When Your Child Has a Victim Mindset
“We sit down for dinner. Declan (5) whines, ‘You didn’t get me my milk!” Not, ‘Thank you so much for this delicious meal you have made after a long workday, Mommy. Can I please have some milk?’ We get to the playground and he complains, ‘You didn’t bring the right pail!’ We read three books at bedtime, he accuses, ‘We didn’t get to read my favorite book about the pandas (because he hadn’t chosen it!) The whining is out of control and driving us insane. He finds fault with everything.”
“Nina (5) and I had a great day together, filled with lots of play and fun activities. Then, at bedtime, just when I was saying goodnight, she insisted she needed to go back downstairs to check on her Magnatile structure. She is a master of obfuscation, and we are trying to get a handle on that—so bedtime doesn’t become chaotic and so she goes to sleep at a reasonable hour. So, I said that wasn’t possible, it was time for sleep, and she could check on her creation first thing in the morning—it would still be there. She started crying and shouting, “This is the worst day ever!”
“My son, Harry (7) is very attached to me and demanding of my attention, which leads to him getting a lot more of it than my other kids! Last night when I told him a babysitter was coming, he pleaded for me not to go and accused, ‘You care more about your friends than me!’ This gets me in the gut and makes me feel guilty—like I’m rejecting and hurting him. When I take a step back, I know that it’s not wrong for me to want a night out to meet my own needs. He just makes it so hard.”
“Ceci (8) insists on accusing people of harming her when it’s clearly an accident and then demands apologies. For example, she was racing up the stairs to surpass her sister and stubbed her to along the way. She started shouting at her sister that she made her hurt herself and needs to apologize. Or, she’s at the kitchen counter coloring and some water gets onto her paper and smudges her picture. She accuses me of causing it and demands an apology. We often just do it to pacify her and move on. But we know it’s unhealthy. We don’t know what to do.”
Why this mindset?
We can’t know exactly why kids react as they do. There’s no brain scan that tells us definitively what triggers their behavior. But the detective work I guide parents through to identify what makes their child tick and how they process and are affected by their experiences in the world helps us understand the meaning behind the behavior. Almost always, temperament is a big factor.
Some kids, often those who are highly sensitive, filter their experiences through this victim mindset. That they have been wronged, wounded and are being deprived when something unexpected happens, when you set a limit they don’t like, or when you are not able to meet all of their needs. They demand apologies and compensation, lest they take their pound of flesh.
They process their experiences in the world through a deficit, half-glass-empty lens. It’s a wiring issue, not a stance your child has chosen or that you have engendered in your child.
Kids who are highly sensitive also tend to have a lower threshold for discomfort. When something doesn’t happen the way they expect or desire, they have a hard time coping and often externalize blame.
I know that can be a hard pill to swallow, especially when you see other kids or have another child who is positive and easy-going (aka, a “dandelion” to your child’s “orchid.“) You wonder, "Why can't you just be like (the flexible, positive child) and see all the amazing things you have and get to do?!"
These kids are also extremely clever and know how to pull at their loving parents’ heartstrings to get them to give them what they want. (They are strategic, not manipulative.) This dynamic is often at play with the parent who has assumed the role of the “emotional support parent”: the person who they depend on to meet all their needs (demands) and prevent or solve all problems.
Environmental factors may also play a role, such as: a new baby in the family, sibling jealousy/competition, or another stressor, like a parent being absent. A mom has had to travel a lot recently to care for her ill mother. Her daughter, Maisy (4) is understandably feeling deprived and filtering everything through the “I’m never getting enough” lens. This has turned bedtime into an hours-long endeavor as it’s never enough books or cuddle time. Mom is having a hard time holding any limits out of guilt.
Jaden (6) is a middle child and is very competitive with his older brother (8.) He is constantly accusing his parents of being unfair: letting his older brother stay up later, demanding that they weigh and measure their desserts because he is sure they are giving his brother a bigger portion.
I would give my kids- Sam and Jess- baths together every night starting when Jess was 6 months (and Sam was 3). Each night I would ask who wanted to get out first. Sam always said he wanted to stay in longer. Jess didn’t seem to care, not to mention that she wasn’t verbal yet. Then, when Jess was about 20 months, I posed what I had come to consider the nightly rhetorical question. But on this night, Jess exclaimed: “I want to stay in!” Given that the “score” was literally 365 (give or take) to zero, I said of course. Sam’s response: “I never get to stay in the bath longer!”