Are You the Person Everyone Brings Their Problems To?
You know who you are.
You’re the one people call. The one who knows everyone’s secrets. The one who has heard things that would make other people’s hair stand up and somehow just… held it. You dispense forgiveness without being asked. Make it okay. Keep showing up.
And they keep coming back. Not because they’re growing. Not because things are getting better. But because you make it so easy not to.
I want to talk to you about a role I call the Shit Sherpa. Because I think you’ve been one for a long time. And I think part of you already knows it.
What Being a Shit Sherpa Actually Looks Like
Here’s what it looks like from where I sit.
A friend comes to you:
“I’m lying to my family.”
“I got myself into a messy situation last night.”
Maybe it’s your partner:
“I ran up our credit card.”
“I’ve done it again.” It being that thing that breaks your heart.
Even your kids, or your parents. They might tell you they “can’t” shoulder part of a shared endeavor. They’re game…as long as you do the heavy lifting.
And maybe they don’t tell you anything, but the assumption, if they did say it, would sound something like:
“Oops. But you’ll take care of it. You’ll overlook it. You’ll get over it. You always do.”
And you DO take it. You hold it. You help them feel better about it. You find the nuance, the context, the reason it makes sense given everything they’ve been through.
And then they go right back out and do the same thing again next week.
Because here’s what’s actually happening. They’re not acknowledging their problems because they want your help solving them. They’re bringing you their problems because when you absorb it they don’t have to feel the weight of it.
That’s the Shit Sherpa.
Why You Became the One Who Holds Everything
Maybe you grew up around chaos, around addiction, around people who couldn’t quite manage themselves all that well all the time. Somehow, you learned that making things okay for people in distress was how you stayed connected to them. Being understanding was how you kept things stable. Being the safe person was how you made yourself necessary.
Plus, it’s good to be trustworthy and capable, right? You wouldn’t want to be judgmental about someone else’s choices.
You got good at it. Really good. And you brought that skill into every relationship you’ve had since.
So you end up, usually without meaning to, surrounded by people who need exactly what you offer. People who are a little chaotic. A little unreliable. People whose lives you can help manage because that is the dynamic you know how to be in. It feels like friendship. It feels like loyalty. It feels like love, even.
Are You a Friend or a Friend Service?
But I want to ask you something about your friendships. Are you actually a friend? Or do you provide a friend service?
Because there’s a difference.
Someone calls a friend service when they need to unload. They may post photos with that friend service as proof of life. A friend service holds secrets and makes dubious choices feel okay and never judges no matter what. But is that energy, that same holding capacity, flowing in the other direction? Is there accountability? Do you get to be human too?
How to Stop Carrying What Was Never Yours
There are things people may bring you that you genuinely don’t want to be part of. Things you know aren’t okay. And you find yourself making them okay anyway. The antidote to being a Shit Sherpa isn’t becoming cold or withholding or suddenly unavailable. It’s learning to give people back what’s theirs.
“I can’t make that okay for you.”
That’s a sentence I want you to practice.
It sounds simple. It isn’t. Because the moment you stop holding other people’s problems, they will feel it. They might pull away. They might accuse you of judging them. They might tell you you’ve changed. That you’re not the person they thought you were.
Real connection doesn’t require you to carry things that aren’t yours. It doesn’t require you to make other people’s choices okay when they’re avoidant, reckless, or destructive. It doesn’t require you to be so endlessly available and accommodating that you deplete yourself or compromise your values.
What Real Connection Actually Feels Like
Real connection means you can tell someone you’re disappointed and trust that they’re going to care and consider your message–not defend against it or deflect. That you can empathically witness your friends and loved ones when they transgress or disappoint themselves without taking on all the repair work. That you can be inconvenient, human, occasionally a mess yourself, and that they stay present to witness you. Not because you’re useful to them. Because you’re you.
If you’re walking a tightrope where holding all the secrets and serving all the needs is the price of staying close, that’s not friendship. That tenuousness is telling you everything you need to know.
You are not a service. You are a person. And the people in your life should know the difference.
Serve, don’t be a service. There is a version of giving that feels nurturing, that comes from a full place, that doesn’t deplete you, compromise your values, or leave you wondering why nobody knows how to do this for you.
Ready to Work With a Codependency Therapist in New York?
If you recognized yourself in any of this, that’s not an accident.
I work with high functioning adults across New York who are exhausted from carrying too much and ready to figure out what’s underneath it. The first session is always free.
Frequently Asked Questions
Why do I always end up carrying everyone else’s problems?
Because at some point you learned that holding it all is how you stay connected to people. It probably started early, in a family where someone was underfunctioning or struggling, and you adapted by becoming capable, reliable, the one who could handle anything. That pattern followed you into subsequent relationships. It will keep following you until you understand what it’s actually costing you.
Is being a good listener the same as being a Shit Sherpa?
No. Being a good listener means being present with someone in their experience. Being a Shit Sherpa means absorbing their chaos so they don’t have to feel the weight of it themselves. One is connection. The other is enabling. The difference is usually whether the person is actually growing or just coming back with the same problems next week, and no new insight.
How do I stop being everyone’s therapist without losing my friendships?
By finding out which relationships can survive you being a real person in them rather than a function. Some will. Some won’t. The ones that can’t survive you having needs and limits and the occasional disappointment weren’t really sustainable to begin with.
Why do people get angry when I stop holding their problems?
Because you changed the terms of something they found very comfortable. When you stop being available to hold someone’s problems, they feel the weight you’ve been holding and it is heavy. The anger isn’t really about you. It’s about the loss of the service. And it’s important information about what the relationship actually was.
Is this the same as codependency?
Yes, essentially. Being a Shit Sherpa is codependency in action. It’s overfunctioning in friendships, making yourself indispensable through what you hold and absorb rather than who you actually are. The antidote is the same: understanding where the pattern came from, recognizing what it’s costing you, and learning to give people back what was always theirs.
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