Why Internal Family Systems Is So Effective for Adult Children of Narcissistic and Borderline Parents.
Many adult children of narcissistic or borderline-disordered parents enter therapy with a deep sense of confusion, emotional exhaustion, and the haunting feeling that something must be wrong with them. Even if they’re high-functioning in their work or relationships, there’s often a quiet struggle beneath the surface—an internal war of shame, guilt, and unmet longing.
Internal Family Systems (IFS) offers something many survivors of these early dynamics have never had: a safe, non-pathologizing, and deeply empowering way to understand themselves.
I am a seasoned level 3 IFS therapist and have been working with the IFS model, specifically focusing on this dynamic.
The Legacy of Growing Up with a Narcissistic or Borderline Parent
Growing up with a narcissistic or borderline parent often means your emotional reality was invalidated, manipulated, or altogether ignored. You may have been:
Parentified, expected to take care of a parent's emotional needs
Scapegoated, blamed for problems that had nothing to do with you
Idealized and then discarded, depending on your parent’s mood
Gaslit, made to question your own perceptions and experiences
This leaves a lasting psychological imprint—often a fragmented sense of self. Many adult children carry inner parts shaped by early survival strategies: the people-pleaser, the high-achiever, the inner critic, the part that feels unlovable, the part that feels angry but terrified to express it.
Enter Internal Family Systems
IFS, developed by Dr. Richard Schwartz, is a therapeutic model based on a simple but radical idea: we are made up of many parts, and all of them are trying to help us, even the ones that seem self-sabotaging or extreme.
Rather than labeling or suppressing “dysfunctional” behavior, IFS helps clients get to know these parts with curiosity and compassion. It also teaches that at our core is a Self—a calm, clear, confident inner presence capable of healing and leading our internal system.
This is especially powerful for people who were never allowed to have an internal world of their own.
Why IFS Is Uniquely Healing for This Population
IFS offers something most survivors of personality-disordered parenting were denied: the chance to befriend themselves. Here’s why it works so well:
It validates complexity. IFS acknowledges that we can have multiple feelings at once—love and resentment, guilt and anger, grief and relief.
It restores inner trust. Instead of overriding “bad” feelings, IFS helps clients understand why those feelings exist and how they’ve been protecting them.
It doesn’t pathologize. There’s no shame in having parts that lash out, numb out, or break down. Every part has a reason for existing, and IFS helps us discover those reasons.
It offers relational repair from the inside out. Clients learn to re-parent their most wounded parts with the care and stability they may never have received.
A Sample Experience in IFS
Let’s say a client finds herself panicking before setting boundaries with her mother. In an IFS session, instead of pushing through or dismissing the anxiety, we might get curious: What part of you feels afraid? What does it believe will happen if you assert yourself?
That part might reveal it’s trying to keep her “safe” from rejection or punishment—echoes of a childhood where speaking up had consequences.
Over time, we can help that part trust the client’s Self—the grounded, adult presence who can handle difficult situations now. The part can soften. The panic lessens. Boundaries become possible.
From Surviving to Reclaiming
IFS doesn’t just help clients cope. It helps them reclaim the wholeness that was never lost, just obscured by years of survival.
For adult children of narcissistic and borderline parents, that means:
Knowing they are not broken
Understanding their reactions in context
Gaining tools to relate to themselves with kindness
Learning to lead from their core Self, not from fear
Healing becomes more than a goal—it becomes a lived, felt experience.
A Gentle Invitation
If you resonate with the experience of having a narcissistic or borderline parent, and you're carrying a tangle of feelings you don't know how to sort through, IFS might be a path worth exploring. You don’t have to exile parts of yourself just to function. You don’t have to keep managing or minimizing the pain.
There is another way. And it starts with being curious about the parts of you that have worked so hard, for so long, to keep you safe.
Let’s connect to see how I can help you.