Who decided what "healthy boundaries" are???

[plantsandworms]

This has been knocking around in my brain for a while. My therapist and I talk a lot about building healthy boundaries, what is or isn't my "responsibility" in inter-personal relationships, and what sort of things my parents were involving me in as a child that "shouldn't have been my job." For the most part I find it to be a great relief and very validating to know that I am able to draw that line for myself and that I shouldn't have to suffer so endlessly at the hands of those closest to me - and that the things that happened when I was a kid were not supposed to be that way. But I feel like I also keep hitting roadblocks in giving myself permission to view my life through the lens of those boundaries because.... who decided what they are?

In an ideal world, they make sense. My parents shouldn't have been counting on me (their child) to meet their basic needs and those needs of my siblings and myself. But I feel like all these rules about boundaries take people totally out of context. For example, my family was very poor. I have ten siblings and my parents were making barely above minimum wage. Adding to that, my parents are also survivors of extreme trauma themselves who were never able to access help due to their financial circumstances and other burdens. Considering all that, it makes perfect sense that they couldn't meet our family's needs on their own and that they leaned on me (the oldest child) for help. I have a hard time looking back on my childhood and saying "They should have done X instead" because the circumstances of our lives were so inescapable. I feel like there are so many circumstances that prevent people from thriving on their own - like I think about communities of people who are oppressed in one way or another and how (by necessity) their social relationships and boundaries look different from the ones we talk about in therapy. Is the concept of "healthy boundaries" culturally bound? Socio-economically bound? Does anybody know what I mean?

[sanmagic7]

p&w, i think the concept of healthy boundaries ideally is about self-care.  'healthy' referring to what is healthy for ourselves, mentally, physically, emotionally, spiritually, sexually.  that can be very individual, determined by each person themselves.  healthy can include the idea of 'safe', 'within our own limits', or 'what we have energy for'.  that will vary with the individual, and can only be determined for you by you.

as far as parents doing what they needed to do or thought best - i understand what you're saying.  my folks were children of european immigrants and had no access to learning about emotions, children's personal needs or sensitivities (outside of the basics), and were relied on themselves to help their parents survive.

understanding that, however, does not change the fact that we did not get what we needed as children.  i know they didn't get what they needed, either, and struggled with their own symptoms all their lives.  now, we struggle with our own set of symptoms because of what they didn't know and/or couldn't give us.

still, they had the power over us and we were, consequently, forced to do what they wanted, whether it was in our best interest or not, whether it trod on our personal boundaries or not, whether it was healthy in any of those above categories for us or not.  we didn't have a choice, we did what we had to do to survive, and we are now looking at how we can finally take care of ourselves in a healthier way than we were taken care of.

because, as much as my parents did the best with what they knew, it wasn't all that i needed to live in future relationships in a healthy, caring, kind, loving way.  i didn't learn what i needed to know to do so.  my guess is that you didn't either.  in order to do so, to have healthier, happier, safe relationships, we have to learn those fundamentals, such as what healthy boundaries are, from somewhere else.  that's what, i believe, your t is doing - teaching you what you needed to be taught but weren't, for whatever reason.

these are just my thoughts about this.  don't know if it helps with your question, or makes sense to you.  this forum has also helped me with exactly this subject as well, allowing me to know just what is or isn't generally 'healthy' for a human being.   we get to adjust those various categories according to our individual beings.   sending love and a caring hug, if it's ok.

[ah]

Seems to me the idea of healthy boundaries is just what San said, it's not just one way of doing things. It's about self care depending on your conditions. What may seem unhealthy in one situation may actually be healthy in another.
The key is maybe what would help you be as safe as possible, protect yourself from dangerous people, help you recognize dangerous people vs. people who can be trusted, know how to react to disappointments and hardships without too many EFs... that sort of thing.

I think if it's seen as a one-size-fits-all sort of idea then it's bound to be unrealistic. Look at "old age", for example. 150 years ago 40 was old age, but now 40 is young. Still, "old age" is a term we use.
Maybe "healthy boundaries" is necessarily just the same, it's a useful term that should be applied wisely, taking all of your circumstances into account?
Otherwise it means very little. To really help us it needs to be deeply rooted in the reality of our life. Not in a non-existent ideal life we wish we could be living, but in our life with all of its problems.

[plantsandworms]

Thank you both for your thoughtful responses. This really helped me to think about these concepts in a different way that feels truer for me. I have found during my healing process that I often have a lot of defensiveness come up whenever I perceive something as criticizing my parents (even though I don't even have contact any more because of the abuse) and I think that was clouding my thoughts when processing my conversations with my therapist. You're right that, even if there are good reasons for why things were the way they were,  I still wasn't getting what I needed to thrive. Thank you for helping me over this bump in the road!