As an empathic and sensitive parent, you can probably sense your children’s energy and needs before they do – a quality that makes you very good at caring for and tending to their needs. Yet, it can also cause you to unconsciously merge with them energetically, with you confusing what’s yours and theirs.

It often causes us to enable our children by overprotecting and over-doing for them. We also tend to lose touch with our own needs in the process, leading to burnout.

Learning to be present and engaged with our children while not completely losing ourselves is a delicate but essential work of balance.

These are the five things that, as an empath, will help you nourish your body, mind, and soul and keep you in balance while caring for everyone else:

• Ground yourself in your body through exercise and being in nature.
• Use your breath as a moment to pause to manage a stressful moment and to remind you to focus your energy back at your core.
• Let yourself feel your uncomfortable feelings, talk about it to your spouse or a friend, and move them through you and out.
• As an empath, you tend to be harsh on yourself. It is essential to learn to manage your negative thoughts and practice self-compassion.
• Make sure to carve time, even short breaks, every day to be in silence and alone.

Practicing self-care can be challenging for an empath; we see it as selfish or a luxury. But when you do, you reclaim parts of yourself that you lost over time through living outside your body and core. Recovering these parts will support all your relationships – deepening them and making them less draining and more rewarding.