Enmeshment

Enmeshment is a concept introduced by Salvador Minuchin to describe families where personal boundaries are diffused, sub-systems undifferentiated, and over-concern for others leads to a loss of autonomous development. Enmeshed in parental needs, trapped in a discrepant role function, a child may lose his or her capacity for self-direction; his/her own distinctiveness, under the weight of psychic incest; and, if family pressures increase, may end up becoming the identified patient or family scapegoat. Enmeshment was also used by John Bradshaw to describe a state of cross-generational bonding within a family, whereby a child (normally of the opposite sex) becomes a surrogate spouse for their mother or father.

The term is sometimes applied to engulfing codependent relationships, where an unhealthy symbiosis is in existence.

For the toxically enmeshed child, the adult's carried feelings may be the only ones they know, outweighing and eclipsing their own.

Clarifying boundaries, putting the generations in separate compartments, and finding a better balance between involvement and separation, are all useful remedies.

At the same time, it is important that the therapist avoids becoming enmeshed in the family subsystems themselves - the unconscious enmeshment of helping therapist/needy client.

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