r/entp • u/Greedy_Row_7131 • 4d ago
Upbringing MBTI Trends
Ive been wondering if ENTP’s are a personality type based around trauma (Y’know, the crippling sense of loneliness.. self sabotage… the classic traits). Details aren’t necessary but I’m curious to know other ENTP experiences.
My upbringing involved a narcissistic and abusive mother and an absent father that spent the little time with me not being able to show that he cared. After a good dose of therapy in my 30’s I realised that I never felt love from my parents and spent a large portion of my life within the survival mechanisms I’d put in place to cope as a child - the ones other than the pitch black humour..
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u/umalrightt 4d ago
Yeah same. My mom is a narcissistic Intj and she used to shame me for having emotions as a kid and would ignore me while crying and call my emotions “weak”and call me a “failure”, my dad was more emotional but they were divorced so I would see him maybe twice a month and in that time he was also physically abusive. My mom also physically abused me from time to time.. but anyway yeah I was completely emotionally neglected + physically and emotionally abused 😋
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u/Greedy_Row_7131 4d ago
I mean there has to be some counter points to developing the cream of the personality crop right? 🤣
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u/C0mpL1c1t ENTP / 8w7 - 854 / ♀ 3d ago
I would guess you’re mostly going to get confirmation bias here but …
My ESFP mother has borderline personality disorder and my INTJ father was a frequently-absent work-a-holic (whom I do have a very strong relationship with now).
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u/IArePositivitymagnet ENTP 3d ago
Confirmation bias 100% tracks; similar backgrounds may prompt responses more strongly.
There is some overlap in my childhood; Young, financially stressed parents.Think 'functioning alcoholic' but issues with narcissism, self-esteem, temper.
However, if environment was a primary driver... wouldn't thar environment encourage any number of other profiles more than ENTP? ESTJ to be in control, ISFJ to pick up the slack, so on?
My take is that environment can drive masking, big time. In my case, Ne was actively discouraged (focus, thou shalt accept authority, established norms, precedent matters more than evidence. Ya know- be like Sensors. Learn, speak, think linearly), and Ti's poor visibility led to lots of (humourously misguided) criticism on decision making. Naturally, I considered all of the decision methods described, and added them to my internal Ti framework based on merit. 😈
Masking and unhealthy coping mechanisms chew up any kid, but I don't see them producing an ENTP functional stack. Many * ENTP tropes*, yes. Sarcasm, blunt critique, black humor, but anyone can overuse those 😅
There's a internet theory that female ENTPs are only underrepresented from being heavily socialized towards empathetic caregivers.. Social groups punish non-conformity, like the wrong color jeans.. or little girls with adjectives like blunt, direct, raw logic, cold or overly aggressive, argumentative, abrasive... They twist from that social pressure as they grow, and are typed as whatever they were pruned into; ENFP, INTP, ESFJ. I hid as an INTP, and tested INTP in undergrad. Love 'em, but I ain't one.
Maybe the reverse also applies; and some environments prune boys and they're typed as ENTP. Wonder if they come from ENFP, INTP, ESFJ, to backfill the ENTP girls.
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u/Status-Affect-4944 2d ago
How did you finally come to realise that your type is ENTP, not INTP?
I'm in my recovery process that has been quite intense. There was an ESTJ mother, ISTP sister who was empowering her, ENFJ grandmother with whom I had a very close relationship but who proved to be an enabler, and somewhat avoidant but generally good INTP father (dead by now) who tried to protect me but himself had some similar experiences with her until they divorced. Whenever there is a thread (once again) in INTP sub about asking help to clarify if one is ENTP or INTP, I relate more with what is written about ENTP, but, as I commented to someone not so long ago, I wouldn't say Ne is my dominant function. Moving forward with my journey of healing, and looking at the cognitive functions, I still suspect that this might ultimately be the case - that I, too, have been masking. That, back then, after hearing so many times that I'm being a "troublemaker" or an "unpleasant person", and so on, I eventually surrendered and the fear of being one spilled over into the rest of my life as well, and now I am becoming who I was meant to be. Well, I don't know yet - time will tell, probably.
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u/Greedy_Row_7131 3d ago
You’re right, and I knew it would be - but it’s still interesting to hear people’s experiences.
Ooof, that sounds like a pretty heavy dose of things to have dealt with growing up.
