When Someone You Love is Toxic – How to Let Go, Without Guilt

When Someone You Love is Toxic How to Let Go of a Toxic Relationship, Without Guilt

If toxic people were an ingestible substance, they would come with a high-powered warning and secure packaging to prevent any chance of accidental contact. Sadly, families are not immune to the poisonous lashings of a toxic relationship.

Though families and relationships can feel impossibly tough at times, they were never meant to ruin. All relationships have their flaws and none of them come packaged with the permanent glow of sunlight and goodness and beautiful things. In any normal relationship there will be fights from time to time. Things will be said and done and forgiven, and occasionally rehashed at strategic moments. For the most part though, they will feel nurturing and life-giving to be in. At the very least, they won’t hurt.

Why do toxic people do toxic things?

Toxic people thrive on control. Not the loving, healthy control that tries to keep everyone safe and happy – buckle your seatbelt, be kind, wear sunscreen – but the type that keeps people small and diminished. 

Everything they do is to keep people small and manageable. This will play out through criticism, judgement, oppression – whatever it takes to keep someone in their place. The more you try to step out of ‘your place’, the more a toxic person will call on toxic behaviour to bring you back and squash you into the tiny box they believe you belong in.

It is likely that toxic people learned their behaviour during their own childhood, either by being exposed to the toxic behaviour of others or by being overpraised without being taught the key quality of empathy. In any toxic relationship there will be other qualities missing too, such as respect, kindness and compassion, but at the heart of a toxic person’s behaviour is the lack of concern around their impact on others. They come with a critical failure to see past their own needs and wants.

Toxic people have a way of choosing open, kind people with beautiful, lavish hearts because these are the ones who will be more likely to fight for the relationship and less likely to abandon.

Even the strongest people can find themselves in a toxic relationship but the longer they stay, the more they are likely to evolve into someone who is a smaller, less confident, more wounded version of the person they used to be.

Non-toxic people who stay in a toxic relationship will never stop trying to make the relationship better, and toxic people know this. They count on it. Non-toxic people will strive to make the relationship work and when they do, the toxic person has exactly what he or she wants – control. 

Toxic Families – A Special Kind of Toxic

Families are a witness to our lives – our best, our worst, our catastrophes, our frailties and flaws. All families come with lessons that we need to learn along the way to being a decent, thriving human. The lessons begin early and they don’t stop, but not everything a family teaches will come with an afterglow. Sometimes the lessons they teach are deeply painful ones that shudder against our core.

Rather than being lessons on how to love and safely open up to the world, the lessons some families teach are about closing down, staying small and burying needs – but for every disempowering lesson, there is one of empowerment, strength and growth that exists with it. In toxic families, these are around how to walk away from the ones we love, how to let go with strength and love, and how to let go of guilt and any fantasy that things could ever be different. And here’s the rub – the pain of a toxic relationship won’t soften until the lesson has been learned.

Love and loyalty don’t always exist together.

Love has a fierce way of keeping us tied to people who wound us. The problem with family is that we grow up in the fold, believing that the way they do things is the way the world works. We trust them, listen to them and absorb what they say. There would have been a time for all of us that regardless of how mind-blowingly destructive the messages from our family were, we would have received them all with a beautiful, wide-eyed innocence, grabbing every detail and letting them shape who we were growing up to be.

Our survival would have once depended on believing in everything they said and did, and resisting the need to challenge or question that we might deserve better. The things we believe when we are young are powerful. They fix themselves upon us and they stay, at least until we realise one day how wrong and small-hearted those messages have been.

At some point, the environment changes – we grow up – but our beliefs don’t always change with it. We stop depending on our family for survival but we hang on to the belief that we have to stay connected and loyal, even though being with them hurts.

The obligation to love and stay loyal to a family member can be immense, but love and loyalty are two separate things and they don’t always belong together.

Loyalty can be a confusing, loaded term and is often the reason that people stay stuck in toxic relationships. What you need to know is this: When loyalty comes with a diminishing of the self, it’s not loyalty, it’s submission.

We stop having to answer to family when we become adults and capable of our own minds.

Why are toxic relationships so destructive?

In any healthy relationship, love is circular – when you give love, it comes back. When what comes back is scrappy, stingy intent under the guise of love, it will eventually leave you small and depleted, which falls wildly, terrifyingly short of where anyone is meant to be.

Healthy people welcome the support and growth of the people they love, even if it means having to change a little to accommodate. When one person in a system changes, whether it’s a relationship of two or a family of many, it can be challenging. Even the strongest and most loving relationships can be touched by feelings of jealousy, inadequacy and insecurity at times in response to somebody’s growth or happiness. We are all vulnerable to feeling the very normal, messy emotions that come with being human.

The difference is that healthy families and relationships will work through the tough stuff. Unhealthy ones will blame, manipulate and lie – whatever they have to do to return things to the way they’ve always been, with the toxic person in control.

Why a Toxic Relationship Will never change.

Reasonable people, however strong and independently minded they are, can easily be drawn into thinking that if they could find the switch, do less, do more, manage it, tweak it, that the relationship will be okay. The cold truth is that if anything was going to be different it would have happened by now. 

Toxic people can change, but it’s highly unlikely. What is certain is that nothing anyone else does can change them. It is likely there will be broken people, broken hearts and broken relationships around them – but the carnage will always be explained away as someone else’s fault. There will be no remorse, regret or insight. What is more likely is that any broken relationship will amplify their toxic behaviour.

