200: The Hidden Reason Highly Sensitive People Struggle to Set Boundaries

Why People Pleasers Tolerate Disrespect (And How to Finally Set Boundaries)

What if the very thing you’re doing to keep the relationship… is the thing slowly eroding your self-respect?

If you’re a highly sensitive person or a recovering people pleaser, you’ve likely tolerated behavior that didn’t feel good. You minimized it. You excused it. You smoothed it over. Not because you’re weak — but because your nervous system was trying to protect you.

In this episode, I’m breaking down why people pleasers tolerate disrespect, how the freeze and fawn responses keep you stuck, and what it actually looks like to set boundaries without guilt.

If you’ve ever thought:

• “I don’t want to make a big deal out of it.”
• “I’m probably just being too sensitive.”
• “They didn’t mean it.”
• “If I’m patient enough, they’ll change.”

…this episode is for you.

Because in trying not to lose the relationship, you may be losing yourself.

Why Highly Sensitive People Struggle With Boundaries

When someone makes a cutting comment or dismisses your experience, your body doesn’t always respond with confrontation.

Many highly sensitive people default to:

Freeze – You go into shock. You can’t believe they would treat you that way.
Fawn – You rush to reassure the person who hurt you.
“It’s okay.”
“I know you didn’t mean it.”

This isn’t weakness. It’s a stress response.

But when you repeatedly smooth things over instead of addressing the behavior, you unintentionally teach others that your boundaries are optional. And your body feels it — anxiety, tension, walking on eggshells.

4 Sneaky Ways You Say “Yes” When You Mean “No”

1. You Accept Words Without Watching for Change

They say, “I’m sorry. I’ve changed.”

You want to believe them, so you focus on their words instead of their behavior. You forgive without evidence. You accept apology without accountability.

Kindness without accountability keeps unhealthy patterns alive.

2. You Minimize the Impact to Protect the Relationship

You tell yourself:

• “It’s not that bad.”
• “They’re just stressed.”
• “I’m overreacting.”

But every time you minimize their behavior, you also minimize your boundary. Over time, your needs matter less.

3. You Overexplain Your Boundaries

Instead of saying,
“That doesn’t work for me,”

you add context and reassurance.

You take on the emotional labor so they don’t have to self-reflect. Clear boundaries don’t require a long defense. They require calm clarity.

4. Your Body Has Checked Out And is Saying No— But You’re Still Saying Yes

You feel tightness in your chest.
You feel drained.
You walk on eggshells.

Your body is saying no, but your mouth keeps saying yes.

Sometimes you don’t realize a boundary was crossed until later. That delayed awareness doesn’t invalidate the violation. Your body keeps the score.

Boundaries don’t push the right people away. They filter out the wrong ones.

A true yes doesn’t feel anxious or heavy.
It feels steady. Clear. Expansive.

Boundaries don’t destroy healthy relationships.
They reveal which ones are.

If this episode resonated and you’re ready to stop people pleasing, strengthen your boundaries, and rebuild self-trust, I’d love to support you.

Book your free clarity call here:
👉 https://calendly.com/maryannwalkerlife/freeconsult

You do not have to betray yourself to be loved.

