Did you sabotage that relationship or was it doomed to fail?

any partner who thinks you are selfish for focusing on your own issues is not the partner for you

I think focusing on yourself and not your partner is a little more nuanced, because it can be easy to use that as an excuse to maintain distance and be selfish if you're looking for one (like if you get into the trap of not taking responsibility for how your possibly legitimately hurtful behavior affects your partner and end up saying, "it's your problem, not mine"). It's more about finding the right boundaries of being considerate but not taking on someone else's personal issues, while always stepping up to be responsible for your own and not expecting someone else to save you. But it involves also not ignoring reasonable requests from your partner for help that aren't intrusive to the healthy boundary line and not outright dismissing your partner if they have communicated needs or feedback (even if it's not something you agree with).

There's a skill to being able to recognize when something is bothering you because of past baggage, and it is yours alone to address, versus when something is truly bothering you about the relationship and the other's behavior towards you and you need to talk it out together.

And yes, it's so very important that you and your partner can trust that the other is taking full ownership of their own individual personal baggage for a serious relationship to be functional. If there's real trust in yourselves and each other and you each have healthy boundaries, it leads to acting with good intentions out of mutual care (versus out of fear or acting out triggered behavior), to not manipulating or trying to fulfill a personal agenda of outcomes, and to each person being both able and willing to communicate their needs (essentially, secure behaviors).

For those times you should consider how your actions are affecting your partner -- it's still about good communication and trust being key, much more than worrying about what's going on with your partner. Hopefully they have already communicated if something is bothering them, but if you're picking up on cues that something is wrong, it's worth asking. If your partner still can't communicate ("nothing, I'm fine," when they're not), then it's not up to you to take further responsibility to draw it out and worry about solving their issues. You can respect their process and decide if it's something you can live with or not, and not direct your focus past that extent. I've found it critically important to learn not to take things personally in those situations, so I can then consider the best course of action for myself with a clear head and not project or speculate about what they need.

I agree that there's so much junk advice out there on this stuff. It really seems to present that only a very limited set of intentions exist and doesn't allow that sometimes it actually is more complicated and requires a step up on patience and communication before you assume and project on your partner. Plus, it doesn't encourage enough honest self-introspection.

Welcome to the board. It's a great place to learn and get support on your journey to healing!

Yes, exactly why I'd brought all that up. My ex FA partner also struggled terribly with the same, no matter how consistently I showed up for him, and eventually looked for excuses to justify deactivating and fleeing... twice. It's not intuitive to show up both for yourself and your partner when your starting point is low view of self and others.

I'm not sure what else to say except...it sucks and the FA needs to learn to be more assertive...and not having any fights is actually a really bad sign.

i've shared it before-
it's kind of silly but it worked.
when i made a commitment to my healing from this stuff i realized i had this huge problem with hiding my real feelings and needs and aspirations. (with the man i was trying to have a partnership with- big mistake)

i got pretty frustrated and it was hard for me to know how people just DO this.

i literally just started blurting out what i needed to say to express myself truthfully, it was not graceful but i could stand by what i said.
I would check myself ... "Juni, you cant control his reaction or the outcome. but you want him to know you as you really are, and understand you. Are you willing to accept any outcome in order to honor you authentic self with him? Yes? ok... 3,2,1... GO!". my hands would sweat sometimes when i made myself vulnerable and said what i really was thinking or feeling.

but i just white knuckled it. over time we built a rapport on that. i guess he does the same. he's been consistently showing up to my truth with his truth for a while now..

What it did was build a fundamental trust that we could be safe with each other. so now, i feel like he really understands me, so i trust his intentions and regard for me- i'm not hiding anything so i don't fear he doesn't get me or that he is in love with something i am not, or that i can't deliver on. he sees me, hears me, and accepts me and is happy about me. It shows, and i trust it.

it was scary at first but now it's really good.
the trust is so important. and you have to really show up raw sometimes. but trust itself protects you.
it's like a shield from harm you can't name but have been afraid of all your life. it's peaceful to have trust.