My boyfriend’s family is extremely enmeshed and I genuinely don’t know if our relationship can survive it. Am I overreacting?
I (22F) have been with my boyfriend (25M) for about a year and a half. I love him, but his relationship with his family has become one of the biggest problems in our relationship, and I desperately need outside perspectives because I don’t know what is normal anymore.
When I first met him, he was living independently, and our relationship felt completely different. Eventually he moved back in with his parents and started working for his dad’s business, and since then it feels like his entire life revolves around his family. His work, money, schedule, living situation, and free time are all connected to them. There doesn’t seem to be much separation between “him” and “his family.”
His parents seem very involved in his decisions and his schedule, and it feels like plans between us are constantly dependent on what his family wants or needs. We’re currently long distance, so seeing each other already requires planning. There have been times where we’ve gone weeks or over a month without seeing each other, yet I still feel like creating independent time for our relationship is treated as secondary.
The relationship with his sister is another part that makes me extremely uncomfortable. They are VERY physically affectionate with each other, including cuddling and spooning. I understand siblings can be close and affectionate, but this goes beyond anything I’ve personally seen between adult siblings, and I have tried explaining that it makes me uncomfortable.
The worst incident happened on my birthday. I was already upset because he was cuddling/spooning with his sister. I tried waking him up, and during the situation he smacked me hard enough to give me a black eye. I know physical violence is a separate and serious issue, and I’m not trying to minimize that. It affected the way I see him and his family dynamic, and months later I still haven’t been able to fully get past what happened.
To his credit, his behavior toward me has improved significantly since then, and I have seen changes in him. That’s part of why I’m so conflicted. If everything were horrible all the time, this decision would probably be much easier.
But I still feel like I’m dating someone who hasn’t actually separated from his family as an adult. I don’t expect him to abandon them or stop being close to them. I actually think being close with your family can be a great thing. I just want normal adult boundaries and to feel like our relationship is capable of becoming its own unit.
I’m also starting to resent the situation because I don’t want my future to look like this. I don’t want to spend years waiting for him to become independent, move out, establish financial boundaries, and start making decisions without his family’s involvement.
I also want to acknowledge my own part because I don’t want this to be a completely one-sided post. I’ve handled some of these conflicts badly before. I’ve gotten extremely angry, said things I regret, and allowed my resentment toward his family to build instead of dealing with it productively. I’m working on my own behavior. But even when I remove my reactions from the equation, the underlying family dynamic is still there.
I guess what I’m trying to figure out is:
Is this actually family enmeshment, or am I interpreting a close family through my own discomfort?
For people who have dated or married someone from an enmeshed family, did your partner ever successfully establish boundaries while remaining close to their family?
And most importantly, how do you know when it’s worth waiting for someone to become more independent versus accepting that this is simply the family system you’re signing up for?
I love him, but I’m starting to realize that loving someone and being compatible with the life they currently have might be two different things. I really need outside perspectives.