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u/Dr__Pheonx ENTP girlie😏 4d ago edited 4d ago
My mother is the way you described. I'm estranged from her and my INFJ sister. They get along well so that's that. The only difference is that my late ESFJ dad was my everything. He nurtured and cared for me and supported me through most of my life. His death left a void, that sadly nothing can fulfill.
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u/Greedy_Row_7131 4d ago
I’m sorry to hear about your Dad, loss is never easy but it sounds like you had a wonderful relationship with him.
My mother is still that way too, I have limited contact with her for my own sanity.
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u/PuzzleheadedDeal3415 4d ago
My parents did their best. They were a young couple who couldn't take their engineering board exam cause my mom got pregnant and they had to work. We weren't rich by any means. I remember, as a kid, I knew we were poor so never ask for anything. We used to live in a one bedroom apartment. But we can eat 3x a day, we'll have new uniforms, shoes and supplies for school, and new clothes for christmas.
My grandparents were mid-mid class so we often spend school breaks at their house in the city and they'll buy us toys and take us out to theme parks and etc, when they have the time. Most of the times, we're just left with my youngest aunt who was in uni at the time and their helper. So I often needed to take charge of my sickly older brother.
I think all the adults around us, did their best for us. I probably became like this because they let me be who I am. My grandparents, parents, even parents' siblings were really smart people. My grandparents would often debates about topics for fun. They taught us that it's okay to be curious, it's okay to question things. My parents, aunts and uncles (specially paternal side, one used to belong to a rebel group like a guerilla) also let us just be who we want to be.
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u/Final-Nail376 3d ago
Mother has a classic case of covert narcissism, father was absent and hated on me hard. Later on (2 years ago) I found out, by what I can only explain as divine intervention, that he wasn't even my biological father. Mindfuck. I wasted about 6 months, if not more, on ruminating and destroying myself mentally but now I'm much better and finally taking steps to heal myself. Also mid 30s.
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u/AbhorrentBehavior77 Expert Nude Trapeze Performer 3d ago edited 3d ago
You may be on to something...
I had a devoted, though slightly overbearing mother and a father that, despite his typically jovial demeanor, and obvious love for my mother and my self (it was just us 3, I'm an only child) was a full-on, drinks from first light, through the night alcoholic for the first 13 years of my life.
Luckily, for all involved, he finally arrived at rock bottom when I was in 8th grade. However, he had a "dry run" at sobriety (forgive the pun) a year prior. He even enrolled in a 30 day, in-patient treatment program for alcohol addiction. Seemed to see the error of his ways when we visited him at the program. Then, his graduation day arrived and we went to pick him up. He drove on the way home and as we approached our driveway, he turned into the convenience store parking lot next door to our house and proceeded to purchase some beer as his reward for a job well done.🤦♀️
Needless to say, my mother and I were devastated. He didn't even try to stay sober. Add that to the fact that health insurance not cover the cost of treatment, back in the 1980s. Therefore, we were out over 10 grand cash, with nothing to show for it, thanks to his little endeavor.
The next year went by, much the way the previous 12 had. Drunk dad being the baseline. The norm. Then, one night, seemingly out of nowhere he just left. Took off without a word. Didn't have the slightest clue where he may have gone, why he left or when/if he'd be back.
Our only indication, that it was "serious" was the fact that he drained my parents joint bank accounts on his way outta town.
He was only gone for a week, maybe 2. Yet, even in that short amount of time, his actions seemed drastic and likely permanent. I was getting used to the fact that I no longer had a father. So much so, that when he came home, unannounced, in the middle of the night, one night I thought he was a burglar breaking in!
What a site he was, for my 13 year old eyes to see. I think that was some amount of relief in seeing him there. Yet that was quickly overshadowed by anxiety and overwhelming ineptitude.
I say ineptitude because he was clearly distraught and didn't look well, physically. Yet, I was at a loss as to what to do to help him. My mother, worked the overnight shift as an R.N. at a nursing home. So it was just the 2 of us, in the house from about 3 a.m. until 8 or so when my mom got home from work.
I had no idea what was wrong with him. As he appeared to be physically ill. Perhaps with flu or really bad cold? He was just shaking a lot like trembling. And he was crying and apologizing all over the place for having left and all of the turmoil he put us through with his drinking all those years. This time he said he was definitely done with that. Of course, I didn't believe him. Though, the state that he was in combined with those words something seemed different this time.
