Or a child may join or be enlisted by one parent against the other in decision making. Individuals within an enmeshed family system are poorly differentiated. Each person within all families is regulated by the family system to some degree, but in enmeshed families, members get lost in the system. Functioning in individually differentiated ways is handicapped because the boundaries that define individual autonomy are so weak. Excessive togetherness and sharing brings about a lack of privacy.
Family members speak for each other and intrude on each others' thoughts and feelings.
All these problems of enmeshment are reflected in the perceptions of the family members towards themselves and each other. These perceptions show the poorly differentiated sense of self. The psychosomatic family that is characterized by overprotectiveness shows a high degree of concern of family members for each others' welfare. Family members in this sort of system are hypersensitive to signs of distress among its family members and constantly elicits and supplies nurturing and protective responses. In such families, the parents' overprotectiveness retards the small or grownup child's development of autonomy, competence, and interests or activities outside the safety of the family.