You abandon your friends and family because they do not want you to be around them. You do not talk to those who made you happy, who gave you a sense of connection. You shrink into a smaller version of yourself. You do not take part in activities that brought happiness, joy, and a sense of contentment into your life. You only do what pleases them. You start dressing down, cutting off people, and silencing yourself because you’re afraid of being who you truly are. You just cope. We call it “fawning.” You become what you think will keep them content or keep their abuse contained. That is not the way to live; that’s not a way to be. If you cannot be true to anyone without the fear of being judged, you are not loved.
Sign 5: You lose yourself.
You lose a bit of yourself every single day. You start developing weird mental and physical health issues: hypersensitivity to sound, exaggerated startle response, you cry all the time, you’re bitter to people, you’re irritated and agitated, people get on your nerves quite easily. You’re afraid; you’re always scrutinizing and interrogating yourself for saying the wrong thing. That’s not how relationships work. Your skin acts out, you have gut issues, unexplained nervous system-related issues, autoimmune disorders that you never had. You were perfectly okay, you were fine, you were healthy before meeting them, or at least things were not that bad. But all of a sudden, everything is falling apart. Your body is the biggest indicator of how you’re feeling and what you’re experiencing with a person. It’s not your food, it’s not your environment, it is the toxicity that is coming from their rotten self. Take these signs very seriously and do not forget to join my upcoming workshop on betrayal trauma. The link is in the description. With that, let’s bring this episode to an end. Thank you so much. I’ll talk to you in the next one. Until then, let the healing begin and continue.
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