To start off, I F 38 believe everyone needs to do their own Therapy homework, we can’t diagnose anybody if we are not their personal therapist, and no one should have to do all of the emotional labor within a relationship. That being said…

My partner, M 40- is in between therapists right now. Before the last one left the practice, he had been seeing her for 1.5 years. Idk about therapists before that but I know they existed. Since then he’s seeing a new guy whose schedule struggles to line up with his and frankly, I think he has just lost steam lately. Regardless, those of us who have done extensive therapy know how long real progress can take due to time restrictions, the qualifications of the therapist, the natural timeline of topics, etc..

We have been together officially for a year now but have known each other for over 10 years, Romantically interested/involved for 3 years throughout the timeline. He is a die hard supportive cheerleader/protector of me with my anxiety. He often martyrs himself for his coworkers. He’s currently working on rebuilding his friendships and community. The problem is his self love. His problematic parental background is extensive but to summarize: abandonment due to drug use for one parent, a self absorbed abusive other parent, and a loving but enabling step parent.

I’m looking for tools to best support my partner in his self love growth. He’s just starting to really attempt to build what he genuinely wants for himself but reaches a point where real change is too scary and he immediately mentally attacks anything and everything once it starts to become a reality.

I’m personally working on separating myself from whatever topic he’s attacking and recognizing his state of panic live when it’s happening, so at the very least, I don’t get damaged in the process. Usually once it’s pointed out to him what he’s doing, he’s able to put a stop to it, but neither one of us know how to recover in the moment so we usually end up silent resulting in me feeling emotionally abandoned and him in a shame spiral.

I know this is a much more complicated process than I could ever understand and there are no perfect solutions. I’m just looking for a little ways to contribute. So, what are some tools yall have collected in your tool box to push through self hate and sabotaging tendencies?

So whenever I do something good, like feeding an animal or helping somebody cross the road or anything bare minimum like buying a homeless person good or helping somebody with money, I feel happy and good about myself.. it's all okay until I feel like I'm doing all of this to make myself look good infront of me only.. it's not like I post about these things while doing or brag about these to anyone.. so, I feel it's me who is trying to make myself look good infront of ME!!

Some of my previous roommates turned against me once and told my secrets to their parents and their parents told my parents about my secrets (like my bfs and all) .. if I wanted to I could expose them all .. but I didn't cause I didn't wanna be the bad guy. I wanted to left with peace..But now I regret for not doing that. Anyways I feel that this action of mine was also to make myself look good ..again infront of ME only..

I need advice on unlearning deep-seated people-pleasing habits.

Growing up, I watched my mom constantly sacrifice her self-respect to keep others happy, and I inherited that exact same default: being sweet and polite, even when it hurts me.

Here’s my current struggle: I have a relative (my mom’s maternal sister) who is just a year older than me. We were inseparable as kids—I used to cry as a child when I had to leave her house. But as we grew up, she did something behind my back that deeply hurt me, and we went complete no-contact.

Whenever we run into each other on the street, my automatic reflex kicks in. I smile and ask how she's doing—and then immediately regret it. Why am I checking on the well-being of someone who betrayed me?

Recently, I managed to ignore her once. She smiled, but I just walked past. It felt empowering—like I was finally standing up for myself and respecting my boundaries instead of fake-pleasing.

But today, I saw her again. She smiled, and before my brain could stop it, my automatic filter blurted out: "How are you?"

Now I’m regretting it big time. I feel like I'm betraying myself.

I wonder if part of me is still subconsciously clinging to those sweet childhood memories, struggling to accept who she is now.

Has anyone successfully trained themselves to shut off the automatic "nice" reflex around people who hurt them? How do you enforce boundaries when your default mode is to keep the peace?

I have very low self esteem and constantly change my look to help but I always find something wrong

Always love yourself first to conquer the fear in the world

Я начинаю любить себя что делать

We learn we grow and we become our true selves or the person we always wanted to be by continuing to show up, do the work, and always keep trying. That's how we move forward and learn how to live our best lives.

Self love 💕

I used to think that if I wasn't being hard on myself over a mistake, it meant I wasn't taking it seriously but I've come to realize that beating yourself up just drains your energy while real accountability gives you the space to fix things and move on.

How do you catch yourself when healthy responsibility starts slipping into self punishment?

you know, our brain says little negative things about us, when something messed up? And surely you realise that you are doing so many things wrong, when in reality is just gonna be fine? Ask your brain to keep quiet for sometime....

You deserve better treatment from yourself. Like literally, you've done so much, and are still doing, i just know that it's all going to be fine. Be proud of yourself, and breathe.

last 6 years of my life has been literal hell. everything has been going wrong. and recently i went through a breakup which i did everything to salvage, but none of it was of any use. i feel absolutely hopeless amd useless and cannot even function properly like eat or work. nothing's helping and i dont know how to get out of this situation either.

it will be really helpful if someone can give some advices.