Healing childhood trauma from narcissistic parent enmeshment

Hello my friends. Today in my path to healing childhood trauma from narcissistic parent abuse, I'm exploring what is often an overlooked part of narcissistic abuse and that is parental enmeshment.

What is Enmeshment?

In a healthy family, there are clear "fences"—you know where you end and your parent begins. Enmeshment is a state where those fences have been torn down. It is a blurring of boundaries where the child is forced to become an emotional extension of the parent.

"It is not love; it is ownership. It is the weight of being a parent’s 'person' before you were ever allowed to be your own."

In this unhealthy family dynamic, parents overstep their children's innate boundaries with selfish demands, coercive control, dependency or "neediness." There's a lot of parentification in which the parent both fails to meet the child's needs while also relying on the child to meet hers. In my case, my parents were both enmeshed and narcissistic which added another hellish layer. 

Malignant narcissistic parents (such as mine) abuse kids in many ways with their entitlement, arrogance, remorseless, cruelty and Machiavellian exploitation. They enmesh with the child by literally taking her over. The child's "self" is absorbed by the parents so that she doesn't know where they end and she begins. In the parents' minds, the child never does begin. She is property. She has no life, nor feelings as they are all wrapped up in what father and mother want, need, feel, expect. Parent enmeshment is the ultimate form of childhood identity crisis. 

Here are some elements of that special combination of narcissistic parent enmeshment plus key dangers to the child, and some suggestions for healthier outcomes. 

Ride or Die

This might be the most disturbing aspect of narcissistic parent enmeshment so I'm going to hit it first. As the description above says, you are your parents' "person" before you were your own. Before they were ever YOUR person. Having/being a "ride or die", someone who loyal to a fault and will always stand by you no matter what, as an adult is good. Being your parents de facto, default, Plan A (B, C, D) support system is an endless, living nightmare. Seriously, I trauma nightmare every night about this. Children cannot take care of themselves let alone other children, let alone an adult, LET ALONE THEIR PARENTS. This is child abuse and exploitation in the first degree.  

Parentification, also called role reversal. 

In my experience with two narcissistic and enmeshed parents, I was the confidant of their intensely personal, uncomfortable and inappropriate over-sharing. I was my mother's sex therapist from age 6 or so. I was always their physical and emotional caregiver. They also abandoned and endangered me as it suited, then dragged me back when they wanted something from me. Because for all their demands and "needs" my narcissistic and enmeshed (talk about a Molotov cocktail) were equally uncaring, negligent, unsafe and even invalidating about my needs. 

Invasion of privacy coupled with inappropriate expectations. 

My narcissistic parents effectively deprived me of ANY privacy by forcing me to co-sleep with their babies over the years. My biological parents remarried and had new partners and new families. But the childcare and nightly supervision fell to me. So I had no access to anything like privacy. There was barely room for me to sleep let alone have a desk or belongings. Then factor in their boundary crashing which includes snooping, prying, eavesdropping, reading diaries, enter without knocking and even going through my purse. My mother blatantly walked into my husband's and my house and then bedroom one morning without knocking, just barged right in. My father used to enter the bathroom when I was in there. I didn't know it till my husband helped me see that this along with the sharing of sexually explicit detail by a parent, is emotional incest and sexual harassment. 

Demand emotional over-involvement while uninvolved in actual care. 

My enmeshed narcissistic parents made every little thing in their own lives into a major event or crisis. Any good thing they did for me, that any normal parent does automatically was convoluted into a major bequest that I should be eternally grateful for. AND which they said, obligated me to endless entailments. Like feeding me dinner or giving me a place to sleep. This sense of Invisible Debt will be familiar, sadly, to readers whose parents gaslit them they must always and endlessly repay parents for the privilege of existing. 