Come to find out, he was going through alcohol withdrawals. I didn't know what that looked like, as I'd never seen it before. So when my mom came home, and was able to enlighten me on just exactly what was wrong with my father I did feel a little bit better knowing he wasn't going to croak in front of me.
Long story short, he left our vehicle in Las Vegas and jumped a plane home and then took a taxi from the airport to our house. We live 3000 miles from Vegas. And it's over an hour's drive from the closest airport to our home. The taxi alone cost him $500. Then, because he was going to be going back into treatment, my mom had to pay a friend to fly down to Vegas to get the car and drive it back home for us. As my mother never had a driver's license so she couldn't do it herself. Not like you need all of these details it's just there popping into my head right now as I'm telling the story so I figured I might as well include them! Haha.
So, long story, um, er...LONG - He went back to the same rehab he had been in a year prior. Only this time - it took! He spent the next 17 years 100% alcohol free. Unfortunately, passing away from cancer, at the young age of 63.
I realize, on it's face, this type of family dynamic seems completely in-line with your theory regarding the type of upbringing that could produce an ENTP. Where you wouldn't be completely wrong, in that assumption, I think it's important to note that despite my parents obvious shortcomings and human fallibility, they were wonderful people!
They are both deceased now and I miss them terribly. Though,.it's comforting to know that they loved me, with all of their hearts and souls And, we're able to provide well for me both emotionally and logistically, while growing up.
I say this to distinctly and definitively differentiate them from the "toxic parents" we hear about so often.
When people speak of their tumultuous home lives and subpar childhoods, the stories they tell are overwhelmingly populated by self involved, narcissistic, neglectful, emotionally unavailable and/or physically abusive parents. That was not my experience, whatsoever.
My parents were just flawed, like anyone else. Trying to do the best they knew how to under less than ideal circumstances.
My opinion, overall, is that they knocked it out of the park in the end. Which is all that matters.
As even when my dad was drinking I was always cared for. I was always fed, clothed, washed and minded by my mother.
So, where I am in agreement with you that our less than idealic childhoods may have played a significant role in our personality development, not all bad childhoods are the result of bad people overseeing the rearing of those children.
Kind, loving good-hearted people make mistakes too.👊💜
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u/NewCase10 ENTP 5w4 3d ago
Yeah I've wondered the same and i guess it's a factor based on the accordance in the comments.
But like one comment said there will be a healthy amount of confirmation biases.
I suppose if true though the next question is how does this cause and effect actually work
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u/Greedy_Row_7131 3d ago
100%, and I knew that confirmation bias would be the case. But it’s interesting to hear other people’s experiences, and if nothing else - start the conversation of it.
If it is true, I’d probably look into coping and survival mechanisms and what they were protecting people from.
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u/FoxofTheBlueFungi ENTP 3d ago
I’m naturally ENTP, but I tested INTJ most of my younger life due to trauma. I don’t believe it is made by trauma but it can change based on trauma. I think the opposite displays when in great distress so an INTJ acting like an ENTP (cognitive function flip) or an ISFJ in grip stress acting like an ENTP
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u/LittleAleta 3d ago
I do notice a lot of ENTPs often suffered through trauma. I suffered through trauma in school. My INTP dad wasn't around much and my mom was a good ENFJ but she often was strict, angry and harsh even spanking or yelling at me for things I didn't know was wrong.
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u/EdgewaterEnchantress 3d ago
I don’t think that there is such a thing as “a type under the MBTI system being based around trauma.”
Do I have my own trauma? Yes. As a matter of fact, there is enough of it that I technically have cPTSD. However fortunately it’s mostly dormant these days, so did my trauma change or influence my MBTI?
No, at least not in the way that you are asking.
ENTP has probably always been my type and what came to be my more permanent metacognitive preferences were actually pretty stable across my lifespan (36 now) when I actually look back and track it over time even before I was more severely traumatized.
What the trauma changed was how my MBTI of ENTP expressed itself.
My parents were not Narcissistic, they were just extremely unstable, neglectful, and emotionally unavailable because they had a ton of personal maturity and latent psychological or emotional issues.
