Unlike Resignation or Abdication, which are vices about passiveness that utterly avoid responsibility by your partner in doing the work of even being a partner, Martyr behavior is a character "vice of excess" that sees the partner actually over-deliver on service to the point of abject sacrifice of their goals, ownership or even the dignity of adhering to one's life goals. The ostensible rationale would be the assumption that if "one gives one's all," they will somehow be rewarded, in kind. Sometimes people just take what they take.
In being unjust as a partner in contributing to achieving a goal, the martyr-like partner is not pursuing their own life's goals - their "mission in life" or "purpose in life" to the direct psychological enrichment of the other partner. It is unfair and unjust, doing one's self harm in what started as joint goals.
People are often being in Martyrdom unconsciously, and so when their overdelivered service behavior is pointed out to them, they are offended that what seems a more-than-fair deal to them is shockingly unappreciated. And that is the problem. They use an Immature Ego Defense, called, "Projection" - which is like attributing one's own traits onto another person. (Learning about the Ego Defenses, you will find them to be a handy, objective measure of a personal character maturity level.)
It is pathologically narcissistic to be a martyr, given that it produces destructiveness, a "win/lose" behavior - causing "unwanted gifts," which is depicted in couples where the man or woman are trying to "buy love."
The other vice of Service as a virtue is called, "Mercenary," where a person "cuts a bad deal for their own advantage in getting to goals.
Someone who is romantically in martyrdom is a hustler, directly surrendering their goals and dreams of a mate, letting themselves be "steam-rolled."
As a vice which makes partnership within relationships fail to get to goals, and intellectually unattractive, consider Marterdom behavior to be negative in many ways, including in sexual attraction, since it actually depletes the reserves of one's own, or the other partner's masculinity or femininity.