Is there any way back from this?

[SmellsLikeRain]

I can't get past the very real feeling that my partner doesn't find me attractive or desirable.

I posted before a while ago and some people suggested that, at my age, it was unlikely someone would find me attractive in the same way they'd have found a younger woman attractive when they were also younger and that I should be more focused on being compatible and companionship and who cares if a man find you attractive anyway? There are more important things in life than being attractive to a man.

I'm nearly 51. I don't know how true or accurate those comments are. I was criticised heavily growing up for my looks, my appearance, my personality, my interests and hobbies. Everything really. I've had therapy for this several times and whilst it worked well enough to be a temporary fix and means I can superficially function in life, I've never been able to change my core beliefs in a meaningful or lasting way.

I have found working on acceptance to be far more helpful, tbh.

I believed my partner found me a attractive when we first got together. But he then made a small number of comments and quips that I've learnt from reading on here are completely acceptable in some relationships and not at all in others so I don't think theres a clear line on that.

I just feel very conflicted. I've ended every relationship I've ever had (within 6 months max) because I've 'known' they weren't attracted to me or didn't love me and so what was the point?

But statistically, I surely can't have reached this age or stage in life without having been attractive to, loved by or even thought fondly of by anyone?

My biggest fears in life are being seen through my parents eyes or being settled for because of things that were said to me until i was nearly 40 and cut of my parent. I'm not afraid of being alone but it would be nice to have one relationships that felt normal and functioning. I think the fact that I genuinely believed this man was attracted to me initially and felt so safe has meant it was brutal to have that belief challenged.

I actually don't know if there I'd anyway back from this now and whether I'm delaying inevitable or just hurting myself by even trying.

I honestly think you need more therapy, because those intrusive thoughts are still impacting your life. You've ended every relationship you've had within 6 months, essentially as self-preservation, before the men involved decided they weren't attracted to you. You need to find a therapy that works, rather than one that half works. Relationships are different in your 20's to what they are in your 50's. If a man truly loves you, that he's going to love you regardless, if you put on weight, are getting older etc. If a man decides that he's shallow enough to only love that person, when they look 'perfect', then that says far more about the man, than the woman. Both my husband and look a little older than when we met 19 years ago, his hair has thinned on top but he's still the man I fell in love with.

I’m in a similar position at a similar age.

My partner was attracted to me initially but now I don’t feel that at all. However, I know this is probably a 80-20 situation and I need to look at my attachment style and ask why I don’t feel more secure and worthy of a loving, healthy relationship. I experienced some difficult parental stuff as a teenager so I believe this has shaped how I view myself.

I’m doing some work and building up my self-esteem so that I feel more confident in myself. I don’t like feeling that my level of contentment with the relationship is so easily undermined and believe the answer lies with me.

See, I know that what you are saying is right but I can't make it part of how I think.

My mum told me that I wasn't the sort of woman men fell in love with. I'm the sort of woman they settle for when they realise they can't have who they want.

I know she had very low self esteem and was projecting her own insecurities when she said that but my partner made a comment a while back when we were talking about a man we were both introduced to who, in his 60s, is still chasing young women. He said that men like him are deluded and "most men" realise at some point they have to be more realistic in who they choose to want to date.

I've read woman on here saying that a lot of men "realise what's important" as they get older or are "more realistic" about the women they can hope to attract regardless of what they actually want/find attractive.

I want to be with someone who wants me. Not someone who wants someone else but is settling for me instead.

Am I being really unrealistic about this?

Love and attraction aren't the same thing.

I identify so much with what you say about the view of yourself that was ingrained into you when you were growing up.

I had a similar upbringing with absolutely no positive reinforcements and as a result have, and have always had, a perception of myself as unworthy and undeserving of friendship or love. Any relationship I have had has been marred by this total lack of self esteem and confidence.

At points I've had CBT - it helped to a certain extent the first time but not subsequently. I understand that it's supposed to be all about changing your mind set. I've been seeing a Clinical Psychologist for the past year but I've just actually told her I feel continuing is pointless because I know the theory of how it works but I don't think I'm capable of actually changing. Partly because, as discussed with her, I'm one of these people whose brain was altered by emotional neglect and also, as recently confirmed , I'm autistic.

