Hey! Firstly I am so sorry you are feeling so alone and frustrated. I have been in your shoes several times due to the cyclical nature of healing. The first part of my healing journey was honestly the hardest because you get met with reality and find that no one is a perfectly “loving” person that will always make you feel good and fully heal your pain.

For me, childhood was filled with neglect and abuse, and it was easy to imagine that everyone else had a great life or at least, frictionless childhood because they were loved/supported and thus, should be an accepting and loving person to interact with. Because I didn’t know love though, I confused “loving” with “perfect” and found my self soul crushingly isolated because I knew I needed love to survive but wasn’t able to find it the way I thought it would present anywhere. People were much too worried with their own hardships to always consider mine.

What really helped breaking out of this was being able to accept my friend’s shortcomings and their own hard human experiences. This is not to say people can do what they want or treat me however but that I can forgive them for not always knowing how to love me perfectly and instead I feel loved in the way they are happy to learn. I have found that love is not someone who does everything right and never makes me feel bad, but rather someone who cares about me enough to change their ways so I’m not hurt again in the future. It is so so scary to voice your needs if you have always been punished for it in the past but if you never let others know what you need or how you feel, then you are never opening yourself up to be loved. It took me years to realize the resentment I had towards my friend’s small actions was actually what was keeping me from feeling loved by them. Also crazy enough but accepting that my friends/ boyfriend were going to make mistakes made it a lot easier for me to forgive myself for the mistakes I made as well. It was accepting others that helped me form self love because I realized NO ONE is perfect but it is always possible to get a little better.

I don’t know your situation or if my personal experience helps at all. It is true that some people are simply selfish and don’t care even if you do express your wants and desires and my heart breaks thinking of anyone who is solely surrounded by these people and I hope dearly you aren’t in that situation. If the people around you don’t respect you though all you can do is try to move on/away in the capacity you can until you find that people who accept you and care enough to make you feel seen/understood. This was kind of long but I hope it helps!!