Do you have a strong sense of who you are?
Do you tend to take responsibility for other people’s feelings?
Do you carry the weight of other people’s problems on your shoulders?
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Creating a strong identity and sense of self is a fundamental part of our mental, emotional, and spiritual development growing up.
All children undergo a natural process of attachment to their parents as babies and then disconnected from their parents during toddlerhood through to adolescence. Detaching from our parents is essential if we are to function in a healthy and mature way in the world as adults.
But often times we are not permitted by our parents to go through our detachment phase. In other words, we are not allowed to develop an individual identity and a clear sense of IAMness. Instead, we are enmeshed and undifferentiated from our parents, just as a baby is.
Table of contents
The Dangers of Not Having a Clear Sense of Self
What happens when we remain undifferentiated from our parents? What happens when we don’t have a strong identity?
The answer is that we cannot function in a healthy way in our relationships. We may face issues such as:
- Codependency
- Social anxiety
- Toxic/abusive relationships
- Depression
- Emptiness
- Neediness
- Attracting needy/unhealthy friendships
- Empathic overload
- Low self-worth
And this is just the tip of the iceberg.
If you have trouble with human connection and relationships, you might have experienced toxic family enmeshment growing up.
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As psychologist Dr. Tim Clinton writes:
Enmeshed relationships leave a legacy of heartache and manipulation. But that legacy can be changed if we are willing to open our eyes…It is possible to break the pattern of enmeshment and break through to freedom—to that place where we are able to give and receive true love.
There is always hope for change.
Keep reading to educate yourself, find answers, and gain clarity.
What is Enmeshment?
Enmeshment is a psychological term that refers to blurred, weak or absent boundaries between people, often occurring in families and romantic relationships.
When a person experiences enmeshment with their mother and father, for instance, they will be incapable of separating their feelings and thoughts from their parent’s feelings and thoughts.
In other words, they will have a poor sense of self and no clearly formed identity.
Enmeshment creates tremendous dysfunction within families and damaging impacts later in adult life.
10 Signs You Experienced Toxic Family Enmeshment
Enmeshment usually begins in childhood within our families. Think about your upbringing for a few moments. Can you relate to any of the following signs?
- Being autonomous, doing your own thing or making unique choices was seen as a sign of betrayal
- Everyone in the family was overly involved in each other’s lives and there was little privacy
- You felt shamed or rejected for saying “no” to any of your family members
- One or both of your parents were controlling and strict
- You felt that you had to be who your parents wanted you to be – you weren’t allowed to be your authentic self
- Your family made decisions as one entity (groupthink), not as individuals coming together sharing their opinions
- If one family member felt anxious, angry or depressed, everyone felt and absorbed it
- You felt the need to caretake your mother or father AND/OR you felt the need to parent your mother or father (also known as parentification)
- Your achievements or failures defined your family’s sense of worthiness
- Your family was built on the foundation of power and submission, rather than equality and respect
Take a deep breath and let the above points sink in.
Now assess how you feel. Do any of these signs ring a bell? Does this list describe your family in a scarily accurate way? If so, you can bet your bottom dollar that you’ve struggled with toxic enmeshment growing up.
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Why Did Your Parents Create an Enmeshed Environment?
Your children are not your children. They are the sons and daughters of Life’s longing for itself. They came through you, but not from you and though they are with you, yet they belong not to you.
– Kahlil Gibran
There are a number of different reasons why your parents created an enmeshed environment growing up – mostly, the reasons were unintentional and unconscious. In other words, your parents likely did not deliberately set out to put a stop to your mental/emotional differentiation … it kind of just happened.
But why? And how?
The first reason may have been that you experienced a dangerous illness, trauma, or significant issue in school that caused your parents to become protective of you. As you grew older they struggled to let go of the role of the protector (fearing you would become vulnerable again) which squashed your development.
The second, more common and likely reason enmeshment occurred was that your parents learned it from their parents growing up. If your grandmother or grandfather were overly involved in your parent’s life, this style of parenting may have been passed along as a toxic cross-generational pattern. The root of this behavior is fear, and this fear can spread like a virus.