Why are toxic people so hard to leave?

If you try to leave a toxic person, things might get worse before they get better – but they will always get better. Always.

Few things will ramp up feelings of insecurity or a need for control more than when someone questions familiar, old behaviour, or tries to break away from old, established patterns in a relationship. For a person whose signature moves involve manipulation, lies, criticism or any other toxic behaviour, when something feels as though it’s changing, they will use even more of their typical toxic behaviour to bring the relationship (or the person) back to a state that feels acceptable.

When things don’t seem to be working, people will always do more of what used to work, even if that behaviour is at the heart of the problem. It’s what we all do. If you are someone who is naturally open and giving, when things don’t feel right in a relationship you will likely give more of yourself, offer more support, be more loving, to get things back on track. 

Breaking away from a toxic relationship can feel like tearing at barbed wire with bare hands. The more you do it, the more it hurts, so for a while, you stop tearing, until you realise that it’s not the tearing that hurts, it’s the barbed wire – the relationship – and whether you tear at it or not, it won’t stop cutting into you.

Think of it like this. Imagine that all relationships and families occupy a space. In healthy ones, the shape of that space will be fluid and open to change, with a lot of space for people to grow. People will move to accommodate the growth and flight of each other. 

For a toxic family or a toxic relationship, that shape is rigid and unyielding. There is no flexibility, no bending, and no room for growth. Everyone has a clearly defined space and for some, that space will be small and heavily boxed. When one person starts to break out of the shape, the whole family feels their own individual sections change. The shape might wobble and things might feel vulnerable, weakened or scary. This is normal, but toxic people will do whatever it takes to restore the space to the way it was. Often, that will mean crumpling the ones who are changing so they fit their space again.

Sometimes out of a sense of love and terribly misplaced loyalty, people caught in a toxic relationship might sacrifice growth and change and step back into the rigid tiny space a toxic person manipulates them towards. It will be clear when this has happened because of the soul-sucking grief at being back there in the mess with people (or person) who feel so bad to be with.

But they do it because they love me. They said so.

Sometimes toxic people will hide behind the defence that they are doing what they do because they love you, or that what they do is ‘no big deal’ and that you’re the one causing the trouble because you’re just too sensitive, too serious, too – weak, stupid, useless, needy, insecure, jealous – too ‘whatever’ to get it. You will have heard the word plenty of times before. 

The only truth you need to know is this: If it hurts, it’s hurtful. Fullstop.

Love never holds people back from growing. It doesn’t diminish, and it doesn’t contaminate. If someone loves you, it feels like love. It feels supportive and nurturing and life-giving. If it doesn’t do this, it’s not love. It’s self-serving crap designed to keep you tethered and bound to someone else’s idea of how you should be.

There is no such thing as a perfect relationship, but a healthy one is a tolerant, loving, accepting, responsive one.

The one truth that matters.

If it feels like growth or something that will nourish you, follow that. It might mean walking away from people you care about – parents, sisters, brothers, friends – but this can be done with love and the door left open for when they are able to meet you closer to your terms – ones that don’t break you.

Set the boundaries with grace and love and leave it to the toxic person to decide which side of that boundary they want to stand on. Boundaries aren’t about spite or manipulation and they don’t have to be about ending the relationship. They are something drawn in strength and courage to let people see with great clarity where the doorway is to you. If the relationship ends, it’s not because of your lack of love or loyalty, but because the toxic person chose not to treat you in the way you deserve. Their choice. 

Though it is up to you to decide the conditions on which you will let someone close to you, whether or not somebody wants to be close to you enough to respect those conditions is up to them. The choice to trample over what you need means they are choosing not to be with you. It doesn’t mean you are excluding them from your life.

Toxic people also have their conditions of relationship and though they might not be explicit, they are likely to include an expectation that you will tolerate ridicule, judgement, criticism, oppression, lying, manipulation – whatever they do. No relationship is worth that and it is always okay to say ‘no’ to anything that diminishes you.

The world and those who genuinely love you want you to be as whole as you can be. Sometimes choosing health and wholeness means stepping bravely away from that which would see your spirit broken and malnourished.

When you were young and vulnerable and dependent for survival on the adults in your life, you had no say in the conditions on which you let people close to you. But your life isn’t like that now. You get to say. You get to choose the terms of your relationships and the people you get close to.

There is absolutely no obligation to choose people who are toxic just because they are family. If they are toxic, the simple truth is that they have not chosen you. The version of you that they have chosen is the one that is less than the person you would be without them.

The growth.

Walking away from a toxic relationship isn’t easy, but it is always brave and always strong. It is always okay. And it is always – always – worth it. This is the learning and the growth that is hidden in the toxic mess.

Letting go will likely come with guilt, anger and grief for the family or person you thought you had. They might fight harder for you to stay. They will probably be crueller, more manipulative and more toxic than ever. They will do what they’ve always done because it has always worked. Keep moving forward and let every hurtful, small-hearted thing they say or do fuel your step.

You can’t pretend toxic behaviour away or love it away or eat it, drink it, smoke it, depress it or gamble it away. You can’t avoid the impact by being smaller, by crouching or bending or flexing around it. But you can walk away from it – so far away that the most guided toxic fuelled missile that’s thrown at you won’t find you.

One day they might catch up to you – not catch you, catch up to you – with their growth and their healing but until then, choose your own health and happiness over their need to control you. 

