Acknowledging I am an Empath

Being an empath or highly sensitive person goes beyond merely being able to show compassion and empathy or be empathic to another person’s situation. Empaths do not have the same ability as others to block or filter out stimulation. Instead, we absorb the positive and negative energy around us into our bodies. It’s like being a sponge that absorbs people’s emotions and feelings: anger, fear, disgust, happiness, sadness, surprise, and contempt. The emotions I absorb can be overwhelming. My description of feeling like I was moving from a simmer to a boil now made sense. As my stress level had worsened over the last 18 months, I had lost what little ability I had to block out the emotions of others around me. Instead, I had created a mechanism to expel the pent-up emotions that I had absorbed and churned around in me until I lost the ability to manage or control them. The boil was a mechanism I had developed to rid myself of what I was feeling. Think of it like the straw that broke the camel’s back. The pent-up emotions get to a point where I can no longer stay calm. I can no longer interact with others in a positive and productive way. Instead, I boil over like an unwatched pot spewing words and tears of frustration and hurt.

Thankfully, I am more extroverted than introverted and genuinely like to be around people. It is exhausting both mentally and physically. To manage and maintain my social ability, I need to recharge away from people, even those I love deeply. When in groups, I have realized that I sit back as if I am watching a scene from a play. This is when I can study how people interact and communicate with others. This is how I come to learn more about those closest to me or those I work with and begin to understand who they are on a deeper level.

It’s interesting to me that while I have the ability to understand others so well, I fail to understand myself. Why did it take me hitting the bottom before I understood or was willing to understand that I suffered from anxiety and had been depressed for several years? Empaths frequently struggle with addictions. I over-imbibe upon occasion and realize now when I am in large crowds; I need to be conscious of how much I drink because it’s easy to use alcohol to drown out my emotions.

I also understand what drove me to become bulimic. Overeating is common in empaths. Food makes you feel grounded. It makes you feel protected. This explains my constant struggle with weight, as carrying a little extra cushion can, in fact, provide protection from absorbing negative energy. The downside, at least for me, is the negative and destructive self-talk that comes with the fact that I have gained weight.

I’ve never been skinny; I have had to watch my weight my entire life. I’m lucky that my family has always eaten well-balanced, home-cooked meals. Growing up, we had two large gardens where we grew most of the vegetables we consumed throughout the year. Rows of yellow and green beans that we picked snipped blanched, and froze. Rows of beets, carrots, onions, and squash that we could store in our cold cellar. In our house, junk food was considered popcorn with butter, and I don’t mean oil-popped; I’m talking about air-popped popcorn. We rarely had snacks like chips in the house, and my mom would prepackage the cookies she bought so that we would not scarf them down as after-school snacks. From my earliest memories, school lunches consisted mainly of fruits and vegetables with a sandwich and no more than two cookies.

I was forever being told to watch what I ate. Being told I was pleasantly plump was hard, especially as my brother was as thin as a rail. To add insult to injury, I matured faster than my friends, which led to teasing at school. I was the first to wear a bra. I was the first to get my period. I was the first to have that dreaded accident of getting your period when you least expected it. For me, it was in grade six. I was wearing a white miniskirt with turquoise stripes, a turquoise shirt and white leather flats. It happened in music class. When class was over, and I stood up to go put my recorder away, I heard snickers. My best friend quickly told me what happened, and a group of girls created a circle around me as I made the walk of shame to the principal’s office to call my mom. As luck would have it, neither my mom nor dad were home. I had to call my neighbour to go to our house to pick up a pair of jeans and clean underwear. I’ll never forget sitting in the nurse’s office, waiting for my clothes to show up. In retrospect, what’s interesting is the fact that I never asked to go home. It never occurred to me. I guess I felt the worst had already happened, so I may as well stay at school and learn because I loved learning and showing that I was at the top of the class. I love sweets. I always have and always will. Whether it comes in the form of chocolate or candy, sugar is soothing. I can recall getting home from school before my parents were home from work and sneak-eating. I didn’t understand at the time what drove me to do this, but I recall feeling a temporary reprieve from my emotions. Of course, eating sweets or whatever other snacks I snuck inevitably leads to weight gain. It was the reason for yo-yoing on the scale and further reducing my ability to be comfortable in my own body. By the time I turned twelve, I began a downward spiral of binging and purging. This continued into high school.

