Book Review: Will I Ever Be Good Enough? Healing the Daughters of Narcissistic Mothers 

Who’s It For? 

If you can’t tell by the title, Will I Ever Be Good Enough?: Healing the Daughters of Narcissistic Mothers is a book written for women who have mothers with narcissistic traits. Narcissistic personality disorder is rare—only occurring in around 2% of the population—and it’s even more uncommon for women to be diagnosed with NPD. This may make some women feel like the book isn’t for them if their mother doesn’t have narcissistic personality disorder. However, you don’t have to be suffering from a personality disorder. If your mother has narcissistic traits, you may have trauma due to those traits. In other words, your mother doesn’t have to have a full-blown personality disorder in order to cause emotional damage and trauma. 

Emotional Abuse Really Isn’t That Bad, Right? 

A lot of people don’t think that emotional abuse is that bad—especially when it’s compared to something like sexual abuse or physical abuse. However, it can still cause lasting trauma, difficulties forming relationships, difficulties maintaining relationships, and difficulties finding fulfillment in day-to-day life. Tragically, emotional abuse can be passed down from generation to generation. Those who were emotionally abused by their parents may display emotionally abusive behaviors to their children. These children may go on to abuse their children as well.  People who suffered emotional abuse may need extensive therapy before they’re able to have successful relationships and parent children. 

Breaking Multi-Generational Cycles 

If you were emotionally abused by your mother, you probably feel deeply hurt by the wounds she’s caused. It’s likely that your mother experienced emotional abuse as well and never knew how to parent in a healthy manner that leads to children who are emotionally whole and able to lead normal and fulfilling lives. While she was likely doing her best, and didn’t intentionally seek out to cause as much harm as possible, that doesn’t excuse her behavior, nor does it abdicate her of her responsibility as a mother. Maybe your mother did fail to fulfill the responsibility of breaking multi-generational abuse cycles. But that doesn’t mean that you have to fail too. You do have the power to change for the better and provide your children with the mother they need to grow into strong, independent adults who lead successful and fulfilling lives. 

Written by a Therapist, but Shouldn’t Replace Therapy 

One of the great things about Will I Ever Be Good Enough? Is that it was written by a licensed therapist—this isn’t just someone who’s lived through this. McBride also has the clinical experience necessary to write advise toward other women who are hurting from emotional abuse at the hands of their own mothers. While this book is a great source of information, it’s not meant to replace therapy. Therapy, for many victims of emotional abuse, will be necessary in order to fully heal. Tragically, those who have endured extensive emotional abuse fail to develop identities of their own. Many of these children also fail to develop the skills necessary to effectively regulate their emotions due to the fact that their primary responsibility in childhood was to regulate their parents’ emotions. If you’re struggling with the trauma that an emotionally abusive mother caused, you’ll definitely find good information in this book—however, you’re not likely to be able to use this book in place of therapy. In many cases, therapy is where the real healing begins. 

Worth a Read? 

If you are a woman who is struggling with the pain of having been raised by a mother who had narcissistic traits, tendencies, or even a full-blown narcissistic personality disorder diagnosis, you may benefit from reading this book. If you were emotionally abused by your parents, but you aren’t a woman, or weren’t abused by your mother, Adult Children of Emotionally Immature Parents may be a better option to get you started on healing.