Will I Ever Be Good Enough?: Healing the Daughters of Narcissistic Mothers

Disclaimer: this is an incredibly long review, because I have found this book to be a breakthrough for me DESPITE NOT HAVING A NARCASSISTIC MOTHER. I found working through this book irreplaceable to healing as the child of a broken, abusive home; broken extended family; broken community; and, broken communist state. I'm hoping this review will help women whose mothers did the best they could, but were too broken to love their child unconditionally.A frame of reference: The "Ever Be Good Enough" title resonated with me to my core. My self-esteem issues began when I was about 7, to be followed later with perfectionist tendencies, anxiety, a lack of self-compassion, and a really unhealthy internal voice. My housemate left this book out and I immediately identified with the lack of emotional intimacy from my mom and others (dad, stepdad, grandma), my mom's inconsistent behavior, her occasional inability to protect me from harm, her desire to parade me around her friends, the family secrecy, and her inability to express an internal emotional world. However, my mom is not narcissistic: she is open now to talking about her deep feelings, albeit reluctantly as they're painful; she does not try to control me in my adulthood; she loves and is proud of who I am despite it not fitting with her world view, etc. That does not lessen the pain, however, of not getting my needs for unconditional love and protection met as a child.My loving mother's emotional problems stem from PTSD from her seriously abusive home, coupled with unhealthy behaviors derived from an unstable childhood (depressed mother, no food or textiles available making survival vs. intimacy the priority, state quota housing that makes it almost impossible to escape an abusive home, and the community selfishness that is par for the course with extremely limited basic resources). She has done her best to actively love me in the best way she knew how, and I am blessed to be so loved. What she has not been able to give me because of her own brokenness and paradigms, I am working through now.How this book helped: Despite a fantastic counselor that helped me learn so many great strategies to feel worthwhile and think positively, when overwhelming situations occurred, I would quickly lose my footing. McBride's book allowed me to work through my aching hurt and emptiness, guiding me through the past and continuing the healing I have started years ago. It has also informed the confused feeling and contradictory messages I have felt from my mother.The highlight: The first 90 pages where the most valuable, personally, for where I am in my healing. Outlining and describing every aspect of motherly love allowed me to create a specific list of what aspects I hadn't received. Before this book, I had not been able to push through my numbness and forced forgetting. It walked me through examples in a compassionate way, helping me remember. The book then guided me through accepting the loss of unconditional love through different suggested exercises.Applying the book to non-narcissistic mothers: The healing process was very easy to adjust to an emotionally unstable parent by replacing " mother was narcissistic and didn't love me in x way" with "mom was y and didn't love me in x way". I also found it helpful to think of my mother more compassionately--since my mom isn't singularly selfish, there was more truth in this thought for me: "my mom did the best she could with her emotional limitations and upbringing, but she still left holes in my heart. It is time to acknowledge the pain, work through those holes, and move past them. " I would also add that the author recommends not talking to your mom about your pain--McBride points out that narcissistic moms can't empathize with their daughters. This advice didn't apply to my mom who does care deeply about my well being but doesn't handle intense conversations well initially. The next step of my healing will be to learn more about my mom's past, which she has said she is willing to share, to understand her barriers to unconditional love. The ultimate goal of this is to heal my relationship with my mother by gaining unlimited compassion for my mom and unlimited forgiveness.Below is a list of additional books that helped me heal (from most to least relevant):Self-esteem by McKay (A complete self-esteem primer. I'm referring to the book, not the workbook.)The Color of Water by James McBride (unrelated to the author)--biographical tribute to a white, Jewish mom from her mixed, black son. I am neither black, nor Jewish, but really understood, related to, and worked through my own pain of an emotionally limited mother. I used this book to figure out where to go from here after reading McBride (the answer for me is to fill in the remaining gaps in the past and gain a greater understanding of my mother so that I can brim with compassion and forgiveness for her.Psalm 139, "ESV"' lines 1-18 (free if you type what I just did into a search engine)I Know Why The Caged Bird Sings by Maya Angelou (fiction, narcissistic mother; broken daughter)Hullaballoo in The Guava Orchard by Desai (fiction, vaguely related, about self-actualization and indirectly self-compassion. In an abstract way, this book demonstrates how to meet my needs)

I read this book about a year ago, rented from my library’s ebook selection, and it opened my eyes in ways they had never been opened before. I cried so much! I’ve spent a lifetime in therapy, but could never accept that my mother was a covert narcissist. Seeing myself described in this book was what finally led me to acceptance. I felt so seen and validated in things I’ve been thinking and feeling my whole life.I decided to buy my own physical copy so I could highlight things and refer back to it in times of turmoil with my mother. I still have a lot of healing to do, but if you have been led to this book either by recommendation or because you are seeking something, please give it a try. It is not a super long read, but it’s intense, so you will need to take your time.Even though I’ve gained a lot of peace and understanding, the work will continue for a lifetime. This book is a great starting point, though. A year after reading it I am in a totally new place with how I view and interact with my mother.

Lots of info and examples..... good read

A good read if you have this kind of mother, which I do. It was interesting that the author devoted a lot of attention to over-achieving daughters (in other words, daughters like the author, and like many of us who will buy and read this book) and very little to the under-achieving daughters (in other words, daughters who are not like the author). Kind of narcissistic, actually. Perhaps the author has some more work to do on herself. Oh, well, don't we all...The descriptions of various ways in which narcissistic mothers short-change their daughters are illuminating and very telling. I couldn't relate to all of them, but I sure could to some of them. I would have liked to read more about how this kind of mother impacts the relationships of siblings to each other. In my family of six siblings, the result has been that all the sibs are at war with each other, trying through their achievements (or their lies about their achievements) to compete with each other to win something they can never have because it simply doesn't exist: our mother's love. I've chosen to opt out of the battle to gain what doesn't exist, but I've seen how it's damaged the life trajectories of my siblings. It's not pretty. Drug abuse (which caused one brother's early death), constant debt in a struggle to keep up appearances to win my mother's approval, denial, delusion, self-loathing, deceit, psychological manipulation, greed...it's awful to watch, so I pretty much don't anymore. I live 500 miles away from my biological family and haven't seen any of them in years. I've formed much more enjoyable, healthy, sane, nourishing and just plain fun relationships with people to whom I'm not related by birth.What the book does cover, though, it does a pretty good job on.Reading this reinforced a lot of what I already had figured out on my own, but it's immensely gratifying to read it in a book that is thoughtful, reasonable, even-handed and non-hysterical, and that offers strategies for dealing with the pain and damage that comes along with having a narcissistic mother (and a fairly passive father). I'm glad I bought it. I don't think it's a substitute for therapy if the pain and damage are deep-seated and impeding a person's ability to function well, but it's both engaging and helpful to read this book. I'm glad I bought it. I'll probably re-read it from time to time to remind myself of why I no longer spend the holidays with my biological family. We can all use a pep-talk now and then, I suppose. I know I can. Especially when the holidays roll around and I'm bombarded with propaganda about how I'm supposed to go "home for the holidays." Home is where I live. Where my biological family lives is a passive-aggressive battleground, with my narcissistic mother as the ring-master.

This is well written from someone who understands the issues of living under a narcisstic mother. Great insight and recovery method.