Recognising a toxic relationship is extremely difficult if you are not a witness but a participant in it. The key is to trust your feelings and check in from time to time to see how your life has changed.
Toxic relationships are relationships that destroy the life and psyche of one or both partners. As a rule, there is little trust, respect, open communication, which are the basis of healthy relationships, but a lot of control, manipulation, criticism, emotional and even physical violence.
What is especially dangerous, toxicity in relationships often goes unnoticed and is perceived as the norm – this is due to the fact that at first, harmful behaviour can appear very veiled and grow extremely slowly. But if you can recognise the signs of toxicity in time, you have a much better chance of escaping. Here are the signs to look out for.
1. YOU’RE BEING MADE TO DOUBT YOURSELF
Do you no longer like yourself, no longer respect yourself? Do you feel invisible, powerless, don’t realise who you are, what you are really like? These feelings may be the result of your partner constantly besmirching you, cutting you off, belittling your virtues and achievements, seeking to undermine your self-confidence, making you doubt your strengths and abilities. His interests and needs are always prioritised and you remain in the background.
2. YOU ARE BEING CONTROLLED
Passive-aggressive behaviour, avoidance of responsibility, guilt manipulation, control – all this manifests itself gradually and subtly. Directly you may not have anything to pick on, but it is worth listening to your intuition.
3. YOU ARE BEING SMOTHERED WITH NEGATIVITY
Your partner brings some negativity into your relationship all the time – criticises, does not support, reacts pessimistically to everything. He always tries in one way or another to extinguish your joy, spoil your good mood. This will inevitably affect (if not yet) your emotional state, as well as the perception of themselves and the world around them.
4. YOU ARE VERY JEALOUS
Jealousy can manifest itself not only in checking your phone and demanding a report on your whereabouts: your partner can walk around with a pouty, resentful look, defiantly ignore you, behave passive-aggressively. All this creates tension in the relationship and undermines trust in each other.
5. YOU ARE BEING TRAPPED
You are stuffy in the relationship, feeling stagnant, unable to grow and increasingly out of touch with your true self.
6. YOU’RE BEING FORCED TO SACRIFICE YOURSELF
Your goals, hopes, dreams are now irrelevant – your partner has nullified them through control, manipulation and devaluation. You are forced to sacrifice what makes you happy in order to satisfy your partner.