Sounds like you've started working on good self-care and you need to keep on with it. The people you're describing seem to be triggered by the idea that you might someday use good self-care to keep them at a safe distance. I'm afraid an important part of good self-care (related to good boundaries) is staying away from anyone who doesn't want you to use good self-care.

I understand that one of the first things lifeguards are taught is the right way to approach a drowning person. You don't, for instance, let them grab you around the neck because then both of you would be in trouble. Instead you slip around them or even under them and grab them from behind. (Disclaimer: I've never taken water rescue training myself, just read about it a few times and heard it discussed in passing in first-aid classes.) The announcement they make to airplane passengers goes something like that, too: if the cabin pressure fails and the oxygen masks drop down, you need to make sure to put your own mask on before you start helping anyone else.

Are you sure you were reacting to being selfish rather than, say, having other people say you were or thinking, yourself, that you might be? Anyway, I've never found that doing anything to prove something -- that I'm not selfish, let's say -- actually works. It doesn't seem to satisfy me, doesn't seem to convince anyone else, gets me obsessing about what someone else is going to think of me, and pretty much stops me from noticing what I really could do for anyone.

Thank you, LittleForgetMeNot, and good luck with sorting this out for yourself!