how TF do people with CPTSD find relationships

No idea. I don’t even want a romantic relationship, just a friendship. But people just keep saying that I need to love myself before I can have that meanwhile there’s so many people I’ve met in group therapy and elsewhere that have relationships/friendships without the condition of being totally mentally/physically healthy. I feel like I try all the typical advice and nothing changes :(

Just wanted to say I fucking feel you. Also 29 and just want a partner to live life with, not looking for perfection but can't seem to figure it out and bond with anyone in that way. Years of therapy, all the tricks and I can't seem to get things right. Also, turning 30 is such a hellish time to feel this way. So many people around me seem to have success in that way, mental illness or not. Can't help but compare myself to them sometimes and it's awful.

So much for unconditional love, right? I have to work for years to fix my broken brain before I deserve love.

Yeap. It's starting to piss me off when people say this. It's not even "the condition is mutual respect!" Bullshit. Sure that too, but the condition is to be healthy, and frankly we are not, and it's not even our fault. Like fine I get it, I get how it works, I get it's a reasonable condition, but I wish we stopped pretending it's not there.

OP, the more responses I read from you, the more I identify with the situation. Im 29 and have not been kissed once. I can't understand how some people just 'fall' into relationships either.

Let me tell you a secret: most people aren't aware of how dysfunctional their relationships actually are. I noticed this a lot in couples I'm friends with: they'll say how much they love the other person, but then do weird shit. For example I'm friends with a couple in an open relationship, and recently one of them said "I know [partner] is going to be jealous if I hook up with [other person] but honestly that's their problem."

Most relationships are deeply flawed, but that's not the part that we can see at first, so take everything with a grain of salt.

That said: I feel you. I recently tried to find peace with the fact that I'll never be able to be in a loving relationship. As trauma survivors we are constantly forced to not only repair, but also to protect ourselves. Each new person is a new threat, a new chance to experience more trauma. And as much as I hate the "you need to love yourself first" rhetoric there is a certain amount of truth to it, since many of us - me included - tend to think of ourselves as worthless, and are therefore putting a partner on a pedestal which gives the other person an unreasonable amount of power and/or responsibility, therefore resulting in a relationship that's not equal for both partners.

I'm sorry you have to deal with this. I truly wish you get to experience that kind of love one day, because you deserve it.

I relate to you so much… People keep saying that healing relational trauma must happen with others. And the next thing they tell me is that I don’t need anyone and I have to learn to love myself. Which one is it? These comments can be triggering since I get the feeling of being left alone and abandoned, just like my childhood. Like nothing has changed and I was doomed to live in isolation, without ever experiencing closeness.

Same, I don’t feel worthy of love and happiness unless I’ve ticked off all superficial qualities - rich, jacked and lives a cool unique life, funny all the time, can handle life’s problems all the time so I don’t drag my partners mood down.

I feel you. The way my trauma presents is as a deep fear of intimacy, I shut down when people are into me or pursue me. I thought I was just picky and it'd fall into place when I met the right person, but I met him and developed severe trauma symptoms. I've been so depressed since finding out there's a chance I might never fall in love.

Almost all my exes made me feel like I was "too much," like my traumas were too much for them to deal with. They were all immature. I finally found a man who understands, and when he doesn't, is patient and eager to learn. They are out there but hard to find. Don't give up on yourself and your dreams of a healthy relationship!

I feel your struggle there. I've never dated or had anyone interested in me. I think it's like if you're sick, people will avoid you. We're "sick" in a way that isn't obvious, but people can tell anyway.

I'm also scared of potentially dating someone who will abuse me, or break my heart. I'm envious of some of the users here who've found love with kind, gentle people. I want that too. I don't really leave my house much though.

I feel the same way at 30, but also admit: I haven't been on a date, ever. I'm too terrified and traumatized to be on an app. I think there are so many reasons it can be impossible to find love. And when things don't seem to work out for you, you automatically go looking for those reasons – I think it's good to remember: a lof of practically perfect people go on a million dates and don't find anyone. There's so much coincidence and luck involved. Not finding someone doesn't mean there's anything wrong with you. And I've found that just as difficult to accept.

CPTSD could absolutely be a factor, but also: love is just hard to find. I think it's a good idea to work on it in therapy, I'm also planning on doing that. Personally, I think I've probably got a lot of blind spots, and damaging internalized beliefs about what I need to do to be loveable, good enough for someone. I haven't quite hacked loving myself enough to be able to deal with rejection.

