You learned to earn love by being easy, helpful, and predictable.
You've poured yourself into people who didn't pour back.
You've protected relationships that didn't protect you.
You've given chances long after the first red flag.
You've made yourself smaller, easier, more agreeable — because somewhere you learned that's how you stay loved.
That wasn't a flaw. It was survival.
But the strategies that kept you safe then are the same ones keeping you stuck now. And now you're not even sure what you actually want anymore.
You might notice:
Feeling overly responsible for other people's emotions
Saying yes when you mean no — every single time
Guilt that shows up the moment you have a need
Anxiety or hypervigilance in relationships
Resentment that builds quietly because you never ask for what you need
A pattern of relationships where you give everything and receive just enough to stay
Losing track of your own voice in the presence of other people
This isn't just a relationship problem.
It's a story problem — and it started long before the relationship you're thinking about right now.
How I work with
self-abandonment
Self-abandonment isn't just a habit — it's a narrative. A story that says your needs are too much, that conflict means abandonment, that love requires you to make yourself small.
In our work together I use narrative therapy to trace those stories back to where they started — and separate them from who you actually are. Because you are not the patterns you learned. You are the person who learned them, for very good reasons, in a very specific context.
Where those patterns are rooted in trauma — early experiences of emotional unavailability, relationships that weren't safe, losses that never got processed — I bring in EMDR to help your nervous system finally release what it's been protecting you from.
This work changes everything. Not just your relationships — your relationship with yourself.In our work together I use narrative therapy to trace those stories back to where they started — and separate them from who you actually are. Because you are not the patterns you learned. You are the person who learned them, for very good reasons, in a very specific context.
Where those patterns are rooted in trauma — early experiences of emotional unavailability, relationships that weren't safe, losses that never got processed — I bring in EMDR to help your nervous system finally release what it's been protecting you from.
This work changes everything.
Not just your relationships — your relationship with yourself.
Why women choose
to work with me
Many high-achieving women grew up being the helper, the fixer, the mediator, the one who kept the peace.
The adult in the room before they were ready.
Your childhood shaped how you love — but it doesn't have to define your future relationships.
I work with women who are done shrinking. Who are tired of giving everything and receiving just enough to stay. Who want to understand the story underneath the pattern — and finally change it.
You deserve connection that doesn't cost you your dignity.