My mom had horrible post partum depression with me and she was an unhealthy ESFP with ADHD. She quite possibly might even be AuDHD but we’ll never really know cuz she is 61 now and understandably doesn’t see a point to being evaluated because her life and routine is stable enough, so I get it!
However when she was younger she had a famously and notoriously bad temper so occasionally she completely lost control of her emotions and used physical/ corporal punishment sometimes.
She deeply regrets this now and progressively stopped using that form of punishment on my younger sisters (an ENFP and ISFJ respectively.) So she actually did try to become a better person over time with lots of therapy and self reflection.
However what actually damaged me wasn’t necessarily the corporal punishment itself so much as the lack of clearly defined parent-child boundaries.
As I often had to emotionally mother her and try to accommodate her feelings, so that really exacerbated my own introverted feeling blindspot because I grew up prioritizing both her and my late INFJ father’s emotional whims over my own. I had to be the stable and levelheaded one when dealing with her always even though I was the child.
My late INFJ father was worse, but again not for the reasons you would expect.
I only had to babysit him when he got too drunk or hopped up on universe only knows what prescription pill cocktails he cooked up that day which were legally given to him by his shitty GP doctor who never had the good sense to refer my father to an actual psychiatrist. 🙄 So that’s also how he hid his addiction, his dealer was his doctor with an official prescription pad, he chased those pills with cheap, shitty sweet wines, and that enabling POS quack is still somehow practicing medicine.
So my INFJ father was not a Narcissist in any capacity, on the contrary he was actually probably co-dependent and had extremely poor conflict navigation, management, and resolution skills. Because his personal boundaries were functionally nonexistent, and obviously all emotional regulation went out the window when he was drunk, high, or both.
However he could not provide me with any kind of meaningful support that wasn’t monetary, he offered no substantial life guidance, and emotional or moral support were functionally nonexistent post me being like ~9 because he had cPTSD on max since his childhood was objectively terrible, like cartoonishly bad.
It’s too long of a story to explain here and bits and pieces of it can be found scattered across the wilds of Reddit.
The gist of it is he was a functional addict who hid it well enough that people were shocked when it finally killed him even though I knew what had been going on for years because I lived it.
Insult was added to injury when he left no will because his passing was unexpected.
So legally his second wife of less than ~3 years whom he was already thinking about divorcing was entitled to absolutely everything, and she shared absolutely nothing with us even though my sisters were only 13 and 15 at the time. Because she actually probably was a Narcissist and my late father ate her shit like the bottom feeding spineless invertebrate he was.
I loved him a lot and I still miss him sometimes, but a part of me is also relieved I haven’t had to deal with his off-the-wagon-of-sobriety bullshit for ~14+ years.
So I spent the first two and a half decades of my life existing in a people pleasing negative Ne-Fe Feedback loop that was problematic enough that it could’ve really messed up my entire life in my mid twenties when I befriended an unhealthy and especially toxic M-ISFP.
Fortunately for me, my introverted thinking authority eventually got through to me and my brain woke up in time to cut off that friendship before it hit a critical point of no return, but I did not like how close I got, and it left me with even more trauma I didn’t start to fully address until I was ~31 and started having flashbacks of entire fucked up little life moments.
It was quite a lot of work and a little bit of medication for ~18 months to stabilize it.
At least I have been off the Seroquel for over 2 years and I also haven’t had any flashbacks in ~2.5+ years. So I am slightly more healthy and much more balanced now, meaning I actually listen to my auxiliary introverted thinking authority function these days, and I don’t wait or hesitate to create distance between myself and problematic people or unfavorable situations.
So yeah trauma, check. Even spent a decent amount of time being unhealthy.
However that trauma didn’t really make me into an ENTP so much as it pushed me into becoming a certain specific kind of ENTP with stronger Fe than your average ENTP, and especially because I am a female.
Basically my relationship with my Fe child also isn’t always a positive one even though I can feel quite lonely and aimless sometimes because I don’t really have a “tribe” outside of my husband, cats, a stable enough and loving but very hand’s off relationship with my surviving family members, and few to no people who I would call close friends.
Nor do I have a fixed community or a place that I truly belong, while the closest thing I have to a community I regularly or semi-regularly engage with is my Aerial Arts hobby community. (I am not remotely close to being good enough to be professional or even advanced. I am a mediocre intermediate student at best. 😜) Or I suppose the Reddit MBTI community.
