Why We Accept the Love We Think We Deserve: A Trauma-Informed Perspective on Relationships

Danika Desforges-Bell, MSc Ps ed.,
Mental Health Counsellor & Behavioural/Parenting Consultant

Why We Accept the Love We Think We Deserve: A Trauma-Informed Perspective on Relationships
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There’s a scene in The Perks of Being a Wallflower where Paul Rudd, playing Mr. Anderson, sits across from a quiet, hurting teen and says:
“We accept the love we think we deserve.”
It’s a simple line—but it lands with weight. The kind that lingers long after the scene ends.
I used to think that quote was kind of dramatic—like something people post when they’re going through a breakup. But the more I’ve sat with it—both personally and in my work as a counsellor—the more I see how much depth it actually holds.
Because it’s not just about self-worth in a simple, surface-level way. It’s about conditioning. It’s about nervous systems. It’s about what feels familiar.
From a trauma-informed lens, the love we accept isn’t always a conscious choice—it’s often a reflection of what our system has learned to recognize as “normal.” If inconsistency, emotional distance, or unpredictability were part of your early experiences, those dynamics don’t just register as uncomfortable—they can also feel strangely familiar. Sometimes even… safe.
And that’s the part that can feel confusing for people.

I’ve sat with clients who can clearly name what they want—stability, respect, emotional presence—but still find themselves drawn to relationships that don’t offer those things. Not because they’re choosing poorly, and not because they think they deserve pain, but because their nervous system is wired to recognize certain patterns as home.
So when we talk about “accepting the love we think we deserve,” I think it’s important to be gentle with that framing.
Because many of us didn’t get to consciously decide what we believed we deserved. Those beliefs were shaped in environments where we were adapting, coping, and doing what we needed to do to feel safe or connected.
And those adaptations? They make sense.
Minimizing your needs, overextending yourself, tolerating inconsistency—these aren’t character flaws. They’re often protective strategies that worked at one point in your life.
But what protected you then might be limiting you now.
That’s where the work comes in—not in blaming yourself for what you’ve accepted, but in slowly expanding your capacity to receive something different.
And that can feel uncomfortable at first.
Healthy, steady love can feel unfamiliar. It can feel “boring” if you’re used to intensity. It can feel unsafe if your system is waiting for the other shoe to drop. So part of the process isn’t just raising your standards cognitively—it’s helping your nervous system learn that consistency, care, and respect are actually safe to receive.
In my work as a counsellor, that’s often what we come back to: building awareness without shame.
Not “Why did I accept this?” but “What did this pattern do for me?”
Not “What’s wrong with me?” but “What happened to me—and how did I adapt?”
Because when you start to understand your patterns through that lens, something shifts. There’s more compassion. More curiosity. And from there, more choice.
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Toward the end of that same film, there’s another quieter moment. The student, still trying to make sense of pain and people and patterns, asks a version of the question many of us carry:
Can people change? Can things be different?
And Mr. Anderson responds, gently:
“We can try.”
It’s not a grand promise. It’s not a guarantee.
But it’s honest—and, in many ways, deeply trauma-informed.
Because change, especially when it comes to relational patterns, rarely happens through insight alone. It happens through experience—through repeated, embodied moments of something different.

This is where the therapeutic relationship can be powerful. In a trauma-informed space—something deeply shaped by the work of Bruce D. Perry and brought into broader conversation through Oprah Winfrey’s work on What Happened to You?—healing begins with safety, attunement, and connection.
But therapy is only one relationship.
Attachment theory reminds us that our patterns are formed—and healed—in relationship. Not just with a therapist, but with friends, partners, chosen family, and community. The everyday moments of being responded to differently. Of being respected. Of having needs met without having to earn it.
Those experiences matter.
They are the “we can try” in action.
Because over time, safe and consistent relationships begin to challenge what your nervous system expects. They create new reference points. New meanings of “normal.” New possibilities for what love can feel like—not just cognitively, but in your body.
And that’s the part we don’t talk about enough.
Healing isn’t just about understanding your past. It’s about experiencing something different in the present—again and again—until your system begins to believe it.
So yes, we may accept the love we think we deserve.
But with support, with awareness, and with relationships that are steady enough to hold us while we unlearn and relearn…
We can try.
And, slowly, that trying becomes change.
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If this resonates with you, and you’re wanting support in exploring your own patterns in a gentle, trauma-informed way, you’re always welcome to reach out and connect.
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References
• The Perks of Being a Wallflower (dir. Stephen Chbosky)
• What Happened to You? — Bruce D. Perry & Oprah Winfrey
• A Secure Base — John Bowlby
• The Body Keeps the Score — Bessel van der Kolk

Danika Desforges-Bell, MSc Ps ed.