The personality profile of Highly Sensitive People and how (for many) it relates to trauma exposure in childhood
There is a common thread in the clients that I see in terms of the behavioural traits or struggles they encounter as a highly sensitive person (HSP). It is a personality type born out of trauma exposure for many. We will each differ in our personal tendencies however for example I would never label myself as shy and yet that can be a trait of a HSP, yet I have many other highly sensitive personality traits. There is a spectrum of traits, of which we will have some and not others, and also will be affected by some more than others.
Equally our experience as a highly sensitive person can be influenced by other root factors, such as neurodiversity and intuitive or psychic abilities (which is in addition to our trauma response or highly sensitive personality (read blog on this). We can also come into the world simply as a ‘sensitive soul’. Amongst my clients, I have had one unicorn client that has not been exposed to trauma by family dynamics in this lifetime and yet have all the HSP traits (probably due to other lifetimes!).
Also, it feels useful to mention that I have been putting off writing this blog for some time, simply because to explore the topic fully it feels to me as though it could be a book - in fact I'm sure there is one out there on the subject. So, in this, I will do the best of my ability to summarise the most potent elements that relate to this topic but there will be more to be mined on the subject for sure if you find it wanting, as I am touching on large topics with a broad brush stroke.
The Beginnings
Trauma symptoms are surprisingly common, and in my opinion that is often the foundation of many mental health problems as we understand them such as anxiety and depression. Trauma symptoms can be created by seemingly common experiences in our everyday lives such as family dynamics and this is where the personality profile of many highly sensitive people begins.
The common behavioural traits of many HSP’s are developed in response to ‘threat’ or unpredictability in the home which may be physical, emotional or verbal, often a threatening caregiver. This can take various guises - a caregiver who is an addict, a parent with narcissistic tendencies, a caregiver who abandoned us or a caregiver with severe mental health issues for example. For example, they may be…
Emotionally immature and self absorbed as well as demanding
Unpredictable or volatile or inconsistent (with suppressed rage or severe depression)
Controlling or emotionally manipulative (gaslighting you, or denying your reality or experience)
Cold, neglectful, distant, disengaged
Unable to take responsibility, blaming others, shaming or highly critical
Extremely depressed or emotionally absent
Physically as well as emotionally abusive
Physically threatening or withdraw sexual attention physically abandoning or rejecting you
The caregiver leaves us feeling either emotionally, mentally or physically threatened, HSP’s then adapt to stay safe around them or win love, forming particular behaviours but it can also trigger trauma symptoms. I may even go as far to say that the HSP personality profile is born, for most, out of a response to common yet emotionally traumatic experiences in childhood - which can vary in severity of intensity.
As a side note: a caregiver may also be relatively benign however, for example, where they are struggling with severe mental health issues such as severe depression, this then creates a sense of instability or uncertainty at home, absence and emotional turmoil. The covert threat is the insecurity which can leave us living in a hypervigilant state or adopting ‘grown-up’ responsibilities (emotional or physical) leading to over responsibility to be ‘self sufficient’ as the caregiver is not reliable, or we may have adapted people pleasing tendencies to keep everyone happy, or alternatively emotional caretaking tendencies from a young age. For the purpose of this article, we will focus on the more ‘overt’ forms of threat.
Trauma Symptoms
So what causes trauma symptoms? Basically - overwhelming experiences. ‘Too much, too fast, too soon’ that throws our nervous system into a dysregulated state. At that moment, with the lack of an empathic witness, we may have entered a state of shock, or feel helpless or powerless, overcome by the circumstances which lead us into states of fight, flight, freeze or fawn. Unlike animals, humans can suppress this activation in the body, i.e. we hold in the exploding rage instead of fighting, in an effort to stay safe or ‘be appropriate’.
However the consequence of this is that this reaction is suppressed in both the subconscious mind and the body as unprocessed experience. Trauma symptoms can hide in plain sight appearing as;
Anxiety and depression
Panic attacks and overwhelm
Chronic or heightened anxiety - racing thoughts, racing heart
Burnout and exhaustion
Helplessness, hopelessness and rage
Restlessness, night terrors, shallow breathing and much more. You can read much more on trauma and the related symptoms in Peter Levine ‘Waking the tiger’.
