Poll Are you an empath? see definitions below.

[Deleted member 8714]

This is what I believe I am in many different areas. And I believe my father knew I had these abilities and usurped them, using them against me.

I hesitated to share something about seeing my father slowly starve a rat to death. I didn't even tell my T. I wasn't certain what she'd think of me. Yet after reading all of these different types of empaths, I'm no longer concerned about her opinion of me and what transpired between the rat and I. I heard the rat speaking to me as clearly as I heard my father speaking to me. The rat said to me, "I came from the woods and I'll return to the woods. Don't worry about me." I get the chills right now writing this. It's just so bizarre to say something like this and yet I know it is true.

And I believe it also plays a direct role in why I've become a virtual recluse after I discovered what my father did to me and others.

I summarized and combined what I found on two different websites regarding being an empath. The first link includes 10 types. The second one lists 6 types.

As I read through the different types I realized I have all of them except the plant empath. Though I suspect I used to have it because sometimes I know what a plant needs. My strongest ones are:
Emotional
Physical/Medical
Geomantic
Animal
Claircognizant/Intuitive
Precognitive

Here's the types and what they mean:

• Emotional Empath — deeply experiences the feelings of others in their own emotional body.
• Physical/Medical Empath — picks up on other people's bodies. Intuitively knows what ails another person.
• Geomantic Empath — also called place or environmental empathy, feels a deep connection to certain places. You may also be sensitive to the history of a place and pick up on the emotions related to that place.
• Plant Empath — intuitively senses what plants need.
• Animal Empath — a strong connection with animals.
• Claircognizant/Intuitive Empath — knows when someone is lying sensing the intention behind the words. Closely related to being telepathic.
• Precognitive Empath — feels events/situations before they occur, usually manifesting in dreams.

 

[Deleted member 41765]

This is fascinating. I would say my strongest are:
Animal
Emotional
Geomantic
Intuitive

 

[Deleted member 8714]

This is fascinating. I would say my strongest are:
Animal
Emotional
Geomantic
Intuitive

I found it fascinating too when I first discovered there were types. I stumbled on them doing some research into the possibility of being an empath. That was Saturday. Today I get it. I am.

On the physical/medical type, I once diagnosed someone's condition a week prior to them getting an infection. I prayed for the man's lungs to be protected during and after surgery. That's exactly the area of their body which had a problem after surgery. I was amazed and so was the whole church I was attending at the time. Well, except for the pastor who had not even wanted me to speak about the man's lungs and then pray for them. I was in his eyes incapable of "seeing" that correctly because I was a baby Christian.

 

[shimmerz]

I didn't answer any the quiz above because, quite frankly, I learned through therapy just how damaging my empathic side has been to me all of my life. I feel like before the PTSD hit at age 45 I was
Animal
Emotional
Intuitive
PreCognitive

When my PTSD hit me full force, I became a raging empath in all ways. I could literally feel everything. My son drove me by a person's house -- I had no idea at the time but I went into a full bore trauma reaction. I could literally feel the pain splitting me in two. My son told me afterwards that the person who lived there slaughtered animals there. I had no idea but man was it an indicator that my energetic body was taking way too much stuff in of other people's. So I worked on it. Shitty that I couldn't feel anything of my own but could of everyone else's.

So now, I have learned to control my empathy. I am still intuitive, precognitive, (naming those two because they are and were creepy - yet very real). The thing is, that I only allow myself to tap into these modes when I want to. Otherwise I will be living the consequences of everyone else's life and not my own. Done with that these days.

Great post btw. I had no idea there were so many types of empaths.

 

[Deleted member 41765]

I don't think I am at all the physical/medical type, but I believe I've experienced someone who is. There was a brief time I could tolerate accupressure (i.e. being touched) and the woman, while working on my back actually said, "Your heart feels so heavy, it must be difficult to carry around." At which point I of course stopped breathing and that was the end of that session.

Shitty that I couldn't feel anything of my own but could of everyone else's.

