’s a sensible question. Generations of people are having children while they reel from the realization that they were emotionally manipulated and abused by their own parents. What are they to do? They want happy families; they want their children to be happy, but they don’t want their children to experience the same trauma and doubt.

Well, listen up, adult children of narcissistic parents: your narcissistic parent isn’t going to change. Not really.

The vast majority of narcissists refuse to change or improve. It’s the nature of the disorder. Oh, they can put on new masks. Play new roles, but the games are always the same.

Putting your children into that environment is to guarantee them more of the same. Abuse and heartbreak are cyclic in families. Breaking those cycles requires breaking them in ourselves and for our children. Don’t turn your back and pretend that it’s all going to go away. Your narcissistic parents don’t need to be around your children in any serious capacity, and it’s up to you to ensure that.

Be careful when your narcissistic parents are around your kids.

The argument for limiting the time your toxic parents spend with your kids is pretty simple. A narcissist is a narcissist. If they didn’t have empathy for you, they wouldn’t have it for your children. They’re just going to source a new supply. They’re going to repeat the patterns and act out that same demeaning, emotionally insidious behavior they always did. Don’t fall for the games. You’re responsible for protecting your children from the monsters under the bed.

Creating a new supply

Foremost, narcissistic parents use their newfound status to create fresh supplies for themselves. The narcissist is nothing if not in need of constant admiration, and they create behaviors that demand this. Your children won’t escape this pattern. Narcissistic grandparents use their children to create new images for themselves. And they especially use it to shield themselves from the blooming insecurities that come with aging in a youth-obsessed society.

Demanding behavior

Demanding behavior comes pretty standard across the caliber of narcissists. Not only do they demand admiration and prioritization, they also demand total control too. Your narcissistic parent isn’t going to be happy simply playing the background granny. No. If they are going to be involved in your child’s life, they will (more than likely) demand to do so substantially, which marks your child’s life or development. (AKA: They want to leave their “mark.”)

Cycling new neglect

Many narcissistic parents are neglectful. They prioritize their own needs and will abandon their children (materially and emotionally) in devastating ways. Think back to that emotional vacancy you suffered through as a child. Do you want that same emotional lack in your child’s upbringing? Think about the type of relationship they have with their grandparent vs. what kind of relationship you really want them to have.

Demeaning lessons

If you were raised by a true narcissist, then you know how nasty their nature can be when they get disappointed or rejected. Call out their insecurities. You’re dust. Disappoint their expectations? They’re going to ruin you. That’s a terrible lesson for your children to learn. But that’s what they will learn as they watch their parents treat those around them with demeaning behavior. And in this way, they teach them how to act (and react) narcissistically in their own way.

Grand manipulations

Manipulation is always the name of the game — especially if your parent is a covert narcissist. These individuals know of no other way but manipulation. They mirror outstanding traits long enough to make you comfortable, then fall back into patterns of selfish behavior and backhanded demands. When things don’t go their way, they lash out emotionally. They will do the same to your kids. The narcissist will always manipulate and lie to your children if it means getting what they want.

Playing favorite games

Narcissistic grandparents are notorious for playing "the favorite" game against siblings and grandchildren. If you give your parents the space, you can find these patterns repeating in the lives of your kids. They will pit siblings against one another in an attempt to create a division that enables further abuse and manipulation. Think about it. If your children resent one another, they are more likely to lean on your toxic mother or father.

Restarting the abuse

Many narcissists can’t help but be verbally and physically abusive. This is especially true when their fuse has been lit, or they have been disappointed. They can lash out and say horribly destructive things. More insidiously, they may just enjoy the manipulation and corruption of pitting your children against one another (or even you). They restart their patterns of abuse and can also lash out emotionally in abusive ways to your kids.

Emotional explosions

Remember those emotional explosions from your own childhood? You couldn’t predict them, and you couldn’t predict them either. Remember how they made you feel? Remember the fear? The shame and insecurity it created? Those same traumas will become your child’s if you don’t protect them. Your narcissistic parent will traumatize your children — just like you were traumatized — by blowing up and emotionally vomiting negativity all over them.

How to protect your children from narcissist grandparents.

Sure, it’s not realistic to completely keep your children away from your parents. After all, you want your children to have some relationship with their grandparents, right? That’s great, but you still have to draw the line. Set serious time limits and keep confrontations discreet.

Always make sure they only access your children under close supervision. Know, however, that narcissists rarely change. Protect your children and prioritize them over your own guilt and hangups.

1. Draw the line (and make it clear)

Your children don’t have the power or the know-how to set boundaries with your parents when they turn on toxic narcissistic behavior. Again, that all comes down to you. You must draw the line with your parents and let them know what their role as grandparents will look like.

If you can’t trust them not to manipulate, lash out, or otherwise harm and traumatize your kids — then don’t give them the space to do it. Create hard and fast limits you can verbalize in certain terms.

Before the need ever arises, let your parents know where the boundary lines are going to be. This can start before you build a family, or as your first child arrives. What’s true is that you cannot wait until your children are old enough to process what’s going on. The earlier, the better.

Think about what’s important to you as a parent and then set the line. Sit your parents down without the children present and let them know where the line is going to be. If you want to woo the narcissist's ego, sweeten the news by taking them out for a nice meal.

Treat them to a trip with you and your partner. Deliver it as a concerned parent with a responsibility to your children — because that’s what you are. Leave it in no uncertain terms that the toxic games won’t fly in the development of your kids.

