confluence

- diminution of the self, abolition of the boundary between the client and his/her environment. One of the four classical resistances. A mother and her baby are in healthy confluence, but a 12-year-old child who is unable to take a different stance from his/her mother is suffering from unhealthy confluence. Some writers identify different sorts of confluence according to where on the cycle it occurs: confluence 1, when the need emerges; confluence 2, at the contact stage; confluence 3, at the end of the cycle (difficulty withdrawing).

• Gestalt Therapy