I didn’t have a name for what I was doing. I knew it was wrong, but it was allowing me the release of getting pleasure from eating while managing not to get any fatter. The ability to maintain my weight and not feel like the fattest girl at school provided some relief. It also gave me a feeling of control. Control over what I ate, when I decided to binge, and when I decided to purge. That sense of control helped me manage the stress of feeling like I had the weight of the world on my shoulders. I realized that being in control allowed me to focus on being a straight-A student and an overachiever who was active in music, competitively showed horses and played the part of a homemaker when my mom was travelling for extended periods of time for work.

It wasn’t until health class covered the topic of eating disorders did I understand that what I was doing was not just bad for me mentally but could be detrimental to my health. In typical fashion, I did not seek help. Instead, I used my stubborn, self-dependent nature to stop. My ability to evoke change when I put my mind to it is impressive, if I do say so myself. I read all I could about the topic of bulimia, including stories of girls whose lives had been forever changed. That was not the future I wanted for myself. I began focusing on eating healthy, appropriately sized portions but still allowed room to have snacks so I didn’t feel deprived. Within six months, I had things under control, at least from a binging and purging perspective. I never addressed or discovered what it was that truly started me down that path. Even now, more than thirty years later, I know I was lucky. Yes, that time of my life impacted my long-term health. I have GERD (Gastroesophageal Reflux Disease), which is a fancy way of saying I suffer from acid reflux and need to take medication to control it. It could be worse; I may have continued to ignore my symptoms and ended up with Barrett’s esophagus, a serious complication of GERD and precursor to esophageal cancer.

Purging has impacted my teeth; stomach acid is hard on your teeth. When I talk a lot, my voice can get raspy, another side effect of stomach acid contacting with frequency tissues it should not be touching. I suppose there are times I can use that to my advantage, like when I try to be sexy and sultry with my husband. What I have only just recently learned is that bulimia can also cause other digestive issues, such as diarrhea, bloating, constipation, and hemorrhoids. Being an overachiever, I suffer from all four. Thankfully not all at the same time. The side effect that I am most irritated by is that it stunted my growth. I am the short girl who wears heels to appear taller and make sure that people know I am five foot four and a half inches tall. That half an inch is important.

I know it was my sheer willpower and unwillingness to admit defeat that got me through. I’ve continued to struggle with my weight off and on but have never relapsed fully. Do I have the occasional pity party? Yes. Do I occasionally sneak, eat and hide that fact from my family? Yep. Have I caught myself binging and purging? Embarrassingly, yes. I now know that when I feel myself losing control and not being the driver of my own life, it triggers my need to control something. Eating is something I can completely control. If I realize I have eaten too much, I can control that by purging. Now I recognize that with this perceived sense of control comes shame. That shame throws me into a dark hole I need to work out of. Sometimes it takes longer than other times.

I am trying to learn how to embrace being an empath with Hellen. We are working on how to keep grounded and keep from being overwhelmed by the emotions I feel while interacting with people throughout my day. I am slowly learning that his emotions are not aimed at me when my husband gets frustrated and goes on a little rant. I am his sounding board in the same way he is mine.

My ability to create a barrier and deflect the feelings of those I work with depends on who I am dealing with and what type of relationship we have. I work with many who do not know what an empath is, would not understand if I tried to explain and simply see me as being overly sensitive or emotional. I recognize that this will take some time. I am impatient and want to see action, so the fact that some days go better than others can feel like a setback. I am slowly learning to be able to create a shield and not let the emotions of others penetrate and become mine.

I will get there, and, in the end, I know the effort will be worth it.

Originally published on December 6, 2020 (https://girlintheredhatblog.wordpress.com/)

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If you are battling an eating disorder such as Bulimia, please know that you are not alone. There are some really good resources to help you on the road to recovery.

• National Eating Disorder Information Centre (NEDIC)

• Understanding and Finding Help for Eating Disorders