The traumatic experience is also in the eyes of the beholder, and not the event itself. Two people may experience the same event, but have a different response. Particular events, such as abuse, are understood by nature to be potentially more traumatic than others of course. (This is a shorthand description of trauma, there are a great many books on the subject if this interests you and where you can learn more).
Heightened Sensitivity
So what has our heightened sensitivity got to do with trauma? Well trauma exposure can cause heightened sensitivity in the nervous system. Elaine Aron says that being a HSP is a personality trait and we are a subset of the population, the scientific name for this trait is actually called ‘sensory processing sensitivity’ SPS. She also says HSP’s have often been exposed to trauma.
This sensitivity may be in part hereditary, it may be caused by trauma symptoms, and / or you come into the world as a sensitive being (or a blend). Personally with the HSP's I work with, they find that their sensitivity i.e. this ‘awareness’ of the nature of them self, others and our environment was always present. I think most HSP’s come into the world as ‘sensitive souls’, such as, we are sensitive to beauty or notice the feelings of others when no one else does, but our childhood conditions or experiences may enhance our sensitivity further.
As highly sensitive people have intense responses, we can become over-stimulated more quickly, I believe this can make us more susceptible to trauma symptoms (aside from the possible increase in our sensitivity being from dysfunctional childhood challenges). Your experience of average life experiences can register as intense - like the volume of the world is turned up for us. Therefore day-to-day living can take a lot of energy to process, or become triggering, let alone strong or challenging experiences which may hit us harder than others perhaps.
For some HSPs, the ‘everyday’ experiences that to us feel shocking and overwhelming due to our sensitivity, have accumulated overtime and are still alive in the subconscious and body such as: the intensity of the school environment, giving birth, or traumatic death experience of a loved one. There may be one experience that becomes the straw that breaks the camel's back as it were, when in fact, it's the final overwhelm in a succession of many over years or decades - leaving us feeling unable to cope with day-to-day living or chores due to anxiety for example.
Additionally as a HSP we have heightened somatic empathy and can be highly aware of the emotional state or physical pain of those around us. This can lead to feeling flooded and overwhelmed by the wordless physical-emotional input from others, as you are experiencing vicariously the states of other people. This can be incredibly confusing or debilitating, particularly when we don't know what's happening.
Consequently our sensitivity can feel like a curse! We can feel…
angry with ourselves, feeling there is something wrong with us, as we can’t ‘cope’ with life like everybody else and we don’t feel very resilient
‘neurotic’ or ‘silly’ with everything we are ‘reading’, thinking or feeling about others (particularly if they deny it), so you lack confidence in your own intuitive insight or the framework or tools to help us trust our felt experience or knowing
our sensitivity just seems to bring overwhelm and problems
like our sensitivity throws up one physical problem after another - a migraine, eye strain and so on
our sensitivity takes us into the depths and complexity of experience, which can lead us into overthinking or over analysing or feeling like we are ‘too much’.
the volume of what we notice takes energy to process which can also feel draining.
as though we are high maintenance as we have to take self care seriously, as we feel deeply and are impacted by the world deeply
the pain of others and this might be almost unbearable for us, so we want to resolve their experience and ‘fix it’ leading to rescuer tendencies and quickly abandoning our needs
that it’s easy to absorb the emotional experience of others, often struggling with energetic boundaries
it's easy to know what others are feeling and we are told ‘You say exactly the right thing at the right time’
Additionally, if we are dealing with threat in our home environment then these problems can become magnified. There are, of course, many gifts and strengths to the trait which can be life changing to both us and others. However for the purposes of this article, we will focus on the struggles!
Self Denial and Self Censorship
So if we are highly sensitive and are dealing with some form of overt or covert ‘threat’ at home, wherever that sits on the spectrum, a common way to cope is self-denial and self censorship, which presents itself in many ways. This is because we weren't given a safe space to be seen and heard at home. Therefore it wasn’t safe to experience our feelings as it was overwhelming or denied. We then develop coping strategies which begins to form our personality such as:
We deny, suppress and invalidate certain feelings. We are ‘not allowed’ to have a full spectrum of feelings, fearing experiencing them in the body or expressing them. Anger for example is ‘bad’ or not acceptable and shouldn’t be experienced or expressed. We listen to only the compassionate, ‘nice’ or seemingly ‘reasonable’ response or voice within us and deny the complexity of emotions - such as the anger, that says no more. We may have learnt to control our emotional display to others and edit our responses.
