Yup. It's a cult. I can't be a Christian in this household because I'm apparently backwards, even tho Jesus preaches love. Narcissists are Pharisees and hypocrites.
My husband’s family exactly They push out wives and girlfriends and Constantly circle back to each other and if they do something wrong to you You’re the bad guy if you call it out.
Trying to "enmesh" or get along with the narc's family was impossible.... it was like going into a room filled with thieves knowing you're gonna get robbed and hoping you won't...😈 THIS CREATED AN IMPOSSIBLE SITUATION! 😈
True. And that's a good way to put it. It's hard to acknowledge it or accept it, but it is what it is. It happens. And that's why the spirit of the LORD will tell you to pull away from them. Because they are not healthy minded individuals, and they generally refuse to change.
This describes my in-laws very well..no boundaries ,make guilty if boundaries are set..try to lower the confidence nd destroy it feel jealous when someone else praises.. try to put down nd show in negative light in front of relatives etc etc..
I've recently just built up bounderies around my family. I was someone who thought I had the most loving and supportive parents, but 2 years of doing shadow work because I was suicidal that time made me realize that was not the case. There was a lot of emotional neglect, lack of communication and parents guilting us for having comfortable lives (they both grew up very poor). I blamed myself for their shortcomings and took it personally whenever they had problems or in a bad mood. This resulted in me being avoidant in relationships, i have never experienced romantic relationships and had problems being vulnerable around friends since I've felt broken and I'm afraid they will see my wortlessness. I am slowly learning how to detach from them whenever they get triggered and have to remind myself "it's not about me and they are still unhealed from their traumas". It was not easy doing this healing and still living with them, the earlier days was soo hard, I didn't have anyone to talk about it, i only posted in reddit and journaling. I'm going abroad for work next month and I've never been happier and excited of finding my identity outside of my relationship with family and I hope I'll thrive and find people where I can be my true self.
I feel for you. But existence while it has pain in it is also joy. Try to find the joy and I will take my own advice. I wish you all the best in your attempt to heal.
Psychologists say the work is almost impossible if living with your family of origin that your emmeshed with. You have to physically separate from the same living space.
They are enmeshed. I’m not. I go no contact and then I go back, and they smother me so bad I have to get out again. When I don’t answer the phone for them they come to my house. I literally had to move and didn’t tell anyone where I went! 😂
HOW can you handle the smothering? and why do you go back if I may ask? Im in a very similar situation.. and I have been avoiding my family so much.. these last few months, more than ever….. I know I have to take distance which they Obviously do not approve of… which is why it probably will have to be no contact immediately… but I’m so scared and I wish there was a way I could handle the smothering… even if it’s for a while until I am more ready to go no contact…
When I left my Narc ex: I was made to few bad. My father told me I was leaving my ex "high and dry". Seriously???? When I found my now husband and started dating him: I was made to feel bad. My mom displayed her anger, annoyance, pouting. Said she wouldn't "fake it". I stayed with him, because *I was happy!* 😂 When I started exercising my "no" with my parents while living at home for a year: I was made to feel bad. When I moved away: I was made to few bad. No praying over me (thanks "Christian" parents) or sadness. My father seemed gleeful. They even took my house key! Punishment for leaving and exercising what I wanted. When I got married under God: I was made to feel bad and they question it. On and on it goes. No contact atm.
Wow described the relationship I’ve had with my dad spot on! Trying to break free and have my own sense of self at 40 years old has been a challenge but much needed clarity
You can do it! I did it at 46 and I absolutely flourished! I’ve had some setbacks since then, but that was the peak of my life. I hope you find the same.
Yeah. My mom is like that, wanting to know everything going on in my life. I know she realizes that I have learned a LOT about this disorder. And I'm NOT the same person that I used to be, and don't let her control, manipulate, or rule over me anymore. At times I can ran outside and take the trash out or something, and when I get back in. She will ask me, where did you go? Ah. I'm super grown. And I'm like, why do it matter to you where I went? I wasn't gone long, so it's obvious and evident that I DIDN'T go far. And even if I did go far, then why would that matter to you? It's quite disturbing and sickening. I can understand them functioning this way for many years due to not quite having an understanding that they have been functioning from pain and trauma all of their lives. But it's challenging for me that they REFUSE to acknowledge it, and try to get help based off of ALL of the info that is out there this day and age.