You can love people, let go of them and keep the door open on your terms, for whenever they are ready to treat you with love, respect and kindness. This is one of the hardest lessons but one of the most life-giving and courageous ones.

Sometimes there are not two sides. There is only one. Toxic people will have you believing that the one truthful side is theirs. It’s not. It never was. Don’t believe their highly diseased, stingy version of love. It’s been drawing your breath, suffocating you and it will slowly kill you if you let it, and the way you ‘let it’ is by standing still while it spirals around you, takes aim and shoots. 

If you want to stay, that’s completely okay, but see their toxic behaviour for what it is – a desperate attempt to keep you little and controlled. Be bigger, stronger, braver than anything that would lessen you. Be authentic and real and give yourself whatever you need to let that be. Be her. Be him. Be whoever you can be if the small minds and tiny hearts of others couldn’t stop you.

[irp posts=”1602″ name=”When It’s Not You, It’s Them: The Toxic People That Ruin Friendships, Families, Relationships”]

1,088 Comments

Meena

Wow! Reading all the comments, tears me up to see how much people suffer because of another’s blindness to their own behavior. I say this because I understand as well. I put up with it for 3 years. It took for him to leave me 10 hours away from home without food, shelter, water and money to realize that no one deserves this. I can’t believe how much control one can have on you if you let it. I still think about him but I know I can’t go back into it. I tried to help this person. I thought I loved him too but I realized I was just trying to help. Help him to the point where I now have nothing left for myself. No job, losing my savings, lost my happy go lucky self. I feel like I am in a dark cloud, but now that I am away from him, I feel like the darkness is slowly lifting. I have an interview next week and working my butt off to learn about the company so I can nail this job. I believe strength comes from faith. I haven’t lost my faith. My faith is in my own abilities. I know who I am. I have always known and I tell myself, I tried. I tried to help another and now it is out of my control completely. I am now focusing on myself and feel the recovery. I am thankful that I’ve been made as strong as I am and I can see my path towards forwardness. I hope everyone that is suffering in this similar situation knows that they are placed in that situation because they are that much stronger to bear and conquer. Don’t lose that strength and don’t lose sight of who you really are no matter what anyone says. You are beautiful, handsome, courageous, caring, loving and above all, extremely tough. You will be alright. Don’t be scared. We are not alone.

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Julie

You are an inspiration and now you have the rest of your life to be free from all the negativity.Although losing it all was hard, in the end you found yourself and discovered your strength. I personally believe life is hard and we need to have the right people by our sides supporting us, not holding us down. Toxic people suck the life right out of us right before our eyes and choose the sensitive good souls as their victims. You are fortunate that you didn’t spend more time than you did wrapped up with this person. Thanks for sharing your story.

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Sarah

It’s always good to remember that men as well as women suffer from abuse. It is easy to believe that only women are abused, but – for sure, men also suffer in the same (or worse) ways.

Sorry to hear about your struggles. I definitely understand about the financial abuse of men that many women seem to feel is their birthright. You feelings seem very valid to me and I appreciate hearing what you say.

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Ross

Thank you. Part of going through this and being able to feel validated is having someone respond and not feeling alone or the only one experiencing the subtle and not so subtle effects of a toxic relationship.

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Ross

Week 4 after leaving.

Seeing a therapist more to know how to defend myself emotionally from her than not understanding myself.
No contact is not possible with all our entanglements of property and finance.
She is blaming me for sacrificing herself for the family, running from my obligations and responsibilities. Leaving her at 65 years of age she does not want to live alone. Refuses to go to counseling for herself and feels I am the crazy person. Makes her and my grown children with grandchildren a package deal. Cannot have one without the other.
Despite the fact that I continue to do all I did other than sleep in the same house she somehow cannot deal with life.
She is still in control of the money and I simply take a small amount every 2 weeks to live she is angry.
Should we divorce she will be well taken care of yet claims she will be destitute. Of course our whole married life was never enough money. Yet we travelled helped our kids with cars, education and even paying bills when they fell on hard times.
I cannot seem to reason with her and never could.
I agreed to couples counseling in the hope she will understand I have a right to my own life now. That I will divorce her.
She cannot understand why I chose to live alone….there has got to be another woman….and yes at least 20 years younger. Sorry, but there isn’t another woman. After 44 years I find being alone quite satisfying and peaceful.
Just felt like rambling to keep me on the path of freedom. She does not want me seeing any therapist that permits me to feel I have a right to leave. She is trying to dictate how often I go. Yet does not understand what I mean by her controlling personality.
Thanks again for having this site. This has been a savior for me and has given me courage to finally feel like a whole person. This article was the most significant influence in me finally leaving and staying gone. Not even feeling guilty for the first time in 35 years. Thank you again Karen.

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Ross

Dear Karen,

This is my third week out and I cannot express how important this site was to staying my course.

How being able to share our stories and the myriad of feelings that the realization it is them not you.

How they have a playbook determined to hold you fast with guilt, fear and blaming you from running away from your obligations.

Being honest with them is impossible as it will only bring more attacks. Withholding an honest answer to survive living with them and dealing with them as you proceed to escape. Only to be told you are the liar. How they do not see the value in counseling for themselves. Counseling is good only for the abused so the abuser can better understand what is wrong and why you want out.

This has been a hard 35 years and I have no regrets how I managed to leave finally. Again thanks to all here and to your insightful article for both men and women.

