Can you be brought up to be unlovable?

[GottaGettaway]

I'm 45 years old, I've never been loved and I'm wondering now if I'm just unloveable.

I don't think I was born unloveable. I think I was brought up to be so. I was emotionally and physically abused as a child and teen. Whilst the physical abuse from my parents ended when I was 18 and left home, the emotional abuse continued until I finally went NC a few years ago. I was aware of my relationship with my parents breaking down from about 8 and was regularly told from being around 10 that no one would love me, that I was unloveable. There was no emotional warmth or support ever and emotionally, I've been on my own since I was about 3. I developed all sorts of coping mechanisms to deal with that. Although I've only really understood that in the last 5 years or so. I had counselling but I have been told that to undo it all, I'd need long term intensive therapy to, essentially, take myself apart and put myself back together again. I have been warned it would be traumatic. I can't afford, financially, mentally or emotionally, to do that.

When I was younger, I was desperate to prove to myself and them that I wasn't unloveable and had a lot of boyfriends but, if they weren't physically or emotionally abusive, I rejected them because they didn't care enough. I read it as ambivalence.

When I was younger, I thought that, one day, I would meet someone who loved me. But I haven't. I didn't realise at the time but I was quite dysfunctional and wouldn't actually have recognised 'love' even if I had found it.

I had a lot of one night stands and brief flings that I always ended after a matter of weeks. I didnt think for a second that these ONSs were 'love' but it was all I could really cope with. My mum I was told I was too fat and unattractive to he loved. I wasn't fat. My dad just didnt give me any reason to believe I could he loved. So the ONSs fulfilled a need for human closeness and a superficial interaction that briefly met my needs.

In the intervening years, I married and had a family. He was also abusive. He didn't love me and punished me for my unloveablilty everyday. Just like my parents had, he tried to correct and improve me to make me a more acceptable version of who I was. I was punished for failing.

We split up around 8 years ago.

I've had a few relationships since but have eventually realised that they were cheating on me; controlling; abusive. I've ended them as soon as I realised - my boundaries are good in that respect but I didnt spot the signs soon enough. None have lasted more than a few months but the signs were probably there from the first date on reflection.

I haven't devoted my life to finding love. I'm very resilient. And I wouldn't date someone just for the sake of not being single. Being single/alone doesn't scare me but realising I've just become completely unloveable breaks my heart if I'm honest.

I'm just empty now. I don't think I was born unloveable but I think my experiences have made me so. I wouldn't 'recognise' love if I found it because I dont know what it looks like. I can only look at what people do/say and if I dont like those, I walk away from them. I've realised now though that it's too painful getting it wrong. Not because i get upset at the thought of losing them, but I'm just adding to the list of people who don't care whilst the list if people who do is so very small.

This isn't about being content with being single; I have found peace with that - this is about my living experiences having shaped me to the point where I can't be loved.

You aren't unloveable. Don't turn the problem to yourself. You were raised to have very low self worth and that has made you vulnerable to abusers but that is not your fault.
You may have difficulty loving others as a result of your experiences. That doesn't make you unloveable.

But that is what has made me unloveable.

I don't think I have the capacity to love or be loved anymore.

Of course you are not unlovable. There is no such thing. Love is unreasonable, so it's not like something you deserve or earn. Maybe because of your experiences, you can't recognize it, or you can but it feels oppressive or something.

You aren't unlovable, you've been very, very badly hurt.

I'm very sorry you've been so badly treated and hope you are able to get some help

Maybe you are wise. Love can be messed up. Just saying

I recognise a lot of what you are saying. It’s incredibly painful to realise that nobody really cares if you are alive or dead. That’s the unloveable bit. I hear you. Mine stems from no emotional relationship with my father apart from anger and frustration and over dramatic emotion from my mother. I wouldn’t recognise real love if it banged me on the head with a saucepan. I have no real relationship with other people and I have no idea how to trust anybody. It’s incredibly painful so I hear you OP. I’m in counselling just so that I have somebody I can trust to talk to every week.

I sympathise with you - my childhood was similar to yours.
What helped me overcome it is having my own children. I had a chance to do things different, love them unconditionally and see them love me back.
I also have the great belief that I can't let them win.

I am off to work soon, but there is a fantastic thread on here "... But we took you to Stately Homes. Survivors of dysfunctional families. " Sorry no link, I hope someone can post you one.
Take care, everyone deserves to be loved.

Thanks.

I think it's difficult to explain the 'unloveable' bit. It's not because I think there is something wrong with me or that my parents were right. I now know that it was them but I just don't have the building blocks for it. Nowhere to put it to make sense of it.

I have 2 children - 20 and mid teens. They both live at home. I have a good relationship with them; we get on well; I can see that I am a better parent to them than mine were to me.

But that's different. When I think about being loved or how it would be or what it would look like, I have the mental equivalent of a big, sharp, scratchy pencil obliterating what I'm looking at so I can't see it anymore.

You are not unloveable. You were raised, however, to believe you were.

I'd like to recommend a book called 'Will I ever be good enough'. Author escapes me at the minute, but it's a well known book and easy to find online.

It's for daughters of narcissistic mothers and from what you have written your mother may have narcissistic personality disorder. What she did to you was beyond cruel.

I hate the term narcissist being thrown around because it's routinely used to explain shit behaviour.

I have worked with people that have experienced NPD and it is far more than being treated badly. Your mother's dismissive treatment of you has had a profound effect on how you view yourself and the world. It is her fault you feel this way, nothing to do with you being unloveable.

I know a lot about the disorder, so feel free to message me if NPD resonates.

It's encouraging you are here, you want a different life. It is within your reach when you learn to love yourself and believe you are worthy of someone that will love and cherish you. Take care.