I feel you OP. One thing I have learned is that people who need love the most never get love!!

... i just got a cat. that's been my solution.

Gotta make friends first. To do that gotta understand what your trauma is doing that makes it difficult to make friends. I'm freeze/fight. The battle is to get out of bed and into a social situation each week. To motivate myself to have clean clothes and nice hair and not give up after an awkward conversation. And then focus on staying present and being genuine. With the fight side making sure I feel safe, not on the defensive, not being hypercritical of myself or others, etc. People who want genuine friends will be turned off by the trauma responses, it's just the reality of life. It's not that they don't want to help, it's the opposite- they want to, but they never see our authentic selves and so they realise they can't help us until we help ourselves.

Part of my CPTSD comes from being raised pretty much in isolation (my only sibling is nonverbal due to autism) and from being bullied and rejected by peers in school. I spent my school years hanging onto the edge of different friend groups, going through all kinds of stuff in hopes that I would be finally accepted as one of them, and then getting pushed out. The same thing happened freshman year of college, with people who I'd previously thought were the only ones that could understand me because they were also fucked up. I haven't really had friends since then. I haven't talked to any of the few people that I ended on a good note with in high school or college (before the pandemic) in a while. Romantic relationships are out of the question. I was bullied for my appearance, and even today hate taking photos or seeing myself in mirrors. I still perceive a guy finding out that I like him as a fate worse than death, so putting myself out there is impossible.

In friendships with people who are at least functional, it always feels like I'm a burden that needs to be looked after and cared for. I hate that feeling even with my older relatives, never mind with people who are my age or even younger. But in friendships with people who are doing even worse than I am, they become my responsibility and I have to talk them out of doing dumb shit over and over and it always stresses me out. I don't think I've ever had a friendship where one person wasn't "saving" the other (although with the people I was with in my first year of college it switched back and forth between who was saving who). Applying this dynamic to a romantic relationship would be even worse. Even if I could find a guy who was willing to play caretaker, which isn't likely, I would hate myself for it.

I say all this to say, I understand, OP. I don't understand how people with similar trauma/mental illnesses are able to still lead somewhat normal lives and relationships while I'm this.

We are all worthy of love, 100%. Any society where power and control (authoritarianism) are valued much higher than integrity is going to find those with the most integrity at the bottom of the heap being abused and traumatized by those with the power and control, as they continue to justify why they cannot give up any of it to us.

That is, until, we embrace, protect, and strengthen ourselves through reparenting our inner child to healthy adult thoughts and behaviors, maintaining healthy discretion and boundaries with safe enough people when they earn our trust through clear action and authentic concern, and finding and keeping our true north identity while learning how to embrace our own power and determination and use it in powerfully placed quiet and loud subterfuge of the patriarchy. ;) Fight my dear, fight! We need you and YOU are amazing. <3

And somewhere on the journey of you, you’ll find someone, or several someones, who will love and cherish you deeply.

I think it’s hard to find a good relationship in general, this condition just makes it even harder. And honestly (I mean this in the best way possible) you could be the one getting in the way of being happy. I have had a long history of abuse and finally found a healthy relationship. It took a long time and a insane amount of patience from him and a lot of self awareness on my part to see that the way I thought of relationships and just people in general was really problematic and did my mental health a lot of harm in the long run. But, in my defence I had every right to think the way I did .. after all it’s all I knew and I thought I was protecting myself. If you can’t rely on therapists be your own therapist. I have read a lot of emotional intelligence, cognitive therapy, anxiety, anger management, laws of human nature .. you name it books and it helped me SO MUCH. Your time will come <3

I've been mulling your post over for a while. I want to hug you. I'm sorry you're hurting and no it's not fair.

I assume the worst. A relationship is bound to be doomed so I just accept I’ll be single for ever and don’t bother. Got nothing to bring to the proverbial table anyway.

I have no clue... On top of it a lot of use are misdiagnosed, discarded for mental illness and of chronic unemployment.

I really feel like the only "healthy, loving" relationship I can have is with myself.

I’m also 29 and experiencing this. I always fall for my friends and they never feel the same way. My current one sided crush texted me on my birthday and I was so excited thinking that maybe he remembered. Nope. He was killing time at the airport waiting to catch a flight to see his gf.