My counseling has been so much more productive this time because of your contribution to understanding this subtle abusive issue.

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Ross

I wanted to correct the perception that counseling is only good for the abused. My abuser told me that I am to go to counseling so she understands what is wrong with me. I was being sarcastic in that last post. Just a clarification.

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Julie

Hi Ross,
Heartbreaking to hear that youve had 35 hard years together. Proves how much people can be impacted by others to say the least. My boyfriend-ex fiance- and I have had a hard time, too hence the reason Im even on here. Theres definitely been some toxicity but to what extent is the hard part. You sound like youve figured your person-or ex person- out. He has just completed his five sessions(she cut him a deal..we are not rich) with his counselor and says hes going to continue periodically. My first is tomorrow. But weve decided to give it another go and work our way back to an engagement. We’ve been great for about a month and just got into our first fight yesterday so now Im back to shaky ground but only not as bad as before, thankfully. So my comment because you brought it up refers counseling in general and and her take on it. He has said the same thing to me. That he cant wait til I go and find out how messed up I am. I wont try to deny that I sometimes dont know how to commnicate the right way with him or that I can be insensitive and selfish at times, but I am a highly sensitive but loving and kind person and do not try to hurt or manipulate people out of fear of not being in control and he knows this. So anyway, Im happy that you are now on a good path. I agree, I am so glad Ive found this site. Its so great. I also belong to The Friendship Blog which is a bit more intimate where you get plenty of feedback/advice from people sharing their personal experiences. No relationship is easy, but hopefully worth all that hard work. How much work is the big question of the day.

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Ross

Hi Julie,

Glad you are both going to counseling. Hope it does work out. I was in counseling twice before and once with her at couples. I never went long enough to understand being manipulated and controlled. After each time I left which was 4 previous over a 20 year span. Things would be a honeymoon phase. Then within 3-6 months she would start back up. This last year I spent researching the way I was made to feel at some point every day by her. So, instead of getting angry, I started reading what she said to me. The words the way they were used and found out that this was abusive. We shared so many interests that I thought staying was worth it. Then I realized that I was more comfortable with the troubles I had than what troubles I might have by leaving. Not exactly a way for self-fulfillment. The hard part was the guilt. Feeling responsible for her emotions and ignoring my own.
Now I am on my own and working to separate our lives which naturally, at my age, is complicated from a financial standpoint. But, strength comes from knowledge and I learned a lot about me. I keep a daily log and started a bucket list. At 64 I have relished cooking and cleaning and yes getting in a car at 7 AM on a whim and driving to the beach. Last comment is a humorous finding. I do not have any friends. Only family which I may lose through this. Last night while going to the “Red Box” for a movie a woman struck up a conversation with me about movies. We talked for a few minutes and parted. Interesting for a guy who women looked through for many years. Confidence does a lot for a person and I guess it is shining through. The best of luck to you.

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Julie

I cant believe I left out an important piece to this. The counseling was/is because of his manipulative and controlling behavior( included us walking in eggshells) stemming from being abused by his father as a child. Very sad. Hes made a lot of changes but Im still leary. I cant help it.

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Ross

Julie,
Give him credit for trying. Remember, if he reverts back it is not your fault. Be prepared for a future with him or without. Also, hopefully, counseling will help him realize it was not his fault with his father. He may be able to unlearn this way of thinking.
But, never forget your own happiness and the right you have to live it. You don’t have to dislike someone not to want to live with them. You owe your life to you first. It is not selfish. Trust me when I put 35 years into trying. It was not a waste just went longer than it should have. All of life events are a learning experience. We can grow from it or spend life angry which is a total waste of energy. Best regards to you.

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Julie

Ross, I am just seeing your comment now. Sometimes I forget Ive even written! But tonight I posted a new comment about something I need feedback on. How are things going?

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Julie

Thank you, Ross. You are so right. I think Ive lost myself in this relationship. Ive been unhappy thinking those things that were making me unhappy would improve and they haven’t. Its just hes always been there and hes steady in my life and the fear of losing him, not the relationship, is too much to take when I finally do break it off all of those times before. Financially, I could barely make it without him. If my daughter were not with me, I could. She will be 18 in two months but she will be with me for a while still. Otherwise, I would have left for good. I need a better paying job but until then I feel like this is the best thing for my daughter and I. I keep seeing glimpses of hope. But I dont feel the same about him anymore. I think all of our issues have led to this. After a while, you just feel depleted. Thank you for listening.

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Ross

Julie,
To make the decision you are making is empowering in itself. You are choosing to stay for a legitimate reason. You know what you are dealing with and see light at the end of the tunnel. Now, while you have to stay with him for practical reasons, is the time to plan what life will be like when you are able to leave. It is not wrong or deceitful. You need to care for yourself and planning for your well being is going to help you heal.
Things on my end are a slow process. She keeps using things and saying things in the hopes that I will return. Since we have entanglements that I cannot avoid dealing with her I am planning each step to file for divorce when organized. I have my first attorneys appointment in 2 weeks. I am in my apartment and find it a sanctuary of peace that keeps me on the path. I wish you strength and courage to rely on yourself and not worry about what others might say or think. Good luck.

