This post is part of a series.

Join us for Part One: The Dangers of Armchair Pathology and Part Three: Can Herbal Medicine Help Heal Betrayal Trauma Symptoms?

Enmeshment is a concept that can be difficult to understand, especially in the context of betrayal trauma and abuse.

Paige is back on The BTR.ORG Podcast, discussing enmeshment. Read the full transcript below for more.
What is enmeshment?
"Enmeshment in itself is too much closeness, but it's too much closeness and involvement at a cost to one's own journey or independence or autonomy."

Paige, Member of the BTR.ORG Community
Are enmeshed-men responsible for their abusiveness?
As Anne explains in this podcast episode, victims may be reluctant to hold abusers accountable if they exhibit traits of mother-enmeshed men.

However, it's important to understand that many adults carry childhood and trauma, including enmeshment, and still do not choose to abuse others.
BTR.ORG Is Here For You
As you listen to this episode and learn more about enmeshment, remember that our BTR.ORG Group Sessions are a safe place to process your experiences and emotions.
Full Transcript:
Anne (00:00):
Welcome to BTR.ORG. This is Anne. We have Paige, a member of our community back on today's episode. If you didn't listen to last week, start there and then join us here. We're going to start with what we ended with last week talking about how dangerous it is to put a bunch of victims in a room and then tell them that they're broken rather than tell them that they're brave. Look at their own character defects rather than realizing, wait, wait, wait. We're victims of abuse. We're strong, we're brave. We can get to safety. Just thinking back on that is taking my breath away right now. Like, Ugh, that was just so yucky..

Paige (03:50):
Well, and it's the hope to not have somebody else experiencing that yuckiness. I spent a lot of my childhood in 12 step meetings because we'd go along with our parent and then my spouse started CR.

Anne (04:11):
CR, what's that?
12-Step Programs - "This is not my jam"
Paige (04:14):
Celebrate Recovery. When he started with that 12 step program and going to their meetings, they had a family type meal beforehand and this and that, and so I'd go for the meal and then I'd leave because I was like, this is not my jam. It's just not for me. And I had people, especially women within their group that would stand near the door to try and interact with me, to stop me as I was leaving in very passive aggressive ways and my husband in witnessing that and in knowing me, he started just escorting me to the door because he is like, no, if my wife wants to leave, if she doesn't want to be a part of this, I'm going to physically be a barrier because he wasn't going to allow further abuse.

Anne (05:13):
Coercion, right?
"I'm not keen to participate in models that essentially enable abusers"
Paige (05:15):
Coercion. Further coercion, yeah, that's a great word for it. He wasn't going to allow that to continue, and I certainly was getting really frustrated with it where I'm just like, let's talk about some of these steps. In all honesty, lemme be real direct with, and I get that they found their own identity and healing and stuff in those models. I'm just not keen to participate in models that essentially enable abusers because so much of it, they use terminology to gaslight partners or be like, oh, just stay on your side of the street.

Anne (06:02):
I think the ethical answer would be, get off the street.