Do you have excessive empathy/sympathy/compassion?

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Can you relate? I will be going to a psychiatrist for a professional opinion when possible. Before I do I want to know if what I am experiencing also occurs with any of you. I have insomnia which I now take medication for. I have been also been diagnosed with social anxiety and at times clinical depression. I used to work at a IT Helpdesk and was very skilled at the technical side of my job. Most of the calls I didn't have a problem with unless the customer was experiencing intense emotions like anger (to the point of being abusive) or sadness. Even when the customer was intensely feeling very happy with me, It all felt too much and caused me to have mind blanks. I ended up quitting because of burn out / break down. I have had only a few friends, the relationships ended mostly because of my problems. Now I have no close friends and have been unable to secure a job.

I seem unable to accurately express my feelings and views. I can only accurately represent myself in written format. I feel things too intensely in person and my mind goes blank. I become unable to focus or think clearly. I usually end up just agreeing with whatever someone says no matter how wrong it is. I am told I often look guilty and have shifty eyes because I usually don't look people in the eyes. I believe this is occurring due to excessive empathy/sympathy. People often misjudge me as a dimwit, unkind and untrustworthy because of all this.

I scored 135 out of 200 on this test: w w w .rdos.ne t/eng/Aspie-quiz. php

this is what AS is mainly about,

anton

Yes I think so. I can get very haunted by other people's strong feelings, and I think I screen a lot of it out completely, so that the intensity of it doesn't get to me.

Wouldn't inappropriate sympathy? A lot of it is all a matter for personal taste.

And the fact that people use your sympathy/empathy to manipulate, deceive and control you. So you really can't tell what's going on.

I can sense very sharply compared to others in my enviroment, but on the other side I am overloaded much quicker then people in my enviroment resulting in degrading empathic/sympathic/compassionate response. Mind blanks result from overload since my brain is already maxing out in unresolved processes.

To handle this i've visualized a feelings killswitch, so when i'm desintergrating I can atleast function. Also able to pinch off the intensity of the feelings flow (for example when someone gets really mad) helps to recuperate this ability instead of a complete shutdown.

Verbal presentation is something I had troubles with too, but I got out of that by practicing. Improv theatre, roleplay, plain trail-and-error, selfhelp books, discussing the topic, etc.

I suggest you do some sports too, to battle the anxiety and depression - it's also good for your self-esteem.

In confidence, although I might not have empathy (to know the inside mental state of another - to 'mind read'), I might be too sympathetic. When someone relates a sad/sentimental personal event or I watch/listen to a video or exhibit, I can start crying on the spot. I try really hard to not to do this and I know it's unprofessional, but I cannot help it.

In office/lab, when I read a personal email/note from my previous mentor that his failing eyesight had worsened - he's virtually blind - I cried and hard. I went to the lab, alone, and kept working but my tears would not stop. I did embarrass myself since someone saw me crying. Did you know, they weren't all too nice about it? I did apologise, just said I was saddened by the blindness of my mentor, but they were rather cold to me. Really, I think NTs saying they are 'more sympathetic' can be nonsense. Yes, I'm sensitive.

Yes, I think I feel very deeply about others, including animals, as does my daughter. If someone tells me something that has upset them, I can feel tears welling in my eyes. Like the OP my mind goes blank and I can't articulate my thoughts. If I get time to think, I can put my thoughts in writing very well. I lose sleep as well. I never slept for 3 nights after I read a story about animal cruelty in the newspaper. It still upsets me, several years later, as the photo is imprinted on my brain. I never read anything like this now and have told my mum never to point out a story of it's kind again, as she would normally do.

My neighbour's 3yr old son died suddenly. I couldn't think of anything else for several weeks after it happened. I told my NT sister in law about it and all she said was 'That's a shame' and didn't appear visibly moved. She was on Prozac at the time - does anyone know if it could have that sort of effect?

My worst scenario is speaking with someone who has lost a close relative. My best friend lost her Dad last year. I was on holiday when it happened and she'd sent me a text, but my phone was switched off and I didn't find out about her Dad until I returned home, a few days later. I'm so glad I didn't get her message when I was away, as I would have needed to call her and that would have been the worst combination for me - telephone and deep emotions. At least in person, I could give her a hug and cry with her. I told her I wished I could think of something to say, but she said she was happy just knowing I was there. I suppose at a time like that, there's not much to be said anyway and it didn't matter that my brain was blank. She says I helped her through an awful time and treated me to a nice lunch as thanks. I must have done something right.

The deep feelings that I have for animals, people and insects causes me to experience all three of these things. I've been like this my entire life. I feel that way the majority of the time, unless somebody's a jerk. I always have opposite feelings towards the jerk. There was a boy who kept on making fun of my Cockney accent and telling me to go home for an entire year when I was in grade 5. A speaker fell on his head one day in PE class. I was thinking in my mind that he got what was coming to him. If it would have happened to another classmate, I would have been crying for 10 minutes straight. You can't cry too long in PE.

I have lived a very good life, Parents that have jobs with lax hours so they can spend time with me, A finacialy stable household, Religious upbringing, I am very lucky. But when I see someone who is hurt, angry or upset I find that I just want to cry for or with them. People think that Auties or Aspies have no empathy, but it looks like we have so much empathy that we feel everything that the other person feels.

People may not always appreciate your sensitivity because it's 'self'-centred and therefore appears narcissistic - and that's because what you're doing (eg crying) doesn't demonstrate that you care about the person who is hurting (angry, upset, sad) because you are not reaching out to them or helping them in some way, you are simply experiencing their pain (or your own version of what you think their pain feels like).

Useful resources

Consider yourself an HSP - Highly Sensitive Person - and search on this especially Elaine Aron's books and website

Nina Brown's books on dealing with narcissistic people offers practical ways of becoming less affected by others eg by using body language.

Judith Orwell is a psychiatrist and HSP who writes on similar topics including emotional vampires.

Henry Cloud's books on having (or not having) sufficiently strong emotional 'boundaries' and what to do about it.

This kind of sensitivity is not true of all people with autism - it seems to depend on those boundaries.

Hope that helps!

I feel like Im the opposite, I often dont feel like I have enough compassion/empathy/sympathy or its not equally distributed. When someone is feeling intense emotions of happiness or anger, I dont feel very much unless someones displeased with me because I socially messed up. If someones angry, but not at me, I dont feel too much.

The only exception is with music. I used to listen to a lot of rock music where I can practically absorb the emotion of the song. Rock tends to be angry, agressive, fustrated moods more often. I had to shift the type of music I listened to help with my moods. Now I listen to more techno, mindless pop music. Ifs feel good music so I can absorb more of a happier mood.

I have plenty of sympathy and compasion but I have very little cognitive empathy, in that I do not pick up how someone is feeling unless told explicitly or circumstanses make things overtly obvious.

People often do not recognise when I am sympathetic or compassionate, probably because I do not give out the correct signals. I have also been accused of being self centred. If this is the case, I dont feel as though I am. I really do feel for others. I feel sad that nobody knows this.

I used to think myself quite empathetic but I've come to realize I can only feel empathy when I have had the experience myself. Recently a friend of mine went through a difficult break up. At that point I had never experienced romantic love and I couldn't understand why he was so sad no matter how hard I tried. I felt bad he was sad but also annoyed that he seemed to be so irrational.