There are no such things as Empaths

[Seafog]

Ffs.
Empathy ....some of us have more empathy than others, but it doesn't make you a fucking empath!
If you have sympathy for people, would you go around saying you are a sympath?

Just say , "I have so much empathy" or "I am really sensitive to people's emotional state."

Making up a word to try and make yourself sound more special makes me think you're attention seeking twat.

AIBU?

I agree, OP. I think it's ok to notice that you are more deeply affected by your emotions than perhaps others are. Some of this may be down to attachment style or for e.g. I have ADHD and experience intense emotions as a result.

But the self declared empath status makes me absolutely cringe.

I agree with you OP. Everyone except actual psychopaths can empathise with others to a greater or lesser extent. It's part of being a social animal. It's just that some choose to give themselves a label to make themselves feel special.

Forgive my ignorance but isn't it normal to feel a great deal of empathy for people? Such that you wouldn't necessarily declare it because most people are the same?
The unusual ones are the people who don't experience it?

As an aside, people who constantly tell others how sensitive they are towards other people, probably aren't.

Agree, the only person i have met who said it was a parent of a kid i teach who is ( the parent) so self absorbed it’s ridiculous

I agree. Can’t stand the word itself or the whole idea of being an “empath”. It’s normal to have empathy for people. Some may find it easier to do that than others but it doesn’t deserve its own cult like status.

I agree OP. I think people who declare themselves as empaths, actually think they are very special and absolutely live for the drama of other people's lives.

Sorry, but isn't an empath a character ( Deana Troy) from Star Trek? Ie someone who reads minds?

Im probably an empath. I soak in others feelings and atmospheres. But i hate it.

Empath = over involved, over invested, busy body drama queen/king in my experience.

Twat works also.

Yeah, agreed. Unless you can use your powers to tell if the Klingons intend to open fire, you are just a garden variety narcissist.

YANBU

I once had the misfortune to work with 'the only empath in the village'.

He felt everyone's pain and emotions apparently and boy did he keep reminding us 🙄

Basically an attention seeking dickbag.

@DroopyClematis

Sorry, but isn't an empath a character ( Deana Troy) from Star Trek? Ie someone who reads minds?

That was the original meaning, it is now people who are So Deep And Sensitive that they make every else’s problems all about themselves, and how deeply they feel things.

Your mum has died? Oh dear, the Empath is far more upset about that than you could ever be. They never met her, but their feelings are way more special than yours. You need to offer them some support you selfish cow, and stop depressing them by moping about yourself. Etc.

Interesting. I know somebody (a nice person) who claims to be extremely empathic but honestly, even though she is nice enough, she seems to lack much thought or curiosity about other people’s feelings. She will never enquire how people are, or seem to consider things from other’s points of view. She is quite thoughtless at times.
I often wonder if she’s like this as a coping mechanism because she’s too empathic to cope with other’s feelings (can any empaths out there confirm this is a thing?)

Or maybe she is just a bit deluded about her empathising ability.

"I'm an empath, it's sooo exhausting for me" basically means "I make all your problems about me, me, me"

I'd be very embarrassed if I met someone who said they were an empath, because I'd assume they could tell I had a huge surge of cynicism happening.

@WorraLiberty

YANBU

I once had the misfortune to work with 'the only empath in the village'.

He felt everyone's pain and emotions apparently and boy did he keep reminding us 🙄

Basically an attention seeking dickbag.

My first boyfriend was like that. Apparently, he was fucking horrible to me because he was 'picking up [my] negative vibes.

If anything unpleasant happened to anybody, it became all about him and his needs, right up to needing to be driven home by the police and have a week in bed being brought snacks after he witnessed caused by reversing across a blind bend a car accident - because he was so distressed by the upset of the car full of seventeen year olds crying and screaming as I pulled them out of the overturned vehicle - whilst he sat in the driving seat watching me try to keep them alive and safe.

See also grief vampires, competitive mourners and 'I feel the pain of the world so it's impossible that I should be expected to get a fucking job'

Dickheads, the lot of them.

The other thing is, it's totally self certification, so of course only those who believe in that sort of thing go looking for the confirmation.
It's like a Cosmo quiz to find out what your name in your past life was, or what your animal twin is.
No doctor is going to say, "Well, I think we need to test to see if you are an empath. "

Yep, the few I've met are complete self obsessed nobs with too much time on their hands, sod what anyone else is going through its all about meee. Boils my piss.

In my personal experience, “I’m an empath” = “I’m a drama queen who will stir everyone up into a frenzy, and then cry when my own awful behaviour is pointed out to me”

Time to trot this one out again...

There's a research paper that suggests that adults who experienced traumatic events in their childhoods have elevated levels of empathy:

https://journals.plos.org/plosone/article?id=10.1371/journal.pone.0203886

I think there's some truth to this - I'm very good at reading people because I had to be as a child, to avoid the inevitable abuse if I said or did the 'wrong' thing - but I don't know whether I'd characterise it as empathy or just emotional/interpersonal intelligence. I do know that I feel down if my husband seems down or stressed, but I think that's more about me and I try not to put it on him - he's not responsible for my emotional state, and I make a conscious effort not to take on his feelings when I don't have his experiences causing them, if that makes any sense!

The only 'empath' I've ever met does tend to make everyone else's problems about them and their responses to it. It's extremely annoying.

🤣🤣

That's just being hyperaware of behavioural cues - you aren't accessing some inner truth of a person.

It’s not a word I’d use but I would like to have less empathy
If I spend too much time with anxious depressed people it affects me far beyond sympathy levels
My DP has enduring NH issues I find time with him draining when he is really bad and then start joining in to the point that I gave to pull away or I can’t help at all
I’m the same I’m my job