Sometimes, and it seems more and more often, I feel completely wiped out after spending time with certain people. Emotional vampires, that’s what we call them.
Maybe it’s a friend who always takes center stage at girls’ night out because of interpersonal problems. Or maybe you have a co-worker whose blood pressure constantly rises due to stress. Or when your teen feels like lying down and taking a long nap after a recent emotional outburst.
But lately, I feel like I’ve been absorbing too much of other people’s anxiety, sadness, frustration, and stress. And hearing several other mom friends vent about feeling the same way made me wonder: What does it mean to be exhausted by other people’s emotions?
The default reaction is to describe this as being an “empath.” But experts say that’s not necessarily happening.
There is a difference between empathy and emotional overload.
Experts say one of the biggest misconceptions is that empathy means automatically absorbing the emotions of others.
“People often use ’empath’ as an umbrella term, but clinically speaking, there is a meaningful difference between empathy and emotional overwhelm,” says Ellie Holmberg, a licensed clinical social worker and founder of Stillwater Therapy. “Empathy is the ability to understand and emotionally resonate with someone else’s experience while remaining grounded in your own experience. Emotional overwhelm occurs when those boundaries become blurred. You are no longer witnessing someone’s emotions; you are absorbing them.”
Is there a way to help think about it? “Empathy says, ‘I can sit with you in this,'” Oberwurm says, “I’m drowning in this with you.”
Signs that you have crossed the line from caring carry
If you’re wondering if you’ve wandered into unhealthy territory, somatic trauma therapist Chloe Bean, LMFT says there are some common red flags.
- Most interactions leave you feeling drained instead of connecting.
- You feel responsible for how those around you feel and feel anxious when they are not okay.
- You can gauge someone’s mood changes from across the room, and the system goes into alert mode.
- You’re probably good at keeping track of other people’s needs, but you may feel lost when it comes to your own needs.
“When empathy is healthy, you can care without compromising your sense of self. When that breaks down, care begins to mix with self-abandonment,” Bean warns.
Dr. Carson Brown, an integrative psychiatrist who specializes in treating highly sensitive people, says these people are more likely to become codependent. “It’s unhealthy for empathetic people to try to control the other person’s behavior,” Brown says, “so they can say, ‘I don’t want to be nervous, so I should send that email. I don’t want to be anxious, so I should stop drinking.'”
why am i so exhausted
This is obviously an emotional problem, but it’s also a nervous system problem. As Bean says, “It’s very taxing on the nervous system.” Basically, you’re keeping your body in a low-grade fight-or-flight mode.
“Our nervous system has the ability to hold someone else’s emotions, our own emotions,” says Brown. “When we take on more of other people’s emotions, we overload our nervous system with what it has to manage.”
And this ultimately manifests itself in all forms.
“Over time, this manifests as fatigue, trouble sleeping, irritability, nervousness, and even gastrointestinal issues,” says Bean. “The nervous system isn’t designed to stay in surveillance mode 24 hours a day, so the bone-deep fatigue that many women talk about isn’t laziness. It’s the result of years of being overly attuned to others.”
This constant activation of the nervous system can even cause it to swing too far in the opposite direction.
“People can sometimes become very isolated because they avoid people altogether in order to calm down, rather than learning how to moderate their reactions to other people’s emotions,” says Brown.
If you guessed this could be traced back to childhood, you nailed it
Several experts have pointed to a surprisingly common cause of this pattern. I grew up feeling responsible for the emotions of the adults around me.
“Many of the women I work with have learned to read the room before they read the book,” says Bean. “People who grew up with unpredictable, emotionally unstable parents understood early on that keeping others regulated was a way to keep themselves safe and connected.”
As someone who finds this deeply moving, ah. The problem, of course, is that the very reactions that protected us as children are the same ones that can lead to burnout as adults.
How to take care of your belongings without carrying too much
OK, unloading was tough. The good news? Experts say it helps to establish healthy boundaries, and no, you don’t have to become apathetic or apathetic to create boundaries. In fact, they often make relationships stronger.
“People get stuck here because they think boundaries mean being cold and shutting people out,” Bean says. “That’s not true. Boundaries aren’t walls that keep people out. They’re boundaries that help you stay in the room without losing yourself.”
According to Holmberg, this means practicing regulated empathy.
“It means not getting too specific and remaining compassionate,” she explains. “Healthy emotional boundaries look like telling yourself, ‘These feelings are theirs, not mine,’ pausing before reacting, and resisting the urge to fix or absorb everything. You can care deeply about other people’s emotional experiences without taking ownership of them.”
You can achieve this by making small, consistent shifts, Holmberg reassures.
- After an intense interaction, do a quick emotional check-in.
- Limit emotional multitasking.
- Incorporate nervous system resets throughout your day by moving your body, getting outside, and slowing your breathing.
- Practice tolerating the discomfort of not saving others.
Because, contrary to what many of us have been taught, being a caring person doesn’t mean being a sponge for emotions.
“Emotional capacity is not infinite, and being a compassionate person does not mean that you have unlimited access to it at your own expense,” Holmberg reminds us. “The healthiest form of empathy includes yourself.”