“What is there to be fearful of?” you might wonder. There are many reasons why parents are scared of letting their children develop mature identities. Some reasons include:
- Fear of the child growing up and moving away (or abandoning the parent) which stems from a fear of being alone
- Fear of being obsolete in the child’s life (and thus serving no purpose or being worthless) which stems from low self-worth
- Fear of being independent and autonomous in the world (and therefore keeping the child dependent on them)
- Fear of having one’s role as a caretaker/parent obliterated (thus a fear of emptiness/nothingness or the obliteration of their identity)
- Fear of having one’s purpose taken away (being child-rearing) thus a fear of purposelessness
… and many other complex fears which cannot fully be covered here. Here you might like to pause and ask yourself, “What fear was at the root of my parent’s behavior?” Take a few moments to reflect.
How Enmeshment Impacts Us As Adults
Enmeshment is a pattern that becomes deeply embedded within us. As adults, many of us are so oblivious to it that we can go years, even decades, without understanding what is happening to us in our relationships.
With enmeshment, we were raised to see ourselves as an entity, as “us,“ instead of being raised in a healthy family dynamic that permitted us to be our unique selves.
Let me tell you about a textbook case of toxic family enmeshment that came from my own childhood.
Growing up, I was raised in a fundamentalist Christian family. My family believed that their religion was the “one true path” on earth and everyone who didn’t have the same beliefs as them was destined to burn in hell eternally as decreed by an “unconditionally loving” God. I shit you not. This is actually what I was raised believing.
Thankfully I cut away from all that BS in my early twenties. It has taken me years to understand just how toxically enmeshed I was with my parents – which they likely adopted from their own parents. I remember my mother saying, “If mother ain’t happy, ain’t nobody happy” over and over again growing up. Now, if this isn’t a textbook catchphrase of toxic enmeshment, I don’t know what is.
And it was true: if my mother wasn’t happy, everyone in the family felt it. If she was sad, we all felt sad. If she was angry, we all felt angry.
I once remember witnessing how angry she was at being mistreated and feeling so angry myself that I was physically shaking and felt like I would explode. There were no clear lines, no clear boundaries, no clear sense of “me” or “mine.” Instead, the lines were vague, blurred, or non-existent. Individuality and personal sovereignty were in most cases rejected or shunned.
Later, as I entered a relationship with Mateo, I felt myself become consumed in the fires of romance. But this was not a healthy type of romance for me: it was a matter of life and death.
I remember thinking, very early after leaving my fundamentalist Christian family that if Mateo were to leave me I would kill myself. I couldn’t stand the idea of not having him in my life.
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Thankfully I have done a lot of inner work and soul-searching since then. I no longer see him as “completing me” but as complementing me.
Thanks to my intentional process of individuation, I now have a much stronger sense of self (although I still do struggle with taking responsibility for other people’s mess – but that’s a work in progress).
Enmeshment has far-reaching and profound effects on our lives.
Here are 13 ways enmeshment may impact you as an adult:
- You feel the need to rescue everyone around you
- You feel the need to be rescued
- You take responsibility for other people’s feelings, habits, and choices
- You can’t tell the difference between your emotions and the emotions from those around you
- You struggle to give yourself (or others close to you) personal space
- You feel like your partner “completes” you and without them, you would be nothing
- You get tangled up in the drama of other people’s lives easily
- You feel betrayed when someone close to you wants to do their own thing without you
- You define your worth by how useful you are to others
- You confuse obsession with care
- You don’t really know who you are (your sense of self is weak)
- You easily lose your identity in the presence of others
- You don’t have many interests or hobbies outside of your family/friend/romantic relationships
- You might make other people responsible for your emotions (rather than taking responsibility yourself)
Stop and reflect. What is your response to the list of symptoms above? How do you feel when you read them? Take a few moments to breathe and tune into your body. Do any strong feelings emerge? If so, what are they? It’s normal to feel triggered by these symptoms if you struggle with enmeshment.
