Enmeshment

Enmeshment is a concept in psychology and psychotherapy introduced by Salvador Minuchin (1921-2017) to describe families where personal boundaries are diffused, sub-systems undifferentiated, and over-concern for others leads to a loss of autonomous development.[1] Enmeshed in parental needs, trapped in a discrepant role function,[2] a child may lose their capacity for self-direction;[3] their own distinctiveness, under the weight of "psychic incest";[4] and, if family pressures increase, may end up becoming the identified patient or family scapegoat.[5]

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.[6]

The term is sometimes applied to engulfing codependent relationships,[7] where an unhealthy symbiosis is in existence.[8]

For the toxically enmeshed child, the adult's carried feelings may be the only ones they know, outweighing and eclipsing their own.[9]

Remedies

Clarifying boundaries, putting the generations in separate compartments,[10] and finding a better balance between involvement and separation,[11] are all useful remedies.

At the same time, it is important that the therapist avoids becoming enmeshed in the family subsystems themselves[12]—the unconscious enmeshment of helping therapist/needy client.[13]

gollark: Do you WANT that?
gollark: I wonder if Emu War Online's ever going to happen.
gollark: That's ibis-kestrel-rat.
gollark: I have to admit that the lack of emus is troubling.
gollark: If you want hyperbolic geometry, you could try HyperRogue in the meantime.

See also

References
  1. H. & L. Goldberg, Family Therapy: An Overview (2008) p. 244 and p. 467
  2. Virginia Satir, Peoplemaking (1983) p. 167
  3. R. C. Schwartz, Internal Family Systems Therapy (1997) p. 162
  4. Robert Bly, Iron John (1991) p. 170 and p. 185-7
  5. Goldberg, p. 239
  6. John Bradshaw, Reclaiming Virtue (2009) p. 390
  7. Bradshaw, p. 272
  8. R. Abell, Own Your Own Life (1977) p. 119-22
  9. Terence Real, I Don't Want to Talk About It (1997) p. 206 and p. 360
  10. R. Skynner/J. Cleese, Families and how to survive them (1993) p. 93 and p. 213
  11. Goldenberg, p. 410
  12. Skynner, p. 93
  13. D. Sedgwick, Jung and Searles (1993) p. 113

Further reading
  • Robin Skynner, One Flesh, Separate Persons (London 1976)
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