It’s honestly extremely invalidating as a woman to be so invisible to men. I’m pretty much at the point where the idea of being in a relationship is almost unfathomable but I can’t abandon my desire for love and sex. It’s deeply embarrassing that I’m likely going to turn 30 next year before having my first kiss, going on a date, or having sex. My friends tell me to just hook up with someone to get over the initial fear, but I can’t do that. I get overwhelmingly scared if anyone messages me on dating sites to the point that I’ll block and delete my account after a few messages. It doesn’t help that men around my age expect that a 29 year old woman has MUCH more experience and are on a significantly faster timeline. I’m still basically a teenager in terms of relationships where kissing is a HUGE deal but trying to date in a situation where everyone else anticipates sex very quickly. I also don’t know how to be intimate and I know I’ll be bad at it at first. So I need someone to not only be interested in me, but patient enough to wait potentially months for bad sex. That seems beyond incomprehensible that anyone would find me worth that. I don’t think I’m worth that.

[TW: CSA] I hate my dad so much for doing this to me and it hurts beyond comprehension that I’ve been alive for nearly three decades and the only person who “wanted” me is my own father. I feel like he stole my sexuality from me and I’m too afraid/worthless to reclaim it on my own terms with a man I actually want to be with. If he were on fire, I’d sooner look for gasoline than piss on him. I hate both of my parents for depriving me of love as a kid and making it impossible to find love as an adult then shaming me for being single.

My partner of 26 years survived a brutal war and also has CPTSD. We understand and empathize with each other. It just works for us. And now her mother, who has one of the most brutal life stories I know and is a senior with previously untreated CPTSD, is living with us because her country collapsed. There's a lot of respect and compassion involved.

I am sorry for your experience. CPTSD definitely gets in the way. I don’t know how I was lucky enough to end up with a man who stayed with me through all of it. I mean he had his own issues for sure, but he was absolutely devoted to me and loved me unconditionally (and me him). He had an unexpected catastrophic stroke and died June 1st. We had been together 20 years. I am disabled and I don’t know how I am going to live without him.

I have unconditional love for people, i wish i could find a man who wouldn't abuse that to his advantage. It seems like narcissistic people are drawn to my love like moths to a flame, because it takes an extreme amount for me to stop truly loving someone.

I haven't quite figured that out for myself either.

Obviously we commit to emotionally and/or physically unavailable people because that's how we've spent most of our lives. Someone just has to express that they care, even if it isn't genuine, and we turn to putty in their hands. Thankfully it does get a bit easier the more you expose yourself and learn, but by nature we are pretty prone to being used and abused.

I've learned to just focus on myself. I mean I may have been pretty mean to myself in the past, but goddamn it if I don't treat myself much better than any of the people I've cut out of my life have, lol. Based on the good people I've kept in my life, I know someone that I truly mesh with is out there in the same dilemma. I just have to give myself time and space and continue to do what's best for myself until that door opens up.

I truly feel that i found my partner out of pure luck, i am terrible at making relationships too and i have almost no close friends because of it. I am unable to trust which makes me very closed off from the get go, and when i finally start opening up to others a bit more i either get scared and shut down (cut them off) or i start trying to escape a friendship from them. I have a very difficult time making any sort of friends im sorry i have no advice.

if it makes you feel any better traumatized people have a tendency to attract abusers so many of us have had less than perfect relationships. there’s two sides to every coin and a relationship with the wrong person can set your healing back immensely.

I feel you.

I'm in the exact same boat, and I'm not even remotely hideous. Makes me feel alien AF

yuppppp I refuse to date because I know that I am all the red flags bc of the cPTSD and all I want is to be able to heal that but I'd never want to subject someone to my shit downs or the stuff I say when I get triggered so I won't date because I'm not going to do that to someone else. and the catch 22 is the only way to fix the flags is to be in healthy relationships. so it's just a cycle of never getting to fix it and having to hide myself from people so I don't act toxic when something triggers me

My boyfriend is pretty neurotypical and pursues me despite me warning him about what a dumpster fire I am. Still I feel like I am hiding so many parts of myself from him, and that at any moment he’ll discover the real me and all my financial issues and book it. It feels like it’s only a matter of time until the clock runs out on our relationship so I’m just trying to enjoy it while it lasts I guess.

