Empathy overload?

[ParaSait]

In the quest for self-knowledge, there are often things I come across that always seemed very insignificant, a bit silly in fact, but could actually be surprisingly important cues to a great underlying truth.

I have this personality trait that causes me to have empathy for the most ridiculous things. One way in which this has always manifested is that I would never hurt a fly, literally.

 

As disgusting as it may seem to you: since pretty early childhood on, I have trained this skill of catching flies that are in the house and then letting them fly away from my hand outside. Flies, spiders, bugs and insects, you name it, I just catch them or take them by the paw and put them outside.

There is another trait, and I had never before made the connection between this and the other one, that causes me to have empathy for things that aren't even alive. Usually toys, but they might not even be toys, just simply objects, whether I have a particular emotional connection to them or not.

 

Whenever I see dolls, puppets, things that have a face of some kind, I get this sort of concern for it. I keep hoping that it won't be left alone, or get damaged, or anything like that. When I was a child and my family moved, I felt sad about our house because I thought he was going to feel lonely forever. I have been fixing damaged old dolls that I found in boxes so that they're healthy and happy again. My own childhood toys are all still perfectly intact. To give the most recent example, my mom bought a cute kitchen clock which is like a chick in an egg, and it pops out and makes a sound when the timer runs out. I swear, I look at it, and I keep thinking about these horrible scenarios, "what if it popped out and fell off the furnace hood and broke? Or even worse, what if it fell into the boiling food?! I would be heartbroken!"

I have tried to analyze these feelings of mine, try to reduce the required properties of objects for this to the absolute minimum, and have concluded that in most cases, all it would need is a face with eyes on it.

 

A third trait that I have, which may or may not be related, is that I'm very concerned about my future self, for no particular reason. I keep imagining these scenarios of me embarrassing, hurting, accidentally killing myself. What if I went out at some point in the future and tripped over a loose tile? What if I got run over by a car and it would change my family and friends' lives forever? And so on, and so forth...

Needless to say, I always think twice and secure my safe zone before doing anything, really.

 

Man, I'm feeling really shy about writing this all down. I think it's pretty silly. I know that it's moral and important to have empathy for yourself and for other conscious beings, but isn't this just absurd? Is this okay? Why do I have this? What things could have caused this? I would find it very interesting to know. Thanks!

[Culain]

To help you understand why you have this problem you'll have to go into much greater detail of your childhood (parental relationship, siblings, ACE, etc,), all you've explained is the symptoms, none of us here have a magical 'answer' button.

[ParaSait]

Sure thing. I don't really know anything that is specifically related to the origin of this personality trait. I'll just write down a bunch of general facts about me and my history here while I'm at it. Maybe I'll refer back to this post at later points, too. Please do ask specific questions!

ACE score
Well, my ace score would be 3, but with two other questions that I'm unsure about.
Were your parents ever separated or divorced?

Yes, and they were very impulsive about marriage. My mom cheated on dad because she felt he was sexually unsatisfying, my dad was very uninterested in mom as well, and they divorced around when I was 10 I think.
Was your mother or stepmother often or very often pushed, grabbed, slapped, or had something thrown at her?

Yes, absolutely, her father was incredibly aggressive to his children and he did all of those things.
Was a household member depressed or mentally ill, or did a household member attempt suicide?

Yes, my mom is always depressed and complaining about herself and about how cruel the world always is to her. She has cut her arms when I was very young, but she didn't tell me about it until I was much older.
Did an adult or person at least 5 years older than you ever... touch or fondle you or have you touch their body in a sexual way?

Sort of. When I was 12 I had a pedo music teacher in school who... had a crush on me. He made quite a few sexual gestures to me. It was very awkward, but didn't particularly bother me otherwise.
Did you often or very often feel that... your family didn't look out for each other, feel close to each other, or support each other?

Sort of. Mom's side of the family claims to be close to each other but they're really always arguing and making trouble. It's pretty terrible and isolating to me (because whatever contact I make with my family carries a risk of stirring a large hornet's nest).

Relationships
The relationship with my mother is emotionally incestuous (since very early on). She keeps claiming that I'm the only one she can hang on to when she's feeling depressed, and I keep needing to "manage" her. These days I am trying to get rid of that poisonous relationship, and try to re-establish a more healthy one. As for how that's working out: she's very resistant. Whenever I try to have any sort of serious talk, I get a barrage of defense mechanisms, and she says I have been influenced by others (as if that's inherently bad...), I'm not the same anymore, she can't connect to me anymore, I'm too ice cold rational and don't care about others' feelings, I'm too intelligent for her,... all absolute nonsense obviously.

