Enmeshment · also called boundaryless family
why does my mom react like my choices are about her
A family structure with no separate emotional identity between members — a parent’s mood becomes the child’s job to manage, a child’s private life becomes family property, and having a feeling, opinion, or decision of your own is treated as disloyalty rather than a normal part of being a separate person.
In a house with no walls between people, someone else’s mood is always technically your emergency.
What to do about it
Pick one decision this week that is entirely yours to make, and make it without reporting it, explaining it, or checking whether it upsets anyone first.
Books that work on this
Each is a 90-day programme. Start with the first — later books assume the work in the earlier ones.
Loyalty Without Standards$6.99
Build The Family$6.99
Faith Without Apology$6.99
The Connection Blueprint$6.99
Marriage Is Job$6.99
Stop Lying Conflict$6.99
Friendship At Forty$6.99
The Loneliness Problem$6.99Part of the Connection series.
How people say it
Nobody looks this up by its clinical name. These are the ways it actually gets said.
- my family knows every detail of my life and thinks that’s normal
- why does my mom react like my choices are about her
- I can’t have a private thought without my family finding out
- my family treats my life like it belongs to everyone
- why do I feel guilty having an opinion different from my parents
- my family has no boundaries between our separate lives
- everything I do becomes a family-wide discussion
- why can’t I make a decision without checking with everyone first
Written by Brian Spiker, who has run Spiker Carpet and Tile Care since 2013 — the receipts. More terms in the encyclopedia.