I have a good friend whom I've known for over 30 years. When we were in our 20s, I thought she was really quiet and boring, and I didn't really want to hang out with her even though she was quite nice. We went our separate ways and about 10 years later I ran into her. She was still basically the same person, but I realized I had changed because I could see things in her that I really loved that I had been too young and dumb to appreciate before. She is still really quiet, although somewhat less than before, but now I can also see that she is just a very solid human being and the kind of friend who would really do anything for you. I've been around long enough to know that it's the quality of your friends that matters a lot more than the quantity. She still struggles emotionally a decent amount, but I find her to be really emotionally stable in some ways too. And even when she is going through something, she is never difficult with me or a drama queen. Perhaps some would say that is boring, but I think it's pretty great.

​

Also, I don't think it's uncommon to go through that many therapists. Good for you for not staying if they are not working for you. I hope you find someone great.

I feel like my husband only loves me when I’m in a healthy/emotionally stable place. I would really love him to love my ‘unloveable’ side. I want to be unconditionally loved.

If anyone has this issue with maintaining friendships, help ya girl out. I

Well for one, the “quality” of humans is Not Universal! Some “totally Neurotypical people” suck, anyways! Not everyone is worth Your time! Understand that.

If you know that you still have a lot of Love to Give in spite of your Complex PTSD, then not just anyone deserves you, anyways! I know that this probably sounds counterintuitive but honestly, “No romantic relationship” is better than “any romantic relationship.”

A bad one is a great way to traumatize ourselves further, and F0ck up our lives, even more! You have to be honest with yourself. Do you truly want “a romantic relationship” knowing that your mental health isn’t where you want it to be?

Even good romantic relationships, where both people are “healthy, and Neurotypical” are really hard! Romance isn’t all it’s cracked up to be unless you find someone who is actually worth your time. Someone who makes you laugh, or at least smile, and who is willing to listen to you when times are rough.

Nobody will ever be able to “give us the validation” we desire, because we don’t know “what that looks like,” because the people who were supposed to provide that didn’t bother! Science, neurology and the whole mental healthcare field haven’t figured out how to fix that.

So even when we are in romantic relationships, there will always be a “Lack,” and a sense of “self-doubt, and general worthlessness.” That is soooooo deeply entrenched in our minds that it, essentially, “broke our brains.” There are Literal Neurological differences between us, and “the Normies” now.

So what we have to do is admit to ourselves, “I am broken, but that’s okay. Realistically, all humans are ‘broken,’ in some way because life can be cruel! I still won’t settle for less than I want, and what I deserve based on the good things I can provide!”

I have been married, for over a decade, and I did absolutely nothing! I just made sure that he was a good, trustworthy man, ahead of time, and let him Truly Love Me, even if I “didn’t get it,” and I still struggle to accept it, so I try my hardest to reciprocate! It can’t be all bad for him, if it’s been a decade!

The problem with complex PTSD is that we tend to be drawn to people who “don’t really give a $hit” about us, cuz we are “used to it.” So, we often miss out on the people directly in our faces, who actually do care about us!

We can also be “needy,” in the sense that just because we haven’t heard from someone in a few days, a few weeks, to a “few months” that we say to ourselves they “don’t actually care about us, at all!” And I know it feels that way, to us! But, when I objectively, and rationally analyze their behavior, and actions, nothing about that is true!

They are simply a bit “self-absorbed,” as we all can be, and they are caught up in their own lives, as we all tend to be. Post ~22-25, life changes. It’s hard to find quality relationships, period! We just don’t have the opportunity to get to know quality people, all that often, cuz we are all just trying to survive! Sure, those of us who have “complex PTSD” drew yet another short straw! Things is, there are less, and less, and less “straws to go around,” overall!

Yeah, it makes me sad when my husband has to work extra hours, yeah it bums me out when my friends don’t respond to my text messages. I feel dejected, rejected, and “worthless,” the same way all of us do! It hurts, and it sucks!

The thing I have noticed, as slightly older woman now (32,) is that we are all scared! We are all afraid that “Nobody really likes me for who I truly am,” that we “will never be good enough,” and that few of us “Live up to the image we impose upon ourselves,” including “perfectly Neurotypical people,” who have lived a “mostly comfortable life.”

Because we all create this freakin image of ourselves and others, in our brains that “don’t match objective reality.” It just so happens that most people who have complex PTSD never learned how to hide our feelings, our guilt, and our sense of shame. While it makes our lives more challenging, it’s not truly who we are. Just an aspect of us that’s “different from the general populace.” You are still a whole @$$ human, independent of the fact that you have C-PTSD. As such, you deserve just as much consideration, acknowledgement, and your time is Just as valuable as any other human being’s time! There is no such thing as “unconditional Love,” and honestly, there really shouldn’t be, as that’s not actually “Healthy.”

