Begin Again with Davina McCall - Begin Again Moments: Growing Up With A Narcissistic Parent

Episode Date: September 20, 2026

In this episode of Begin Again Moments, Simon Squibb and psychotherapist Kathleen Saxton examine how the behaviour of a parent can shape the person you become long after childhood is over. Simon shares the reality of growing up with a mother he describes as a narcissist, from being left to find his own way home at eight years old to being kicked out of home at 15, shortly after his father died. Now, as a parent himself, he reflects on the experiences he once accepted as normal. Kathleen helps unpack what happens psychologically when a child grows up around narcissism, addiction or unpredictable behaviour. As Davina reflects on her own relationship with her mother, they discuss why children learn to keep the peace, adapt themselves to their parents and sometimes lose touch with who they really are in the process. Both conversations examine the difficult work of revisiting childhood as an adult: recognising when something wasn’t okay, understanding why we instinctively defend our parents, and beginning to reconnect with the person we were before we learned to adapt in order to be accepted. To hear the full conversations, watch the complete episodes on YouTube or listen wherever you get your podcasts. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

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You know the same way you can skip an ad? I get it. I'm Siaiaa and I live in Ice Cove. I've made some questionable decisions that didn't end up the way I planned. And today I'm still figuring it out. Somehow things usually get worse before they get better. Apparently, that's how I roll. So bundle up and come along for the bumpy ride.

Stream a new episode of North of North Tuesdays on CBC Gem. I was eight years old and I went to a, I lived in a small town called St. Niers. And we went shopping one day in Bedford, which is nearby, maybe a 30 minute or so bus ride away. And so we went there and I remember it's probably one of my earliest memories as a child. I can't remember it so clearly because we were having a nice day and we were shopping. And then I can't remember exactly what happened. I think we just had an argument basically about something. I think I said I wanted to get a drink and she said she wanted to finish what she was doing.

I can't remember the exact detail. But then she just basically said, well, you can just get home on your own then, can't you? And she walked off and left me. Now, at eight years old, I don't know if that's normal or not. At eight years old, I'm just instantly thinking, okay, I've got to get home. You know, what do I do? How do I get home? What bus do I have to get?

We came in a car, by the way. So I didn't know what bus I had to get, and I didn't have any money on me. So, of course, but then no mobile phones, no nothing, right? So it's kind of an interesting panic. Now, you know, since growing up now, I've got a seven-year-old. He's just about to turn eight. I can't even leave him in his bedroom on his own, you know? Like, I look checking on him, make sure he's okay.

So now I understand maybe, you know, it was technically wrong. But it didn't feel wrong to me at the time. I felt like I had done something wrong and she was punishing me. That's what parents do when you do something wrong. So I guess kind of this is the good thing about when people are hard on you. I learn to get home. I learned to, you know, get the money I needed, figure out the bus, get on the bus. You know, an eight-year-old is not a weakling.

You know, I managed to learn this thing that I now carry with me. You can call it a curse or a blessing that anything is possible. And you can just, you know, despite being dumped in a town with no money, I can survive. Yeah. Which is kind of an interesting revelation. It's almost a bit freeing. If you've got nothing, you've got nothing to lose. If you've got nothing and you can make something out of nothing, it kind of wakes you up a bit.

Now, I would never do it to my child. No. But I also see some good in it and I see some benefit in it. When I interview people, I can see sometimes people that have single parents or parents that's a bit tough on them. Sometimes they have a better life long term because they do the hard thing when they're young for the easier life later. And I think my mum also kicked me out at 15 years old just after my father had died. And so that was also a crazy moment I mean she literally put your stuff on the street

Yeah well no she didn't even give me my stuff She just told me to get out So I literally grabbed a bag And threw some stuff in it And she said get out of my house screaming at me I'm going to call the police Get out of my house

And you never went back Never went back Wow 15 Yep Yeah And even now when I think about it Now I feel a bit sad about it

Because it's it's I went from having a father and a mother And I got three brothers We're all together in a house And then suddenly I'm on my own out in the real world. And I think the thing that really hit me was just how unprepared I was for the real world,

even though the eight-year-old experience, that wasn't my daily experience, that was just a one-off experience when I was younger. Actually, at 15 years old, looking like an adult, so you don't look, I didn't look 15. I didn't look 15. I was a rugby player. I looked like a grown-up.

