It’s….hard to believe that what you think was normal behavior in a relationship was actually grooming.
It’s even harder to believe that you go your whole life thinking that whatever happened to you is what you’re supposed to do with a partner or friend.
I fucked up so many relationships in the past because of learned behaviors from people who I thought I could trust, and hurt a lot of people. But the cycle of abuse has to stop somewhere, and I’ve put an end to it once I finally learned that what I’ve done to someone was grooming.
It took….an embarrassingly long time for me to figure this out. It wasn’t until after I met my husband when I started to realize that the harmful behaviors I displayed were learned from the people that have groomed me in the past. I didn’t know it was grooming at the time it was happening to me; I just thought that someone could actually tolerate me. I talked about things that I never should’ve even discussed, and was coerced into toxic mindsets and circles that were all normalized for me.
I never even CONSIDERED that I could continue the cycle, until I met my ex.
I was their first partner, and I completely ruined that first experience for them, because I couldn’t identify that what I was doing was harmful. I couldn’t even take accountability for my actions when confronted because I genuinely didn’t know that what I was doing was wrong.
I was supposed to know that what I was doing was wrong. But it being treated as normal by the people that harmed me, it’s pretty obvious that I never learned otherwise. All I can do now is learn from my past mistakes, and keep pushing forward to unlearn these things while healing from my own trauma.
If you’re reading this, I’m sorry for what I’ve done to you. You never deserved what I did to you. All I can do is wish you well, and leave it at that.