My family is EXACTLY like this. If i leave the house to take something out to the trash, or go for a walk without saying anything, they'll prod me for answers. There is NO WAY i'd be able to go out on my own or with myself without that mountain of questions and statements "why are you going out?" "where are you going?" "when will you be back?" "you dont need to go out" "we can go out together" Its exhausting...
Flying monkeys will always point out what the narc said and ignore what the narc did. They'll tell you how thin skinned you are while demanding you walk on eggshells for the narc. Upside down backwards people 🙃 can go live in their own crazy world. Leave me alone!
I suffered a lot with enmeshment, either emotional or spiritual or physical... Because narcissists always need help, even if they don t... Important is to suck you dry, make you a total people pleaser and it s my job now to discern and have compassion for myself first. This video is really important to me! Thanks
I can’t believe I’m 40 and still dealing with this from my mother and brother, and I’M being called toxic and “not authentic” for not following their plan for me. I need to move away from it, and will likely lose them if I distance myself from it. How will there be any comfort in that?
There may not be comfort in loosing them but there will be in becoming at peace with yourself. Maybe there will a new way of relating to them in the future. My childhood family never changed, always I was the problem and they never were. Go figure!
I dont know if i experience exact enmeshment, but i do feel trapped in my house and with my family. I love my family but I feel I struggle a lot with having my own independence outside of the house, I'm 21 years old and i have no Real life friends, i dont drive, i dont have a phone, i dont go to in-person university, I've lived the same life i have lived when i was 13. My whole life is basically my house and my family. It can be terrifying because i've been an adult for awhile now, I'm worried my whole life will always be this. I want to be able to go out for fun, and not with my family present. My family is always with me and I'm so ready to just go out and live my life on my own. I also am frustrated by the fact that they have not prepared me for the real world, they help with university, they help me with taxes, but I have very few in person social skills or street smarts. they've sheltered me for my whole life, so in a way, i am angry that i cant even go out on my own, because its not safe, and i do not know how to navigate life outside of my house.
They make you dependent, insert fears that you won t get jobs, or true love. And it s all a lie. To keep you under their wings. And if by any chance you go and fail... They tell you.... I told you... You can fail.... In other more normal families is ok to make mistakes...
Boundaries are hard to set or even know when you're not allowed to be a real person. The hooks are so strong that I actually felt I had to die if I expressed or thought for or about myself at all. You can't survive that way. I couldn't. But I didn't die, the relationship with them, sister, father, mother, father's wife, did. The empty place can be filled with new people new ideas etc. but I still have to be a separate person and my own responsibility. I'm still not comfortable with people. It's easy to get confused. I'm still not a good boundary setter. I had no acceptance for such a long time and there was no way to show the truth of the persecution that mostly I gave up.
Enmeshment caused me to develop anorexia in my teen years. The only area of my life I felt like I could control was food and weight. It is difficult now to define myself outside the realms of my eating disorder; i don't know what i am without being known as someone who is perfect, 'clean', or disciplined when it comes to my body and my food. I can manipulate it and its the one thing I feel good at controlling
You just described Narcissism. Not respecting boundaries, being controlling, despising other people for feeling happy or viceversa dismissing their bad feelings... Doctor Ramani described all of this in her videos.
There is also a lot of covert competition, and I’ve noticed more enmeshment in large families of origin, where the extended family literally acts like an organisation or a tribe. You get pseudomutuality (appearance of closeness at family ‘social events’) but nobody authentically connected or valued. You get King/Queen Bee’s running the extended family, and the independent-minded/lost kids cut-off and live separate lives. But some people enjoy this extended family enmeshment. It helped humans survive tough times in the past.
My mother used to do things like this to my father and me. When my father tried to reason with her or protect me or disagreed or questioned her in any way she would take his house key and lock him out of the house until he begged her for forgiveness.
So I had a great childhood but as I got older and became more independent this caused my parents to act in these ways and now as a 30 something my mom and siblings treat me like this (of coarse I left home at 18 and this caused my family to basically black sheep me) long story short now my family is Toxic now !?!