Telling ourselves I ‘should be’ calm, logical, and acceptable to avoid conflict and - to be loved or liked, but we end up denying our feelings, needs and experience. However in doing so, highly sensitive people can then struggle with our own authenticity - not knowing what we really feel or need, feeling confused or foggy, struggling to express our emotions. Feeling disconnected from ourselves and our bodies, not being able to trust ourselves, our feelings, our decisions and we lack a connection with our intuitive voice. This can feel very disempowering and lonely, as we don't feel seen or heard on multiple levels especially as our sensitivity can naturally make us highly emotional and tender.
This self-denial, which may have been born out of chronic criticism from a caregiver can lead to strong perfectionist tendencies - to avoid being under ‘attack’. We can then internalise that critical voice, and become highly self-critical, feeling as though we are never good enough, chasing elusive and unachievable perfectionism. We may find ourselves being very self-defensive because we can't handle any more criticism, or we try to deflect it.
Bottling, our feelings and true thoughts can become a habit to maintain the good girl/boy status or stay safe. Yet this lack of self expression and subsequent inner processing can lead to triggers coming out in physical form, or periodic overwhelm and outbursts of crying or emotion. As these are processed emotions and experiences layer over time, the intensity can keep rising leading to chronic anxiety and panic attacks. Denying our experience may hit a breaking point.
Relationships
Dysfunctional childhood dynamics can lead to dysfunctional relationship dynamics in adulthood be that intimate relationships, family, friendships or work. As a consequence of the sense of threat experienced in childhood, HSP’s tend to enter codependent relationships where we are enabling the poor behaviour of others - such as emotional immaturity, irresponsibility or self-destructive behaviours, as this is normal to us and is how we coped as children.
As we lack power to change the situation and we're stuck, we have to adapt and manage or excuse what may actually be ‘toxic’, unhealthy or unacceptable behaviour. We make excuses for poor behaviour ‘oh they are just misunderstood’, or ‘they had a traumatic childhood’, ‘oh it’s not that bad’ or ‘that’s just how they are’ and so on, continuing to tolerate it, as that is just normal for us and we want to avoid conflict or rejection. When in fact, we are enabling the behaviour because we don't address it.
It’s important to remember that our whole survival and existence as a child is dependent on our caregivers. If we were a cub in the wild and our parent/s rejected us, we would literally be left for dead as we wouldn't be able to survive, being unable to protect ourselves or hunt to feed ourselves. The same is true as a human baby or child - if our parents abandoned us, we equally wouldn't be able to feed ourselves or stay safe alone, as we don't have the skills yet.
We are therefore wired for connection and love, the thought of rejection or the threat of conflict can therefore trigger a strong survival response in us. Therefore, if a caregiver is a threatening force to us this is incredibly conflicting because we need them to survive and we are stuck living with them! This can lead to adaptive behaviour to please them to stay safe physically and emotionally. Therefore many HSP’s can have people pleasing behaviour to avoid conflict (if this feels uncomfortable to us) or a fear of rejection (as we have an anxious or anxious-avoidant attachment to others).
Struggle with healthy boundaries
Why we can’t set healthy boundaries - A struggle can then arise with healthy boundaries around our needs, wants, time, energy and behaviours and we will tolerate poor boundaries, particularly if it wasn't safe to have boundaries with our caregiver or this was denied and this may be because:
they were emotionally, demanding, and we had to give them our time, energy and attention to keep them happy
it wasn't safe to say ‘no’, as they would overreact and start attacking us verbally
they displayed gaslighting behaviour, so this could be incredibly confusing as they were denying both our feelings and our reality. And so on…
We can then develop a distorted sense of healthy boundaries. HSP’s can find it easy to deny their own needs, claiming it is ‘unkind’ to assert their boundaries, or say no or challenge behaviours. When really there is a fear of conflict, of not being safe, loved, or accepted due to childhood experiences.
Fear of Upsetting People - This can lead on to HSP’s then having a fear of upsetting people and persistently apologise, (even if there's nothing to be sorry for) this is due to self doubt and low self esteem. HSP’s often naturally read the room to be aware of how people are feeling to keep everyone happy or we will meditate if we sense trouble; this need to always check the temperature of the room in a hypervigilant state is to stay safe.