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Anne

Sometimes things are so hard that you dont even get to know where to end things. I’m in a relationship for about4 nd1/2 years now and its been a whilr since I remembered that am I even happy?
This person I’m with, he’s making things even harder for me.
He’s never happy, always insecured, jealous possessive and to a extent a lot suicidal.
Whenever we had the talk that I wasnt happy with him, or when I try to tell him that I want to leave him things always get worse and he threatens to kill himself.
This relationship already took what was good of me. And now I cant even figureout how to leave him.

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Sarah

Great article, thank you for writing it. I am just coming through the last five weeks after a man I was getting to know did something very shady to me, with the full knowledge of our large circle of friends.

I have had to step away from them and from him (of course), and it has been hard to sort out my hurt and anger at his crappy behavior (he stood me up, in front of our friends). Seeing him since twice, he has never even acknowledged that he blew me off even tho everyone around us knows. So, how he could just pretend I don’t exist or act like nothing had happened or that we don’t even know each other even tho we have known each other for 8 months.

I think our mutual friends are sympathetic to me, but his friends side with him and so I have been left to leave our group of friends. So, double ouch because now I feel pushed out by his crappy behavior. My girlfriends want to remain in the group but privately side with me.

I can see now how he was a very controlling and fearful man, and he tried to control me and make me small. I am a happy and openhearted person, I like to love with my whole heart. Something that maybe was attractive to him but also – may have frightened him. Who knows. I am starting to come out of my funk and see all that I learned. It was abusive and I made it clear that his behavior was not ok, it was hurtful. He won’t change or apologize, and that’s on him. I can only take care of myself and be the best that I can be. Feel sad at the loss of what it seemed it could be, but he was not willing to participate in a healthy way. Our friends liked us together (and we liked us together) and tried to help, but – there it is. A very big lesson. Sad.

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Dr. CommonSense

Ok…I don’t mean to sound brash, but here GOES, you were not being abused, nor should you have left your circle of friends. You were dating or had a date setup with a Jerk. I think you’re overdramatizing it. Nothing about him standing you up makes him controlling, here’s the fact, what he did by standing you up is controlling your emotions. You feel bad about it and you can’t control your sadness and anger because you liked him.

You said you were just getting to know him, so who cares if he didn’t show or acknowledge it, you shouldn’t have allowed him to take your circle of friends away. I don’t understand that part. You gave him way too much power as you guys didn’t even know each other that well. I’m not sure how long ago this was, but I sure hope you’ve gotten over it, or there’s no way you’re going to ever handle being in a real relationship. And the lesson wasn’t that big, I’m over 40, guys do stupid things all the time, it doesn’t mean they’re abusive or controlling. You just have to not take it so personal. By doing that you’re allowing the situation to control you.

This was NEW and sometimes NEW doesn’t work out, you have to move on. It shouldn’t have been that detrimental to you being that you guys were just getting to know each other. It bothered you to that point because you created an illusion in your mind about the friendship.

I truly apologize if you feel like I’m attacking or disregarding your feelings, because that’s not the case. I just want you to be STRONGER than this. In the future, don’t consider DATING as a relationship. they’re both entirely two different things and try not to take it so personal when things don’t workout in your favor. Good Luck!

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Val

Sarah,
My heart goes out to your unfortunate relationship & difficult situation of common friends. With respect to standing you up, in front of friends, and never acknowledging it – that absolutely is a red flag for someone who is disrespectful, likely controlling/abusive. That incident also tested your boundaries. Your response and attitude indicates if he could continue to infringe upon your OWN self-respect. This is not someone to give a second chance to, because that’s just permission for him to disrespect you again.

I agree with some of the comments from Dr CommonSense, to not take things too much to heart, and to certainly not leave your circle of friends!!
However, when you describe him as controlling and fearful, that suggests there’s more that bothered you than just the standing-up incident. So you are correct, this wasn’t a healthy situation. To that point, I’d suggest abandoning the idea “we liked us together” – someone who made you feel small is not someone to feel a “we” bond with.

Even a brief relationship with a toxic person can begin with the most amazing whirlwind of everything perfect, walking on air. When it falls apart it’s confusing and crushing, painfully so. It’s not like a normal short-lived dating experiment, the mind-games take a toll.

There are some great articles here that describe toxic patterns & people, check them out, arm yourself with knowledge. If you are happy and openhearted you for sure are a target for toxic people, as highlighted in the articles. Don’t feel sorry for this guy, thinking he was attracted by that or spooked by it, “poor guy just needs to work on things”. Nope. Someone who chooses you because they can take advantage of your caring traits is NOT to be pitied. Walk away, don’t look back, reclaim your friends, and learn signs of toxic & manipulative people to avoid them in future! Be kind to yourself!

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Ofelia

Every time I set boundaries he sucks me right back in. I know I’m in a toxic relationship and somehow I end up convincing myself he will change. It’s so hard to accept that I have been loving a man that does not consider my feelings or wellbeing. That I feel unsafe in every way possible and his anger is so unpredictable and scary. I’m not even a real person in his life yet I do what I can for him because I think that he has problems he cannot control and I believe he can overcome them. Truth is he can only help himself and he won’t. Why is this so hard and how did I end up in this mess. How did I not see this pattern or why could I not except it? I just want to give in some days and just do what he wants, but what’s a few days of his “love” compared to uncountable days of unhappiness and misery. Why do I feel responsible for any of this?

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Karen - Hey Sigmund

Relationships become habits. Don’t break your own heart by staying with somebody who isn’t able to love and nurture you the way you deserve. You see the pattern now, and you have the power to break it. Staying might feel easier in the short term – that’s what habits do – but staying in a toxic relationship also means long term pain. Toxic people don’t change themselves, they change the people they’re with.

