When Love Hurts: Why You Keep Repeating Painful Patterns.....and How to Build Resilience

Vicki Johnson Author

Have you ever wondered why you stay in painful cycles or confuse chaos for connection in relationships?

Lets Get Real

Most people don't stay in painful relationships because they enjoy suffering.  They stay because the pattern feels familiar - safe, even when it's anything but.

Personally, I used to believe my pain was someone else's fault.  If they could just stop lying, stop withdrawing, stop criticizing--then I'd finally be at peace.

But waiting for someone else to regulate your emotions is emotional outsourcing.  No one was coming to save me.  Freedom didn't come through control for fixing others.  It came through taking responsibility for how I kept showing up.

That realization marked the shift from being a victim of my story to becoming an active participant in my resilience.

Why We Stay (Even When We Know Better)

Many people share stories of partners who lie, manipulate or mistreat them -  maybe you were one of them.  The pain is valid.  But real growth begins when we shift the focus inward.  Because while you can't contol someone else, you can understand the part of you that keeps reaching for what hurts.

I used to believe leaving would fix the pain.  Instead, I found myself repeating the same patterns, different faces, same story.  It wasn't just about "bad choices." It was trauma bonding...how our nervous system can mistake familiar pain for love (wish I knew this 30 years ago).

It's not just love that keeps us tethered to unhealthy people, it's biology.

When you grow up with inconsistency, neglect, or emotional chaos, your brain learns to pair adrenaline with affection.  You start confusing the intensity of survival with the depth of connection.  That's how we get hooked—not just on people, but on the chemical rush of being seen, wanted and then abandoned again. The connection feels real, at a visceral level!

The highs and lows of unpredictable love mimic the same emotional rollercoaster your body once rode to stay connected.  So when someone triggers those old sensations, it doesn't just feel familiar....it feels like home.

That's why you can know someone isn't good for you and still feel drawn to them.  It's not weakness....it's wiring.

For a long time, I thought if I could just love "him" enough, prove my loyalty, or hold on a little longer, things would workout.  He'd finally see my heart.  He'd finally treat me the way I treated him.

But things didn't change.  And I kept shrinking.

The Stories We Tell Ourselves

I can still hear the voice that once echoed in my head - "You're going to die an old maid."  It was said by someone who believed fear was protection.  But those words sank deep, shaping the story I told myself about love and worth.

For years, I wore fear like a virtue.

I called it forgiving.  I called it patient. I called it understanding.

But underneath all that grace, I was terrified.  Terrified of being alone.  Terrified of admitting that I had mistaken chaos for love.  Terrified that if I walked away, I'd have to face the parts of me that believed pain was the price of connection.

That's how subtle conditioning can be....fear dressed up as faithfulness, self abandonment disguised as strength.  It's not weakness to want love.  It's human.

But when your nervous system equates love with anxiety, you'll call survival "devotion" and confusion "chemistry."

The Voices That Convince You It's You

When you start waking up to the truth, there will be no shortage of voices--some soft, some sharp-- telling you that you're the problem.

They'll say you're too sensitive.  Too emotional. Too much.  That you "love being in love,"(despite the fact you're heart closed decades ago). They'll remind you how "good" you have it compared to others and "if you screw this up, you're an idiot," or how you should just pray harder, be nicer or try again.

For a long time, those words became my beliefs.  Because I didn't yet understand the difference between being cared about and being truly safe.  People can care and still be incapable of seeing your wounds clearly.  They can love you and still reinforce the very patterns that keep you stuck.

So yes, there will be plenty of voices telling you to stop overthinking, just move on, to forgive and forget.  But real resilience isn't built by pretending you're fine.  It's built by learning why your body keeps trying to protect you in ways that now keep you in pain.  It's built by listening, not to the voices outside you, but to the quiet whisper within:  "You're safe to choose peace now."

The Promise That Protected and Punished Me

This is where my story gets honest.  I wasn't a passive recipient of pain.  I was participating in it.....over and over again.

It's easy to talk about what others did wrong.  Harder to face how we contribute to our own suffering.

Asking the hard questions:

• "Why do I keep allowing this?"
• "What part of me still believes I have to earn love through suffering?"
• What fear keeps me settling for less than peace?"

After a heartbreak in my early twenties that cut straight to my core, I made myself a quiet promise, "No one will ever hurt me like that again."

And beneath that vow was another I didn't dare say out loud— "I'll never love anyone again."

At the time, it felt like strength.  Like protection.  But looking back, I see it for what it really was - a survival contract my younger self made to keep me safe.  A vow built on pain, not peace.

The truth is, I used to run before they could leave me.  I'd sabatoge love the moment it felt safe - because safety felt foreign.  When someone got too close, my nervous system would sound the alarm.  Love started to feel like a threat, not a refuge.

Looking back, I didn't have the tools to handle what was happening inside me.  When I started receiving attention - especially from men -I mistook it for love.

Underneath it all was a deep, desperate need to feel worthy, to be chosen, to matter. That's what self-sabatoge looks like when your nervous system is wired for survival:  you crave closeness but fear it at the same time.  You long for love, but build walls around your heart, convincing yourself that distance is power.