This feeling that well this is me, I'm on my own now. How do I face the rest of my life knowing I can't really do much about how I feel about myself is actually terrifying.

I'm not saying this to depress you OP but I honestly think people who have no experience of ingrained negative feelings about themselves can understand how it feels. I think it's all very well to talk about therapy as if it's a magic wand that will cure the negativity but in reality, for some people I don't think that's the case.

Like you OP I try to accept how I am and I thought being diagnosed autistic would help because to a certain extent I know I am biologically determined but tbh it's actually plunged me into depression and panic.

I'm really sorry I've no helpful suggestions OP and my intention is not to make you feel worse. I think I just wanted to offer some solidarity with you because you are not alone in knowing the hand you have been dealt- in your case certainly by those who criticised you and helped form your opinion of yourself whilst growing up - is a really difficult one to negotiate life with.

That makes sense.

I'm confident about two things in my relationship.

That he loves me.

That he isn't attracted to me.

I don't feel worthy of any relationship.

I ducked out of my own birthday celebration night out and often feign illness/tiredness to get out of things because the belief that he/everyone will have a better time without me there is overwhelming.

I know the theory of how it works but I don't think I'm capable of actually changing. Partly because, as discussed with her, I'm one of these people whose brain was altered by emotional neglect and also, as recently confirmed , I'm autistic.

Same!

I've been told my thinking is too rigid and black and white in this matter and I should just believe my partner when he compliments me or finds me attractive.

But he has said things that contradict this too.

So what do I believe? The things he tells me to? Why are those things more true than the other things?

He's not said anything 'bad' just conflicting and contradictory.

People are confusing and contradictory.

No two relationships are ever the same and every relationship changes over time. What is acceptable to me in a relationship may not be acceptable to you. You can't judge how good a relationship is by what others say.
I know the damage being told as a child that you are less than others does to you. It doesn't go away. All you can do is try and silence that voice in the back of your head and try and let it not become a self-fulfilling prophecy.
"Attraction" in a relationship is so much more than the physical attraction it was at the beginning. It becomes entwined with memories. It changes and grows. It's not a constant, linear emotion.
Your partner can be really attractive to you 95% of the time but the other 5% when they are being moody or childish you can just think yuk. If you are in a bad mood or annoyed with them because they said something stupid you can look at them and the last thing you feel is attraction. It doesn't mean the attraction is gone it's just not present that instant.
When you wrote about ending your previous relationships because you "knew" they didn't find you attractive anymore it struck me that the change you may have felt was just the change from the shiny new exciting relationship to the start of a deeper more settled partnership that a longer term relationship can bring.

Roseshavethorns

I understand what you are saying and I do know that.

What I meant about previous relationships was that 6 months was the absolute longest they've lasted before they've made negative comments about my appearance or I've realised that weve not gone out locally to them and it's because they don't want to risk being seen with me by someone they know.

I don't mind observations but when they become comparisons or criticisms, that's when I have an issue with it.

I can't tell whether my partner has done that. But he has made comments. I just feel like I've been lied to.

Looks are only one part of attraction and desirability.
Only very superficial people are interested by looks alone.
Rumination and endless spirals of negative thinking can ruin your self confidence and then degrade the quality of multiple relationships you are in. The feeling “I’m so ugly that no-one can possibly love me” can become self-fulfilling eventually, but it’s as likely that the result will happen because it’s hard for the other person to feel a bond to someone who keeps putting themselves down as for any of the reasons your anxious and depressed mind is telling yourself.
Am sure you know this all, deep down, and would tell any friend to think along the same lines, challenging ingrained ways of downward spiralling thoughts. Wouldn’t you?

Have you ever thought that maybe the previous partners were actually abusive? I consider myself fairly attractive and although I have not had anything like the upbringing you have had, I have nevertheless had former "relationships" make snarky or negative comments about my appearance and it hurt very much at the time. Usually so personal about a specific part of my body or my nose or skin or hair not being thick enough. It took me ages and a bit of counselling and talking it over with close friends to realise that it was THEM and NOT me that was, in fact, unattractive. I mean in terms of wanting to hurt me to feel good about themselves, to make me feel insecure.