The fact that people believe in such an unrealistic notion is precisely why we all feel like $hit, and those of us with Neuro-Psych conditions have the misfortune of “feeling $hitty more easily, and more often than the general populace” cuz we are chronically Traumatized for some reason or another, and our brains are permanently changed, and “Divergent,” as a result. But Oh, well! What can we realistically do about it?

That’s too relatable and hurtful. It’s a curse. I wish to be someone normal so much.

Feeling strong attachment to those that are emotionally unavailable or even unaware- is most likely a theme due to the childhood programing. The unattainable is what seems familiar and intense.

Work on that. If you can modify those feelings and get comfortable with accessible people- that may work for many. Others could find someone similarly effected by their childhood experiences and be submissive or dominant with them- within safe and respectful params.

I feel you on this one. I don't think it's ever going to happen for me. Because I'm 45 at this point.

Relationships are a bit easier than friendships in my experience because at least there’s a structure in place where you put yourself on a dating app and play the part of a person dating, by following the usual movie scripts.

Friendships are way harder for me so any advice for that is nice. There’s no real script on how much you should care or share or anything; and I’ve felt even with trust issues I am still more caring (maybe actually unhealthy caring too much) than the average friend while simultaneously having no idea how to open up. I don’t know if people have found that the friendship scripts in movies don’t play as well as the romance ones?

Found my boyfriend through online dating. I am open about my CPTSD early on (without detail, no trauma dumping) so I can sift through to find a guy who’s pro mental health and not judgmental.

I used to have this problem. This is how I rationalized my way out of it.

1. You are the only one maintaining the relationship you share with another person, means from the other person's perspective, they probably are intentionally putting distance between you. Good relationships flow naturally, they should never feel emotionally taxing or straining, don't be afraid to let a connection go untapped for a while until you have a "real reason" to reach out. Like to make plans on the spot, or, for holidays.

2. I was unable to form any meaningful connections for my entire life, until I met my now wife. I am friends with her friends, and we are pretty close, but that's because I have my wife to buffer our interactions.

I try to come across as engaged, interested, and knowledgeable. But my wife tells me people tell her that I come across as incredibly intimidating. I had a rough childhood as I am sure most here have had, I have various intensities about me that I am not always consciously aware of, apparently I have a bit of the "calculated psycho killer" look about me, which is a bit distressing. Sometimes I may argue a point, or push a conversation beyond a point of exhaustion. Without trying or even wanting to.

I'm not aware of it while I'm doing it, I'm just very desensitized to listening to the hours long rants of my own angry parents, and needing to be able to remember what the point of it all was, and the few important bits laced between the screams and laments. A ten minute conversation can be incredibly taxing on a neurotypical person, who wasn't specifically conditioned to endure that sort of thing, from somebody who is used to putting their "value proposition" into every conversation. (See I am knowledgeable about subject x, you should come to me with all of your subject x questions)

I can only describe it in this detached way, because I can only describe it in terms that have been explained to me from my wife, and only because I can trust my wife can I even believe that what I've just said is objective reality.

Most people with CPTSD probably don't even realize they have it. They probably feel like they've had "a pretty normal life" because regardless of your actual life experience we usually all try to normalize our own life, and everyone else ends up looking a bit odd. But in reality it's the opposite. We are the odd ones out, everyone else is "normal" or "normal passing".

Try not to get discouraged. I'm 30 years old. My best friend is my wife, I met her through a dating app, we worked out, because she was in school to become a teacher, and she received specific training during that education that helped her identify that I'm very fucked up, and she was able to understand that fucked upedness. Even I never considered myself as a sufferer of CPTSD, I have some health care benefits as a veteran, but, a. Nobody really gives a shit about what happened to you as a kid unless you kill someone, and b. Neurotypicals can't look at your situation without saying something to the effect of "why don't you just get over yourself?" Or "why don't you let this pain go?"

It takes a special kind of person to see beyond the pain, to see the person you're trying to be, that you want to be. That you exist, as you do, with the pain, and sometimes in spite of it, and there is nothing that you can do, that will ever invalidate the pain, or make it less impactful on your life.