How to Step into Your Power and Overcome Enmeshment
Here are a variety of practices you might like to explore to help strengthen your sense of self:
1. Be a detective: explore your own interests
Finding out what you’re passionate about is an exciting path. Yes, you might feel a little confused or dazed at first, but keep persisting. Exploring interests outside of your relationships will give you more personal autonomy. More autonomy = a stronger sense of self = more personal empowerment. Try researching hobbies online. Pay attention when anything catches your interest or when you would secretly like to do the same thing as another person. For example, I discovered my passion for alcohol ink after stumbling across a few beautiful pieces of art online. I then decided to invest in a small course and learn the basics, and later bought my own inks to experiment with.
2. Set boundaries and respect your right to say “no”
Boundaries are an essential step in learning how to overcome your enmeshment patterns. You absolutely need to focus on how you feel around others and what is okay vs. not appropriate. Putting your foot down and drawing a line can feel uncomfortable at first. But don’t worry, everyone experiences pangs of discomfort when learning new skills – and that is what boundary setting is: a skill you hone. Read more about setting clear personal boundaries.
3. Learn to enjoy being alone
Growing up in an enmeshed environment can make it hard to spend time alone in solitude. You may feel lonely, bored or depressed when alone because you have not learned to enjoy your own company. To strengthen your sense of self, try setting time aside each week to be alone. Make your alone time enjoyable by setting yourself tasks that you love doing like gardening, painting, cooking, writing, reading or anything that relaxes you. You might like to dedicate your alone time to practicing self-care, such as making yourself a soothing bubble bath, listening to music, doing yoga, or sitting outside in nature. I also recommend some form of journaling which involves keeping a private journal in which you record your thoughts and feelings. This is a wonderful way to differentiate yourself from others. (Note: you don’t have to be a writer, write long paragraphs or be good at spelling – even just a few words or sentences will do.)
Learn more about how to journal.
4. Read lots of books and take personality tests
Self-discovery and self-awareness will be important parts of your journey if enmeshment is an issue for you. One of the most interesting and exciting ways I began differentiating myself from others was through self-help books and personality tests. There are tons of brilliant self-help books out there such as Daniel Goleman’s Emotional Intelligence and the old gem How to Be Your Own Best Friend by Mildred Newman and Bernard Berkowitz. You can also find many tests on our website in our free tests section.
5. Practice the fine art of self-love
Learn how to love and accept who you are. I encourage you to practice self-discovery (mentioned above) alongside self-compassion. Strive to take care of your physical, mental, emotional, and spiritual needs. If this sounds overwhelming, I encourage you to check out my free self-love guide: How to love yourself.
Regain Your Personal Sovereignty
The entire point of this article has been to help and inspire you to regain your personal sovereignty. Personal sovereignty is the ability to be the ruler of your own life and to clearly understand (and meet) your own needs, desires, and dreams. I hope you have a few more paths now to explore on your journey of healing and wholeness.
I’d love to hear any of your thoughts or personal stories about enmeshment below.
Much love.
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One thought, and feeling, that kept coming up for me in this article is GUILT. Growing up in a family with toxic enmeshment, you are basically trained to feel GUILTY about being an individual. This is still something I am working on, at 26, and I’m still working to establish boundaries with my parents to respect myself and my needs.
Thank you for this work that you do, and share with all of us.
I totally get it! It’s what I’ve been thinking all along about my family. Without realizing it, I’ve been on a journey of self awareness and self love for the past few years. Then I understood what personal boundaries meant. Then I started seeing my family differently. I was brought up in an environment that gave importance to family. It’s not bad in a sense, but I started seeing what was wrong with the family, and at first there was guilt because I didn’t want to feel bad about the people I love. But my mom is overly attached and enmeshed with her family and hence passes it to us. I remember, I was redesigning my room just recently and she didn’t want the mirror positioned to where I wanted it. Then I said, “This is MY room.” And she replied: “This is OUR house.” Talk about not having personal boundaries. I really find it hard to break free from the enmeshment. And I want to point it out to her but she is not awakened enough to understand or accept what was wrong.
