People Pleaser, HSP, or Empath? Untangling the Difference

And I would say that for me, the way that I see them intertwine the most evidently in my life has been with boundary setting.

So I have always...

I think I've always had a deep understanding just of psychology and how people work and patterns and things like that.

So being an empath and an HSP, I've always kind of understood what motivates people to do the healthy or unhealthy things that they do.

And I've also understood how experiences in people's lives may have affected how they act in the world.

How they show

up.

Yeah.

So I've had a history of pretty unhealthy relationships.

And I've really seen this in my intimate partner relationships.

Mm-hmm.

Where there's always been a history typically of some trauma or unhealthy behavior.

So because I understood what they had experienced as a child and how that might affect how they interact in the world.

I had a hard time setting boundaries for those behaviors.

And also being the feeler, I thought, oh, well, I'm just going to teach them they're unlovable too if I reject them.

So why not work with them and see where we can go with this? But because I understood that those behaviors were a result of hurt or trauma, it became hard for me to set a boundary for myself, differentiate that I didn't have to tolerate that behavior I could have empathy for them and care for them and all that, but it didn't in any way mean that I had to tolerate that behavior from them.

And that took me a very long time to figure out.

And it was a struggle.

I think that understanding and that feeling, and I think there also plays into that a piece that I didn't feel very witnessed for my own feelings and my own hurts as a child.

So then I felt a larger responsibility to try and... do that and see that in other people as well.

So I was always trying to give what I wish I'd gotten.

So it was kind of

multifaceted, but I definitely feel being the feeler and the empath and understanding what was motivating the behavior that I had empathy for them and didn't understand how to Still have

boundaries.

And as you're kind of describing that, I'm thinking of situations where I've needed boundaries, especially in relationships that feel challenging.