Hi Reader

Last week I shared a post on Instagram that struck a chord in a big way. It was about self-abandonment, and how the relationship we have with ourselves sets the tone for every other relationship in our lives.

I've never met someone who deeply fears abandonment, who doesn't also regularly abandon themselves. I've never met someone who is terrified of rejection, who doesn't also reject, criticise, and shame parts of themselves on a daily basis. I've never met someone who constantly feels like an afterthought to others, who is genuinely good at prioritising themselves. I've never met someone desperate for reassurance, who deeply trusts that they will have their own back — no matter what. I've never met someone who struggles with boundaries in relationships, who holds clear and consistent boundaries with themselves.

The things we fear in relationships are so often reflections of the relationship we have with ourselves. This is where our work begins.

In the days that followed, I received hundreds of messages from people who saw themselves in these words — asking me to go deeper into what self-abandonment actually is, why we do it, and how to shift into something healthier.

So... let's talk about it.

In its most general sense, I view self-abandonment as anything we do in relationships where we choose connection to someone else over connection to ourselves. That might sound a little abstract, so let's look at some specific examples of how it can show up:

Pretending to be fine with something that you're actually really uncomfortable with
Making yourself responsible for (and trying to control) other people's emotions and behaviour
Continuing to tolerate something that you said you would no longer tolerate
Overriding your gut sense that something is not right because the truth feels too threatening to the status quo
Taking on more than you have capacity for in order to be maintain your identity as the "helpful" one
Overfunctioning, people-pleasing, and caretaking to the point of burnout and resentment
Blaming ourselves for other people's treatment of us, and trying to prove our worth to make them change
Chasing after people who are inconsistent, non-committal, or otherwise unavailable for the kind of relationship we want and need

This isn’t anywhere near an exhaustive list, but it gives you a sense of just how pervasive these patterns can be.

And while self-abandonment is not the exclusive domain of anxious attachers, let's be honest — there'd be a lot of overlap in that Venn diagram. Which makes so much sense — because when our deepest fear is being abandoned by another, we will almost always abandon ourselves first to prevent that from happening.

So we tiptoe. We minimise. We ruminate, rationalise, suppress, pursue, and self-silence — all in the name of preserving connection. And while that might “work” in the short-term, it comes at a high cost.

Because when we fracture our inner relationship in order to sustain a relationship with someone else, we naturally become overly reliant on that relationship to provide us with everything: comfort, identity, meaning, worth, and safety. And so if anything happens to threaten that relationship, we feel completely vulnerable, powerless, and out of control... which in turn drives the classic "anxious attachment" behaviours that we all know so well.

This is why I will always guide people back to self, first.

Because until we learn to relate from a solid inner foundation — one built on self-trust, self-respect, and deep self-worth — we’ll always be reaching for someone else to make us feel okay. And it’s really hard to build a healthy, reciprocal relationship from that place.

If you'd like to go deeper on this topic, I released a podcast episode this week on How & Why We Abandon Ourselves in Relationships, which you can check out here.

As always, I'd love to hear how this has landed for you. Feel free to hit reply and let me know — I read every response, even if I can't respond to each person individually.

Sending love,
Steph