When we aren't having a healthy relationship with ourselves, it becomes impossible to have a healthy relationship with others.  If you are:

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• finding yourself in the same kind of relationship over and over

• constantly worried that your partner will abandon you

• unhappy in your relationship but too afraid to be alone

• unable to express your emotions

• never feeling quite close enough to your partner

• feeling like you don't exist without a partner, defining yourself by who you date

• escalating to lashing out, passive-aggression, or shutting down

• engaged in cheating behaviors

• feeling unseen, unheard, or unloved

• feeling like your partner wants to be "too close" for comfort, feeling suffocated

• feeling like you can't be honest with your parter

• never quite feeling like you can trust your partner

• having a hard time saying "no" or don't feel your boundaries are respected by your partner

• feeling compelled to take care of your partner, be "perfect" or ruminating on mistakes as evidence your partner will leave you

• devaluing/putting your partner down, or experiencing them put you down

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relief is possible.  Relationship skills are skills! This means that they can be learned.  The more we learn about our inner worlds, the better skill set we can develop, practice, and apply.  Relationships aren't always easy, but they certainly don't always have to be hard.