This is an important distinction!! I've always struggled with my own feelings and yet those of certain others are acutely felt. Group therapy was a nightmare.

I volunteer as an animal care tech at a marine mammal center, and am acutely aware of the trauma expressions and vocalizations of the animals. It has both hindered and enhanced the work. I'm known for certain things I can do for them. I'm also known for my "delicate sensibilities" which often have me in tears in the locker room!!! Actually, the physical/mental may come into play here...?

 

[Deleted member 37474]

For me it is: animal, emotional, intuitive and pre-cognitive.

Pre-cognitive:
A few things I sensed happening before they happened: 911 (The Thursday before in an airport), a person being murdered by a stiletto (read it had happened in the news after the bizarre thought entered my head out of nowhere hours beforehand), I sensed the telling of bad cancer news while it was being told to my husband. When he called to tell me, I already knew his dad was dying. I knew a friendship was ending once despite what the person was telling me. I solidly knew I would marry my husband on the second date. I knew we would live in this house. None of these things come in the form of dreams. Usually visions or thoughts.

 

[shimmerz]

Group therapy was a nightmare.

There's an understatement! Was impossible for me. Too much mixed up energy.

 

[Deleted member 41765]

There's an understatement! Was impossible for me. Too much mixed up energy.

Yes! It was an unmitigated disaster last year!

 

[Deleted member 8714]

I've learned to tell what is mine and what is someone else's emotions/thoughts. It took me many years to figure this out.

The one type I have big time and intense is Precognitive. I have vivid nightmares which differ from those about memories in that they begin with an earthquake or disaster (flood, etc.). They contain information about an upcoming event or situation pertaining to mass death usually. I had one prior to 9/11 and one before the mass murder in Las Vegas. The 9/11 one was pretty spot on with details about the country from which the terrorists came from. The one about Las Vegas had details about the man's name who committed the murders.

With Claircognizant/Intuitive type I've been able to literally tell a person what they were thinking instead of what they told me which was a lie. The first time I did it the guy said he couldn't believe how accurate my words were. After that he stopped lying about smoking cigarettes. He said he quit when in fact he hadn't.

With Physical/Medical type I can predict when people are going to die. I'm given a 24 hour leeway time. I used this ability when I worked in hospice as an RN. It prepared me and my patients. The patients knew that I knew as well and would ask for me to be their nurse for the last three days of their life.

When we first came to Washington State and passed through Vancouver, WA, I saw a strange black cloud and immediately got a sense that something evil had happened recently in that city. This was the Geomantic type at work. I later learned there was a horrible murder.

A lot of my types are related to death because I witnessed many deaths as a child. So I'm sensitive to anything to do with death.

 

[Still Standing]

I have never heard any of this before, in the context that has been shared. However, my grandmother, mother, and her two sisters, would have dreams that impacted themselves or others. Often they would call each other at the same time and their phones would then be busy. They would write letters to each other all on the same days etc. My grandmother had dreams about the kidnapping of the Lindbergh baby that proved to be true. I have dreams about people, occasionally, about things they are upset about, or, things that they need to do. My biggest and most upsetting dream that I have had was two weeks before the large 1989 San Fransisco-Oakland California earthquake. I saw the earthquake happen and I saw the Oakland Bay bridge collapse complete with the large cement slabs and rebar sticking out where it simply gave way over the bay. The dream upset met deeply, so I sought counsel from my husband and others. Someone, at church, said they thought it was a warning for me to purchase earthquake insurance on our home. Innocent me, I did just that, even tho' I lived in Washington state, at the time. Two weeks later as I watched the news coverage on TV about the earthquake that hit the Bay area and saw the pictures of the Bay bridge, recognizing what I had seen in my dream, I realized that my dream had been given to me by the Lord, to pray for the event before it was ever to happen. It was a painful lesson to learn, that when I have dramatic dreams such as that one, it is to be prayed over. I regret to this day that I did not understand this then. I also have had dreams about future events that have also come true. I have not shared any of this with my T because of the fear he will think I am really a looney toon.