2. Set more serious time limits

Time limits can do wonders in dealing with a narcissistic family you can’t entirely avoid. If grandma or grandpa can’t be trusted, then they can’t be left in unlimited situations with your kids.

Get creative in creating time limits. This is a compromise that allows your parents to be in the lives of your children without giving them unlimited access to inflict emotional (and physical) harm that follows your kids for decades to come.

Set more serious time limits for your parents with their access to your children. They don’t have to have unlimited sprees with your children. That’s how the narcissist can sink their claws in and create fresh supplies. There is an absolute need for absolute limits with toxic parents, and you’re the only one who can set them.

Sit down and think about all the holidays, all the weekends, all the family dinners. These things need to come with time limits, so where does the line lie for your family? Maybe there needs to be a time limit on the entire holiday weekend. Or maybe Mom and Dad need to book a hotel room and head back once dinner is over. Be practical, but be stern. Consider where the agitations and manipulations get triggered.

3. Keep the conflict discreet

When our parents are narcissists, that makes conflict an inevitable part of the equation. Add children to the mix, and there are going to be guaranteed blowups and frustrations.

Again, as a parent, it’s up to you to manage this. Some anger and some sharp words might be needed. But they don’t need to be aimed at your kids, and they certainly don’t need to fill up their environment. Take it out of the room. Manage things. Find a way to shut it down or move on so that your kids don’t learn the habits you’ve fought to overcome.

Conflict is going to happen with a narcissistic grandparent around. It’s up to you to limit the exposure your children have to this conflict. Take the high road and take the confrontations into another room (or into another medium like phone calls, coffee on another day, etc.).

Keep the conflicts discreet. If your mother or father escalates a situation, ask them to leave the room, the house, the restaurant — whatever it is. Focus on keeping your own demeanor quiet and still. Your children will prioritize; however, you stand up for yourself as the greater lesson.

So be an example they can live by as you ask your toxic parent to exit the scene. They don’t have a right to react any way they want in front of your children. It’s up to you to make sure that doesn’t happen…unless you want your children to overcome the same obstacle you had to.

4. Always be in the room

Narcissists who have not undergone substantial treatment and personal enlightenment (which is incredibly rare) are still a substantial threat. They are a threat to you and a threat to your children. The way they treat you is how they will come to see your kids, too.

The narcissist is an envious person. They will compete with your children, and they will shut them down in all the same ways. That’s why it’s your duty to make sure you’re always in the room to observe and manage behavior.

Always be in the room whenever the narcissistic parent is interacting with your children. Only you can honestly assess the danger level. But you need to always be immediately on hand to intervene when things take a toxic or manipulative turn. Just as you limit the time your parent spends with your child, limit the physical access and isolation they have with them.

If you doubt yourself, flashback to your own childhood. Consider the quiet moments when the most damage was done. This might include off-hand conversations in the car on the way to a soccer meet.

It could even include holidays and trips, which should otherwise have been filled with joy. The narcissist’s manipulations don’t happen in the open, and they are not always obvious in the light of day. Limit your parent’s ability to commit these manipulations with your kids by limiting their time alone with them.

5. Don’t let your guilt hurt your kids

A lot of adult children of narcissists live their lives burdened with tremendous guilt. There’s a guilt about not living up to your parents’ expectations. There’s guilt around not feeling loved or being responsible for your parents’ emotions. This guilt turns deadly when it’s applied to our children.

The narcissist, as a grandparent, may guilt you into granting access or promoting them into the elevated role of grandparent. At any cost, you have to overcome this guilt in every conceivable way.

Don’t let your guilt and hangups put your children at risk. Your parents may throw at and guilt you about the tightly controlled relationship you’ve created. You cannot allow the guilt trips to put your kids in danger. If they don’t need to be around someone, they don’t need to be around someone.

Deny grandparents who cannot toe the line and put your children first. If they want to prioritize their ego, they can do that somewhere else with adults who are not still developing cognitively on every level. Children pick up more than the declarative lessons they’re taught.

They read into everything we say and do. A narcissist is toxic, essentially, at every level. But more than that, they represent instability. And that’s the one thing a child needs least in life. Be that stable source of protection and put your foot down when enough is enough.

Putting it all together…

It’s not an easy truth to hear, but your narcissistic parents don’t need to be around your children in a serious and isolated capacity. Very rarely do narcissists change. With this truth in hand, we can better understand how they use our kids to create new supplies and continue toxic patterns that wrench our families apart.

As a parent, your job is to protect the innocent life that you have. And that has to include against the people closest to them. Accept who your parents are and take action to create space around your children.

Draw the line with your parents and make sure they know where the boundary lines are with your kids. They don’t have a right to treat your children the way they treated you, nor do they have a right to instill the same toxic cycles in them.

Set time limits when they come around and make sure they only interact with the children under close supervision. When confrontations arise (as they will) take it to another room and keep it away from the kids.

Don’t let the guilt trips and the hangups allow you to deviate from reality. Your job is to protect those children from people who will make their life worse. Put them first and keep them away from anyone who would do just that.

L. Hall, J. (2021). Should Narcissistic Grandparents Be Kept Away From Kids? | Psychology Today United Kingdom. [online] www.psychologytoday.com. Available at: https://www.psychologytoday.com/gb/blog/the-narcissist-in-your-life/202111/should-narcissistic-grandparents-be-kept-away-from-kids [Accessed 3 Aug. 2024].

© E.B. Johnson 2024