Outside of my wife though, I won't be shocked, I'll be ready, in the event that the rest of the world abandons me. I'm grateful, that I am comfortable enough in my relationship with my wife, that I can expect her to be home at the end of the day. I can EXPECT it of her. I could allow myself to feel discouraged, if she weren't there.

I can't EXPECT it of my family, and I could never EXPECT it of my friends. May as well be passing shadows and ghosts imo.

Sorry that was a bit of a rant. Still trying to work on my own value proposition, even still.

Good luck!

I mean, I totally feel you. That said, you say you’re 29 like that’s old. :) The first man I found that was worth my time was when I was 30. I’m now married to him. There were a lot of worthwhile women before that, but I didn’t know I was bi yet so I missed out lol.

My 20s was a shit show. My 30s has been sooo much better. Men I hand around are more mature. If they aren’t, I just ditch em. I’m more mature and working to heal.

You are totally deserving of unconditional love.

Edit: men I *hang around. Funny typo though.

I think you notice the posts/comments that mention relationships more so because that's a core issue for you. Because sometimes I feel that sense of "what's so wrong with me that they are successful where I can't be?" but in reality it's not all that prevalent. I have even resented people in the real world for such things.

I recently had a consult with someone after a long wait and this was my stated goal, to be able to make connections better. My problem is the mental fatigue I experience leading up to basic events or tasks that leave me with nothing left for other people. If I have an appointment or errand regardless of how small I am completely spent in terms of social energy left afterwards. I just want to be alone but I am so lonely at the same time. I have a lone but super supportive and understanding friend. Who also has cptsd or honestly it would probably never work.

One last comment/opinion. The idea of unconditional love is so wild and unhealthy to put on others. Like my previously mentioned friend and I are former partners and we have this deep love and respect for one another even after not being romantically involved for nearly 2 years. If I banged one of her family members ever that would vanish instantaneously along with my dong. There are always conditions even if you'd never hypothetically do said conditions.

I just got fucking lucky. And me and SO both have issues/therapy, wich makes the therapy work more possible..blablabla…I can say what I want…but I still got lucky and I know it. So I wouldnt know, I know either way its unfair and not your fault that relationships can feel so impossible.

My husband and I trauma bonded to each other as kids. We are fully aware that neither of us could ever really love or even stand someone else because of it. We have had our fair share of really rough times, but we always talk about how rough it is out there being single when you’ve gone through trauma. If we didn’t have each other we would both just fully throw ourselves into our jobs and hobbies and have pets and spend out money on self care and experiences and whatever comforts money can buy. I hope you find someone that has walked a mile in your shoes, but if you don’t, life can still be beautiful and the non romantic relationships can be fulfilling. You’re so young though, you have at least 10 years before the pool really starts to get small.

I found a woman with CPTSD, this is the only way I've found happiness since my diagnosis. I know that it is the exception and not the rule but she understands. Regular people don't want/have to so they don't understand.✌️

I can relate. I'm accepting that it's highly unlikely I'd find a loving healthy relationship. I'm very much not conventionally attractive and they say personality is what matters, but my personality is basically 200+ traumas in a trenchcoat lol. Mental healthcare sucks ass in my country and I don't have the money for better. I can't in good conscience allow someone I like to deal with intimacy issues, social incompetence, and tons of other trauma related issues. Who would have the patience for all that when they could find someone who can actually give them what they want? Don't even get me started on being trans and an ethnic minority. My mental health won't make it through the dating hellscape :/

Reddit is having issues with my (rather long) comment, so I will have to split it up into a bit of a thread...

So much for unconditional love, right? I have to work for years to fix my broken brain before I deserve love.

And YET somehow I see stories everywhere of people with CPTSD who found relationships. Even super healthy, loving, healing relationships. Even relationships they found before ever even thinking about therapy. So maybe it's not the CPTSD at all. I'm just fucked up. Or maybe I'm hideous. How am I supposed to believe I'm deserving or worthy of love? I'm obviously not. I didn't even experience anything that bad and yet I somehow ended up incapable of attracting love and probably incapable of loving.

I have countless journal entries where i wondered the same exact thing. For YEARS. So please know that i came from the same exact place of existential torment when I say this. What i learned through healing is that unconditional love is something YOU can only give YOURSELF.

Y'know the kind of love a parent is supposed to be able to give you when you're a small vulnerable child? I believe the reason for that is that children don't know anything about the world when they enter it. It's on the parents to meet that child as a brand new person and give enough emotional latitude to be supportive and caring.

