There are many forms of disconnect however apathy is the most injurious. Apathy kills the human spirit and leaves a person feeling worthless and hopeless.
Children define themselves in the eyes of their parents. If the parents simply don’t care or don’t care enough, the child will incorporate a very profound and destructive message: “I’m not important, I don’t matter, maybe I shouldn’t have even been born.”
With these core beliefs in place the child will grow up to repeat these patterns by choosing people that make them feel according to their negative core beliefs. In other words they will set themselves up to do what I refer to as the What The Freud!, a series of repetitive patterns in relationships that replicate the wounds of childhood.
Typical repetitive patterns show up in romantic relationship choices, friendships and even choices in bosses. The underlying themes of these relationships repeat the message that the person doesn’t matter and isn’t worth much. This leaves the individual subject to being demeaned, devalued, and destroyed. Eventually it can even lead to the person being discarded. This sequence of events retraumatize the early childhood wounds. Rather than avoid people that create trauma, they are actually drawn to them. No matter who they turn to they conclude that they are really not worthy, no matter how hard they try to please.
Apathetic parents create in their children a toxic bond that looks like a one-way street of love. The child is invested in the parent however the parent is not invested in the child at least not in the way that the child needs. Instead of being invested in the needs of their child and putting the child first they put their own needs first.
This narcissistic system gone wrong flips the family system into one of unconditional love to one of control and manipulation. In other words if the child wants to be loved, they must march to the tune of their parent”s wishes and desires. These wishes and desires may include manipulating the to marry a certain someone, become a certain type of professional or even support the parents financially.
Because apathetic parents are not connected to their impact on the child, there is no feedback loop to allow them to self reflect and self correct. Without this feedback loop they can continue the damages because they don’t feel the effects their pain is inflicting on their children. Furthermore, because this process of self reflection and self correction is missing from the narcissistic parents, they cannot take ownership of their bad behavior.
As a result, a common defense mechanism of apathetic and narcissistic parents include blaming their children and or gaslighting them to avoid responsibility. This makes the child feel that they are going crazy. I like to say that we are not crazy, we are made crazy. Until the system is busted, the child or children involved feel that they are to blame.
The biggest shortage that we are experiencing on a global basis is the shortage of empathy. Empathy connects, apathy disconnects. Apathy is a defense mechanism against not being cared for. It also keeps generating more of the same. The multi generational transmission of apathy continues to be passed on to future generations. The implications are horrifying: children who either go too far to please people who are not able to be pleased. Or children becoming apathetic and cut off their emotions to protect themselves from being hurt.
And it doesn’t stop there. Apathy spreads to the community and then worldwide making it easy for people to destroy others emotionally and physically. After all, if we can’t feel the pain of others, there’s no reason to stop creating pain.
In order to end this vicious cycle it is important to follow attachment theory parenting, the type of parenting suggested by Dr. John Bowlby. If you want empathic children who are connected, we must provide nurturing, attunement, mirroring, and put their needs before ours. It is easier to create a system gone right then to try to rectify a system gone wrong. That is why prevention in the form of proper parenting is so important to the mental health of our next generation. If we could all participate in creating mental health through connection we can be the cause of better outcomes for future generations to come.