Transcript

0:17

welcome back. My name is MaryAnn Walker and I help highly sensitive people and recovering people pleasers, learn how to set and maintain their own personal boundaries. And today I want to explore something with you gently, but directly. There may be some ways that you are crossing your own boundaries without even realizing it. Sometimes in an effort to keep people in our lives, we ignore our own limits. We minimize our hurt. We excuse behavior that doesn't feel good. And ironically, that is often what creates the very mistreatment that we're trying to avoid. If you want relationships that are built on trust and mutual respect, it is vital that you maintain your own boundaries so that other people will respect them too. Now, I want you to think for just a moment about a time when somebody pushed past your boundary and you let it slide. Maybe it was a cutting comment. Maybe they said something that was really dismissive of your lived experience. Maybe it was something that was downright disrespectful and instead of addressing it, you froze or you smoothed things over, or you pretended that it wasn't that big of a deal. For many highly sensitive people, this is a stress response. We talk about the stress response of fight, flight, freeze, and fawn, and for my listeners, they tend to either freeze or fawn. So a freeze response might look like shock. You can't believe that somebody would speak to you that way or treat you in that way. It is so misaligned with your personal values that your system kind of goes offline in disbelief. And the fawn response, it can look like reassuring the very person who offended. So this might sound like,"oh, it's okay. I know that you didn't mean it. I'm sure you're just tired. You are just having an off day. It's okay that you treated me that way. It's okay that you crossed my boundary." So you're essentially rushing into forgiveness before there's been any actual accountability. And then the internal dialogue starts in where you might be thinking,"well, I don't wanna make a big deal out of it. I'm probably overreacting. I don't wanna rock the boat." So you stay quiet. But here's the truth, in trying not to lose the relationship you might be losing yourself. Many recovering people pleasers believe that speaking up makes them too needy, too sensitive, too high maintenance, not understanding enough. So instead of holding a boundary, then they try to love somebody into better behavior. This means that they're often telling themselves, okay, well if I'm patient enough, if I'm kind enough, if I'm forgiving enough, then eventually they'll change. And listen to me closely. You are amazing. You are kind. You are empathetic, you are understanding. You're so compassionate and forgiving, and also continuing to offer access to you after repeated boundary violations. It doesn't teach somebody to love and respect you. It actually teaches them that your boundaries are optional. And what makes this even more challenging is that your nervous system, it prefers familiar pain to the unknown. Your nervous system would rather choose a familiar dysfunction than unfamiliar freedom. It would rather choose a known problem, even if it's really, really painful for you than that can feel safer than starting over. So you stay. You tolerate this behavior, you endure it. You believe that, well, if I can just prove my loyalty and compassion, then I'll finally earn secure love. But boundaries aren't what push the right people away. Boundaries are what filter out the wrong people. So let me share with you four sneaky ways that you may be saying yes when you mean to say no. Number one, you accept words without watching for real lasting change. They say,"I'm sorry, I've changed." And because you so want to believe their words, then you turn up the volume on their words, and you turn down the volume on their behavior. You forgive without evidence. You accept apology without accountability. Kindness and compassion are really beautiful qualities, but without accountability, the patterns, they never change. If you reopen access to you without first seeing change, you're actually unintentionally saying, you know what? This is tolerable. This is okay with me. This is forgivable. It's not a big deal. And deep down your body actually knows that it isn't. It's not okay with you. And that's why you feel anxious. It's why you feel guarded. It's why you feel like you're just waiting for the other shoe to drop. All right. Number two, you minimize the impact of their actions to protect the relationship. This is when you're saying things like,"well, it's not that bad. They must have been really stressed out. I'm probably being too sensitive. Once their project is finished, once the stressful event is over, then they'll treat me the way that I deserve." And when you're doing this, you're essentially moving the goalpost for your own respect. You're minimizing the impact of their actions and making excuses for their behavior. But when you're minimizing the impact of their behavior, you're also minimizing your own boundaries. And the more you downplay your own boundaries, the more you actually reinforce the already unsupportive relationship dynamic. The more you're actually saying,"yes, it's okay for you to treat me that way, I'm gonna forgive it. It's not that big of a deal." And that can be another way that your fawning response is trying to protect you. Sometimes minimizing it actually is your fawn response doubling down. It's trying to keep you safe and help you to feel better in the moment by trying to prove,"see, I'm the understanding. One, I'm not the problem, I'm the bigger person because I'm just so forgiving." And while being loving and forgiving are amazing qualities to have, the truth is that real love, it can't flourish where boundaries aren't honored. Number three, you overexplain your boundaries instead of stating it kindly and clearly this means you're essentially taking on the lion's share of the emotional labor in relationship. So instead of saying, you know what, that doesn't work for me, or,"no, that's not okay with me." Instead, you're offering up context, backstory, emotional cushioning to make sure you're not being too hard on them when they've been cruel to you. So you soften it, you pat it, you reassure them while explaining how much they deeply hurt you. So essentially this can sound like,"oh, you know what? I know that I told you before that that's a boundary that I have and you crossed it anyway. And I also know that you've been super stressed lately and maybe I didn't explain myself well enough. So let me try again. I know you've been stressed. You probably didn't hear me," so you over explain, hoping that this time, then they'll understand. This time, then they'll respect your boundary. Meanwhile, you're taking on all of the emotional labor and relationship. They do not have to self-reflect on their actions because you are doing it for them. You are making excuses for them. Over explaining, often sends the message, you know what? I'm gonna work harder in this relationship so that you don't have to, I'm gonna make things so easy for you that you will want to stay with me. But at the same time, it's not creating that accountability. Accountability, it requires discomfort, and it is okay to let somebody sit in their own discomfort. Let me share one of my favorite tools to create self-reflection without overexplaining. When