Karen Woodall – Psychotherapist, Writer, Researcher, Trainer

Recognition

enmeshment n. a condition in which two or more people, typically family members, are involved in each other’s activities and personal relationships to an excessive degree, thus limiting or precluding healthy interaction and compromising individual autonomy and identity. (APA)

Enmeshment is recognised in the psychological literature as a boundary violation which prevents a child from being able to develop healthily due to the need to regulate a severely anxious or otherwise emotionally out of control parent. In psychoanalytic terms, the enmeshed relationship between parent and child, causes an arrest of the developmental stages, meaning that the child remains stuck in the idealisation of the parent for fear of disregulating them. Such children cannot make a shift away from the parent with whom they are enmeshed and will echo their internal conflicts as an expression of their own intra-psychic experience. What is seen on the outside, is a child who mirrors the parental anxiety in any circumstance which disregulates the parent, the mirroring of the anxiety being a confirmation to the parent that the inter-psychic world is stable. (Inter-psychic meaning between two minds in psychological terms). When the child experiences the stabilisation of the parent in the inter-psychic relationship, they learn to do more of the same to keep the family system stable, thereby tightening the enmeshment.

Enmeshment and Parentification

Children who are enmeshed by a parent are often parentified, which means they are looked to by a parent to meet their psychological and emotional needs. This is a boundary violation which is recognised as covert incest in the psychological literature. This often only comes to light in divorce or separation when the child begins to reject a parent and align strongly to the other.

Covert Incest

1. a form of emotional abuse in which a parent turns to his or her child as a surrogate partner, seeking from the child the emotional support that would more appropriately be provided by the person’s spouse or another adult.

2. see emotional incest. [concept developed by U.S. psychologist Kenneth M. Adams]

APA

Identifying enmeshed relationships requires a clinical observation of the way in which the child and parent dyad relate to each other with detailed recording of the way in which the child’s developmental progress is interrupted or in some circumstances, blocked completely. To obtain details of this, clinicians must observe the relationship over time rather than base an opinion on one interview alone. Children who are enmeshed with a parent will echo their words, look to the parent to confirm acceptance of their views and be resistant to the relationship with their other parent.

Treatment of Enmeshed Relationships in the Family Courts

A judgment in the UK published recently, has raised the issue of enmeshment in children who align with one parent and reject the other after divorce and separation. This is a clear judgment in which the mother of the child concerned, was recognised as being enmeshed with her child to the degree where emotional and psychological harm was recognised and the welfare threshold was met.

The Threshold

The Threshold Stage – there must be sufficient reasons to justify making a care or supervision Order. This can only be passed if the Court agrees that:

• Things have happened which have already caused significant harm to a child
• There is a serious risk that significant harm will be suffered in the future
• The child is beyond parental control

When children are removed from a parent in private or public proceedings, it is because the threshold for significant harm has been met and the child must be protected from the behaviour of the abusive parent. This judgment sets out the reality that far from parental alienation theory being the cause of the removal, the underlying harms, which are drawn from the literature on psycho-analysis, trauma and family therapy, are the basis for the opinion of the experts involved, enmeshment being one of the familial dynamics which can cause significant harm which meets the welfare threshold. In my experience, the detailed analysis of the dynamics causing the child to align and reject which are seen in this judgment, forms the basis for most if not all expert opinion in the family courts of England and Wales.

Treatment of enmeshment is difficult if the parent causing it lacks insight and even in structured programmes, there can be difficulty in helping a parent to see what it is they are doing. In addition, the campaign groups who characterise this problem as being about abusive fathers obtaining custody of children via nefarious means, cause further harm when they prevent a parent from obtaining insight. In such circumstances, where there are claims of domestic abuse and coercive control which are not found by the Court, many parents (often mothers) are unable to recognise the harms they are causing to their children. This reported judgment is a good example of how this happens.

Disentangling enmeshment therefore relies upon strong boundaries around the child, so that the influence which is often normalised by the parent causing it (and their supporters), can be prevented. When that protection is in place (what is being protected against is covert or emotional incest), then the child can be helped to learn about their own needs and their own right to live life without having to regulate an anxious parent. This is structual work which takes place within the family setting and which makes use of the parent in the rejected position to assist the child to receive healthy care. This treatment process can take some months as the child’s intrapsychic experience is often distorted by the unhealthy caregiving they have received by the influencing parent. When the mental health intervention is interlocked with the legal management process however, rapid change can be achieved for children who are parentified or otherwise enmeshed in a fused dyadic relationship with a caregiver.

Longer term treatments include training previously rejected parents to use therapeutic parenting and to understand the attachment maladaptations which have caused the enmeshment. When a parent in the rejected position understands how to read the child’s behavioural adaptations, their ability to provide care over the longer term increases and there is a successful outcome for the child. Where possible, work with the formerly enmeshed parent takes place over a six to twelve month period post disentanglement of the fusion and where that occurs, longer term prognosis for sharing care is good. Where that parent is unable to gain insight however, continued protection of the child from the covert emotionally incestous relationship is necessary.

Social Work Treatment Pathway

The social work treatment pathway which has been developed by the Family Separation Clinic, provides the stepwise guidance to social workers which enables rapid treatment of the problem. This is based upon child protection principles and enables social workers to understand the harms which are caused to children when they are enmeshed with a parent and how to intervene to prevent the harm which is being done to the child. Each of the above steps enable social workers to understand the harm, identify the presentation in the child, differentiate it from other forms of abuse, test the parental capacity for behavioural change, constrain the harm being caused if necessary, protect the child and then treatment can be provided. Treatment is based upon therapeutic parenting and always involves the formerly rejected parent where that parent has been assessed as having capacity to provide good enough care.

Enmeshment is a serious form of child abuse, the family courts recognise it and increasingly, social workers recognise it too. When everyone recognises it, children will be protected from it and their lives will be improved because of that.

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The Family Separation Clinic Social Work Pathway is currently under evaluation for outcomes in cases where children are removed into care due to serious emotional and psychological harm. Results of this evaluation will be available in due course.

Evaluation of Residence Transfer Outcomes outputs will be available in due course

Therapeutic Parenting Listening Circle – June 13 2023 – unfortunately, due to my Court responsibilities, this circle has been cancelled. The next circle will take place on June 27 2023. If you have booked on the circle for June 13th, you will be offered a full refund.

Holding up a Healthy Mirror this course will be available to watch on demand later this year.

Instructing the Family Separation Clinic in Court We cannot accept instructions other than in the High Court of England and Wales, Republic of Ireland or Hong Kong. We do not have any capacity for instructions in any of these Courts until 2024.