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.[1] Enmeshed in parental needs, trapped in a discrepant role function,[2] a child may lose his or her capacity for self-direction;[3] his/her 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]
See also
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References
- ↑ H. & L. Goldberg, Family Therapy: An Overview (2008) p. 244 and p. 467
- ↑ Virginia Satir, Peoplemaking (1983) p. 167
- ↑ R. C. Schwartz, Internal Family Systems Therapy (1997) p. 162
- ↑ Robert Bly, Iron John (1991) p. 170 and p. 185-7
- ↑ Goldberg, p. 239
- ↑ John Bradshaw, Reclaiming Virtue (2009) p. 390
- ↑ Bradshaw, p. 272
- ↑ R. Abell, Own Your Own Life (1977) p. 119-22
- ↑ Terence Real, I Don't Want to Talk About It (1997) p. 206 and p. 360
- ↑ R. Skynner/J. Cleese, Families and how to survive them (1993) p. 93 and p. 213
- ↑ Goldenberg, p. 410
- ↑ Skynner, p. 93
- ↑ D. Sedgwick, Jung and Searles (1993) p. 113
Further reading
- Robin Skynner, One Flesh, Separate Persons (London 1976)
