I was waiting for my drink at the Starbucks counter of a local hospital when I overheard a conversation between two nurses. They discussed relationship woes and blamed their experiences on the curse of empathy. Apparently, they considered it their professional duty to take responsibility for the destructive choices of another because they were empaths; they felt everything too strongly; what choice did they have?

That’s when it hit me: empathy gets confused with enmeshment, a dysfunctional internalization of another person’s beliefs and feelings that dismantles healthy boundaries in a relationship and leads to identity confusion and codependency.

In the counseling and psychotherapy professions, enmeshment is diligently guarded against and regarded as a mark of unethical and unprofessional practice. You might hear a licensed counselor speak about it in terms of transference and counter-transference, our universal tendency to project our feelings onto another person and believe that we know how they feel.

Nurses are helping professionals; engaging with strong emotions is part of our job too.

Humans are capable of detecting the emotional state of others; the brain is hard-wired for experiential connection with other humans. But unless I’m practiced in recognizing emotions as additional information and adept at maintaining awareness of how my emotional state is influenced by the environment, then it’s all too easy to regard an empathetic response as an indicator of my own self-concept, “I’m feeling this; therefore, it’s a part of who I am. This feeling is part of my identity.”

While I have every right to regard the emotions stimulated by my own assumptions, beliefs, and values as an indicator of my identity (an indicator, not the whole truth of it), I must also stand sentinel watch on my human tendency to internalize the feelings of others. Especially as a helping professional.

Empathy supports healthy connection and effective interpersonal communication. Enmeshment destroys healthy relationship and takes the entire organizational culture down with it.