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As an empath, we love deeply and unconditionally, often at the expense of our own well-being. On my healing journey from narcissistic abuse, one of the most profound truths I uncovered was that my healing wasn’t just about my last relationship. It wasn’t just about my narcissistic ex. It was about all the relationships before him my friendships, my family, and most importantly, the relationship I had with myself.
I didn’t understand, at the time, that I had been accepting love in forms it was never meant to be accepted. My narcissist said something chilling to me during one of his last phone calls. I was facing ten years in prison for a crime I didn’t commit, with him pressing false charges against me. Taunting me, he told me, “You’re exactly where you belong, and the way you love people is why you’re here.”
As cruel as his words were, there was a kernel of truth in them perhaps one of the only truths he ever spoke. The way I loved people was wrong, not because love itself is wrong, but because I was loving unconditionally without boundaries. I was giving of myself in ways that left me vulnerable to exploitation and abuse, over and over again.
I didn’t know better. From childhood, I was conditioned to think that love was something you had to fight for, something earned through sacrifice. Love was never freely given to me; it was always conditional, always tangled in strings. My stepmother, a narcissist herself, taught me that love came with a price. So I grew up believing that love meant enduring pain, pleasing others, and sacrificing my own needs.
That belief followed me into adulthood, shaping every relationship I entered. I unconsciously invited familiar patterns of conditional love into my life because they felt normal. And that realization was devastating. For the first time, I understood that while I wasn’t responsible for the abuse I endured as a child or a teen, as an adult, I was responsible for the love I accepted and for breaking the cycle.
Now I see that some people simply don’t know how to love better. Their capacity for love is limited, shaped by their own wounds. But that doesn’t mean I have to accept it. I’ve learned the hardest truth of all: I can love someone unconditionally while still setting boundaries to protect myself.
That’s why I now love some people from a distance. It’s painful. I think about them often, even my abuser. But their access to me had to change. My love hasn’t changed it’s the same deep, unconditional love I’ve always had. What’s changed is my understanding of what I need to thrive.
Loving without boundaries left me broken, but loving with boundaries is helping me heal. Because at the end of the day, my peace, my safety, and my self-worth are worth more than any relationship. And while I will always love deeply, I will no longer love at the expense of myself.
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