You finally figured me out that’s exactly what happens every single time not every day but every single time but they do it over at my facility they don’t do it over at their house
Gosh, I’m surprised how many of these I identify with in terms of my parents! I had realised there were some issues, and am working on being healthier in how I relate with them and how I relate to my own children. Thank you - I keep learning a little more with every one of your videos! 😊
At the point where I’m realizing there isn’t really another choice…. But I am so so so scared…. Please if you have any tips/advice for me, please share.
This makes me sad because I live in my own place and they reach out like cockroaches expecting me to be there when they all get together and I don’t even have my own identity without them. I’m alone because if I have any other relationships they all want to be included with them too.
3:16 Thank You I have this problem every single time I see my mother, Christmas, this is the exact yt video I was searching for, thanks I will put this in my playlist for Journaling, 37 years old & still trying to heal but never can because of enmeshment!!
I don't try to enmesh my kids - my husband thinks anything that they do OUTSIDE of the home is a reflection on him in the eyes of other people which means I wasn't "involved". Here at home, anything they do reflects on me immediately. Any attitude they give him is my fault and I get to hear about it for as long as he feels indignant. Except anything good. Anything good they do, say or are is purely by accident. I am not "involved" enough to have had a hand in anything perfect because anything imperfect is proof that I'm not "involved". So yeah, sometimes to one of my kids I'm like WTF DUDE. You know this is gonna come down on me like 9 pound hammer. Can ya NOT???? Lol Is that enmeshment???
Enmeshment and control tactics seem to go together hand in hand, seeing it its almost like a form of mind control sometimes. Emotional regulation by projection of negative feelings onto a 3rd party. It seems to me, guilt trips, sympathy farming, bribery, zero boundries, passive agressiveness, triangulation, are just some symptoms of a step grandmother heavily enmeshed with a step grandaughter, almost seems like competition against another awkward to me relationship... Don't know if im right but my life has been hell for a minute. Yes, the sharing is toxic, I try not to share much anymore, as the things i told are used against me, and or are shared.
Just sent this to my EX who keeps texting me. This was our biggest problem…his family is a cult
A cult. I'll bring this up to my X. Total burn.
Yup. It's a cult. I can't be a Christian in this household because I'm apparently backwards, even tho Jesus preaches love. Narcissists are Pharisees and hypocrites.
I also need to send this to my ex
Lived it for 15 years with my ex. Moved in with his parents but still wants me for intimacy. sick!!
Look carefully at the parents often one in a Covert Narcissist. The Cult of Mom usually
Enmeshment is toxic. Let's set boundaries, specially if you happen to be the scapegoat of the family.
My husband’s family exactly
They push out wives and girlfriends and
Constantly circle back to each other and if they do something wrong to you
You’re the bad guy if you call it out.
This is my family described! Thank you so much for your help. Being enmeshed is like sitting is a mental prison. It is time we broke out!
Same here😔
Yes
But what should i do
A mental prison. That's it! Me and my father are victims of the rest of the family: mother and siblings.
Completely Agree
Three minutes in to the video and I allready go like "Yup, that's my family of origin"... Wow!
Cyccyyfyyfyyyyfyfyyfyyfyyfyyfy yuyyyfyyyfyf was
Trying to "enmesh" or get along with the narc's family was impossible.... it was like going into a room filled with thieves knowing you're gonna get robbed and hoping you won't...😈 THIS CREATED AN IMPOSSIBLE SITUATION! 😈
Yup
..well put in words
True. And that's a good way to put it. It's hard to acknowledge it or accept it, but it is what it is. It happens. And that's why the spirit of the LORD will tell you to pull away from them. Because they are not healthy minded individuals, and they generally refuse to change.
"get along with" 🤣
Narcissists are impossible! 🤦♀️🏌️♂️⛷️🏃♂️
Everything you say can, and will, be used against you in the court of the enmeshed family system…
Against you and to their favor.
This describes my in-laws very well..no boundaries ,make guilty if boundaries are set..try to lower the confidence nd destroy it feel jealous when someone else praises.. try to put down nd show in negative light in front of relatives etc etc..