I completely agree! Any attempt to be an individual was always interpreted as me “threatening to leave the family” (i.e. job interview out of town). With researching enmeshment, I am greatly encouraged in my own self work! Good luck to you!
Just started therapy started learning about transactional analysis and I can honestly say this is so incredibly helpful a true ete opener. Now I understand all the issues related to my family and how it can affect relationships with people. Detaching yourself from an impossible situation when you have to live with that person is really hard. I thank you for making me understand all the why’s. Just wish I could change that. Ultimately we all seek happiness and love but without communication we can’t move forward.
Honestly, I don’t think I have much else of a place to vent about this, and I’m not telling my mom I mentioned this here, mind you, but growing up she was rather abusive. She’s not abusive anymore, though, but back then we were always arguing.
She kept trying to create a parentification situation, where I had to take care of her, and if I don’t, she’ll guilt me, shout at me, or pull me to where she wants me to go. In Dr. Pete Walker 4F terms, some people react to this with fawn, which means helping the parent as much as possible. Some react with flight, which means reacting in worried anxiety? For me, I reacted with freeze, or just making myself isolated from everyone. And when I finally lose my temper holding it in, I responded with fight, and you can guess how that went.
It was so frustrating. I was never one of those emotionally oriented kids that talked about “feelings” with friends. If anything, I was disgusted by the idea of helping her with something as awkward as that. I suppressed my anger since something in me cared about her, but. . . I just never put out a hand to listen to her vent. I hated large emotional displays, and she always did that. I kept telling her to call another adult or some other relative, but she didn’t. So I said, “F you,” and went on my way.
A lot has changed then, but I feel I still have some kind of guilt over not helping her then. (See the website traumahealed for more information). Somewhere in me I always feel responsible for other people’s pain, but I can’t find it in me to awkwardly help them. Well, isn’t that why I’m a scientist today?
Sigh, maybe that’s why I’m so awkward with emotions these days. The emotional influences I’ve seen growing up with loud tearful displays were out of control with rage and all over the place. I wanted to be the opposite of that. Only now with my relationships today in my social circle am I learning there are more healthy ways to express emotions. And I find I’m okay with listening and giving emotional advice, either with close friends or at a distance online. Any more than that and it’s too much. I was a kid then. It emotionally troubled me I had no idea how to respond to her early childhood experiences, debt and fear for what others thought. That’s what irritated me the most. She always cared what people thought to irrational levels, and it always annoyed me how that limited my freedom. Now I feel disgusted when I care about what other people think, when often it’s in much smaller ways that don’t affect my larger life decisions.
I needed to learn to be more assertive, not in that I was being overly nice, but I needed to learn how to start communicating anything in the first place. Sigh. I really hate it when people vent things over me too much, especially when they’re not close. “I’m not your therapist. I’m an engineer, you idiot.”
Sigh, but maybe these days from time to time, I’ll listen to a stranger’s woes, and I’ll find something in them was deeply healed.
“But you’re a good listener,” they say. “Only when I’m not tired,” I reply back.
Wow! Thank you! After a ridiculous amount of therapy and countless rehabs no-one has been able to explain this to me so concisely. Greats post, great tips! Thank you!
Wow. Never even heard or enmeshment and have 100% of “the 10 signs that your family has enmeshment”! currently I am under the process of backing-away from the relationship with my mother and have many years ago done so with my abusive father. Much like yourself I was raised in a fundamentalist church/family. How mental that was and am still trying to understand my own beliefs as an adult. Thank you for the article. Would love to see u on Instagram.
OMG!! The list of “what you can expect in adulthood” when you come from an enmeshed family had me falling off my chair…I could put a check next to each and every attribute! @MCRub this statment, “It was heartbreaking when I finally got an understanding of what my family is.” I have been grieving this over a year only to find out a few months ago exactly what has been happening. On some level I wish I knew sooner, but I know that with all the other “issues” I have had – including a divorce from an emotional abuser and more – I don’t think my poor brain could have handled it. There were so many AHA! moments and truths as I read this article, that it is just amazing to me that this is the first time I have heard of this. I hope that anyone who has the internal fortitude to move forward from enmeshment has access to this kind of info. THANK YOU!