Can you share specific examples of the things he has said, OP? Your descriptions of "comments" are very vague, it's hard to know what sort of thing you're referring to.

Oneflightdown

Comments about qualities he finds attractive that I don't possess - eg a certain look or aesthetic that I don't have. Clothing that another woman looks really good in that I should wear (even though it wouldn't suit me). Comments about particular women who are gorgeous or beautiful. Comments about accents he finds sexy.

He stopped doing it once I told him it made me feel like shit but I haven't forgotten and the more time that passes, the more it haunts me.

He said they were light hearted glib remarks. He can't tell me what positive effect he was hoping to achieve just that they were not comments he expected to become 'the whole basis of the relationship'.

But I grew up being compared unfavourably to other girls/women and never being good enough myself. Why can't you just be, look, dress, behave more like x, y or z? I was small and scared and insecure and sad. I worked so hard on myself and cut contact with my mother and assumed at some point, it would all be OK only to find that other people see me in exactly the same way she did. Just not good enough.

I feel like I've just never escaped just not being as good as someone/anyone/everyone else.

He made a comment about a mutual friend of ours being sexy. The problem with that was that the only reason we were talking about her is that my previous boyfriend had told me if I tried really hard I could look as good as her. I told him and the only thing he said was, "Tbf, she is sexy."

So that was both of them. The thing is, she looks nothing like me. I would never be able to look like her. She is taller than me and has a completely different body shape/frame/proportions to me.

He told me that he'd been interested in me for a while when we first got together but then later told me he'd never thought about me in that way.

When ive asked, he says he doesn't remember making either of those comments (about not seeing me in that way or the sexy friend).

They're not true and so he can't imagine why he said them.

He doesn't deny saying it but just can't (won't) say why he did. He denies that the most obvious answer (because it's true) is the reason.

But I read comments on thread on here from women where they talk about free passes with their partners and tease each other about who they each fancy in films and I'm assuming his exes were fine with it which is why he thought it was ok to do because he hasn't done it since I told him but the damage has been done.

In every other way the relationship is perfect but I just feel like a troll.

We've been together for nearly 4 years but there are no photos of us together past the first year or so because all I can see in photos is the ugly child my mum saw. He gave me so much confidence in myself for that first year. I actually felt like I knew what it was like to feel 'normal', happy and 'safe' for the first time ever. And a few 'light hearted glib comments' have destroyed it all.

I'm so sorry you're in this headspace.

Emotional neglect does change the brain... But neuroplasticity also means that it is also possible to change it again in more positive ways. As you had many decades of your parent's negativity, it would likely take similar amounts of positive reinforcement to change back - so don't think it isn't possible just cos your odds are skewed at the moment.

The comments you are referring to - well, I might say similar things and so might my partner, because we're just expressing our own preferences. I love my partner deeply and sincerely, but that's the whole package of him, not that he is necessarily my ideal in ever individual respect. And that's pretty normal for most people, I think. Doesn't mean I love him any less or am any less attracted to him simply because there are also other things (including things different to him, physically or character-wise), that I also find attractive.
E.g. the clothes he suggests - maybe he genuinely does think they'd suit you. Maybe they really would but they're a style that would make you uncomfortable, that you were told something negative and untrue about by your mother. Who knows, but it's truly unlikely to be intended in the way you are taking it.

He can't tell you what positive effect he was hoping to have, cos he wasn't. But not maliciously, just that you are hyper-sensitive to such comments, while for many they're essentially meaningless "filler" chat, with no actual thought or intention behind them at all, and for sure no intention to wound.
He is sensitive to you, because he understood and stopped making such comments when you told him. But now you're ruminating massively on something that is hugely significant and impactful to you, but you're assuming it has the same significance and impact to him, when it really really won't have at all.