You know, most people thought I was 18, 19, 20. So, you know, 15 years old out in the street. Yeah. I mean, the other side of it is the world I learned, suddenly throwing out into the real world, like I have a lot of empathy for the homeless because I was actually homeless in total for eight weeks but the homeless people were the kindest people ever to me

most people's experience with homeless people in this country are like someone begging you for money I had a completely different experience they gave me the half a sandwich they had left they gave me the blanket that they couldn't really justify they needed it for themselves to me they told me how to survive in the streets you know like the people that I thought were the

almost society's abnormal you know were the kindest people. And so, and then I, when I, kinder than your mother. Kinder than my mother in that moment. Yeah. I have, my mum, I always feel so if she's still alive and she may listen to this podcast. So I'm always conscious that I don't want to hurt her.

But I also, you know, must tell the truth. And she was a great mother when I was young, actually. And despite that story of where she had some moments where she just lost it and did perhaps the wrong thing. We used to play board games. She would all have fun. She was engaged mother. But I didn't know she was a narcissist. And I didn't know what a narcissist was.

So I didn't understand that terminology or what it meant to me. And she would pitch me against my brothers to fight each other. She would like drama. I just thought that was normal. You know, like as a kid, you don't know what's normal and what's abnormal. It wasn't until I left home, actually, that I realized it was abnormal. But, you know, I still struggle. all talking about it because I feel bad

that she might be listening and I'll be hurting her feelings I think she's your mother so of course you love It's naturally instinct to protect our parents Right that's part of our responsibility As kids as the parents get older I feel it But I also know every time I've ever tried to deal with her

In my whole life She just It's an end of bipolar too It's like you just said one minute She's the funniest person you've ever known and next minute she'll just burn the house down and you with it. And she'll just, there's no logic. I think that, you know, that, I was, you know, now I understand what a narcissist is,

but to me it's just like there's no logic sometimes. It's just about destruction. And I don't like destruction. I like harmony and kindness. And I've discovered who I am. And that took me some time to figure out who I am. Because when you're with someone that is like that, you kind of mirror them because you want to fit in.

Yes. Right? So I see this, you know, when I was at school, bullies who were hanging out with other bullies, maybe some of those kids don't want to be bullies. But if they don't bully as well, they're going to get teased or bullied themselves. Exactly. So it's a survival mechanism. And I think in my house, we're all fighting each other all the time. I thought that was normal.

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there's a little piece of me now that's questioning whether my mother was a narcissist from what you're saying. I think she was just an alcoholic. Okay. And alcoholics are selfish. They're very self-in-taughts. I think it's a different. I think it feels like something a bit different.

And this is quite a nice. Maybe a reassurance that maybe not. Why did you think maybe? What would it led you to think that or to be curious about it for her? About her being a narcissist. Yeah. I think because she was a bit like me, a peacock, but an extreme peacock. It was walking down the street.

I've talked about this before, but with a, with a long fake fur coat on and flashing people, she was naked. But she's with me and I was 11, you know. Or putting me in kind of danger or taking me to a nightclub when I was 13 and then going to school weed and leaving me on my own in the DJ booth. But and then she's like, you're fine, I need to go and do this. Like it's just thinking about herself. But I wonder whether that is just an absolutely chaotic alcoholic.

chaotic and the selfishness of the addiction she was in. The addiction. Yeah. Yeah. Because I, she was totally self-absorbed and never was interested. I mean, she did get, she did get angry with me if I tried to impress her. I just wanted her to be proud of me, really. That's what I was constantly seeking.

Yeah. What happened when you challenged her in life? I would never challenge her. Ah, okay. I was terrified. I mean, she'd go mental. Because feedback or challenge for a narcissistic. is very, very difficult because for them, it's the equivalent of you picking at the mask.

