Before I became a relationship coach, I believed love was an impossible puzzle. I carried wounds I couldn’t name and patterns I didn’t understand, always feeling locked out of the kind of love that seemed to come so easily to others. What I didn’t realise then was that past trauma can leave a lasting imprint on the present, influencing the way you connect, express needs and trust others.
If you’ve experienced relational trauma, love can feel confusing or distant, sometimes even unsafe. But healing is possible, and love is not beyond your reach.
How trauma shapes the way you love
Trauma can leave you frozen in time, stuck in the moment when you first learned that love could hurt or disappear. This might have happened in childhood, through relationships that should have felt safe but instead left wounds. Or it may have come later, through heartbreak, betrayal or the slow erosion of trust over time.
More than what happened, trauma is shaped by what you were left to carry alone. If no one gave you the tools to process pain or create healthy emotional boundaries, you may still be navigating love with missing pieces. You might find yourself shutting down, overgiving, second-guessing, avoiding intimacy, or chasing validation from people who can’t give you what you need.
Healing starts with awareness
Healing doesn’t happen by accident, it happens by choice. The first step is noticing the gaps in how you were taught to relate and trust yourself, as well as care for your own needs. Ask yourself:
Do I trust love to be safe, or am I always preparing for disappointment?
Do I feel secure in my needs, or do I lose myself in relationships?
Am I able to be fully seen, or do I hold back, afraid of rejection?
Do I recognise when I’m repeating old patterns, or do I feel stuck in the same cycles?
When you begin to see where you were never shown how to love or be loved in a healthy way, you open the door to change.
Rewriting the patterns
Healing from trauma isn’t about fixing yourself. You were never broken. Healing means relearning how to connect in a way that feels safe and fulfilling. This is often all about:
Building self-trust by learning to hear your own instincts again instead of outsourcing your worth to others.
Setting new standards and recognising where you’ve accepted less than you deserve.
Embracing emotional safety, not just in others but in the way you speak to yourself and hold space for your emotions.
Practicing patience with yourself as you unlearn patterns that have been in place for years.
Love after trauma is possible. With intention and awareness, you can create the kind of connection that feels safe, nourishing and deeply real.
I know this path because I’ve walked it myself, and I’ve seen so many others do the same. No matter your past, love is still available to you.
