me_irl

Yep! And the worst part is in addition to fucking you up, it instills habits with which you can accidentally hurt people you care about. Having a trauma response to legitimate criticism makes your partner uncomfortable bringing up issues they're facing. Most of the issues I've had in my marriage have stemmed from behaviors I learned to protect myself growing up. It's taken a lot of work over the years to improve on these issues, and a lot of communication to ensure that what I'm still struggling with doesn't hurt the relationship.