Understanding Enmeshment Trauma

Key Takeaways

• Enmeshment trauma happens when families have no clear boundaries, leading to roles being mixed.
• People with enmeshment trauma may struggle with self-esteem and forming healthy relationships.
• Setting boundaries and exploring personal interests can help someone heal from enmeshment trauma.

Family enmeshment occurs when a family lacks clearly defined roles and boundaries. Salvador Minuchin first described the concept in his structural family therapy theory, which emphasizes the role of family relationships in an individual’s ability to function. According to Minuchin, enmeshed family members struggle to define themselves outside the family. They have high levels of communication and little physical and emotional distance. 

Cultural Norms and Enmeshment

What appears to be enmeshment in the United States—a highly individualistic society—might be typical in more collectivist cultures, like Japan and Italy, where group needs are prioritized over individual needs. If you grew up in a group-centered culture with strong connections, you might prefer an enmeshed family model.

In a study of enmeshed adults, those in the United Kingdom experienced more depression than those in Italy. The authors attributed the differences to cultural expectations.

Critics of these family system concepts say that they represent patriarchal and male-centered family structures and that the concept of enmeshment pathologizes the maternal drive to build relationships.

Enmeshment Trauma: Too Much of a Good Thing

Childhood emotional trauma often brings thoughts of neglect, but being overly close can also lead to enmeshment trauma.

For example, a child can be emotionally “parentified,” which is when the child cares for the parent’s emotional needs. For example, a mother might tell her teenage daughter about her issues with her husband, expecting the daughter to take her side.

Signs of Enmeshment Trauma

Some signs you might notice in people experiencing enmeshment trauma include:

• Little physical or emotional privacy between parents and children
• Expectations that children will be their parents’ best friends
• Parents who are overly involved in their children’s lives, not allowing them to develop independently
• Reliance on children for emotional support
• Children rewarded for not opposing enmeshment

The Effects of Enmeshment Trauma

Enmeshment trauma can lead to long-term mental health effects, such as:

Fear of Conflict

Those who grow up in enmeshed families often avoid conflict. They may have felt unsafe disagreeing with their parents, leading them to believe that disagreeing with others as an adult is also unsafe.

Difficulty In Relationships

Enmeshment trauma can make it challenging to form and maintain relationships. After feeling overwhelmed by their parents’ demands, they may expect similar emotional demands from partners or friends. Alternatively, they might seek relationships where they become the caregiver, as they learned in childhood.

Low Self-Esteem

Individuals from enmeshed families often struggle with low self-esteem. Relying heavily on parental approval can lead to a lack of self-confidence and fear of judgment.

Lack of Identity

People with enmeshment trauma might focus on pleasing others without considering their own needs. If you’ve chosen significant aspects of your life, like a career or partner, based on parental preferences, you may not know who you are without them.

If you have chosen a career, partner, place to live, or all of the above based on what your parents think is right, it may be hard to know who you really are without them.

How to Heal from Enmeshment Trauma

The good news is that it’s never too late to recover from enmeshment trauma. Here’s how to find your own way after growing up in an enmeshed family.

Create Boundaries

Boundaries are your new best friend. One of the key characteristics of an enmeshed family is a lack of boundaries.

Take stock of when you are feeling upset with something a family member has done. Is your mother calling you 10 times a day, for example, making you angry every time you see your phone ringing? 

This means you might either ask her to call less often or just stop answering your phone as much. In an enmeshed dynamic, this will likely upset her. However, you will know it is the right boundary for you if it helps you feel better.

Find Yourself

Enmeshment can become comfortable in some ways, because you must make fewer decisions on your own. But as a result, you might not develop a solid sense of self or know yourself very well.

One strategy: Date yourself, as you would a new partner. Take yourself on outings and trips, explore what makes you happy and sad, wear clothing your parents wouldn’t approve of—whatever sets you apart in some way from your other family members.

Seek Professional Help

Coming to terms with unhealthy family dynamics while also trying to change them can be difficult. Consider working with a therapist so that you don’t have to do this on your own.

Be Patient

It took a lifetime to create your current thought and behavior patterns. It won’t take a lifetime to undo them, but it won’t be overnight, either. Be patient with yourself.

Parents generally try to care for their children in the best they know how. The fact that some of those dynamics didn’t work for you doesn’t mean that your parents were bad people or that you had a terrible childhood. It means you’d like to do things of your own choosing in your own way—a healthy, responsible way to take care of yourself.

Verywell Mind uses only high-quality sources, including peer-reviewed studies, to support the facts within our articles. Read our editorial process to learn more about how we fact-check and keep our content accurate, reliable, and trustworthy.

1. Minuchin S. Families and Family Therapy.

2. Manzi C, Vignoles VL, Regalia C, Scabini E. Cohesion and enmeshment revisited: differentiation, identity, and well-being in two European cultures. J Marriage and Family. 2006;68(3):673-689. doi:10.1111/j.1741-3737.2006.00282.x

3. Bograd M. Enmeshment, fusion or relatedness?  A conceptual analysis. Journal of Psychotherapy & the Family. 1988;3(4):65-80. doi:10.1037/fam0000118

4. Kivisto KL, Welsh DP, Darling N, Culpepper CL. Family enmeshment, adolescent emotional dysregulation, and the moderating role of gender. Journal of Family Psychology. 2015;29(4):604-613. https://doi.org/10.1037/fam0000118

Additional Reading

• Minuchin S. Families and Family Therapy.

By Theodora Blanchfield, AMFT

Theodora Blanchfield is an Associate Marriage and Family Therapist and mental health writer using her experiences to help others. She holds a master’s degree in clinical psychology from Antioch University and is a board member of Still I Run, a non-profit for runners raising mental health awareness. Theodora has been published on sites including Women’s Health, Bustle, Healthline, and more and quoted in sites including the New York Times, Shape, and Marie Claire.

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