I've recently just built up bounderies around my family. I was someone who thought I had the most loving and supportive parents, but 2 years of doing shadow work because I was suicidal that time made me realize that was not the case. There was a lot of emotional neglect, lack of communication and parents guilting us for having comfortable lives (they both grew up very poor). I blamed myself for their shortcomings and took it personally whenever they had problems or in a bad mood. This resulted in me being avoidant in relationships, i have never experienced romantic relationships and had problems being vulnerable around friends since I've felt broken and I'm afraid they will see my wortlessness. I am slowly learning how to detach from them whenever they get triggered and have to remind myself "it's not about me and they are still unhealed from their traumas". It was not easy doing this healing and still living with them, the earlier days was soo hard, I didn't have anyone to talk about it, i only posted in reddit and journaling. I'm going abroad for work next month and I've never been happier and excited of finding my identity outside of my relationship with family and I hope I'll thrive and find people where I can be my true self.
I feel for you. But existence while it has pain in it is also joy. Try to find the joy and I will take my own advice. I wish you all the best in your attempt to heal.
What you wrote re: your healing is so relatable! All the best with going abroad! How old are you if you don't mind me asking?
Psychologists say the work is almost impossible if living with your family of origin that your emmeshed with. You have to physically separate from the same living space.
They are enmeshed. I’m not. I go no contact and then I go back, and they smother me so bad I have to get out again. When I don’t answer the phone for them they come to my house. I literally had to move and didn’t tell anyone where I went! 😂
HOW can you handle the smothering? and why do you go back if I may ask?
Im in a very similar situation.. and I have been avoiding my family so much.. these last few months, more than ever….. I know I have to take distance which they Obviously do not approve of… which is why it probably will have to be no contact immediately… but I’m so scared and I wish there was a way I could handle the smothering… even if it’s for a while until I am more ready to go no contact…
I moved in March and didn’t tell any one of them.
My parent used to be trying to know everyrhung going on in my life but i fought so hard now they dont anymore
Bursted into tears bc of how badly I relate… going no contact is inevitable… I literally can’t handle one more second of this… I’m so so scared
Please 🥺🙏 be strong 💪.
When I left my Narc ex: I was made to few bad.
My father told me I was leaving my ex "high and dry". Seriously????
When I found my now husband and started dating him: I was made to feel bad. My mom displayed her anger, annoyance, pouting. Said she wouldn't "fake it". I stayed with him, because *I was happy!* 😂
When I started exercising my "no" with my parents while living at home for a year: I was made to feel bad.
When I moved away: I was made to few bad. No praying over me (thanks "Christian" parents) or sadness. My father seemed gleeful. They even took my house key! Punishment for leaving and exercising what I wanted.
When I got married under God: I was made to feel bad and they question it.
On and on it goes.
No contact atm.
Wow described the relationship I’ve had with my dad spot on! Trying to break free and have my own sense of self at 40 years old has been a challenge but much needed clarity
You can do it! I did it at 46 and I absolutely flourished! I’ve had some setbacks since then, but that was the peak of my life. I hope you find the same.
Yeah. My mom is like that, wanting to know everything going on in my life. I know she realizes that I have learned a LOT about this disorder. And I'm NOT the same person that I used to be, and don't let her control, manipulate, or rule over me anymore. At times I can ran outside and take the trash out or something, and when I get back in. She will ask me, where did you go? Ah. I'm super grown. And I'm like, why do it matter to you where I went? I wasn't gone long, so it's obvious and evident that I DIDN'T go far. And even if I did go far, then why would that matter to you? It's quite disturbing and sickening. I can understand them functioning this way for many years due to not quite having an understanding that they have been functioning from pain and trauma all of their lives. But it's challenging for me that they REFUSE to acknowledge it, and try to get help based off of ALL of the info that is out there this day and age.
My family is EXACTLY like this. If i leave the house to take something out to the trash, or go for a walk without saying anything, they'll prod me for answers. There is NO WAY i'd be able to go out on my own or with myself without that mountain of questions and statements "why are you going out?" "where are you going?" "when will you be back?" "you dont need to go out" "we can go out together"
Its exhausting...
They are lazy, better to use us to carry their boredom... That s the deal!
Flying monkeys will always point out what the narc said and ignore what the narc did. They'll tell you how thin skinned you are while demanding you walk on eggshells for the narc. Upside down backwards people 🙃 can go live in their own crazy world. Leave me alone!
It's enjoyable when fm's are promised something by the narc but things change so they cannnot receive. Big laugh in their face
...yes: saying things, acting contradictory and you are to expect it... the hallmark of it
Totally!
