What are the Psychological Effects of a Toxic Family?
This article is the opinion of the writer. It is for general informational purposes only. It does not constitute individual therapeutic advice.
What are the psychological effects of a toxic family?
You may have heard that toxic family cultures can prevent healthy communication. You may be aware that your family is dysfunctional in some way. Yet, you might also think it’s not a big deal.
I’ll leave it up to you to figure out if your family culture is harmful in some way. Maybe you're okay, even if you have trouble communicating with parents and siblings. Still, see if the following symptoms of toxic families describe your own experiences:
Harm and shame are the norm. This is one reason why people think that their family culture is fine. They’re used to feeling hurt or bad about themselves, to the point that it takes work for them to notice it.
Difficulty trusting people. When you distrust your own family members, that can spread to other relationships. How distant are you from romantic partners, friends, and new acquaintances?
Shutting down and no longer sharing. You’ve given up trying to communicate with your relatives. As a result, you no longer reach out for help or act authentically around them.
High-conflict approach to relationships. Some toxic families normalize aggressive communication such as yelling or insulting each other. Do you expect this kind of behavior in everyone you encounter in your life?
Isolation or splitting off from family. Most people who cut off their families already see their family culture as toxic. Unfortunately, this can leave you in a vulnerable place with little or no support.
Lack of clarity around identity and beliefs. Some families use codependency, where everyone is expected to think the same way. As a result, you might not have any idea what you believe on your own.
Looking for similar relationships outside of the family. Toxic relationships might be the only kinds of relationships you know or understand. Do you keep repeating these same patterns with new people?
Perfectionism. Does your family put too much pressure on you? It’s possible to internalize that pressure as a way of keeping them from criticizing you.
Exhaustion from spending time together. The energy you put into managing these complicated relationships can be tiring. How do you feel after spending the day with your family?
Signs you grew up in a toxic family
It’s hard to analyze our own families. They are the most familiar people we know, so how can you tell if the family culture is toxic? Here are some common signs of growing up in toxic family:
Harm continues in cycles. People in any family can hurt each other, and they can apologize afterward. Toxic families, though, continue the cycle of hurting loved ones over and over.
Harm can be in the form of blaming, shaming, or gaslighting. Emotional harm can be more difficult to detect than insults or physical violence. It's also difficult to defend against, because the victim ends up feeling like they are at fault.
Attempts to stop harm either lead to more harm, or relationship repair does not last long. You may have tried standing up to a family member in the past, only to receive violent pushback. Either that, or reconciling turned out to not mean much, as the same type of hurt kept happening to you.
You get nervous, anxious, or irritable going into family time. Your nervous system goes haywire around them. This can be a sign that you’re stirring up old trauma, or you worry about new trauma occurring.
You’re unwilling to share your feelings or beliefs with family. Over time, you learned that being yourself around them leads to criticism or worse. You’ve found that it’s easier to stay quiet.
You seek out or find yourself in other toxic relationships. Look at your friendships or romantic history. Similar toxic relationships might make the most sense to you, even if they hurt.
You’re afraid to be different from your family. Maybe you’re somewhere else on the political or religious spectrum from them. Either way, you keep important parts of yourself a secret.
You don’t know who you are or what you want. Growing up was so confusing that it’s hard to develop an identity or purpose. As a result, you feel stuck, possibly waiting for someone else to tell you what to do.
You ignore or deny your feelings. Toxic family cultures typically discourage people from being intuitive about how they feel. After growing up in a situation like that, you sincerely struggle to detect your own emotions.
Signs you’re ignoring your feelings
How do you know that you tend to ignore your feelings? Even more, how do you know that it’s difficult for you to know when you feel something? Here are some signs that might help you figure it out:
You’re tired. It might be a lot easier to tell that you’re tired, than to tell that you feel something deeper. What if you’re protecting yourself from your own emotions without knowing it? If so, that can take a lot of energy.
You seem to have trouble reaching your goals. What if the goals you have don’t really line up with what you want deep down? Maybe your family assigned life goals to you, and you’ve never let yourself admit that you want other things.
You beat yourself up a lot. When people don’t pay attention to their own feelings, they can do things they regret later. Do you regret the way you behave most of the time?
You pride yourself on being “rational” or “data-driven.” This might be one of the easier ways to know that you aren’t in touch with your feelings. Could it be that knowledge of your emotions should be part of your dataset?
Your belief systems are torn. You might think you carry certain beliefs that help you fit in with your environment. It can seem dangerous sometimes to admit that those beliefs just don’t feel right to you.
You have big reactions when you don’t expect it. If you never admit to yourself that you feel sad or angry, you might end up exploding over little things. Pretending that you don’t have feelings doesn’t make the feelings go away.
You feel purposeless. Shutting down your feelings in general can include positive feelings like excitement. Do you find yourself struggling to find direction in life, and could this be why?
You frequently blame other people. If you struggle to feel unpleasant emotions like shame, one way to cope is by projecting. It can be easier to feel angrier at others than to feel sad or remorseful.
You struggle to admit when you’re wrong. Maybe you are always protecting yourself against invalidation. Sometimes people goes too far with this, to the point that they can’t ever admit that they’re wrong.
How to respond to invalidation
Frequent invalidation can be one of the hardest parts of living in a toxic family. What if they are still invalidating you now? Do you struggle to deal with invalidation from everyone? Here are some ways to respond to invalidation without shutting yourself down:
State how you feel. Tell them that you feel invalidated, pointing out how and why. Let them know how that invalidation affects you.
Directly tell them you want validation. Sometimes people invalidate us when they are just trying to help or give advice. Feel free to say that you’re only looking for validation, and that you don’t need them to solve your problems.
Talk to yourself or journal about how you feel. Even if the other person doesn’t respond well to your feedback, you can still process emotions on your end. Ask yourself how you feel afterward, and what those feelings mean to you.
Seek out other people who are validating. It's important to have relationships with people who are trustworthy and kind. Who do you know in your life who is good at understanding and expressing empathy?
Set boundaries. What rules can you place on people who consistently invalidate you? Will you distance yourself from them at all? Tell them what the consequences will be if they continue their behavior.
Model validation. Sometimes people just don’t understand the difference between validation and invalidation. Express empathy to them if you can when appropriate, and maybe point out what you’re doing if needed.
Accept that they might not get it. Boundary-setting only works if you’re willing to follow through on the consequences. Acceptance in this case does not have to mean approval. Can you at least acknowledge the reality of the situation?
Cope ahead for the worst-case scenario. How can you take care of yourself and be okay even if the other person never changes? Try to visualize a life where you thrive even though this person doesn’t support you the way you would like.
Are you looking for more help with family relationships? I offer relationship therapy for individuals, combining parts work and skill-building. Feel free to contact me and schedule a free consultation to see if we’re a good fit.