However, those of us with self-absorbed parents end up being neglected and abused. Why? I expect it's because our own parents can't love unconditionally, because they also can't love themselves unconditionally. Why? Because they probably had some shitty version of childhood as well due to self-absorbed parents.

The way we are meant to learn to love ourselves unconditionally is by example. Parents who successfully emotionally attune to their children WON'T punish them for crying, threaten them with their worst nightmare to force them to behave (mine was "stop crying or you can go sit in the car while we have fun at the family Christmas party"), use them as an emotional punching bag, etc.

Instead, good parents WILL meet their child's emotions where they're at and use gentler tactics to 1. Reassure the child they're loved and cared for and 2. Teach the child to self-soothe. They will observe the child's actual interests and encourage them to grow in their own way, rather than what the parent thinks is "right" (i.e. signing them up for art camp if the child loves drawing, rather than forcing the kid to go to math camp). They will actually praise the child for doing good things (imagine that!). And they will not usually take out their negative feelings on the child. If they DO, they will actually APOLOGIZE (shocking, I know).

All that is to say, our childhood will set us up with the tools to go out into the world. And unfortunately, OUR childhoods taught us that we are unlovable as we are, that we are inherently misunderstood and unappreciated, and that we can't be our true selves. So what do we do about that?

We reparent ourselves. We learn the things we should have learned from our parents. That our interests have a place. That we have gifts that can be appreciated, even if only by ourselves sometimes (for instance, my husband can make puns sometimes that silence the room like a bad fart lol). We learn to literally self-soothe (NOT COPE) which involves noticing the actual physical sensations (reconnecting with our body) and figuring out how to calm our emotions through physical action (screaming into a pillow, rocking back and forth, going for a run, recognizing when we're overtired and need a nap and maybe a good cry, etc).

When you start to learn all that, you start to see the ugly things about your CPTSD that maybe remind you too much of your parents. For me, CPTSD made me see the world through the lens of victimhood. I conceptually knew I could do wrong, but I believed i had good intentions, i was being victimized, i was hurt so of course I reacted by lashing out, what do i have to apologize for??? But over time, i started to see that my victim mindset made me like my narcissistic parent (read: parent who had CPTSD and no introspection skills so they got stuck with the mentality of a 14 year old brat), in the sense that I actually had such a hard time apologizing when I behaved shittily. I truly thought I had empathy all my life, but when it came down to it, i realized I was unable to empathize with the recipients of my own behavior because I was always on the defensive.

Why was i defensive? I'd felt the need to fight for my right to exist. Bc my own parent had behaved toward me in a way that seemed to call my worthiness into question. So, what i needed to learn was that 1. No one is perfect, and even my parent had no idea what perfection was - they were just so uncomfortable with themselves that it passed on to me; 2. I truly could not love another person until i learned to love myself. Not because I was unworthy of love, and not because I couldn't feel fondness for another, but because love is actually something you do, not something you feel. And I did not have a proper foundation for how to love. And 3. My inner child could guide me in learning to love.

For instance, loving another means accepting their quirks and being curious, rather than victimized, when your partner does something that frustrates you. For instance, not getting angry over them leaving a glass on the counter, assuming they're lazy, and instead communicating about why they did that (they have valid reasons for things just as you do) and coming to an understanding about what each of you prefers in the situation so you can agree on how to handle dishes in the future.

Loving also means that you can accept their love without question. And you can't do that if you're constantly wondering whether you're worthy of love at all. Yes you are, you just need to find it within yourself. Even if you recognize toxic or lazy behaviors in yourself that you want to change, that doesn't mean you're unworthy. It means you're human. So, even if your partner is mad at you or hurt by you, know that you have the agency to change that through genuine behavioral changes. Healing from CPTSD, you're going to do a lot of apologizing. And i don't mean apologizing for your existence. I mean reflecting on your behavior, even sometimes feeling it was SO justified, apologizing for hurting your partner, and trying to do better in the future. For us, that usually means recognizing triggers and bodily sensations and dissociation and making a real concerted effort to change how we react to those triggers.

Some healthy tactics you may find helpful: express your emotion directly ("I feel angry right now"), reassure them and tell them you're working on it ("I love you, so i want to take some time to calm down and think about my own contributions to this issue before we continue"), and be vulnerable with your needs ("could i have a hug?")