I am with you. This article is unreal! I wish I’d read this ages ago!
Ammaazing article. MY ENTIRE LIFE WAS BUILT ENMESHED! T hanks to i Yusuke like you who are raising awareness about the issue, i am aware and am actively recovering from it. Thank you. I love your blog. Keep sending and sharing you r light with the world ❤️ blessings and blessings and more blessings to you ❤️❤️❤️
One thing you didn’t mention as a cause of toxic enmeshment is having a narcissistic parent, particularly the mother. The symptoms of enmeshment you describe are very similar to the symptoms and aftereffects of growing up with a narcissistic mother, especially in the role of the scapegoat. In fact often the narcissistic mother actively promotes toxic enmeshment of the family members, like a spider sitting in the middle of a web. It’s a perfect means to control the family and be the centre of attention, also known as triangulation. This was and is the method my mother uses to this day to control the family and all communications between members. It started when my father died; he was all that held the family together. Once he was gone, I was no longer invited to family get-togethers, and those gatherings have dwindled to almost nothing.
Toxic enmeshment can have deep and far-reaching effects. In my case I tried to break it years ago by cutting off contact with my mother and the rest of the family. However, I was lonely, got into a toxic and abusive relationship with a man and had a child with him. I still remember thinking “if I don’t have a family anymore I’ll just have to make one”. Then when my daughter was 6 months old, I made the biggest mistake of both of our lives – I decided to contact my family again to let them know about her. I mistakenly thought that their attitude towards me would change if I presented them with the first grandchild. Pure toxic enmeshment.
To make a long story short, mother and her flying monkeys (my siblings) did everything they possibly could to pry my daughter away from me so they could replace me as her parents. I left the abusive relationship about a year after my daughter was born and I remained single throughout her childhood. I worked long, hard hours to support us both and put food on the table. The monkeys would whisk her away on expensive jetsetting “family” vacations to which I was the only one never invited. They would buy her lavish and expensive gifts which I couldn’t afford, a form of financial competition.
Mother the narcissist couldn’t stand that I had this beautiful child while her own kids were grown up and gone. For her this was a chance to once again denigrate me, undermine me as a parent and show me up as a bad mother. She even told my 3 year old daughter “don’t worry, if she makes you do anything you don’t want to do you can just come and live with me”. Another generation of narcissistic abuse.
As the years went on my daughter’s attitude became more and more disrespectful towards me as mother’s brainwashing continued. She hooked up with an abusive boy at age 15 and the two of them promptly dropped out of high school. She began smoking cigarettes and drinking alcohol. As someone who was still affected by growing up as the scapegoat of a narcissist and the effects of toxic enmeshment with my abusers, I was a “people pleaser” and I raised my daughter with few or no boundaries. I wanted to be her “friend” and I wanted to do the opposite to what my parents did to me. However, with no discipline there was no gratitude or respect. At the same time, mother was secretly in touch with her and filling her head with more reasons why I wasn’t worthy of respect.
Finally I was living in my bedroom while my daughter and the boyfriend trashed the rest of my apartment. Neither of them worked or went to school. They played video games and ate junk food day and night. His parents refused to provide money to support him. I couldn’t take it anymore and when she reached 18 I kicked the two of them out.
She refused to speak to me for several years – until her cat got sick and she wanted me to foot the vet bills. I left work to go and rush the cat to a vet. I spent several thousand dollars but she had left the illness too long and the cat had to be put down. The whole time she was complaining to mother about me (I heard later), and I didn’t get a thank you, nor did she return any of my calls about the cat. I never heard from her again, other than through Mother Spider in her web, who told me that my daughter “hated me” for having her cat put to sleep. That was 11 years ago.
It took years for me to get over the loss of my daughter. I started out by grieving as if it were a death, and told myself I might as well consider her to be dead so I could have some closure. For a while I idealized her and blamed everything on mother. I sent e-cards to her at Christmas and birthdays, hoping she’d change her mind, but she never picked them up. Finally I realized she’s doing me a favour based on her attitude. Whether she grew up to hate me because of something I did, or my mother did, or both of us did – the result is the same.
