Have you ever said, "I know this isn’t healthy for me but for whatever reason I just can’t seem to leave or stay away?" It’s most likely a “trauma bond”.

It has an extremely powerful pull because the pain you feel at the thought of them being unhappy with you is so intense that you run back to this dysfunction to avoid feeling the pain of the past trauma that is being brought to the surface.

The pain and the panic is too much. You just want to feel safe and comforted again. "Let’s just make up and go back to our dysfunctional normal."

You will continue this cycle until you finally gain the courage to sit in the pain of this past trauma that you have been carrying around most likely since childhood.

Unfortunately, the majority of us were raised by emotionally unhealthy adults. We looked to these emotionally unsafe adults or older siblings as a place of safety or comfort. They are older, bigger, so they must know more. Our minds are impressionable and we believe whatever they say.

Emotional dysfunction + manipulation & control tactics + times of comfort & safety = trauma bond.

I call it the break me, fix me cycle. The person breaks you down by taking their emotional garbage out on you, then they comfort you and pull you close to them with love and affection. This is a very unhealthy cycle and an unhealthy relationship.

No one should be breaking you. No one should be dumping their emotional garbage on you.
No one’s thoughts and opinions about you or your life should hold more influence or importance than your own..especially not an emotionally unhealthy person.

As children we don’t know any of this. So we bond for comfort with all we have available. Our emotional tanks are filled with pain and fear from the instability.

Then we grow up and we continue this type of bonding, and get hurt over and over again, relationship after relationship.

Once we learn about emotional health and what a healthy balanced relationship is supposed to look like, we begin our path to healing and dissolving that old stored pain we accumulated from when we didn’t know better.

#empath #relationshipgoals #relationshipadvice #toxicrelationships #healthyrelationships #selflove