Yeah, and they're thinking you stay away from that. Maybe she was a bit. So there could be something that might give you a clue in there. On the spectrum somewhere. Yeah. Yeah. Because I would never, I would never even try and approach her because she'd just go, elapsie, apeship.

Yeah. We were always just trying to keep her. Keep the peace and keep it, of course. But what happens and where do you put all those feelings if you weren't able to find a place to put them as a kid? it's tough. Well, I was just very lucky because I only spent my school holidays with her, but my sister is over there. She was with her all the time. And she had a very, very difficult life. And she protected me from quite a lot when I was over there. So I, I, when she came over here, but what was interesting, I thought you were talking about kids not knowing their identity.

My sister lost her identity, I think. But is the chronic lying? something attached to anything. Oh, is it? Yeah, of course. Is it attached to that? Yeah, it was partly attached to that, which is, if we think about, because my sister was a compulsive liar, but we used to laugh about it in the end, because I'd just go, is that a porcup?

Is that a feel? Yeah, it is, yeah. I mean, it was just part of our, this is loss of identity again and wanting to be accepted. So we talk about, it's Donald Winnicott's theory, who's the most amazing, you know, he was the most amazing psychiatrist and psychotherapist. If we're born a true self, so we come into the world as a tiny, baby and nothing's happened to us and whatever spirit pilot like we have is ours to own. But very quickly we realise that we need to, you know, we're keeping the peace with mum,

we're worrying about what's going to kick off, etc. We start adapting. So we have an adapted self that we know we're in it a lot of the time if we've got difficult parents. It then can move out to false self. We completely start lying about what we are, who we are, what we've done in order again to be accepted in some form. I think that's exactly what she did.

And the very worst is also idealised self. we think I must be idyllic in order to be accepted and loved but if your sister got caught in false which would have not been her fault because it was the way she survived. Yeah, it was, I knew it was a survival. Yeah. But what we say is we're quite a long way from home.

And so if we can find a way to bring ourselves back to home, that's the therapeutic work that I do with my clients. How hard is it to kind of untrained someone who has like when you're talking about this journey going from someone who has literally had to change themselves to survive a narcissist how kind of long are we i mean i know it's a bit hard for you to say because everybody's different everyone's different but i genuinely think it can take about 18 months of concentrated work because we say that when a child doesn't feel loved they don't stop loving their parent they stop loving themselves oh so i've got to work with them on that to start with we also quite naturally tend to defend our

Even though we know... I did that. Of course, there are clearly things that aren't right. Our natural instinct is we've only got probably one or two or maybe three of the step or blended. But so therefore we tend to defend them initially. Or we'll say, look, other people have had it much worse than me because let's say that parent hasn't physically being violent or sexually being difficult or abusive, then we kind of feel psychologically, you know, should I be complaining at all? So there's all sorts of things that people will say initially. There's defence mechanisms.

And it's really clever that as a kid you've come up with that. But over time in therapy, we begin to slowly just peel it back to the point where they can get a little bit more comfortable with accepting. It wasn't okay. Yeah. I mean, what a wonderful realization to realize that you were wronged as a person. Yes. And people will often say, yes, but my mum or my dad had a difficult upbringing and they might have done. Or they were in the grip of addiction.

Yes, absolutely. But what we say is it might explain it, but it doesn't excuse it. Yes. There's a difference there. Wow. And so that's also the work, gently helping someone come to terms with that, because then what does that also mean for them? If their parent is alive or their parent has passed,

what does that mean and what do they want to do with it? What I can't do is sort of open Pandora's box and show them and then kind of leave it there. You're leaving them right in the middle of that pain. So that's why the work takes some time, because we need to be very gentle with these inner children, if you like, to help them begin to slowly come to terms with it and accept that that is what happened.

And then where can I find the compassion for myself that I went through that as a kid if that was the story that this person's had in front of me. This family is on the brink of Civil War. Mobland. The hit original series is now streaming on Paramount Plus. We are the Hurricanes. Don't know the app.

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