Struggling hardcore with everything mentioned in this video regarding my family, primarily my mom. It’s so difficult to deal with.
I suffered a lot with enmeshment, either emotional or spiritual or physical... Because narcissists always need help, even if they don t... Important is to suck you dry, make you a total people pleaser and it s my job now to discern and have compassion for myself first. This video is really important to me! Thanks
I can’t believe I’m 40 and still dealing with this from my mother and brother, and I’M being called toxic and “not authentic” for not following their plan for me. I need to move away from it, and will likely lose them if I distance myself from it. How will there be any comfort in that?
There may not be comfort in loosing them but there will be in becoming at peace with yourself. Maybe there will a new way of relating to them in the future. My childhood family never changed, always I was the problem and they never were. Go figure!
@@lorraine9097 thank you so much for this comment..
I dont know if i experience exact enmeshment, but i do feel trapped in my house and with my family. I love my family but I feel I struggle a lot with having my own independence outside of the house, I'm 21 years old and i have no Real life friends, i dont drive, i dont have a phone, i dont go to in-person university, I've lived the same life i have lived when i was 13. My whole life is basically my house and my family. It can be terrifying because i've been an adult for awhile now, I'm worried my whole life will always be this. I want to be able to go out for fun, and not with my family present. My family is always with me and I'm so ready to just go out and live my life on my own.
I also am frustrated by the fact that they have not prepared me for the real world, they help with university, they help me with taxes, but I have very few in person social skills or street smarts. they've sheltered me for my whole life, so in a way, i am angry that i cant even go out on my own, because its not safe, and i do not know how to navigate life outside of my house.
They make you dependent, insert fears that you won t get jobs, or true love. And it s all a lie. To keep you under their wings. And if by any chance you go and fail... They tell you.... I told you... You can fail.... In other more normal families is ok to make mistakes...
Same here girl and it sucks especially when you want to go out by yourself and live your life
Boundaries are hard to set or even know when you're not allowed to be a real person. The hooks are so strong that I actually felt I had to die if I expressed or thought for or about myself at all. You can't survive that way. I couldn't. But I didn't die, the relationship with them, sister, father, mother, father's wife, did. The empty place can be filled with new people new ideas etc. but I still have to be a separate person and my own responsibility. I'm still not comfortable with people. It's easy to get confused. I'm still not a good boundary setter. I had no acceptance for such a long time and there was no way to show the truth of the persecution that mostly I gave up.
Enmeshment caused me to develop anorexia in my teen years. The only area of my life I felt like I could control was food and weight. It is difficult now to define myself outside the realms of my eating disorder; i don't know what i am without being known as someone who is perfect, 'clean', or disciplined when it comes to my body and my food. I can manipulate it and its the one thing I feel good at controlling
You just described Narcissism. Not respecting boundaries, being controlling, despising other people for feeling happy or viceversa dismissing their bad feelings... Doctor Ramani described all of this in her videos.
Dr. Ramani, is a woman.
Yeah! she described a manipulative behavior that is pretty typical of narcissistic personality disorder.
There is also a lot of covert competition, and I’ve noticed more enmeshment in large families of origin, where the extended family literally acts like an organisation or a tribe. You get pseudomutuality (appearance of closeness at family ‘social events’) but nobody authentically connected or valued. You get King/Queen Bee’s running the extended family, and the independent-minded/lost kids cut-off and live separate lives. But some people enjoy this extended family enmeshment. It helped humans survive tough times in the past.
Wow i could not like this enough. This is literally my mother. She try’s to ruin any attempt of independence
OMG. This is my mother and sister to a tee. I always knew there was something wrong with them, but had no vocabulary for it.
My mother used to do things like this to my father and me. When my father tried to reason with her or protect me or disagreed or questioned her in any way she would take his house key and lock him out of the house until he begged her for forgiveness.
Its always like .. its my way or the highway
So I had a great childhood but as I got older and became more independent this caused my parents to act in these ways and now as a 30 something my mom and siblings treat me like this (of coarse I left home at 18 and this caused my family to basically black sheep me) long story short now my family is Toxic now !?!
my mom uses I'm just wanting to help as her excuse for everything.
