💔 Parents Separating or Divorcing

When your parents split, your world didn't just break—it shattered into two irreconcilable realities.

After your parents divorced, your family broke into pieces, and you had to figure out how to exist in two separate worlds. You felt caught in the middle of adult conflicts, caring for everyone else's feelings while your own got lost in the shuffle. You learned to pack your entire life into a suitcase, shuttling between houses that never quite felt like home.

You became a shapeshifter, learning to read each parent's emotional climate and adjusting your behavior based on which parent you were with—developing different versions of yourself for different households. Love became something that could disappear overnight, and family became a concept that could be legally dismantled.

Survivor Love Styles You May Have Developed

🌗 Living in Two Worlds: You became a master chameleon, mirroring different versions of yourself to navigate the conflicting rules, expectations, and emotional climates of multiple households. Your identity became fluid, adapting to whoever needed you to be someone different.
👋 Expecting Everyone to Leave: These days, you keep one foot out the door in relationships—because "forever" always ends. You learned that love comes with an expiration date and people you care about will eventually leave, so you're always preparing for the inevitable goodbye.
🦎 Versioning Yourself: Being pulled into the middle of your parents' fights turned you into a skilled room-reader, constantly adjusting your behavior and personality based on who you are with and what they need to hear. You learned to be whoever people needed you to be to keep the peace.
✋ Guarding Against Heartbreak: Witnessing your parents' relationship collapse left you with a heightened awareness of cracks in your own relationships. You brace for the "turn"—that moment when love flips from "forever" to "go to hell!" because you've seen how quickly everything can change.
🌊 Come Close, Go Away: With time, all of your relationships tend to become chaotic and volatile—so you often swing to the opposite extreme and become emotionally distant to protect yourself. Intimacy feels dangerous because you know how badly it can end.

💫 The Core Wound

"You learned that love is temporary, families break apart, and you must constantly adapt and guard your heart to survive the inevitable loss."

Related traumas:

Child custody battles

Divorced parents

Ready to Discover Your Love Style?

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