With respect, I sincerely doubt that other people see you in the way your mother did. What it does sound like is that, having had her views imprinted on you for so long, it's very much the filter you look at the world through and are looking for evidence of - "I'm not good enough" - even though there's lots of evidence to the contrary that your brain doesn't ever register because of your mother's toxic influence. Confirmation bias is real, and it's very easy for us all to believe that our spiralling negative/intrusive thoughts are "real" or "logical" or "true" when they're anything but.

Maybe your friend genuinely is sexy. If she is, that doesn't detract from you. There is someone more attractive than all of us out there, usually many people. And that they exist, or even that our friends and partners notice them, isn't the issue. The issue is that you still don't feel good enough in yourself, even though you are, and always have been, and your mother lied to you and abused you.

Like you say, all you can see is the "ugly child your mum saw". And you were never that. The challenge is to get yourself to know that, deeply in the core of your being, and fully reject your mother's hurtful lies.

I don't know whether therapy could help you change your core beliefs, but it doesn't sound like acceptance is working very well for you, and these intrusive thoughts are stopping you enjoying a relationship with someone who it sounds like cares for you a lot and it's trying to be sensitive to your insecurities.

Maybe EMDR and reducing the impact of those traumatic memories might help, or hypnotherapy or NLP with a similar intent.

You are not who or what your toxic mother said, and you never were. But what strategies might you use to help you come to truly believe that?

WrylyAmused

Thank you so much for your response. It was really helpful.

The emotional abuse was well entrenched by the time I was 3 (I know this because my mum would still tell me about the awful thing I did when I was 2 that showed her who I really was 35 years later and that was the point she rejected me). It continued until I was very late 30s. I'm only 13 years or so into being nc and things have improved in myself but I do still really struggle when it comes to relating to other people and seeing myself through other people's eyes and in a different context.

I think you are probably right about his intentions in what he said and it being meaningles filler chat and now you're ruminating massively on something that is hugely significant and impactful to you, but you're assuming it has the same significance and impact to him, when it really really won't have at all.

It's come up a few times since and he always seems really shocked and asks where it has come from. For me, it never goes away. It's there all the time.

Maybe your friend genuinely is sexy. If she is, that doesn't detract from you

The previous boyfriend had made the comparison to be cruel to both me and her. Without going into details, his comment was actually him intentionally being a dick to both of us. Essentially, he was saying, "You're so unattractive, you're not even as good as her."

I suppose I expected my partner to agree it was a dick thing to say and unkind to both of us. Not to agree with him. For him to tell me he thinks she's she's 'sexy', he must have meant it. Meaning for him it's true. But she and I couldn't be more different in every sense! And he'd never describe me as 'sexy'.

After years of being told I was ugly, not enough this or too much that and by my mum and believing I was completely unlovable as a result and having a year of actually feeling like I was good enough after all (from my partner), his response set me back massively.

I don't wear make up anymore and don't wear any of my nice clothes. I've bought some new stuff since but whenever I put it on, I feel like a fraud. Someone who is trying too hard and needs to stay in their lane. So I change again.

I know this is a me issue but I'd rather go unnoticed than draw negative attention. And wearing nice things doesn't make me feel good about myself. It makes me feel worse.

I'm not really in a position for more therapy (time and money) and there's too much to explain and go through. I'm just tired of it all now.

The most concerning thing you say is:
“But statistically, I surely can't have reached this age or stage in life without having been attractive to, loved by or even thought fondly of by anyone?”

This is all in your head. You clearly need more therapy, it may be useful to have a session with him at some point (not as a couples therapy but to help him understand what you are thinking).

First off, being attracted to someone can be the initial reaction to how someone looks but almost immediately other factors come into play. So many people can start off attractive but quickly drop off once you get even s small sense of what they are like. In the same way the opposite can happen.

Even taking your most extreme point, if men were only mildly attracted to you they almost certainly some will have “felt fondly” about you. Though in fairness if you are needing all relationships in less than 6 months you probably haven’t been loved in a romantic sense. This is not a reflection on your attractiveness but how you respond in the relationship by getting out before things have developed.

Being found attractive and loved are not unexpected for you but you are assuming they are.

Ah, If you are autistic and have emotional abuse then your problem makes more sense.