You finally figured me out that’s exactly what happens every single time not every day but every single time but they do it over at my facility they don’t do it over at their house
Gosh, I’m surprised how many of these I identify with in terms of my parents! I had realised there were some issues, and am working on being healthier in how I relate with them and how I relate to my own children. Thank you - I keep learning a little more with every one of your videos! 😊
My family of origin fit all 10 descriptions to a tee. At this point, I have gone no contact. I'd this the route most of us end up at?
At the point where I’m realizing there isn’t really another choice…. But I am so so so scared…. Please if you have any tips/advice for me, please share.
This makes me sad because I live in my own place and they reach out like cockroaches expecting me to be there when they all get together and I don’t even have my own identity without them. I’m alone because if I have any other relationships they all want to be included with them too.
I was hoping I wasn’t enmeshed with my parents….this video just confirmed I am. Lovely. 😂
This is 100% my family...unfortunately. ;(
3:16 Thank You I have this problem every single time I see my mother, Christmas, this is the exact yt video I was searching for, thanks I will put this in my playlist for Journaling, 37 years old & still trying to heal but never can because of enmeshment!!
Thank you Michele 🕊
Thanks for sharing. Though late , I am trying to find myself ❤
Could we have a help video to heal xxx
One of the best videos on the subject I’ve ever heard. You nailed it perfectly as this is my family exactly.
Thank you for creating this type of contents.
Enmeshment abuse is hell!
Happened every day at home.
Wow I wish I could send this to my husband but I don't think it would be received well. 😕
I don't try to enmesh my kids - my husband thinks anything that they do OUTSIDE of the home is a reflection on him in the eyes of other people which means I wasn't "involved". Here at home, anything they do reflects on me immediately. Any attitude they give him is my fault and I get to hear about it for as long as he feels indignant. Except anything good. Anything good they do, say or are is purely by accident. I am not "involved" enough to have had a hand in anything perfect because anything imperfect is proof that I'm not "involved".
So yeah, sometimes to one of my kids I'm like WTF DUDE. You know this is gonna come down on me like 9 pound hammer. Can ya NOT???? Lol
Is that enmeshment???
Maybe because your rasing them to be brats? Just saying
That s total enmeshment! Create boundaries or this dynamic will destroy your self esteem. Sounds like a mind game...
Trust your husky. She or he probably helps you a lot by not judging you.
my mother is the main trouble maker among my brothers and I and in the extended family. I can't wait to say good riddance to her.
Mine too.
actions/words can be very passive aggressive
Im so happy i found your chanel. Thank you🙏
You are the best at explaining this stuff 👍❤️
Wow......Thank you so much for this!!!
Much love to u for what u're doing here!
Thx.
Also I was part of it and enmashing as well.
SPOT ON!
Im phisically dIsabled aged barely getting through day. Son that caring for me is leaving. Need to be moved.
How can i ask for the care i need ?
This video is KEY and so on point and on TIME!! Michele, you are an Angel!!
Thank you so so much for this clarification! 🙏❤️
Great video love well needed 💟
Thank you! 👍🏽
Awesome, helpful, insightful video. Thank you.
Typo in title for enmeshment
Fixed - thanks for pointing that out =D
I grew up with all those around me!
Sounds a lot like narcissism. The traits are similar though different.
wishing I didn’t relate to so much of this 😞
Tytyty
Good stuff.
Enmeshment and control tactics seem to go together hand in hand, seeing it its almost like a form of mind control sometimes.
Emotional regulation by projection of negative feelings onto a 3rd party.
It seems to me, guilt trips, sympathy farming, bribery, zero boundries, passive agressiveness, triangulation, are just some symptoms of a step grandmother heavily enmeshed with a step grandaughter, almost seems like competition against another awkward to me relationship...
Don't know if im right but my life has been hell for a minute.
Yes, the sharing is toxic, I try not to share much anymore, as the things i told are used against me, and or are shared.
It’s my family of origin.
I wish I was able to talk to you in person but I do not have zoom on my phones
For me i didnt do it to make them happy i did it so they wouldnt bring me down it was never about them
Yeah, I live in an enmeshed family :(
Everyone’s is everyone’s some cultures think this way
It’s wrong to ask the child to look inside and see where they allowed enmeshment through their parent.
13:01
13:58
15:19
D
I'm sorry I don't know you,
But you seem to know me.