170: The Dark Side of Empathy: When Understanding Becomes Self-Abandonment

When does empathy become toxic? When it leads to self-abandonment. 

Yes, empathy is beautiful—it helps us connect, support others, and hold space. But what happens when your empathy starts costing you your peace, self-worth, and well-being?

Join me as we explore:

• What toxic empathy is and how it differs from healthy compassion
• How people-pleasers and highly sensitive people (HSPs) often fall into this pattern
• Real-life examples of toxic empathy in romantic, platonic, and family relationships
• The shift from enabling to empowered empathy
• How to set boundaries without losing your compassion

🛑 In This Episode, You’ll Learn:

• Why understanding someone’s trauma does not justify harmful behavior
• How toxic empathy often looks like:
  • Making excuses for others
  • Self-abandonment
  • Avoiding boundaries
• Why empathy without boundaries leads to resentment and emotional burnout
• How to begin using empathy as information, not justification

🔍 Real-Life Examples Discussed:

1. The Neglectful Partner – Understanding someone’s trauma doesn't mean tolerating emotional unavailability.
2. The Flaky Friend – Compassion for someone’s anxiety shouldn’t leave you doing all the work in the friendship.
3. The Critical Parent – Empathizing with your parent’s pain doesn’t mean accepting their constant criticism.

✨ This Week’s Reflection Invitation:

Ask yourself:

• Where has my empathy crossed into enabling?
• What behavior have I been tolerating in the name of understanding?
• Am I sacrificing my needs while waiting for someone else to change?

Then take one small step:
Set a boundary.
Stop chasing.
Initiate a long-overdue conversation.
Let self-compassion lead the way. 💛

📞 Want More Support?

If you're recognizing patterns of toxic empathy in your relationships and you're ready to make a change, I’d love to support you.

✨ I'm currently offering 6-week 1:1 coaching packages where we’ll dive into your specific situation and build a more empowered, balanced way of showing up in your life and relationships.

🎯 Book your free 20-minute clarity call to see if we might be a good fit: https://calendly.com/maryannwalkerlife/freeconsult

Ready to reserve your 6 week package? Let me know here: https://maryannwalker.life/contact-me
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Transcript

