Choosing Yourself: What Happens When You Stop Self-Abandoning After Hurt

"I no longer self-harm when someone else harms me."

This is a recent quote from one of my clients and I have to speak on this.

Because I know she's not alone for having lived that cycle. There was a time when someone else’s hurtful words or actions could send me into a self-destructive spiral. Maybe you’ve been there, too. Someone lashes out, betrays you, or treats you poorly, and suddenly you’re left carrying the weight of their behavior. But instead of just being angry at them, you turn that pain inward.

You skip meals or binge eat. You procrastinate on things you care about. You skip showers, don't brush/wash your hair. You stop hydrating and exercising. Maybe you get black out drunk, take more than is prescribed Xanax or go straight for the hard drugs, feeling like living isn't really all that important anymore.

You isolate yourself from the people who do love you. At the time, it feels like you’re just trying to survive the hurt and maybe not burden anyone else with what you're going through, but in reality, you’re punishing yourself for something you didn’t deserve in the first place.

And here’s the hard truth: it doesn’t stop the pain. If anything, it deepens it.

It also deepens the lack of self-trust and the belief that you aren't worthy of love. Of being treated better.

You feel abandoned, so you abandon YOURSELF. Because you believe, you are someone who should be abandoned.

For so long, I didn’t understand what was happening. I thought my reactions were just part of who I was. I even thought that I would benefit from the punishment. Like somehow being punished would make me behave better next time.

I even somehow felt temporary relief like there was honor in the punishment and taking it on the chin.

I thought, If someone I respect and love abandons/rejects me, it must be my fault and somehow I absolutely deserved it.

But then something changed. Not all at once, not in some big, dramatic moment, but gradually, like pieces of a puzzle clicking into place.

It started with the realization that their actions—their hurtful words and actions, their inability to communicate, their rejection—weren’t about me.

Their choices reflected them, not my worth. That one truth was a seed. Over time, it grew into something bigger: a refusal to let someone else’s behavior decide how I treated myself.

Instead of spiraling, I started to pause.

When someone hurt me, I’d ask myself: What do I need right now? Maybe it was a long walk to clear my head or journaling the emotions I couldn’t speak out loud. Sometimes, it was reaching out to a friend, even when my instinct was to withdraw. These weren’t grand gestures—they were simple ways of reminding myself that I deserved care, even if I wasn’t feeling okay.

Eventually, I stopped punishing myself for how others treated me. I stopped letting their actions define the way I saw myself. And for the first time, I felt free.

Breaking the Pattern: Why It’s Worth It

If this sounds familiar—if you’ve ever turned someone else’s cruelty into your own self-destruction—know that you’re not alone. And more importantly, it doesn’t have to stay that way.

Breaking the pattern is a process, but it starts with one choice: to treat yourself with kindness, even when others don’t. It might feel unnatural at first, especially if self-destruction has been your way of coping. But little by little, you’ll notice a shift.

The next time someone hurts you, instead of immediately reacting, you might pause. You might ask yourself:

What would it look like to respond with care instead of harm?
How can I honor my feelings without punishing myself for them?

You may even be able to ask yourself what part of the emotional roller coaster you might ENJOY. (this is pretty advanced inner work so it's ok if this question elicits a "what the hell?")

It’s not about being perfect—it’s about progress. Some days will be harder than others, and that’s okay. What matters is that you’re taking steps toward breaking free from the cycle. One tiny step at a time.

The moment you stop hurting yourself in response to someone else’s actions is the moment you take back your power. It’s the moment you start reclaiming your life—not for anyone else, but for you.

Because you deserve it.