For years, I didn't realize my "independence" was really hypervigilance in disguise - my body keeping its promise to never feel that kind of pain again.  But the truth is, walls don't just keep danger out; they also keep love from getting in.

When Intuition Gets Twisted

If trauma can shape your biology, so can divine guidance - because intuition is biology, and biology was designed for connection.

Your intuition isn't some mystical feeling floating outside your body.  It's your nerous system's early warning system, a sacred instrument wired to read safety or threat before words arrive.

But when you grow up in chaos or inconsistency, your internal compass gets scrambled.  You start confusing anxiety with chemistry.  You call chaos "connection."  You chase adrenaline and call it love.

That's not intuition, it's trauma wearing a familiar face.

As you begin to reconnect with your body, you learn that true intuition is calm, not urgent.  It's quiet, not chaotic.  It's the nudge that says, "You can trust peace now."

And whether you call it the Holy Spirit, intuition, or divine wisdom - it's the same Source that whispers truth beneath the noise.  It's presence that helps you pause before reacting, that teaches you to discern between fear and guidance.

When your biology begins to feel safe, you can finally hear your spirit speak clearly.  That's the moment when trauma gives way to the truth.

Your Childhood Wasn't Just a Story— It Was a Blueprint of Your Brain

Your childhood wasn't just a season - it was a wiring manual for your nervous system.  Everytime you were seen, soothed, ignored, or shamed, your brain took notes.  Those experiences didn't just shape your memories; they shaped your biology.

The Blueprint in Action

• Predictability & Consistency → Creates the Cycle of Trust & Safety
  • Children who experience consistent care develop neural pathways for regulation, empathy and trust.  They grow into adults who seek connection, not chaos.

•  Misattunement → Creates the Cycle of Survival
  • When connection is unpredictable, the brain adapts for vigilance, not peace. These adults often confuse control with safety and independence with worth. You long for love but don't yet trust what safety feels like.

• Criticism or Tough Love → Creates the Cycle of Shame
  • Constant correction or comparison floods a child's system with cortisol, shaping an adult who fears disapproval and overthinks every decision.

• Chaos or Fear→ Creates the Cycle of Hypervigilence
  • When fear is constant, curiosity shuts down.  As adults, this looks like anxiety, control, or avoidance....even when life is stable.
• Attunement→ Creates the Cycle of Resilience
  • When children are seen, soothed, and allowed to fail safely, their nervous systems learn harmony. As adults, they navigate challenges with flexibility, trust and grace.

From Survival to Resilience

Resilience isn't found...it's built.  For me, it started with awareness.  Recognizing sensations in my body that came before negative thoughts.  Noticing when my chest tightened, when my stomach dropped, when by breath got shallow.  When I "braced" for impact.

1. Awareness was the first step.  Action is what continues to build capacity for life.  
2. Reconnecting with my body.  Allowing a felt sense of safety.  Cultivating faith- trusting something greater than me was guiding this process.  Forgiving myself and others, piece by piece.
3. Journaling helped to untangle the noise.  Therapy supported me once my body felt safe and ready to receive it.  And through parts work, I began to see:  peace isn't something you stumble upon - it's something you build through self-trust, compassion and daily practice.

The Divine Design of Resilience

Whether you call it God, the Holy Spirit, the Universe, or Source - the same life force that breathed creation into being is within you.  It's in the cells learning safety again, in the breath that slows when you stop running, in the quiet knowing that you were never broken, just beautifully wired for survival.

Resilience isn't about perfection - it's about partnership.  Between biology and spirit.  Between faith and science.  Between the part of you that was wounded and the part that knows how to rise.

Sometimes the real heartberak isn't what they did to you.  It's how you abandoned yourself trynig to make them stay.  Healing doesn't begin when they change.  It begins when you do.  When you stop trying to fix others and start listening to the parts of yourself that whisper, "I deserve better than this."

So today, ask yourself:

• "How am I participating in my own suffering?"
• "What would loving myself more look like today?

Because freedom doesn't come from being chosen by someone else.  It comes from choosing yourself.....over and over again.

You Are Standing on the Edge of Breakthrough

Everything that has happened in your life, up until this point, has been preparing you for what's coming.

Every struggle, every setback, every disappointment, every tear you've cried and every moment you felt alone was shaping you for the greatness that is about to unfold.

The truth is.....the way you've been thinking, living, and approaching your life....has to change.

You can't keep thinking the same thing and expecting different results.  You can't ignore what your body remembers and your mind forgets. 

This requires surrender, for me, it's to God.  The willingness to have an open heart, open hands, an open mind, and open to possibilities, even when it feels scary.  Letting go of the story that became truth about who you are and what you're capable of.

Regardless of your experiences, you have the power within you!  Let your mess be your message, your pain be your purpose and turn your test into your testimony. Move from the "prison" to the playground!

Become the change you want to see in your life. 

Categories: : Attachment, Bonding, Empathy, Faith, Relationships, Resilience, Stress, Trauma