Lots of elaborate discussion I can't quite understand here, but I'll give my opinion if you don't mind Evie. Many points of it have been said with more detail but maybe not so directly. A person doesn't stop being a person simply because of PTSD, though it can be quite convincing when you're very low. For romance a lot of it does go to physical and/or mental attraction. Even at the most extreme PTSD doesn't simply dictate what develops. You kind of conditioned your question to get the one kind of response about codependency, but its greater than that. I'll call it the appearance of a person, but meaning the total appearance and not just the surface-how that person behaves, what they like, etc. Everything that comes out while dating and that makes them unique. Everyone meets on that level, and starts a relationships on the basis of whether they like the appearance of the other. I can't even get close to qualifying this for all the possible deceptions that exist but it is the essential point.

After that is where PTSD can effect things since it alters that appearance and it goes to the tolerance of the other whether they can accept the change or not. Its more than just the give and take of affection (You were talking about that right?). Again, lots of things I don't really know about can qualify that in disorders, but those are exceptions not the general rule. And the sufferer has certain duties to keep things in check and prevent violent and intimidating behavior. Even in isolation from PTSD those behaviors cause major problems in relationships. Good behavior is required from both to make it work and if either don't do that then it fails, it must fail at that point. What I'm trying to say is to go back to your question of what the appeal could be to make a person date a sufferer, I think it would be decided based on those total appearances and whether it works or not decided by the limits of proper tolerance for change. Better word to use but I can't think of it now.