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Shannon

I was dating a guy for about a year, first 6 months of dating, we weren’t exclusive because we lived in different cities. I ended up being relocated to where he lived for work. Nothing I planned, it was due to a lay off. After getting there, things had changed with him, but he wanted to date me and we were working on building a relationship. Then out of the blue, the woman he was seeing before I moved there called to say she was PREGNANT. I had already fallen for him, and asked if he was going to be with her, he adamantly told me no, he wanted to be with me. He said it was a careless mistake and they both knew that they were going to co-parent. I trusted it.

Well after a while….AND I KNEW THIS WAS COMING…she lost her job. Guess where she’s staying……WITH HIM……he asked me to understand and just give him time. Now unlike some of the people on this thread, this man was Charming, he seemed caring and it seemed like it pained him to be away from me, so I trusted him when he said it was just an arrangement until she got on her feet. Well the baby came 3 months early….She was born on Aug 20 2016, and he kept me informed on everything.

One afternoon, he was at my house and I asked where the mom was from and he froze, refused to answer the questions. I got upset, and felt like he was protecting her. Well I found out she’s 15 years younger than he is, he’s 45, she’s 30, I’m 40. And I told him it bothered me that she was so close to his daughter’s age, and told him I felt like he was lying and trying to force me to be the outside woman to a 30 yr old. WTF…He said I was judging him, I told him I wasn’t, but I was baffled as to what he saw in her and why he wanted to keep me around……I’m obviously not or in no way on the level with the women he made the baby with. I can respect his choice, but didn’t understand it. He tried to say it was something new he was trying, but didn’t enjoy being with her because of her maturity level……we had a big blow out and we haven’t spoken since.

I feel relieved that it’s all over, but I question why I stayed through all of that. I’m a single beautiful woman who does not have a problem attracting men, but I seem to only want to be with the ones who are a CHALLENGE. Reading this article made me realize that all TOXIC people are not mean, crazy, some of them are as charming as Prince charming, using synthetic love tactics to keep you attached. I mean, when I would leave, he would tell me how much he loved me and didn’t want to be without me and I melted like butter every time. Thanks for writing this. It cleared up a lot and when he comes back, I’ll be ready to stay away. I still love him, but I don’t want to be the outside woman and I refuse to let him control me any longer. To all the people on this thread who has gone though things like this with people they genuinely love, I would say don’t feel bad about being a person that LOVES, you’re supposed to be that way, but LOVE yourself first and always be willing walk away. We are cursed with a gift of heroism, we want to save people, but sometimes it’s just not worth it.

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kendra

i have been in a toxic relationship for three years now. Sometimes i feel like i wasted/ am wasting my early 20’s. I’m 25. he made me fall for him because it seemed he had all the answers to life. he had been in a five year relationship and got cheated on, but tried to stay with the girl anyway. she left him.
We fight and break up constantly. he bought an engagement ring and i said i didn’t want to get married yet and he freaked out.
We have huge, emotionally draining fights. I believe he is bipolar/boarderline personality. i recently discovered he had been on a dating website while we were together (though going through a rough patch) when he at the time insisted he wasn’t on one or pursuing anyone else.
He is pretty successful and somewhat famous so i cant give too many details. but i just wish i was strong enough to make a clean break and get back my independance . i just know how much it will hurt when i see in two weeks he’s found someone better (he used me for this with his exes). and i also have to see him in the media/ spotlight all the time.
i dont know why we cant get away from each other.

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P jones

I’m 17 and have been with my boyfriend for 2 years and it was all great at the start as it would be young and it all being new, all that. But then over the two years he was unfaithful too many times more than I can count on my fingers and he was a heavy user of cannabis which I never believed actually did anything wrong to you but I realised it changed him and he would care less about me and treat me so badly.
The thing is he can be such a lovely young man so kind and caring and loving and considerate and very emotional, but then something just turns him and he’s manipulative and is incredible mean and hurtful towards myself but I always always ended up apologising for it every time because I was scared I would loose him and he’d tell me to go elsewhere and that he’d find somebody else.
At the start of this year he improved himself and I started to honestly gain all trust as he reall showed he loved me. Still struggled with his cannabis habits but considered me more then he cared less and less and we had our first holiday planned with his family for a few months time.
I then found out he had secret accounts and was sending innapropiate pictures and receiving them off girls but they weren’t just girls, they were 14 YEARS OLD! He was 18 years old so this came as a shock and reading this article about control makes me realise that he is a toxic person and that he wants to control because he was older and saw a young girl as being vulnerable.
I admit from everything I’ve experienced in our relationship I’ve got some trust issues so I would be very discrete and check up just to make sure I wasn’t being a mug again and every time I found other things.
The relationship started getting violent and he started to lay his hands on me and grab me which was concerning as one time he said if he ever found out I’d been unfaithful he’d want to drive he car very fast and for us to die together because he didn’t want anybody else having me, these things just weren’t normal.
So after these young girls we had a big massive blow out, a fight, and I lost it.
I struggle with my emotions I get attached and I feel scared when things don’t feel like they will work as I am vulnerable, when younger I lived with my mother who I love to the end of the earth but her ocd caused emotional abuse and psychological abuse, it was a tough start to my teenage years then moving in with my father who provided a completely different life it was hard to ajust and I still am.
I admit I can’t be very paranoid but everything that happened in our relationship was blamed on me, he once made me believe I followed in the same footsteps as my mother and often calls me mental and crazy.
I’ve just had my GCSEs results and himself and his whole family were so unsupportive and he made me ashamed of my results whereas my entire family congratulated me and we’re proud, he doesn’t pay attention in my things, he will not ever take me out, I have spent the holidays waiting around every day until 5 (when he finishes work) to see him and then sit in his house and do nothing all day, no colleges away from home does he want me to go, I don’t have a life.
Today I’ve found more accounts with girls and I was shouted at for looking on the phone, I was penalised for looking on his phone, was pointed at in my face and given the worst looks because of it by him, was spoken to like a piece of rubbish on the floor, and then when I decided to leave was grabbed and restrained around the neck till I have the keys back.
I am in a toxic relationship and I am stuck because I don’t want to leave but I do because I’m loosing who I am, I’m loosing the fun side to myself, I’m becoming dependant on seeing him and so upset and not knowing what to do with myself when I’m not with him.
If that isn’t control then I don’t know what is.
I know people would say I’m young and have many more relationships ahead of me but that’s doesn’t make my feelings irradiated, I love him but I’m in a toxic relationship.
Hopefully one day or soon I will build the strength to leave and I will stick to that to give myself a better life and allow myself to be treated how I deserve.
One day.