If someone seems unhappy or displeased we worry we might have done something wrong to upset them. Or if it may be easy to take the blame and we’ll parcel ourselves with self-criticism. We may feel guilty or shameful of seemingly upsetting others and / or conversely secretly suppressing our rage at being continually emotionally denied (this is usually hidden under fear or terror). We can get stuck in overthinking, over analysing and mental loops, deconstructing, social engagements, worrying what others are thinking or feeling.
Worrying about the needs of others - HSPs can excessively worry about others and their needs before our own, and we can also take on their pain and problems as we want to help. We may find ourselves over-giving with our time and our energy. Saying yes we're available to listen when actually we're not we're exhausted. So we are continually denying our needs for the sake of others which can lead to burn out, by being overstretched and overwhelmed.
We may want to make sure everyone else is happy first before we consider ourself. This can give rise to us becoming a rescuer and fixer - wanting to make it ‘nice’, make it ‘okay’, to make it ‘pleasant’, keep the peace, to avoid a situation becoming overwhelming or painful, feeding that perfectionism. (Our strong somatic empathy can feed into this as we are deeply affected by the plight or emotions of others).
Keeping ourselves safe - We might feel we need to give our energy away or even ourself away to stay safe (unconsciousness) as that’s what we had to do when we were young, abandon ourselves, keep giving, being understanding. HSPs override their own feelings and needs, leaping into rescue mode at midnight to counsel a demanding friend who is always in crisis, or being loyal to bullying bosses or listening to our Mothers manipulative story of victimhood again. We lean heavily into our voice of understanding and deny the frustration or resentment that says no! What about me? Struggling to prioritise ourselves.
Avoiding conflict - HSP’s can be conflict avoidant and do not like to address challenging behaviours. Just the thought of conflict can be incredibly triggering, bringing up a strong sense of threat. At times we may feel that we can't say what we want or really feel as we need to ‘keep people happy’. So we will avoid upsetting people, to avoid overwhelming situations for us. We often struggle to validate our own feelings or talk ourself out of them, not really feeling allowed to say no ever.
Manipulation of HSPs - This lack of healthy boundaries - being able to express our feelings, assert our needs, challenge harmful behaviours, or walk away from relationships when necessary - means that HSP’s can more easily be manipulated by others, leaving us to feel as though we ‘attract’ narcissists or energy vampires. Where HSP’s fall down is that we think the relationship can be ‘fixed’ and then tolerate abusive behaviour.
I used to think, for example, if only ‘I do X’ or if only ‘I said y’ then ‘they'll be happy’ or then it will be okay. However that time never appeared, and the emotionally manipulative behaviour just continued. It was always my fault, I upset them, no responsibility was taken by them and so on. We try to change ourselves instead of recognising that it’s not okay and removing ourselves from the situation, which as adults, we can now do.
How I manage boundaries - In my own journey, I've had to learn to accept that not every relationship can be mended. That some behaviours are just not okay to live with. That sometimes it's simply painful and sad, that there is, in fact, nothing we can do, or say to make that person ‘happy’ or have a harmonious connection. That in fact their behaviour will continue to be harmful to us. We often live with a false hope that it will change, they will change, but they won’t. It is therefore important to take responsibility for our own needs, and there may be a point when we just need to step out of a dynamic, to separate ourselves from particular relationships to keep ourselves emotionally well - and that’s okay. It’s a mature and healthy response.
Of course, what I have described above is not an exhaustive list of HSP traits, this is a blog not a book. You can read more on boundaries and HSP tendencies in my other blogs.
Authenticity
The healing journey, therefore, for many HSP’s, is often one of trauma healing to some degree, releasing related unhealthy belief systems and unlearning behaviours born from these experiences. It's a process that leads us to feeling comfortable to validate, as well as express our own needs and act on them! This often means developing healthy relationships where we feel validated and able to assert our boundaries with confidence or finding our tribe of sensitive like-minded people who support us. To live and work in a way that is supportive of a sensitive nature, and harnessing the skills of sensitivity in the way that feels natural for us to be of service in the world. To realise our own unique gifts within our sensitivity and to feel confident to authentically be ourselves.
Further reading
Five Shadow sides of being an empath
Four reasons why highly sensitive people attract narcissists
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