In the meantime I’ve finally taught myself to enjoy being alone. I haven’t been in any kind of relationship for 6 years now, and I feel a sense of peace that I’ve never felt since I was born. If my daughter were to contact me now, I’d be extremely wary and might even refuse contact. I don’t need to be exploited and abused again.
It sounds like you’ve been through a lot, and seem to be a very strong individual stuck in a shitty cycle like so many others here…
but have you ever considered how your daughter might feel? It sounds like she went through more or less exactly what you (and most of us in some way or another) experienced?
Idk if you considered it or not but I bet from her perspective she feels the exact same way.
My mom was/is obsessed with being right, and often things get lost because she’s so focused on not being wrong everything else is ignored. She would cut me off to defend herself and it ends up being about her again. I know her intentions are good and she loves me but she’s so stuck in herself it actually makes things so much worse.
I wouldn’t doubt I display a lot of negative traits I’m unaware of as well, just a thought if you haven’t already considered it.
I often wished I could spontaneously lose my memory in order to be free of the toxic damaging effects of having narcissists for parents. The aftermath of living in this sick, twisted environment left me with a lifetime of suffering at my expense. The toxic enmeshed family dynamic left me with deep seated venomous rage & hatred, due to the injustices I endured. I can’t wrap my head around how incredibly selfish and abusive narcs are. Being the “Black Sheep” (scapegoat), has taught me to fight to the death for my individuality. I am so adamant to cut the cancer (family) out of my life, I have completely gone “no contact” with each and everyone of them. My abusive incestuous father passed away and I refused to attend his funeral, as I don’t pay respects to people I have zero respect for. Anyone who can identify with this type of abuse, my heart goes out you. You deserve unconditional love, validation, empathy and the biggest hug ever. What you have gone thru is no different then walking through the raging fires of hell. Walking out of this demented upbringing where you have to sneak around to be yourself, deny your truth & feelings. or face merciless retribution. This is the worst form of enslavement, being stripped of any personal boundaries & identity so you only exist as an empty soulless shell. Trying to function in society after enduring the ongoing collateral damage from this evil toxic abuse, is the dark black ominous cloud you can never escape. You long for amnesia to set in to finally embrace your freedom.
This article offers some really good information, however, I find some of the information to be quite flawed. I, too, was raised in a family that did not value individuality or personality differences. My family was always very judgmental of anyone, family or not, who dared to hold a different opinion than them. My first two long term relationships were with men that my family did not approve of, resulting in my family members shunning me and my children that were born of those relationships.
My current husband and I have been married for several years and while my family seriously approves of him more than they do me, I am lucky because I realized many years ago the favor they were doing me by shunning me and my children. Those years we were shut out of the rest of the family allowed me to grow and learn to make choices based on my own thoughts and beliefs without worrying about their approval. They also gave me the privacy away from all of them during the formative years of my children’s lives thus allowing my children to grow up without that pressure from the rest of my family.
I told myself when I started out in life on my own, out from under the shadow of my overbearing family that I would rather die than ever treat my kids the way I had been treated and am very proud of myself for having the ability to break that cycle of emotional abuse and conditioning.
I have to be honest with myself though, I call myself lucky because my situation is not necessarily a great family life, it’s more like the lesser of two evils. While I can easily see the differences in the relationships that I have with my children as they are now young adults than I ever did with anyone in my family and I am very thankful for that because we have some pretty amazing relationships between us. I get pleasure is watching their lives unfurl into adulthood and all that comes with that, while I am also confident in our love for each other that I have no fear of ever becoming irrelevant in their lives. It all sounds pretty amazing so far, right? Well, like every other thing in this world, to have the good we must also have the bad, and in this situation, the bas is just as bad as the good is good, if you understand what I am saying.