 

[Deleted member 8714]

I have never heard any of this before, in the context that has been shared....

I realized that my dream had been given to me by the Lord, to pray for the event before it was ever to happen.

I didn't think about any of this until I saw others on myPTSD say they were an empath. Also my T wondered if I was hypersensitive to the world around me and thought about that playing a role in my need to avoid people and the world outside. She also thinks it might be a factor in my weight gain.

I contemplated all of this on Friday and then Saturday I did some research on the topic. As a Christian I wanted to stay clear of certain types of empaths yet instead found myself drawn to them, such as plant and animal empaths. I can so much relate to those.

I've got this prolific indoor garden going behind my kitchen sink. I've always had the ability to grow things which should have died long ago. One such plant was a lowly cedar tree seedling which my husband brought home from work. It was pulled out of driveway at a construction project where it had been run over many times and placed in a styrofoam cup with some dirt. I nursed it along, transplanting it to bigger containers as it grew. At the time I lived in a travel trailer, and we had not settled down and purchased a piece of property. Therefore I couldn't plant it in the ground. When we finally purchased property, the lowly seedling was around three feet tall. Still I refused to plant it until I discovered the perfect spot in the yard for it. I soon found it where there was plenty of sun, more than enough water, and acid-based soil.

The acid-based soil was augmented to help another lowly transplant grow. A single
strawberry plant which had latched onto some bulbs which had been in a pot that I had dug out and placed in the ground. The enriched soil provided the perfect spot for the cedar tree which loved that type of soil. During the first year in the ground, the tree took off in phenomenal growth. Within two years it became the stately tree it was meant to be and solved a problem with the area of the yard where we had some flooding after rains. After the tree reached six feet, in a short time, we no longer had a problem with pooling water.

And the strawberry? Oh my! Strawberries filled the whole area around the tree and then took off under the fence. Neighbors used to come by and help themselves to the abundant, sweet and juicy, huge strawberries growing there.

One year I planted some sunflowers. It was my first time. They grew close to ten feet tall! All the neighbors commented on their height and asked me what I had done to get them that tall. Absolutely nothing.

@Still Standing that's exactly what I recently figured out about my nightmares with earthquakes or other catastrophes. I call them my earthquake nightmares. Thank you for confirming this. I didn't pray after either "Event Nightmare" even though that's obviously what the Lord wanted me to do.

 

[Still Standing]

Concruency, I see tornados, too. The tornados I "see" refer to traumatic events in the future, but are of a spiritual nature. I have seen landscapes in places where I have never been, only to recognize them when traveling through a different state. I can prove my experiences, because I write down my "visions" in as much detail as possible and date them. When I then see the places, they can be compared to my dated descriptions and the details match. I have other experiences of knowing what others want or need before they ask. One such time was with my son who had moved out of the house. When he left we told him he could not come back home. About a year later, I sensed that he was going to ask to move back home with us. So, I asked hubby how he felt about having our son come back home. He said he would be ok with it. Four days later, our son came by the house to visit. He was nervous and had a hard time talking. But, he eventually asked if I would ask his dad if he could move back home because he needed a safe place to be until he could get back out on his own. Up until this day, we had no knowledge of his private life or had any conversation with him about needing to move. I told him I had already talked to his dad about it and the answer was yes". And I told him that I "knew" four days earlier that he was going to come and ask to come home. He was blown away.

I can also grow anything inside the house. My house is always full of green plants and vines. But, outside, uh, no. No can do, much to my frustration. But, indoor plants draw me.

Are these things that I share with my psych doc? In Cognitive Behavioral Therapy, there is a term called "mind reading" that is seen as a negative behavior. I have stayed away from discussing that for fear of being seen as really crazy. But, there are times, I do know what someone is thinking before they say it. I struggle with the mind-reading term. I want to be honest about it but also am wanting to be self-protective. So, my thinking is to simply stay silent about it and let him think it is not an issue with me. Even now, I feel very vulnerable sharing what I have shared.