It makes a lot of sense to me. Having parents like that creates a lot of anxiety, which seems to be relieved by trying to live up to some impossibly hard ideal of "giving." Only the striving never puts you in a totally safe place, so the striving just gets double-downed on. My early experience in life involved a bit of the same dynamics.

You have great insight. That alone does not neutralize this pattern of behavior. That's why therapy doesn't fix this. It's like the behavior has to change first, so then the mind can follow. That's hard to talk yourself into.

A certain amount of "selfishness" is healthy. Otherwise, other people drain you. I had a retinue of people who would call me or get together with me to extract attention that made them feel better. I told myself that I was building social-connectedness. But I felt so used. Finally, as my own unmet needs escalated, I snapped and started cutting these folks off. It felt like I was being unbelievably mean. But I would not go back to the way it was. Still I can relapse into that pattern in a heartbeat.