I became more attuned to others’ emotions than my own. In my family, there was one person whose emotional fluctuations dictated everyone’s experience. This dynamic teaches a child to be highly attuned and vigilant to others’ emotions to keep the peace. I did that my entire life and only recently learned that it’s an actual thing. It’s called emotional monitoring, and it involves living your life as a fixer in hyperactive awareness of everyone else’s experience. You’re so busy keeping everyone comfortable that you completely lose any boundary between everybody else’s experience of a situation
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