The relationship with my sister is absolutely terrible! She always feels better when I'm not there (even though I just sit quietly on a desk behind a wall). Ideally, she just wants only mom for her own, but she must still leave her alone, all she really wants from her is being a host for her material parasitism. She will nag and sigh and bully until she gets something. She is incredibly socially anxious and agoraphobic. She is usually the scapegoat of all trouble in the family, which is not really justified, but she is a horrible to everyone around her regardless. She's always been a major source of stress to me.

Before 12 I had absolutely no friends nor any interest in them, I didn't have almost any social skills whatsoever, I could barely even recognize facial expressions, but I could connect to people if they expressed themselves very explicitly verbal. I was extremely introverted. Nowadays I have a select few very good friends on the internet that I can always talk to.
I have never had girlfriends or boyfriends or had even the slightest bit of interest in them. Love occurred a few times during puberty, but it felt like a horrible, mind-numbing disease that I wanted to get rid of. I consider myself to be aromantic and asexual.

Miscellaneous
I have asperger's syndrome.

I feel like I'm an alien on the wrong planet, and I often feel very "opposite" from other people.

I am extremely introverted and I prefer to be left alone. I strongly prefer living at night when everything is quiet and everyone has gone to sleep.
I have always felt very concerned and reflecting about morality.
I have always been an atheist even though I was raised religiously in school.
Starting from around 12 I created my own sort of philosophies. It started somewhat mystical, a karma-like thing, then I also made metaphysical theories (this was all before I knew about the discipline of philosophy), I later became socialistic, then nihilistic (this was during a major depression in my life), then became objectivist/libertarian/voluntarist (the depression was over and I felt energetic and positive again). Regardless, dark and nihilistic fiction still deeply touches me.

[Culain]

I'm sorry for you man, what a painful history to have.

 

You obviously were never exposed to any empathy as a child, you felt alone at both school and home because you wern't able to develop social skills. You are then labeled with a mental condition (Aspergers) because your family had no bond with you. Your mother continually abuses you mentally, by trying to force you to take care of her through guilt . Your sister attacks you for pointing out this poisonous relationship.

 

You try to talk to your mother and sister about how you feel yet they just attack your integrity.

 

 

I'm too ice cold rational and don't care about others' feelings,

This quote right here is so painful to read. I think that you care so much about the feelings of your family that they are using that vulnerable side of you to inflict this 'ice cold' personality onto you. They want you to start believing it, they need you to believe that you are an unempathetic bastard because it protects their own delusion. But you struggle against that by practicing to project empathy onto everything, if you stop you fear you will become this 'ice cold' monster. Your family is using your empathy as fuel to attack you and I guarantee that eventually you'll run out of fuel and die inside.

 

I don't know your current economic situation and I can't make decisions for you, but it sounds like you still live with your family and I think you should get out now before it's too late.

[tjt]

Hi ParaSait, I don't have any theories to share with you yet, but I wanted to first thank you for sharing this and second let you know that I can relate.

 

Reading your post brought up a lot of personal memories, and I realized I might have traits similar to you. A few examples to see if you think so, too: When I was little, I had a stuffed animal bear that I became very attached to. He was originally stuffed with a small bag of candy that you could remove via a sewn in zipper. When I saw him in the store, I instantly became attached and envisioned his life becoming happier if I were to remove the candy and fill him with beans. My mom bought him for me and I did just that. I would sleep with him at night, and hold him tight for years. Whenever the zipper on his body stuck out and poked me, I believed that was his way of telling me he was in an uncomfortable position and needed readjusting - like his neck was getting sore or something. So I'd readjust him.

 

Another memory: I'm not sure exactly how old I was, but still a child... I was trying to choose a pencil to take a test with. I was selecting from a new set of pencils, shiny and colorful, and I just couldn't decide which one to choose... I felt that whichever one I chose, the rest would feel hurt and left out. I even thought that they would be so upset that they would somehow sabotage me as I took the test. It took entirely too long to choose a pencil because of this.

 

And just one more: When I was 4 or 5, my little neighbor boy started cutting into a tree trunk. I felt so bad for the tree, thinking that it was being caused pain. I stuck around until I could be alone with the tree and apologized to it and gave it a hug and a kiss.

 

Wow, now I know exactly what you mean when you say you feel really shy sharing these things. It certainly makes me feel a little crazy, but there has to be an explanation for this and I think it's worth examining like you do.

 

I wanted you to know that I'll be thinking about this for the next few days to see if I can get anywhere with it.

 

Just a few quick things I wanted to share about me. I also score a 3 on the ACE. My sister had absolute control over my parents and grandparents when we were growing up. She could get anything out of them, even if that meant they had to neglect me completely. Furthermore, my mom would force or shame me into be her servant as well. (I'll share more about this in my next post. But it seems similar to how you've described your sister.)

