Why does parental abuse turn a lot (if not all) of us into people pleasers ?

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This, really

I don’t know but I agree it does. I suffer badly from this.

I guess we just want to avoid conflict at any cost

So true ❤️

Fawning.

It is desperately sad how parents can abuse their own children in different ways.

I see it as survival- inbuilt survival instinct to please who we are dependent on, our bodies do that so we survive. So we continue to be housed and fed.

Unlearning that as adults is hard.

Who are you pleasing?

because generally people pleasers “please” the people that shout loudest but then leave others less demanding not “pleased”?

Because people pleasing in adulthood is a development of parent pleasing in childhood. In childhood you rely on your caregivers for survival, so attachment with them is more essential than your authenticity. Hence the need to please them and hide anything they can’t cope with (your anger, sadness or fear usually). Gabor Maté is good on this - lots of videos on YouTube.

What would you class as abuse? I’m a people pleaser & hate it. I feel panic if I sense my parents are angry/upset with me

beacuse its a learned response. as children we were conditioned to behave and act in a certain way by our parents, pretty much like we learn to read and write.

and once its in there, its in there for good!

This is very interesting- thank you

i personally am a people pleaser because i was groomed from a very young age by my mum to be and provide whatever a male wanted from me.

i know i do it, and i am working on not doing it, but sometimes that sh1t runs deep

Um lots of examples -,getting drunk and aggressive

This is emotional abuse from your parents. It might not be malicious or intentional, but it is abusive to your emotional health.

i will also add, abusive parents dont always produce people pleasers.. i have 4 siblings, all abused as children. I am the people pleaser, the others are not but they are all narcissists... so maybe its an individual thing rather than across the board

But if you ask your siblings, they will probably describe themselves as people pleasers and you as the narcissist.

i only say that because i often wonder whether others would describe someone self diagnosing themselves as a “people pleaser” as a “people pleaser”!

It’s surprisingly simple. You learn to feel responsible for your parent’s mood.

You watch for the things that set off your parents bad moods and this abuse. Then you do everything in your power to avoid those situations happening. It could be keeping your room clean. It might be bringing your dad his drink. It might be not mentioning your shoes are too small.

not upsetting your parent becomes a part of your personality. Then you become an adult and the habit is ingrained.

it took me a very long time to get to this level of clarity. It’s a large part of why abuse makes me so angry. The children never really escape.

Because your boundaries were invaded before you had a chance to establish healthy ones - resulting in very flaccid boundaries that are all over the place - you didn’t safely learn what is acceptable and feels ok and what doesn’t for you - it just probably all doesn’t.

therefore it’s hard to tell what’s going on when you grow up because you ah these all over the place boundaries

because you don’t want to repeat the emotional trauma pain you will people please to avoid having that pain again

Seriously, this is a load of nonsense in most cases.
Blaming your parents for everything that's wrong in your life is just a way of shifting responsibility for your own shortcomings.
We are all so convinced we are perfect parents now - just as your parents probably thought they were when they were bringing you up (Note: I am not talking about actual abuse here, just the general my parents were not as good as I am type comments). Times change, parenting styles change and while today's parents are utterly convinced the line is drawn here and nothing will change, it really will.
How will you feel when your children start to pick your parenting apart when they grow up?

This is very true. I was a people pleaser until about 7/8 years ago and slowly stopped. I still am to an extent but it’s a work in progress.

That sounds like the thin skinned and thick skinned narcissist - both are reactions to trauma and abuse

this is very true.. there's nothing wrong with them its me thats the problem. I am however, after many many years to therapy certain i am not a narcissist, i did ask my therapist once 'am i a narcissist' and asked them to be 100% honest with me and the reply was 'if you were a narcissist you would not ask the question'.

i don't use the label 'people pleaser' although i know its a trait i have. if that makes any sense

Dunno, it had the opposite effect on me.

but i suspect.. the OP is not really talking in terms of my own experience of abuse, as mine, like many, looking back was horrific, and have much deeper scars and issues than 'people pleasing'

It’s not about blaming. It’s about being real and truthful about how these things come about so we can heal from them and not perpetuate them with our own children.

It isn’t a load of nonsense. It’s been studied by psychologists for decades now.

I'm already encouraging my dcs to look.at their childhood and try and recognise patterns in their behaviour now.

I was highly manipulated by my mother, had a very distant father and then walked straight into a highly abusive marriage. It's taken a lot of work to recognise why I have no boundaries and I'm desperately keen to make sure my dcs can see learned behaviour early so they don't do what I did.

Pete Walker is good to read on this - free information on his website or his book Complex PTSD.

There are four types of trauma responses - flight, fight, freeze and fawn. Different people will lean towards different responses based on their personality, upbringing and conditioning.

Fawning is people pleasing - typically a more female response. Women tend to repress their anger and get depressed.

Fight is being angry - it’s a typically more male response. Men tend to externalise their anger and be argumentative.

Not always, but typically.