A Truth to Root In

"Children don't owe parents anything. We owe ourselves—and our little inner child—a healthier, happier life free from sick, twisted, self-serving, narcissistic parent enmeshment and gaslighting." -Marilisa

DARVO dynamics

Enmeshed narcissistic parents blame-shift and DARVO (deny, attack, reverse victim offender) and round on the child if confronted, by anyone. I was expected to nurture, soothe, placate, humor, smooth feathers and feel guilty for anything that happened to them, even problems of their own making. They'd exaggerate any wrong-doing any on my part, gaslight me with endless shame. Generally it wasn't wrong-doing but normal childhood stuff every kid did. They stuck their noses into every choice I made with shaming, judgement, censure, and fault-finding. Yet they  never lifted a finger to help me and actually created chaos which forced me into dilemmas.  

Coercive, guilt-driven control paired with remorseless, irresponsible, harmful actions. 

Enmeshed and narcissistic parents use FOG (fear, obligation and guilt), manipulation, threats and reprisals to keep children unnaturally close. My parents demanded all kinds of insane things of me while neglecting and depriving me of the most basic things (food, shelter, safety, inclusion). They are punitive, self-righteous, bossy and judgmental  towards their scapegoat children with hypocritical, feckless double standards in their own behavior. They are blind to their golden kids' faults and will blame the scapegoat for everyone else's wrongdoings. 

Limited Care and Autonomy

My enmeshed and narcissistic parents discouraged and actually shamed independent decision-making but were curiously unconcerned about my actual well-being. Their objective is to control thought, choices, mobility and capabilities not foster healthy ones. When I was 20, I was living home to finish school. I was doing everyone's housework and so paying more than my share. My dad told me he "had" to go out for coffee every night so I "had" to be home so he could. This impaired my studies and teaching work. My brother was older than I had been when I was expected to babysit them all. Since I was 11, he'd been curtailing me from any outside activities so I could be available for endless chores and childcare. It negatively impacted my homework as I was rarely able to start until bedtime. 

Impacts of narcissistic enmeshment on children

Scapegoat kids raised in enmeshed families often develop low self-esteem. Their sense of self is tied to their parents happiness and if the parent is upset, well, it's the child's fault. As an adult with childhood trauma from enmeshment, I have trouble setting boundaries. I feel intense shame and anxiety about saying no. I struggle to identify feelings, needs, or wishes. I'm a hypervigilant people pleaser with extreme fawning trauma response. In relationships, I give too much and expect too little. Or actually nothing. I carry everyone's mental load. 

🌱 Homework: Digging into the Soil

Take these questions at your own pace. There is no rush to "fix" what took years to build. Just notice.

• • The "No" Experiment: Practice saying "no" to one small, safe request today. Notice the physical sensation in your body when you do.
• • Identifying the "FOG": When you feel a pang of guilt, ask: "Is this my responsibility, or am I carrying a parent's heavy coat?"
• • Creating Space: What is one physical or digital "lock" you can put on your life this week to reclaim a sliver of privacy?

Some homework for us adult children of narcissistic enmeshed parents. 

Let's practice setting and maintaining solid boundaries. Let's not be so easily persuaded to capitulate, and give in on limitations. Here's an exercise for us. Say no to something just for the experience. Pick a safe person who will understand. But then move to the more difficult narcissist parent. 

Let's develop "spaces in our togetherness." This is good practice for all relationships. And thank you Kahlil Gibran for that sage advice. If we must live with the enmeshed parent, we can find outside groups, plan weekends away and put a lock on the bedroom door. 

Let's consider therapy. If that seems unattainable, we can watch those helpful YouTube videos of Patrick Teahan, Jerry Wise, Dr. Ramani and Danish Bashir.  

Let's journal or blog. I've found unexpectedly catharsis in having Google Gemini read through  my blog posts, not just for clarity or professionality. For camaraderie and support. 

Here are some more that The Prophet has to say on individuality. It reflects on marriage but applies to parents and children just as much, maybe more.  

Wisdom from The Prophet

Love one another, but make not a bond of love: Give your hearts, but not into each other’s keeping. For only the hand of Life can contain your hearts. And stand together yet not too near together: For the pillars of the temple stand apart, And the oak tree and the cypress grow not in each other’s shadow.

— Kahlil Gibran