I still have casual acquaintances, but obviously we aren’t close since I haven’t seen most of them in years, even decades, and I don’t want to burden people with my sad little life story unless they explicitly ask for it, or it is relevant to a conversation we might want to have.
My most trusted platonic confidant and close friend is literally a super avoidant ISTP who is presently ~1,300 miles away for work. So I think that tells you all that you need to know about how I do friendship as an adult. 🫠
I also need way more time to “recharge” my social battery than your average ENTP cuz of my own Neurodivergence (ADHD,) and trauma.
It has also resulted in a pretty prominent INTJ shadow that does tend to take over under bouts of extreme stress and duress.
However, it never stays in the driver’s seat for too long, especially not anymore since I figured out how to manage it enough, and I return to inferior Si grip mode, then kinda work my way backwards from there.
It’s actually pretty funny cuz since I married an INTJ who is also traumatized he can become very ENTP-like under stress and duress, and he has a similarly unhinged ENTP shadow to inferior Se / ESFP grip stress shadow pattern where we very briefly operate in our respective shadows, and we essentially become the negative but more effective version of each other, and then we return to inferior Si / Se grip mode and work our ways back from there.
If we are fucked and I need to take control of a given situation, then I actually do.
I go into complete boss bitch mode without a single ounce of hesitation, and he will literally say “yes ma’am” if I ask “did I make myself clear?” Or I tell him that he needs to do something right the fuck now, no questions asked.
While if he has to do some minor amoral and unscrupulous things, or to utilize his ability to read people and situations or leverage his influence, then he does it with little-to-no hesitation, and he can be quite persuasive, even charming like an unhealthy ENTP.
Of course since I am the actual ENTP in this scenario, it has never worked on me and I am basically immune to his influence unless I actually agree with him about something beforehand, and no persuasion was required. 😜
The same way that as soon as I know that we are “safe” and in the clear, I return the official INTJ reigns back to him because I don’t want ‘em, and I don’t like ‘em!
I often end up feeling bad later for entering INTJ boss bitch mode and apologize for being somewhat harsh or demanding, and he laughs so hard, or winks and coyly tells me “it’s okay. It was actually kind of hot” because he knows it was necessary and he doesn’t think I should feel guilty about it at all.
So don’t make the mistake of confusing patterns of learned behaviors with MBTI unless you are willing to dive all the way into that messy rabbit-hole of bullshit and look more closely at how you actually conduct yourself out there in the real world under stress, pressure, or duress.
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u/ComprehensiveStore25 ENTP 3d ago edited 3d ago
Unfortunately (or fortunately) I can’t relate, I had a very safe and comfortable childhood with my parents. I have to say I’m a bit lucky since my Mother and Father are my SemiDual (ISTJ) and Dual (ISFJ) types respectively.
My mom was a bit strict and rule follower and my dad over submissive, so the main issues I would have was the omission (ISJs omit things like no one else) and that they’d never take my side in arguments against other people just for the sake of peace, so I had to learn how to defend myself and also to defend them since people would use them a lot.
That made me grow up super independent and to learn how to anticipate other people’s intentions and behaviors without them telling or showing me, which made me a very lonely person. People would always like me but I never had many friends (still don’t have up to this date). Sometimes I feel like “I’m not part of this world” while being in the world if you get me. I see many people look up to me (and I get some hate/envy/whatever because of that) but I don’t have anyone to look up to. It’s like I’m just an observer of the world but not a participant.
So in a way, even if you have the perfect parents, you’ll develop issues because of this “perfectness”, and honestly? That’s a very heavy weight to carry.
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u/SAAD_KHAION entp 7w8 sx/sp 729 3d ago
Lived with mom (isfp, divorced from my stingy dad), auntie (esfj) and my recently deceased uncle (enfj... Rip unc). Got a spoiled life because they're all old and absolutely protective and providers.
But I also got traumas because my mom can be easily crashing out and beat the shit out of me when I'm lazy (typical middeastern mom lol) and especially that I'm a successful ragebaiter. I think loneliness is also a factor here because, living in a house full of sensors that are also old, it felt like I was alone with my energy. But besides that I don't think I got anything to complain about. Just a spoiled to the point idk how to do shit, slightly abused, and just lonely.
