Originally Posted by
Adam Strange
In my family, my narcissistic LSE mother had an older IEI sister, and when we visited her house, we (the kids) always got a lecture about how she (the IEI) was spending too much money on decorating, how she was raising her kids (my favorite cousins) wrong, etc. etc. In retrospect, the two sisters did not get along well at all.
My SLI father is my Supervisor, and no matter how much I (LIE) achieve, I cannot get him to say I have done anything productive with my life. It is not that he is reticent. He genuinely believes I'm a screwup. So, I find it best to simply keep a distance from him, and to expect nothing from him.
Growing up in a household with parents whose approval is conditional or non-existent forces a person to maintain a psychological distance to maintain their own identity. I sometimes felt as if my parents were trying to kill my soul, and replace it with one that they liked better. Still, maintaining a psychological distance does not remove the desire for parental love. The desire merely gets transposed to someone else. I married an SLI because she was a better version of my father, and my LSE sister married an IEI conflictor male, because the conflict and distance she felt with him was familiar to her (growing up with a narcissistic mother who was her Identical, and thus competition), but the IEI also loved her. My other sister, an LII, married an LSE male. She says she married our mother, and she's desperately looking for an out from that marriage.
Neither I nor my sisters spend any time with our parents. They sometimes ask why.
Still, my son is another SLI, and both he and my SLI ex-wife visit my LSE & SLI parents frequently. They all love each other, and call each other almost daily. So, it is not that one type or another is intrinsically good or bad, but rather it is the interactions which can be good or can be toxic.
This is why I am a strong advocate for finding a dual with whom you have compatible love-maps, world-views, and instincts. Mutual approval and support are almost a given in that situation.