 

I've realized that I never empathized with myself, and I have a long history of putting others' needs ahead of my own. I have been trying to get in touch with my own needs for a while now (I mean the me in the now, not the future me, similar to you I've never had trouble with empathizing with the future version of myself), and it has been incredibly challenging for me. I am making progress; I also catch and release bugs that get trapped in my home... most of time. I kill mosquitos because my needs to not be bitten in my sleep is more important to me than their life. But still, I feel pretty awful when I kill them.

 

More to come. Thanks again for being vulnerable and bringing this up!

[tjt]

First, my apologies if this post seems all over the place. A lot is running through my mind, so I wanted to share everything in case others are able to add more clarity.

 

So, I've been doing a lot of reflection and memory recollection in pursuit of greater self knowledge. Lately, it's caused me to look deeply into Obsessive Compulsive Disorder. 

 

Here's a blurb that caught my attention in the Wikipedia article about Obsessive Compulsive Disorder and made me think of your post, ParaSait:

 

"Other obsessions concern the possibility that someone or something other than oneself—such as God, the Devil, or disease—will harm either the person with OCD or the people or things that the person cares about. Other individuals with OCD may experience the sensation of invisible protrusions emanating from their bodies, or have the feeling that inanimate objects are ensouled." http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Obsessive–compulsive_disorder

 

Much of the mainstream research I've come across emphasizes that there does not exist a connection between OCD and adverse childhood experiences, attributing OCD to psychological dysfunction due to biology and genetics. Well, I'm curious to know what your opinion is, but I tend to believe that psychological and personality disorders are the effects of unprocessed childhood trauma at any degree of severity and are the result of the environment we grew up in (which I think absolutely includes failed or bad parenting).

 

Anyways, I had childhood OCD and constantly battled what the research calls "intrusive thoughts," always worrying about something bad happening (death, illness, uncontrolled bodily functions). I felt that I could prevent these things and calm the thoughts with irrational and unrelated rituals. Fortunately, I've been able to minimize these irrational responses in my adulthood, but when I'm under a great deal of unprocessed stress or experiencing a drastic life change, I find myself being bombarded with invasive thoughts that are hard to control and begin noticing signs of minor "rituals."

 

The scientists would tell me that I had a genetic predisposition to this disorder, but after careful and analytical reflection of my upbringing, I realize that I lived in an environment in which I had no control and chaos could break out at any time... my dad was a loose canon and anything could set him off... I couldn't do anything about it because it all depended on his mood at the time. Yet he made me to believe that it was all my fault and I could have prevented it somehow, if that makes any sense. To me, there's a huge connection here between unpredictable negative occurrences and my irrational attempt to have some control over my environment. Basically, my unsupported theory (or opinion in other words ) is that OCD is a direct reflection of the person's true environment, and an attempt to scale it down and control a miniature and irrational version of the environment in which we are raised or still live.

 

At first this ranting might seem unrelated and maybe a bit lofty. But I was thinking, that if a person grew up in an environment where no one truly cared for him, or where he was neglected, or no one was available for him to love and be loved by, he might begin to try to satisfy these needs in a scaled down environment that he thinks he has more control over. Like having relationships with toys and puppets.

 

Or possibly, he himself might feel like an inanimate object that no one acknowledges or loves, and therefore develops a strong sense of empathy towards other inanimate objects.

 

Basically, if you're treated like shit and unloved by people who are incapable of showing love, it's going to have nasty and potentially life-long effects. Which sucks because it's not your fault. And I don't know if all of my analytical bullshit is really any good for people like us because we have habits of trying to analyze the pain away. Just try to see it for what it is... your family sounds pretty shitty and super toxic if you ask me. They sound like they themselves are incredibly disturbed and trying to infect you with their disturbedness.

 

+ all of what Culain said, too.

 

I'm sorry for you man, what a painful history to have.

 

You obviously were never exposed to any empathy as a child, you felt alone at both school and home because you wern't able to develop social skills. You are then labeled with a mental condition (Aspergers) because your family had no bond with you. Your mother continually abuses you mentally, by trying to force you to take care of her through guilt . Your sister attacks you for pointing out this poisonous relationship.

 

You try to talk to your mother and sister about how you feel yet they just attack your integrity.

 

This quote right here is so painful to read. I think that you care so much about the feelings of your family that they are using that vulnerable side of you to inflict this 'ice cold' personality onto you. They want you to start believing it, they need you to believe that you are an unempathetic bastard because it protects their own delusion. But you struggle against that by practicing to project empathy onto everything, if you stop you fear you will become this 'ice cold' monster. Your family is using your empathy as fuel to attack you and I guarantee that eventually you'll run out of fuel and die inside.

 

I don't know your current economic situation and I can't make decisions for you, but it sounds like you still live with your family and I think you should get out now before it's too late.

 

 

I don't know if this is you, but I wanted to throw these ideas out there to see what you and others think. Hopefully this all makes some kind of sense.