r/CPTSD•
Tropikana_

Is it enmeshment ?

Question

F43 - I grew up with a violent father who was constantly screaming, insulting, threatening, spitting, harassing ... Since I was little I was always worried about my mother's needs and safety. My whole mental space was filled by her, all my thoughts were about her life, about her misery, her issues with my father and their awful marriage. I didn't have the room to be me, to develop any sense of self, my mind was always focused on her and nothing else mattered or existed. She would always confide in me, telling me the horrors my father told her, his threats, how sad she was because of him. It was her main (if not her only) topic of conversation, she was telling me about it over and over ... She still talks to me endlessly about him. Do you think this kind of family dynamics can be called "enmeshment" ?

Posted Oct 6, 2025, 7:12 PM UTC

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