For most of my life, I’ve moved through the world seeing humans around me not just as individuals, but as vessels - each one carrying a small, invisible bowl that represented their needs, their sense of belonging, and how included and welcome they felt. Some bowls were always nearly full (no matter what), some bobbed up and down constantly and some were cracked, or just empty…everyone has a clear position in the hierarchy of needs in every social situation (to me).
The emptier bowls are quietly asking for help without ever saying a word, the fuller bowls were often carried by people who were only interested in communicating how full their own bowls were and then you have infinite variations in between - the bowls are always there, and I am always aware of them - it doesn’t matter who you are - you could be Hitler - I will see and measure you and I will probably try and help, or at least make you as comfortable as I can within my power.
Somewhere along the way, I decided it was my job to try and keep these bowls full - mostly because nobody else appeared to be seeing or reacting to them.
I didn’t react because anyone asked me to, I didn’t try to help because I thought I was going to be good at it - it was because I couldn’t not do it. The moment I sensed someone feeling left out, unheard, or uncomfortable, something in me just fires up like an air raid siren with a strobe. I’d deliberately shift my attention, constantly adjust my behaviour, and pour whatever emotional energy I had into making sure their bowl didn’t stay empty in the context of the group.
This behaviour is typical in someone suffering from HED - hyper empathy disorder - and it’s common in people with ASD - either that or the direct opposite (empathy deficit disorder). There is also physical evidence that some people have mirror neurons that fire up only during this sort of exchange - people with it have more, or less neurons turned over specifically to this function - so symptoms can manifest via clinical origin, not just neuro-divergent wiring…
The Lidless Eye
Living, driven by HED, meant I was always scanning the room, reading micro‑expressions, tracking tiny tonal shifts, and spotting the invisible cues most people will barely even register. I wasn’t just aware of how others were feeling — I was left feeling responsible for it -
If someone seemed lonely, I’d seek to include them
If someone looked anxious, I’d smile, avoid eye contact (more) and soften my voice
If someone was upset, I’d drop everything to help them get steady
My own bowl? I didn’t even realise I had one.
The Private Exhaustion
People often praise empathy as a virtue, and it can be. But when empathy is compulsive — when it overrides your own needs, boundaries, and energy — it stops being any form of personal kindness and starts becoming a quiet form of self‑erasure.
You don’t really notice the exhaustion at first - it creeps in slowly, disguised as "being a good friend" or “being supportive”, but over time, constantly tending to everyone else’s emotional world left me drained in ways I can’t even begin to articulate.
I was always worried about how others were feeling
Always monitoring
Always adjusting
Always giving
And eventually, I hit a point where I had nothing left to give - and my point to people was largely removed.
Withdrawal is Survival
When you spend years filling other people’s bowls, you eventually realise you’ve been running on fumes. And when you finally notice the emptiness, it’s terrifying - there is no reservoir to draw upon - these people will have to look after themselves - and that feels bad.
My withdrawal from society wasn’t a dramatic collapse. It was more like a slow fade. I stopped reaching out. I stopped joining conversations. I stopped putting myself in situations where I’d feel compelled to manage everyone else’s emotions - a nice cup of tea with the neighbours perhaps.
It wasn’t that I stopped caring. I haven’t found a way to switch this off.
It was that caring had become a deeply painful process and taking a step back felt like the only way to live again.
What I’m trying to learn
I’m still figuring out what healthy empathy looks like for me — I know it doesn’t match most neurotypical behaviour, for one, I never really appreciated that empathy (as a thing) should have included me…
So I’m trying to learn that:
Not every bowl is mine to fill
Other people’s discomfort isn’t a crisis I must solve
My own needs matter just as much as anyone else’s
Withdrawal/Avoidance wasn’t failure; it was a critical boundary that I required to exist - when no other way could be found
And maybe the biggest lesson:
You can care deeply about others without fully abandoning yourself.
I don’t think I will ever be capable of understanding selfishness, or those people that decided to use me as a robot because I always said yes - and it hurts because I can’t understand it and could never do that. It also hurts because nobody was ever doing this for me - and when you find yourself, covered in dust by the side of the road - it sure makes you reflect on your life and where all those slightly fuller bowls went when you are the one cold, lonely and in pain.
How do you tell someone they got it all wrong and cared too much and that's basically what happens? You didn't get credit for any of this - and now you are all used up? That was silly.