somebody says or does something that crosses your boundary, simply say,"ouch." It's one word. There's no lecture, there's no justification, there's no emotional labor. It is just one word to create that self-reflection for them. Now they have to do the emotional labor of identifying what it was that they did that caused harm, and they now have an opportunity to either make it right or to defend their actions. And either way, it gives you really valuable information. Questions can also be a very valuable tool when it comes to creating that accountability and self-reflection for other people when your boundaries have been crossed. So a few of my favorite questions are: what made you think it would be okay for you to speak to me that way? How do you expect that comment to land? What made you believe that that would be an appropriate way to respond in this situation? How would you like me to interpret that behavior? Questions can create self-reflection and accountability without you over owning the situation. number four, you stay engaged in the relationship. Even after your body has checked out. You're going through the motions, you're still showing up in relationship... even though your chest feels tight, your breathing is shallow, you feel drained. You feel guarded, you might even feel numb. Maybe even feel like you're walking on eggshells in that relationship never really knowing, okay, well, are they gonna lash out at me again? I don't know if I can trust them right now. And you feel like you're walking on eggshells. Your body is saying no, but your mouth and your actions keep saying yes. Sometimes you might even not realize until your boundary has been crossed until later because it can be really shocking when somebody mistreats you because it is so outside of how you personally would treat someone, it is so out of character for you that you don't expect that anybody would possibly treat you that way. I recently overheard a conversation that was pretty powerful to witness, and I did not hear the whole conversation, but I did hear the delayed response. A group of friends were visiting and one comment was made that gave the other person pause, and I'm just gonna kind of create names for them to make the storytelling easier. I don't know who these people are, but Sammy made a derogatory comment towards Erica, and because Erica is such a sweet person, she didn't notice the disrespect at first, but when a second derogatory comment was made, then Erica said,"wait. Are you trying to be mean to me?" And Sammy kind of fumbled over her words, but this kind of brought it to the attention of the whole group. So one friend said, yeah, that wasn't very nice, and another friend said, Hey, don't be mean to my friend. And this kind of put a spotlight on Sammy's disrespect and made it about Sammy's behavior rather than about Erica's response to her behavior. It shifted the accountability. So now Sammy needs to be accountable. now, even if you aren't noticing the disrespect in the moment, I want you to know that delayed awareness, it does not invalidate the violation. You can absolutely, even in hindsight, you can choose moving forward to adapt your behavior, to better maintain your boundaries. To think about, okay, what do I want to say and do moving forward so I can be better prepared if I'm in a similar situation moving forward? You can use that as information to help you to maintain respect for yourself as you engage with other people. Your body keeps the score. So even if you aren't yet consciously aware of where the disrespect is coming from, listen to your nervous system. Notice what relationships help you to feel safe and seen and respected. And also tap into your nervous system to notice what relationships leave you feeling on edge and adapt your level of investment accordingly. Love does not require self abandonment, and I get it that many of you were taught either explicitly or implicitly, that love means forgiveness at all costs. It means endless patience. It means staying no matter what. It means enduring pain and heartache to earn love. and because of that, your nervous system may have learned over time that connection requires self betrayal and self abandonment. And maybe that belief did help you to survive in the past, but it is not helping you to thrive now. So in closing, let me share with you just a few signs that you might be saying yes, when you mean to say no, you feel relief imagining the relationship ending or them no longer being a part of your life. You experience tension, fear, or dread at the idea of seeing this other person. You find yourself rehearsing explanations in order to justify somebody else's behavior, or you find yourself moving the goalposts that they'll be nice to me after this has been resolved. After this event is over, after this stressful event has concluded, then they'll be nice to me. You find yourself moving the goalpost for when they're gonna be able to actually give you the love and respect that you deserve. Maybe you find that you're feeling guilty before you've even stated a boundary, or you're afraid that if you speak up, they're going to leave. If you're experiencing any of these things, I want you to pay attention to that because it may be a sign that you are saying yes when you actually want to say no. A true yes doesn't cause confusion or detachment from yourself or from others. A true yes isn't anxious. It's not heavy, and it doesn't cause you to brace for impact. A true yes, it feels steady. It feels clear, it feels expansive and living life through true yeses. That's what's going to create the true lasting connection that you're seeking. Sometimes in an effort to keep other people around, we tolerate behavior that slowly erodes trust and respect over time. This is trust and respect with other people, but it's also self-trust and self-respect. But I wanna remind you that the relationships that you truly want, the ones that are built on safety and mutual respect, they actually require you to hold your boundaries. Boundaries do not destroy healthy relationships, but instead they come to reveal where those Relationships are. If today's episode has resonated with you, if you're looking for ways to set and maintain your boundaries and you would like some support, please come and book a free clarity call with me. Through coaching I can help you to learn what a real yes feels like. Not a people pleasing yes, not a survival yes. But a grounded and self-respecting, yes, you can find the link to book that call in the show notes, because guess what? You do not need to betray yourself to be loved. Also, I have many new listeners joining through listening on my website. Now, if that is you, I wanna let you know that while my most recent episodes can be found on my website, all of my episodes can be found on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, audible, iHeartRadio, YouTube, and so much more. So come and subscribe on your favorite podcasting platform so I can continue to show up for you in love and support. I am here every single week supporting my beautiful, highly sensitive, recovering people pleasers because you deserve relationships where your boundaries are honored and respected. And I feel absolutely honored to be a part of your personal journey as you work to build those relationships that really honor your sensitivity. Thank you so much for being here, and I'll see you next week. Bye now.