Women who were never shown how to love themselves growing up often display 8 specific behaviors as adults

The journey toward self-love begins in childhood, shaped by the messages we receive from caregivers and influential adults. But for many women, this foundation was never properly built.

Instead of learning to value themselves, these women absorbed lessons that tied their worth to external validation or service to others. The absence of role models demonstrating healthy self-worth creates lasting behavioral patterns that can persist for decades.

Recognizing these behaviors represents the first step toward healing. While these patterns may feel deeply ingrained, understanding their origins offers women the opportunity to rewrite these narratives and finally embrace the self-love they’ve always deserved.

1. They deflect or diminish praise or compliments lavished on them.

Watch carefully the next time someone offers sincere praise to a woman who wasn’t taught self-love as a child. Her immediate reaction reveals volumes. “Oh, it was nothing” escapes her lips before the compliment fully registers. Perhaps she quickly redirects attention to someone else’s contributions or points out flaws in her work the giver hadn’t noticed.

Such deflection stems from a profound disconnect between how others perceive her and how she views herself. Compliments create confusion because they directly contradict the internal narrative that she isn’t worthy of positive attention.

Behind this behavior lies a protective mechanism. Accepting praise requires vulnerability, an acknowledgment that she might actually deserve recognition. For someone raised without models of healthy self-love, this territory feels dangerously unfamiliar. Deflection and diminishment serve as a shield against the discomfort of possibly believing in her own value.

2. They criticize themselves excessively for minor mistakes or perceived flaws.

Spilling coffee becomes evidence of inherent clumsiness. A single typo in a report transforms into proof of incompetence. Women who lacked childhood lessons in self-love often engage in relentless self-criticism that vastly exceeds the situation’s reality.

I remember a university classmate of mine who would openly berate herself during study sessions. “I’m so stupid,” she’d mutter after misunderstanding a concept, her face flushing with genuine shame. Despite ranking near the top of our class, each small error triggered a disproportionate spiral of self-condemnation that left the rest of us uncomfortably silent.

Behaviors like harsh self-judgment emerge from deeply internalized messages that perfection equals worthiness. Making mistakes doesn’t simply represent a normal human experience—it triggers shame about fundamental flaws in their character or abilities.

The intensity of this self-criticism frequently shocks others who witness it. Friends and colleagues might point out the disproportionate reaction, yet these external perspectives rarely penetrate the conviction that imperfection justifies self-punishment. What appears as simple perfectionism actually reveals something deeper: the belief that acceptance and love must be earned through flawlessness.

3. They default to negative self-talk.

Inner monologues shape our reality in profound ways. Women denied the foundation of self-love during their early years often develop an internal narrator that specializes in criticism and doubt.

“You’re not smart enough for this promotion.”

“Nobody actually enjoys your company.”

“You’ll never figure this out.”

Negative self-talk becomes so habitual that it operates below conscious awareness. The constant stream of ridicule feels normal—just the “truth” rather than a harmful pattern.

Recognizing this behavior requires developing awareness of thoughts that pass through the mind unchallenged. Many women discover their inner voice sounds suspiciously like critical adults from childhood—parents, teachers, or others whose judgment carried weight.

Learning self-love later in life means confronting this voice and questioning its authority. The most insidious aspect of this pattern? How invisibly it operates, coloring perceptions and limiting possibilities without announcing its presence.

4. They tie their self-worth to external accomplishments or appearance.

Success at work brings temporary relief. A compliment about physical appearance provides momentary comfort. Women who weren’t taught self-love during childhood frequently develop behaviors centered around achievements and looks as proxies for worthiness.

Beneath these patterns lies a fundamental misunderstanding about human value. Without early models demonstrating unconditional self-acceptance, many conclude their worth depends entirely on what they produce or how they appear to others.

Promotion celebrations quickly give way to anxiety about maintaining performance. Weight fluctuations trigger identity crises. The constant need for external validation creates exhausting pressure to achieve increasingly higher standards.

External markers of success can never fill the void where self-love should reside. The accomplishments pile up while the underlying belief—”I am not enough as I am”—remains stubbornly intact.

Breaking this pattern means recognizing worth exists independently from any external measure, a profound shift for someone who never witnessed this truth in action.