Yes, my kids are proving to be well balanced, productive responsible citizens who have seemed to be capable of emotionally maneuvering everything life has thrown at them so far. The unfortunate part of the story is the fact that my children live in the same tri-county area as many extended family members but just a few months ago my son sat having a beer at a local bar when he found himself in a conversation with another young man at the bar that night and in their conversation discovered that he was talking with his own first cousin, my own sister’s son who is only 2 years older than my son. My children have no emotional ties at all whatsoever with any of their extended family.
My family was sick and twisted in places they shouldn’t have been and all that, but I have always loved and cared about them and some of them have expressed the same feelings towards me over the years, maybe they do love me in their own way, who really knows? But my children are destined to live life without those deep family roots that most people need in life at some point or another.
As I am approaching 50 years old I can honestly say that I highly value my personal time and I make sure that I have some of it every single day, not just every week, and I do not feel guilty at all about that. Not only do I have hobbies that I enjoy doing alone, I am not even slightly interested in sharing them with anyone else. It could be said that I have evolved into quite the introvert and while I dearly love spending time with my husband and children and now my granddaughter, I find that I still prefer my own company over that of others most of the time.
I would like to also say that your story about your family and how you were raised was delivered quite offensively. I an a Christian who takes my faith seriously and I expect to have the right to believe how I choose to believe. In order for me to have that right, I must also respect other people’s right to choose their own beliefs or dis-beliefs without belittling or passing a harsh judgement on them for daring to believe different than I do. When you chose to insinuate that my beliefs are stupid and then blatantly referred to my beliefs as “BS”, you were exhibiting the exact behavior that this article was written to condemn.
Kathie, I understand where you’re coming from, but unless you’re a fundamentalist Christian, and believe your faith is the “one true way” (which belittles and passes judgment on other beliefs) there’s no insult intended.
As I write in the article:
As you can see, I’m clearly writing about fundamentalist Christianity, and personally, I think anyone in their right mind would call such an approach to life BS – especially if they have lived through the mental, emotional, and physical horrors associated with it.
I don’t have a problem with Christians or their beliefs – they are entitled to believe what they believe, and a lot of good has come from Christianity – but when they impose it on others, then I have a problem.
I do believe that my faith is ‘the one true way’, however I also believe that each and every human has the right to believe what they choose to believe and it’s not my place to judge them or their beliefs. My bible clearly states that Jesus Christ is THE way, the truth, and the life, and I believe that. It does not say that Jesus Christ is an option, if other people are offended by that then that is something they might want to look into, but it truly is how I believe.
That is the problem, “MY bible says…” Please don’t jump on other people’s experiences with Christianity. That is opinionated and so negative. And so very un-Christian of you to take her to task when she was opening up about HER experience. Wow. :(
Woow lol I’m honestly flabbergasted and I hope this person is trolling. Kathie the article is not flawed because your experiences differ… the whole thread is a rollercoaster but that aside, After claiming the information is flawed you go to share experiences that sound more or less like the article explained.
Then you go on to say your offended by the author calling extreme religious people who use religion solely to manipulate others bullshit, then claim what you believe in fact IS the only way and if others are offended oh well. ♂️ Btw doesn’t YOUR book have something to say about premarital sex and divorce? We’re your 3 relationships before you converted? Or is it too bad so sad to that as well?
Thats the problem with these Christian believers their religion takes away ANY individuality. Then they judge others to the rigid standards that they supposedly chose to believe ! They are aggresive judgemental and TOXIC and enmeshed with religion. That is why i became a humanist. Religion is absolutely insane
This was my life. I’m in therapy for it now. It was “us against the world.” You couldn’t tell where one of us began and ended. We were so inseparable until I realized I was the “black sheep.” It was heartbreaking when I finally got an understanding of what my family is. I’m in the process of creating my own identity, but I will admit it gets kinda lonely when you’re accustomed to excessive family involvement in every aspect of your life. Creating boundaries was hard but so necessary. I’m moving with my daughters soon to another city, and I’m going to miss my family.
MCRub, I’m so glad you’ve broken away darling, and are starting life fresh. Good on you! It’s normal to experience some level of grief, but the freedom that comes with setting boundaries is unimaginably empowering and liberating. Good luck :)