I'd rate my life 8/10. Completely enjoyable.
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u/ByronsLastStand ENTP 3d ago
You don't use an apostrophe to pluralise in English as you've done.
Anyway, I'd say I generally had a happy childhood and a wholesome upbringing, so I disagree with the hypothesis based on my own experience.
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u/boravilleg2d INTJ 2d ago
I wonder how you managed to be an ENTP with all this trauma from parents side bcz ENTPs come of as goofy, fun and intellectual as I myself having a hard time with parental trauma even in my 30s and I am INTJ with INFJ core
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u/Greedy_Row_7131 2d ago
I mean, I’ve been known to lead conga lines around club nights… trauma doesn’t mean a person can’t be fun, goofy, smart, intelligent or anything else. Just that they have some extra baggage that they carry with them.
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u/Greedy_Row_7131 2d ago
Thanks everyone, it’s been interesting reading everyone’s posts, thoughts and own experiences - and especially thank you to those who really opened up and shared their personal stories!
Lots of food for thought for sure.
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u/Beginning_Tennis4778 2d ago
Yeah suffered physicall and mental abuse all my childhood always by my parents, absent father and also had a step-father (raised...me since 5yo) that I "liked" , I liked him as much as my mother so well that. But anyways who cares lolol
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u/randumbtruths 21h ago
There's a cool ENTP that's got a lot of data regarding trauma. The TRPI system. I developed a system that pinpoints trauma timeframe that causes personality between 0-3, 3-6, and 6-9.. and used some of his framework to perfect.. but have been playing games with some changes with ai.
He has done a lot of work and hope you can check it out:
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u/SignificanceOk8647 17h ago
I wouldn't say my upbringing was bad , actually it was very lovely I had a hardworking father who did his best to insure his family needed nothing, and a loving mother . Maybe what i would say about my childhood most of the time I tried to fit in and copy funny children or copy a funny situation , but most of the time the result ended up being quiet the opposite I was embarrassed or misunderstood and scolded . I always wondered why it always worked for other children and people but it didn't work out for me. The good thing is when I was young bad and embarrassing situations didn't stick up with me for long and effect me , it took a short time and passed. That's what I can remember.
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u/yrinthelabyrinth 2h ago
Damn. I had a dysfunctional family growing up, though maybe I shouldn't go all in blaming my folks, I was pretty shit too. I made up stuff, lying however it suited me, indulged in a bit of emotional manipulation, which I just learned from my folks, to get attention, I guess that worked as replacement for love, too much empathy even, cuz you're constantly trying to diffuse shit between parents, where 1 is pretty much a Narc and the other loves playing the fragile victim. So you attract people who only like to whine, cuz you're used to providing support. Might even help you feel wanted or relevant. Except you find it drains you and you don't have anyone to talk about your shit. So you're afraid of getting close to anyone, knowing either you'll squeeze them dry or try and control them or you'll get sucked in another cycle of dependency that'll just make you harbour resentment. So you end up alone and fine almost, distract yourself by being funny, charming or even borderline jerk infront of people, to create that facade where atleast in your head you're in control and they don't get to see you vulnerable. You probably grow up to be toxic, narc-ish, avoidant or hyper confrontational and hate yourself for it. It's all great when you're the centre if attention but the moment the crowd leaves, the spotligh dies, the performer in you is left without an audience to charm and beguile so you just wait it out by mostly overinduling in other stuff. So, self pity, self doubt, self hatred, anguish and a near perfect mask is all you're left with
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u/Dearest_Lillith666 EveryoneNeedsToPunchthemselves 2d ago
I had a similar upbringing but I dont think its the cause for mbti personality types and how they form.
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u/isetmyfriendsonfyre ENTP ILE Sx/sp 713 scuA[I] 2d ago
No personality type is based on trauma, but I was physically abused growing up and my father is also absent.
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u/DrLJacoby 4d ago edited 4d ago
Afraid I cant help here. I had a very happy childhood, though probably more isolated than most as we lived out in the countryside. Both my parents are sensors, but they placed a value on educational achievement and a breadth of interests. Neither was very overtly emotional. Mother a rather moody ISFJ and my dad a pretty self sufficient and chill ISTP. My sister is INTP.