It starts with being praised for it.

A girl who gives things up is called generous; a girl who takes up little room is called easy to have around; a girl who anticipates what everyone else needs and provides it before they ask is called, by every adult in her life, good.

And she learns the lesson the way children learn all the deep lessons, not from what she’s told but from what earns her warmth, and the lesson is: you are most loved when you are least present.

So she gets good at absence.

She gets good at wanting less, needing less, taking less, until wanting anything for herself comes to feel like a small theft from the people she loves.

By the time such a girl is a woman in a marriage, the machinery is so deep in her she cannot see it working.