I had a happy childhood and I can't make sense of love either. It pops up out of nowhere, whether I'm being loved or doing the loving. It is overwhelming and not really controllable. I couldn't imagine it in advance either. There's no way I could explain or understand it. It's like riding a wave or being sick. But there are other kinds of love too that are maybe more reasonable.

So I mean, the fact that you can't imagine it doesn't mean it won't happen. That's normal (?)

It pops up out of nowhere, whether I'm being loved or doing the loving

It doesn't pop up out of anywhere for me.

Not being able to make sense of it and not being able to experience it aren't the same thing.

First, just be still a moment while I give you a great big hug.

I, too, was told repeatedly that no-one would ever love me. My charming mother also let me know that I ‘should never have been born’ and was different from everyone else.

I’m not going to say you can get over it. I was on course for the big therapy on the nhs, serious hoops to jump through, but the last bout of cbt worked for me and I now don’t need it. 16 sessions with a senior psychological therapist. Using a book called ‘Mind Over Mood’. But, I had my major breakdown six years ago and was working on myself already, so it didn’t come from nowhere. Everything you have done so far will be helping you, even if it doesn’t show yet.

Look at mindfulness and Ekhart Tolle. The message is that the love you seek is within you. It sounds like a sop but it isn’t. In the core of your being is that sweet baby who was born to be loved but who was in the care of damaged people. I took my timeline to the last therapist, and on the front cover I put a picture of myself as a baby, to remind us both that I had been small and vulnerable, and didn’t deserve what happened to me. Like you.

You are not unlovable. They were wrong to say so. Treat yourself with love and care today. Be kind to yourself.

Thank you windmill.

I have wondered about that before. I've spent my life trying to understand her and why she was like this with me.

I dont know of it's relevant but it has been suggested by several people over the years that I might have HFA (by people with autism/autistic family members or people who work with autistic people). I was referred for an assessment but wasn't able to attend. Certainly now when I reflect on my upbringing, I had a lot of traits that are now seen as female autistic traits and it is these that I was often punished for. I was mocked for 'stimming' behaviours. I also know that I was an embarrassment to my mum in particular because I wasn't a pretty child/teen and had no inclination to 'improve' myself in that respect. She felt I was failing at being a girl/woman.

Generally, my mum is one of the most misogynistic people I have ever met. She will excuse a man of anything and believes that divorce/relationship breakdown is largely the responsibility of the woman.

However, she blames me (and how difficult I was) and the OW for my dad's affair, which was nothing to do with her.

She resented any success that I had because she wanted me to suffer for the blight I was on her life - she said as much. She intentionally sabotaged quite significant things that I am still living with the consequences of now and told me that I didn't 'deserve' any better.

Someone here said this to me when I was recovering from abusive ex and the marriage broke down. "Being unloved is not the same as being unlovable"

You were unloved and subsequently find it hard to recognise and accept love, that is actual love not abuse in the guise of it.

If you can't afford counselling then I think you arm yourself with some really good reading. I've read lundy Bancroft, amir levine's Attached, and there's a really empowering read I'm doing at the moment "the courage to be disliked" which is better than it sounds! It's about how to look at things. We cannot change events only how we react to them (I think that's epictetus). Look at arming yourself.

But no you're not unlovable.

Your kids will love you that means you are not unlovable but that you feel unable to be loved. Understandably stemming from childhood and the abuse you suffered. I think if its an issue for you then to continue counselling is really the only thing that would help.

Thank you barry

I am kind to myself. It took a long time to get there.

I don't feel worthless but I don't think I have developed the capacity to be loved.

I could tell you 5 things I like about myself, for example. I already do mindfulness activities and use CBT strategies- they're the things that get me through each day tbh.

Sorry, I said it the wrong way. It was just how you said you didn't have the building blocks. But yeah, you're the one who knows your own life and feelings. But, just, if you don't understand it, how can you know you're unlovable? You can't. You've got no idea, like the rest of us.

But, just, if you don't understand it, how can you know you're unlovable?

Good question... I suppose it's because I can't see it. I don't know what it looks like. There have been a couple of times when I thought I might have seen it, but then I realised I hadn't.

So i always believed that my grandma loved me. When i was growing up, she was the only person who stood like a shining light in the dark for me. But when i was 30, my mum told her such lies about me that she didnt speak to me for months. She became cold and hostile towards me. One day, I just broke down and called her because I just didnt understand what was going on. By the end of the call, she was in tears and apologised and realised my.mum had completely lied to her and manipulated her. But she ended the call with. "Your mum was wrong to do all of that but she is my daughter and I love her and my first priority is to her". Our relationship never recovered and I lost the only person I'd ever believed had loved me.

I've read lots of books, tbh. Some have been more helpful than others. Some have given me great insight and a better understanding generally.

Sorry my grandma said that her priority was my mum and her loyalty was to her.

I said it was a pity that no one felt that way about me and I think she started to get it.

Being betrayed is part of love though? So yeah, your grandmother probably did love you, and she messed up? Like, everyone does. That's my experience. They totally eff it up, and then you have to forgive them if it's family. Then they get a bee in the bonnet about something tiny that you have done, and then they forgive you.

Like, getting a grandmother to choose between her daughter and granddaughter is putting her in an impossible situation. She'd probably pick the more vulnerable one? Doesn't mean she didn't love you imo.

My grandma knew of the relationship history between my parents and me. She was aware of the abuse.

There is no way in that situation that she could have read my mother as the 'vulnerable' one.

Well, I can't imagine being a grandmother tbh. You get all kinds.

I'm really sorry that happened to you. Of course, you deserved better.

Well, a lot of people were aware but it was a long time ago and people don't like to get involved.

Thanks. I did. I've dealt with a lot of it now but this 'unloveable' thing is the one thing I can't shake.