Reply
beanz

P.Jones

My dear young girl you have no idea just how beautiful you are do you… your boyfriend sounds like my ex constantly texting girls breaking trust then turning it around to me sayin he would kill us both if he found out I did any of the things he did.. last Nov having had his baby who then was 4 mnth old he was supposed to come back to mine to get up in the morning with him instead he stayed the night with a girl I caught him walking out of hers as friends told me where he was… He got in the car and becuz I’d said I spoke with his male friend to find out he strangled me so hard he broke the hyoid bone in my neck it’s the bone that hold up your wind pipe. .I was told it was potentially life threatening.. The hospital called the police and I went along with it in a daze.. he’s now serving 3yrs in prison my son is over one now and doesn’t know his dad.. its definitely difficult having this tie to him. My msg to you dear girl is don’t put up with it as I did for it to escalate to a point it becomes life threatening u sound as though you have a supportive loving family.. u did good in ur gcses and that u should be proud happy excited for the new life u are about to imbark on.. he’s afraid he will lose grip of you if you start college meet new ppl new friends that’s what these abusers do they want to keep u sat around waiting for them all day no life no friends any attempts to look good or feel good are met with them causing a fight blaming you saying you have changed.. The min u try to be strong thats when they get worse but believe me you can be strong without him.. life will go on without him and you can and will be happy if you walk away from this bully. The times I found pics with girls not in his phone just the girls putting it as there profile pic on fb and things while I was pregnant haha gosh I laugh now but it still burns.. These girls now go to visit him in prison and as hard as it is to come to terms with him never truly loving me or my baby I still have a good cry every now and then but my life has peace again.. I find happy moments being with my family going to have lunch with my dad or an old friend peace…calm… I don’t have fb anymore or any social media just peace and calm and happy… I think back to the days with him always hurting always afraid always distrustful always thinking when the next thing he’s guna do that’s guna break a piece of my soul… u can leave… u can walk away.. u can be strong.. The only one stopping you dear girl is you….ultimately no matter how much we may be led into believing we can not be happy without these people it’s really the only the biggest lie we fall for… u can and will be happy and ok after leaving an abuser! Find noah elkrief on youtube he’s very good and helped me alot. Take care xx

Reply
Winnie

I have tried for the third time to walk away from my ex-boyfriend. He has drained me emotionally with his abusive ways and I always end up feeling stupid for going back to him. It isn’t love but a great weakness on my part. Hope I can muster the strength this time and walk away for good!

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kendra

i am in the same position that you are. i really hope it works out for you and that you find some peace and happiness !

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Joe

Hey Karen, I wanted to say thanks for the article. It’s the only article I’ve read that helps explain a difficult relationship I went thru, and provides a little comfort. I’m in my 40’s, and the only woman I’ve ever fallen in love with, fits your article to a “T” ! It’s been almost 2 years. Even now, I struggle NOT to think about her every day, and yet, deep down at my core, I know I don’t want to ever cross paths with her again…it just feels right.

Thanks

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Karen - Hey Sigmund

Joe you’re so welcome. I’m pleased the article was able help to bring some comfort for you. You can care deeply someone and not want to be with them at the same time. It’s sounds as though you have great clarity and strength on this.

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JPB

10 year relationship. She is emotionally detached. I tried to work things out and talk to her. She is gone. I am done. I am grateful this is over now. I thought we had a great relationship but I was the last one to find out. The thing I don’t understand is why couldn’t she talk to me and be honest. I guess thats why they call it break up – things always end with things untied, unsaid and undone. Fuck it- I am better off now. Someone who goes behind your back is scum. Thats exactly what she did . And all I ever read is guys cheat- such f-ing bullshit – it takes two and this woman i was with is a cheater. I have got through the grieving and now I am starting to feel happy again. Thank you for reading and letting me vent- I feel better now lol Life is a crazy ride….

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Julie

So sorry this happened. We get into relationships and there is never a guarantee that either one will stay. A huge risk but that is love. You take the good with the bad. Moving on is hard. Take care of yourself and much good luck to you that each day gets a little better.