The emotional abuse has obviously done a number on you but the autism may make it harder for you communicating with partners and they may not know how to respond to you to take that in to account. Being a men they will probably not notice that they need to communicate differently, so may need help seeing that.
You are looking at the different statements in too much detail. People say things all the time that they may express poorly, may be effected by their mood in the moment, may have no connection to reality at all. You are trying to “decode” the men in your with unreliable data.

You will need someone who will learn that you need the right sort of communication, what may work as humorous or flirty joking to some people could be really hurtful (or anxiety inducing) to you.
You also need to have a way of you clarifying your doubts with him in a way you can both work with. If you constantly bring up things he said that contradict each other assuming they are either total truth or him trying to lie to you he will run out of patients with that.

You also seem to assume people all have a fixated “type” when that is really rare. It is very likely a man would find Audrey Hepburn and Marilyn Monroe attractive as both are regarded as beautiful but looked very different. If you remember men’s and women’s magazines from the 90s the women on the covers of each were wildly different but men would see either as attractive. Those are just among the most attractive people in society.

I can see that you both make sense.

But when I'm here with only my own thoughts, I can't work out, which are correct and which are not.

I can't cope with the thought that I'm with someone who has settled for me and who looks at others and sees qualities he wishes I possessed but has to put up with the fact I don't.

If he looks at so many other women and sees things he finds attractive in them but doesn't see those things in me - any of them - then what does it mean?

I could give you a list of things he finds attractive in women, none of which describe me. Not just appearance wise but everything.

Imagine you thought Tom Cruise is the most gorgeous man in the world. And that George Clooney is the second most gorgeous.
Now you start going out with George Clooney.
Have you settled? Because there are some attributes of Tom that George won't have?
Of course not. Neither has your partner.

I'm aging too, i'm two years post menopause and in the middle of a divorce with stbxh. I was panicking about attracting another partner but then i've found that being cheerful, wearing makeup, clothes that suit my body type and being flexible i.e. yoga helps with attractiveness. Also if you date an older man that works so for e.g. a 10 year age gap

I ducked out of my own birthday celebration night out and often feign illness/tiredness to get out of things because the belief that he/everyone will have a better time without me there is overwhelming.

This is about more than how you look.

You really need to try therapy. Or more therapy.

I'm not really in a position for more therapy (time and money) and there's too much to explain and go through. I'm just tired of it all now.

But it's impacting your life so much you're missing out on things and don't feel loved. Can you really afford not to? Life is too short to spend like that.

People can find lots of contradictory things attractive. There is not just one body type/ height/ colouring that makes up their ideal person. You can find both blonde hair and auburn hair attractive but you can't really have both in one person.
What makes a person attractive is the whole package. I have dated men who, would in theory, be my ideal in looks, body type, occupation but there was absolutely no spark of attraction. It doesn't mean that if you were to ask me if they were attractive that I would say no. They are, just not attractive to me.
If you were to list everything you find attractive in a man, with no restrictions, I would bet there would be some contradictions ie you like more than one skin tone, you find more than one profession really exciting and it would be a very long list. It's much easier to list what you don't like and probably much shorter.
If you were to look at the list of all the things you find attractive in a man and then look at your partner could you honestly say he is everything on your list? Is that possible? Does that mean you have settled or does it mean that you find your partner attractive because everything he is appears on your list just not everything in your list appears in your partner?

Someone I know was obsessed with hairs on her chin. She did have quite a lot of hair and shaved but she was fixated on other people judging her.

Once we were in a bar and she started having a go at a man we were with for staring at her chin and making snide remarks.

He hadn't done anything of the sort. I was there and he hadn't said anything remotely to do with her chin. Now everyone was looking at her chin because she was drawing attention to it and she got upset because people were looking at her chin.

You might find it helpful working on your core beliefs about yourself OP. You've ended every single relationship you've had because you're fixated on people finding you unattractive and making comments.

I think you need to consider, as PP have said, that maybe these criticisms were real and unfair and that you have actually really good antenna for these things. Maybe you need to keep your standards high until you find someone who truly loves you.