0:17

Hello and welcome back. My name is MaryAnn Walker and I'm the life coach for the helpers, the healers, and the empathetic ones. And today we're going to be talking about something that might sound counterintuitive at first, and it's the idea of toxic empathy. Now I hear you. I work with the empaths and the highly sensitive people, right? So I hear you saying, but empathy's a good thing and yes, yes it is. Empathy it is beautiful. Empathy helps us to connect. Empathy helps us to better understand each other. It helps us to hold space for each other's pain. But when empathy becomes toxic, it doesn't look like love anymore. In fact, it can look a lot more like making excuses for someone else's poor behavior. It can look like self abandonment. It can look like making yourself small just so that somebody else feels a little bit more comfortable. It can look like enabling someone rather than encouraging them to learn and to grow. So today we're going to kind of unpack a little bit what toxic empathy is, how to recognize it, and how to shift into healthy, empowered empathy that really honors yourself and others without sacrificing yourself. As a highly empathetic person, then you may have even found yourself in a relationship with people who may have even told you over time that well, you just don't understand. If you did understand, you wouldn't be asking this of me. You wouldn't be holding this boundary with me. You wouldn't be making me feel uncomfortable right now if you really understood my situation, but I want you to know it is possible to empathize with somebody else while also encouraging growth. So first, what is toxic empathy? Toxic empathy is when you understand why someone is the way that they are, and because you really do understand why they are the way that they are. Then you may start making excuses for their harmful behavior instead of encouraging growth and encouraging change. You know what their trauma is. You've heard their stories, you've seen the pain that they carry. And so when they hurt you, when they neglect you, when they dismiss you, when they cross your boundaries, then you might not say anything. In fact, you may even be justifying their behavior. You're minimizing your own needs and your own desire for comfort because they've had it harder than you, right? You can empathize with where it is that they're coming from. But here's the truth is that understanding someone's trauma is not the same thing as accepting harmful behavior. You can understand someone's past and someone's trauma without accepting their current harmful behavior and how it's impacting you. Empathy is the lens by which we can view somebody else's behavior, but it should never be a license for somebody to behave poorly. and let me say that again. Empathy can be a lens through which we can better understand each other, but it should never be a license for someone to continually hurt or neglect you. So let me kind of illustrate what this might look like by using a few examples here. So first I'm gonna use the example of the neglectful partner. So we'll talk about Sarah A little bit. Sarah's been with her partner Jake for about five years, and she really craves emotional connection. But Jake is emotionally unavailable. He shuts down during conflict. He scrolls on his phone during dinner rather than engaging with the family. He hasn't asked her how her day has gone in... well, months. But Sarah knows that Jake had a hard childhood. His parents were really cold. He never saw affection modeled at home. And he told her once that being vulnerable actually made him feel weak. So now she should understand why he never shares, right? So every time that Jake withdraws, then Sarah tells herself, well, he's doing the best that he can, and maybe he is doing the best that he can, but Sarah is now in a relationship where her needs are going unmet. She's accepting neglect because she understands where it came from. That's toxic empathy. So here's another example for the friend who never shows up. So here's Maria. And Maria has this friend named Jana, who constantly flakes on her. So they make plans, and then Jana is constantly canceling at the last minute. Maria feels really hurt by this, but she doesn't say anything because she knows that Jana really struggles with anxiety Jana has been burned by past friendships, and so social settings, they can feel really overwhelming for her. And so Maria continues to overextend. She's always the one reaching out. She's always the one who is being understanding. But here's the thing, is Jana's never initiating. She never apologizes for withdrawing last minute, and she's not actually working on the relationship. So in this instance then Maria's empathy has now become a trap in that relationship. Because Maria gets it, because Maria understands. Then she started making excuses for Jana rather than stating her expectations. And again, that is toxic empathy. Alright, example number three, the criticizing parent. So let's talk about Lisa. Lisa has a mother who is constantly critical of her. Every phone call turns into subtle jabs, for example. Are you sure that you want to wear that for the family photos? Well, I didn't raise my children to be that way, but okay, whatever. Oh, it must be nice to have time to rest. I never got that luxury when you were little, but Lisa knows that her mom had an incredibly hard life. She was raised by a single parent. She worked from a very young age, and she never had emotional support growing up. So of course, she doesn't know how to offer emotional support. So instead then Lisa rationalizes, oh, well, she doesn't mean to be hurtful. She doesn't know better. She's doing the best that she can. But the reality is that Lisa leaves every single phone call feeling smaller. Less confident and defeated, and that's not empathy, that's enabling. So with all of this in mind, I want to remind you that empathy isn't the problem here. Okay? You can empathize and understand all that you want. It can be very, very helpful to empathize and understand where someone is coming from. But the real issue here is the lack of boundaries. It's enabling, instead of stating a boundary. You can absolutely say, Hey, I understand why it is that you do that. And you can also say, and I'm not willing to tolerate that anymore. Empathy doesn't mean that you let your partner neglect your needs. It doesn't mean letting your friends ignore your time. It doesn't mean letting your family talk down to you. You can understand why someone behaves a certain way and you can still have the expectation that they should be learning and growing and evolving over time. Empathy is not a hall pass. It is not an excuse for disrespect and it should never cost you your personal peace. People learn how to treat you by the behaviors that you are willing to tolerate. So you're teaching them how to treat you by making excuses for things or by remaining silent instead of speaking up, you're teaching them what it is that you are and are not willing to tolerate. But if you are always the one giving, waiting, explaining, and understanding without ever asking for reciprocity, then you are not modeling empathy. You're modeling self sacrifice. And I honestly think that's a big reason why people fall into this toxic empathy. They think if I can just model this for the other person, then they'll see how it is that I want to be treated. But the other person, they might not be emotionally aware enough to see that that's what you're doing to see that you're modeling how it's that you wanna be treated. They're going to learn by how it is that they're feeling, okay? So they're going to learn through your stating boundaries, through your speaking up, through your letting'em know, Hey, I'm not going to be spoken to in that way. I understand that this is a struggle for you and I'm not going to choose to remain in this abusive or neglectful situation. So use your empathy as information, not justification. It's not, well, I get why it is that you're this way, so I guess I'll stay. But instead it's, I understand why they're this way and I hope that they grow, but I am not going to abandon myself while I wait for them to change. So here's your invitation for this week. I want you to kind of reflect back on your relationships and notice if there may be a relationship or maybe your empathy has crossed over into enabling. And here's a big red flag for this is more than likely it's going to be in the relationship where you are feeling that things are really out of balance. It might be that you've been making excuses for them for too long, and now that resentment is starting to step in. So ask yourself, okay, so where is it that maybe my empathy may have crossed a line into enabling? And then ask yourself, what is it that I'm tolerating in the name of understanding? Are they willing to understand me? Or is this understanding only going in one direction? Have I been excusing behavior that is hurting me? What would it look like to love myself enough to ask for more? And then take one small step. Towards creating change. So maybe that's stating a boundary. Maybe it's having that conversation that you've been putting off. Maybe it's simply not chasing after someone who always expects you to be the one doing all of the mental and emotional work in relationship. Empathy is amazing and it is oh, so powerful, but it was never meant to come at the cost of your wellbeing. So today I want you to remember this. You are allowed to be kind and clear. You are allowed to understand someone's story without being personally responsible for it. You are allowed to expect respect. Empathy can coexist with boundaries. Compassion can coexist with self-worth, and you my dear, you deserve both. So thank you so much for tuning in today. If this episode resonated with you, if you're noticing patterns, if you're noticing that you may be experiencing some toxic empathy in your relationships and you're not quite sure how to break out of that, I would love to support you in working through it. Right now I'm offering six week coaching packages. This gives us six sessions where we can work on your situation specifically, and honestly, I think you'll be blown away by how much you and I can accomplish in just six weeks together. Since I do work in six week rotations, then I do have some spots becoming available. If you would like one of those spots, I encourage you to come and jump on a consultation call with me. This is just a 20 minute call to see if we're a good fit. I can answer any questions that you might have around coaching, and we can see if we'd be a good fit for each other. So check out the link in the show notes if you'd like more information on that. You can also find all of my social media contact information there. I would just love to have more ways to communicate with you. Alright, well I hope you have a great week and let's talk soon. Bye now.