For me, attachment injuries are the hardest to heal. Fortunately, they are also the most rewarding when I make any progress.

I remember some authors writing that crushes could actually be a symptom of attachment disorder.

Maybe that could be tripping you up. It seems to be quite common in this community.

You do not have to answer but do you ask people out for dates?

I have CPTSD from very bad things in childhood and a couple in adulthood. I’ve been married 23 years. I’ve been in therapy a few times. Been on/off meds. Most of my healing has been done on my own. Reading. Writing. Avoiding. Starting over. My brand of traumas birthed a lot of compassion and empathy so I’m a very kind & thoughtful person who happens to hurt a lot and often felt like I’m nothing important. But I long ago learned that the voice that convinced me of that that is a liar. That’s what I call “Kevin” -the voice of unreason; the voice that was hurt and neglected and made to feel insignificant. For so many of us, the internal “Kevin” is wrapped up in habitual patterns of thinking & hurting. It’s the deepest wounds we carry. All the ugly things said about us that we decided must be true. Healing started when I started calming that voice. When I started saying no to it. When I started offering it compassion as I would to anyone else hurting. Try doing that for yourself. Give that internal dialogue a name. This helps distance yourself from self-identifying as all those negative things. You are not disgusting or unloveable. That’s just wounded Kevin feeding you lies because he doesn’t know any better. Teach him better. Each time those negative thoughts arise, challenge them. Counter them. Make this a habit. Eventually, you’ll notice a shift in how you see yourself and when that happens, your relationship with others are easier, more genuine, and deeper. It’s not easy. It takes consistent practice and there will be times when you still feel defeated by “Kevin”, but you deserve to find happiness and love, so it’s worth it.

I'm sorry I can't give you advice, just my experience. The CSA trauma started when I was a child, so I believe I have CPTSD since then. I have never had a normative body either, I'm very far from what society finds attractive, I only have a sort of pretty face and that's about it. Still, a lot of people have been interested in me during all my life.

There were some things related to CPTSD that got in the way. I was constantly dissociated, had low self esteem and lots of hypervigilance. So when anyone was interested in me, 95% of the times I didn't notice because subconsciously I was trying to avoid all relationships (this is very common with CSA, either you are sex avoidant or hypersexual, sometimes both throughout your life). The few times I noticed I would make up shitty excuse in my head: "they are trying to manipulate me", "I'm sure this is a bet they made with their friends", "it's impossible they like someone like me", and more.

The only relationship I had in my life besides the abuse was a very shitty one who only lasted a few months, and it wasn't healthy neither. If I could choose again, I would rather not have that relationship again. I was young, confused, I only knew to be treated badly so I allowed lots of the shitty things that happened. CPTSD played a part in that. And that relationship ended when I got a flashback, told him and he left me.

However, all that happened while I was living on denial. Once I realized what happened to me was abuse, everything changed. I started noticing all the people who flirted with me. At first it was unbearable for me, it was so new that I didn't know what to do. Now I still don't know how to react but I have learned to accept those things happen. I still have CPTSD but I'm high functioning so people don't notice. So I guess I wasn't ready for a relationship all that time and my brain knew in some twisted way. Still, I can't reciprocate most of the times because I am on the asexual spectrum, that's giving me more problems than the mental condition.

I don't know your situation but saying CPTSD is getting in the way is very blunt. Everyone has their trauma and insecurities, even neurotypicals, and those condition the way we have relationships. It just happens that our trauma hurted us more than the others. In fact, I would say we have the potential of looking for healthier relationships since we are trauma informed while most neurotypicals try to hide and deny their problems.

Sorry about the long post, but the short answers is that, in my opinion... Although some symptoms might be getting in the way, don't discard the possibility that it's a mix of more factors. Society is still ableist and still lives in denial as a whole, they prefer to not see the kind of horrible things that happened to us and that certainly has an effect in how they see us. They neither understand that you can live with a chronic illness and have relationships at the same time - at this point I consider CPTSD a chronic condition, at least in my case. And that's not the CPTSD, but a social problem that is not our fault.

I totally found my first one by accident and it basically set my expectations SUPER high for the future and gave me a checklist relationship and sex-wise in the best way.

6 therapists have been disasters

How so?

ask someone you're never gonna see again, like a person moving out of town, why you can't get a date. you're lucky, lots of people missed their best dating years not knowing what cptsd was