Natalie Cole Quotes

There's a definition of narcissism that when a parent is narcissistic, instead of the child seeing himself reflected in the mother's face and the mother's joy, the child of the narcissistic parent feels like, 'What can I do to make her okay, to make her happy?'

I have a great need for affection from an audience. I don't know whether this is because I had such a tough life when I was a child.

They say that abandonment is a wound that never heals. I say only that an abandoned child never forgets.

Growing up without love, without being cared for, might be the worst type of poverty.

I've always wanted to be what my father never was to me.

I felt abandoned at a young age. That's where most of my anger came from, I guess.

I think I'm extremely vulnerable and that in some ways I seek out rejection. Never feeling like you're getting that pat on the back from dad is probably at the heart of that.

My dad used to ignore me when I was a kid. He couldn't stand my voice, so he just used to ignore me, and then he'd impersonate me.

I started running away when I was five years old. It wasn't until I was an adult that I realized what I really wanted was somebody to come after me when I was running away.

I've overcome neglect and deprivation, abandonment and abuse.

I was just the youngest in the family, and most in desperate need of attention.

The reason why parents mistreat their children has less to do with character and temperament than with the fact that they were mistreated themselves and were not permitted to defend themselves.

When I was about 10 I ran away to see my father. He couldn't have cared less. He just took me back as soon as he could.

I could tell my parents hated me. My bath toys were a toaster and a radio.

I never heard 'I love you' as a child. I never felt pretty or cared for.

I had a very rocky, difficult, emotional childhood with my parents.

I walked on eggshells a lot. I have a bad self-esteem problem, and my father probably facilitated it. He once looked at me very seriously when I was about 15 and had whipped cream smeared all over myself. He said, 'You'd do anything for a laugh, wouldn't you?'

I never got hugged as child.

I suspect I wasn't loved enough as a child.

I was pretty much tap dancing for attention from a very early age.

My mother always thought if her mother hadn't left her, she would have been happy. All the problems she had never would have happened.

If you're getting abandonment, if you're getting abuse as a child, if you're getting uncertainty when you're a child, unfortunately you tend to look for that in your life later on, and you think that's love.

Providing - that's not love. Being there - that's more important. I mean, we see that. We see that with all these rich socialites. They're crying out for attention; they're hurting for love. I'm not being judgmental - I'm just making an observation. They're crying out for the love that maybe they didn't get at home, and they got everything.

When I left the house to become an actress, my mother literally flung her body across the door and said, 'You're killing me!' It was a very strict household. That can be okay, but there was also no nourishment, either.

I grew up on Section 8 housing, food stamps, welfare, and dealing with social services. I never had a Christmas. I never had a birthday.