5. They prioritize others’ comfort while neglecting their own needs.

Her friend’s minor preferences become non-negotiable priorities while her own significant needs remain unspoken. She’ll drive across town to deliver something someone could easily pick up themselves. Behaviors centered on others’ comfort often dominate the lives of women who lacked childhood models of healthy self-regard.

Self-love deficits manifest clearly in “Good Girl Syndrome”—prioritizing everyone but themselves. Physical discomfort, emotional strain, and personal boundaries all become negotiable when pleasing others feels like the primary path to connection and security.

The origins trace back to environments where love appeared conditional. Children lacking unconditional acceptance quickly learn to earn connection through service and compliance. Years later, these same women struggle to identify their own desires separate from others’ expectations.

Hidden beneath the helpful persona often lies resentment—not toward others, but toward herself for being unable to establish boundaries. Breaking this cycle requires the challenging work of recognizing her needs deserve equal consideration, a concept foreign to someone raised without witnessing healthy self-care in practice.

6. They gravitate toward critical or emotionally unavailable partners.

Relationship patterns reveal profound truths about our deepest beliefs. Women deprived of self-love lessons in childhood display a troubling tendency toward partners who mirror their earliest experiences of conditional acceptance.

The critical boyfriend’s harsh judgments feel strangely familiar. An emotionally distant spouse’s withholding of affection creates a painful comfort zone. Rather than seeming problematic, these dynamics often register as normal or even as confirmation of their unworthiness of consistent love.

A lack of self-love makes spotting these patterns particularly difficult. Red flags that would warn others away appear as expected, even deserved treatment. The unconscious pull toward familiar emotional landscapes overwhelms conscious desires for healthier connections.

Partners who reinforce childhood messaging about conditional worth create environments where early wounds repeatedly reopen. Breaking free requires recognizing how these relationships maintain rather than heal old injuries. Developing self-love later in life often coincides with profound shifts in relationship patterns, sometimes after multiple painful cycles with similar partners.

7. They feel guilty when investing in self-care.

Massage appointments get canceled when someone else needs help. Meditation time disappears when work demands increase. Basic self-maintenance activities trigger waves of guilt. Women who weren’t taught healthy self-love during childhood often exhibit behaviors that reveal deep discomfort with prioritizing their own wellbeing.

Nurturing oneself feels fundamentally selfish rather than necessary. Simple acts of self-care transform into indulgences that require justification. “I haven’t worked hard enough to deserve this” replaces the healthier perspective that everyone inherently deserves care—especially from themselves.

Guilt surrounding self-care stems from messages that personal needs matter less than others’ wants. Learning self-love as an adult means confronting this guilt directly, recognizing it as an outdated response to new, healthier behaviors.

Many discover their resistance to self-care reflects fear as much as guilt—fear that prioritizing their needs might cost them connection or approval. Establishing sustainable self-care practices represents a radical act of self-love for women who never witnessed adults modeling this essential balance.

8. They apologize excessively for taking up space or having basic needs.

“Sorry” precedes requests for information. Apologies accompany statements of preference. Women lacking childhood foundations in self-love frequently develop behaviors centered around excessive apologizing—not for actual transgressions but simply for existing with needs and opinions.

Self-love deficits reveal themselves clearly in this pattern of perpetual apology. The underlying belief becomes transparent: my presence, my needs, my voice inherently inconvenience others and require preemptive atonement.

Personal boundaries get prefaced with apologies that undermine their legitimacy. “I’m sorry, but I can’t stay late tonight” communicates that having limits deserves remorse. Even physical space becomes territory for unnecessary contrition—apologizing when someone else bumps into them.

Living with a constant awareness of one’s impact on others while minimizing one’s own right to exist fully creates exhausting hypervigilance. Unlearning this behavior means challenging the core belief that their existence itself represents an imposition. Genuine self-love requires accepting that taking up space in the world needs no justification or apology.

The Path Forward: Reclaiming Self-Love

Recognizing these behaviors marks the beginning of healing, not a permanent sentence. Women who observe these patterns in themselves aren’t broken—they’re responding logically to childhood environments that failed to nurture healthy self-regard. The journey toward authentic self-love often begins with compassion for the child who developed these protective strategies.

Small, consistent steps toward treating yourself with kindness gradually rewire these ingrained responses. Each time you accept a compliment, prioritize your needs, or silence self-criticism, you create new neural pathways. Behavior change follows belief change. The capacity for profound self-love exists within you, waiting to be reclaimed.