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Lynette

Thanks to https://www.heysigmund.com/toxic-people-when-someone-you-love-toxic/

I can honestly feel better about leaving the toxic relationship, held on for 3 years because of my daughter. But i am ready for my happiness and for my kids to see their mother happy. I couldnt have found another website to explain the toxic relationship i was in. I was feeling like i was the only one in the world feeling like this.

God bless, May everyone get thru it strongly.

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Denise

My older sister has excluded me from Christmas at her house going on the third year. The entire rest of the family is included. The first year it hurt a lot to be alone on the west coast knowing they were all enjoying Christmas. My other sister, who is a good person & one of my cousins are sad and upset with my mean, dishonest sister and wanted to intervene. I told them not to bother as my mean sister would then turn on them. I feel brave & strong in my resolve to have no contact with the toxic sister who has never admitted to ever doing anything wrong. She mocks & blames others for things that are definitely her fault. She will outright lie about anything that will make her look good and say I said or did things that I never did just to frame me! She is always putting me down in front of other people to the point that several have pulled me aside to ask why she always sounds so angry and what is wrong with her. Although I will never get to spend Christmas with my family again, I think cutting out this hurtful monster is best.

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VinLy Q

Hello, its my first time here. I must say that your article have touched my heart. Sadly, my own family does not accept me as who I am.

I am a bisexual and a bigender. I never had a choice. I tried to change and fit in for many years. At a very young age, I was being threatened by my own mother because for wearing clothes of the other gender.

Every time my mother talks about it, she cries. Once, she believed that some sort of evil spirit is possessing me. We went to see a counselor. Sadly, the counselor, along with my parents are heterosexists who believe that a heterosexual marriage should be the ultimate joy of everyone’s life.

I am being called selfish, for being myself. But, who is more selfish? Someone who only wants to be accepted. Or someone who guilt trip others into changing themselves, just because they don’t fulfill his or her ideology?

Does this count as an abuse? I have already tried to compromise. For example: only wear clothes of the other gender when alone. Yet, all my requests are rejected.

Still, I have to thank them. They did a fine job ensuring that I am not malnourished. Somehow, their beliefs that I am lost and “its just a phase”, makes me stronger in believing myself.

Does this count as an abuse? Should I do what was mentioned in the part, ‘The growth’?

Please, your advice will be appreciated. Thanks in advance.

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Karen - Hey Sigmund

It is certainly NOT selfish to be who you want to be and to be accepted for that. You deserve that. It sounds as though your family are struggling to understand. This doesn’t mean they don’t love you. It is for you to decide what you will be prepared to tolerate and what you won’t. What behaviour is okay for and what behaviour feels unbearable Decide on where your boundaries are and protect your heart. Talk to them about where those boundaries are so they have a clear message about how imporatnt this is for you. I wish all the best for you.

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Ross

May have had an obvious but light-bulb moment for me. I am mourning a way of life that is ending. As toxic as it was for 35 years it was what I knew as a marriage. Despite the pain and frustration I had adapted to tolerating the verbal abuse because the way of life physically was comfortable. Mentally stressful but that was harder to accept as damaging than if there would have been physical discomfort.
I wonder if we had been less than fortunate and that the travel, vacations and living comfort had been hard financially, if my toxic partner would have stayed??
Instead of fearing the loss of my partner I am realizing I am fearing the loss of the dysfunctional lifestyle and atmosphere. I had become so attached. No matter how your logical brain tells you the attachment is unhealthy you will still miss it until you attach to a healthy lifestyle.

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Donna

Ross, that is such a good point. I’m in the same path, trying to leave an unhealthy and quite dangerous situation. Your message about fearing the loss of the dysfunctional lifestyle is exactly what I’m grieving. Incredible as it may seem, but that’s exactly what I’m longing for. I just sent a series of messages begging for him not to cut me off (it’s a controlling thing he does, making me beg to speak to him). Reading your message, all I can think is what could I possibly be longing for? And it’s the dysfunction. I found this article tonight and it might be my life saver. Your comments, in particular, resonate so well. May we all find peace.

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Ross

Donna,
This is day 6 since I left. I am in an apartment that no one knows where I am.
Tonight I must meet her to discuss moving forward. she has thrown every angle at me to keep me close and hopefully break down my resolve. This has always worked in the past.
Last night I had a moment of wanting to pick up the phone. I have not talked to her in 48 hours. that is the longest we have not spoken in 35 years.
Please don’t lose sight of where you want to be. It hurts, you will feel nauseous, you will have doubt and fear. You will look back at what you perceived as reality only to realize you are not the crazy one.
You will doubt your abuse if it was only emotional or verbal. Do not give in. Do not doubt you as a loving giving person who does not have to answer to anyone. There is another in your future if you choose. But first, keep in contact with here or a counselor so you stay grounded and believe in yourself. I realize I never had boundaries at work or family. I have no “friends”. I found “joy” in helping people. But at a price of me. Learn that you do not have to have another to make you whole. Tom Cruises’ “you complete me” is foolish Hollywood sales. No one needs to complete another. Good luck to you and you will find peace. It is just waiting for you to reach out.

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Donna

Good luck to you as well. I made it through another day without reaching out. And I told my family about the situation, for the first time. It’s holding me accountable and now I don’t want to go back. My counselor is keeping me grounded. The human nature of longing for love and compassion is beautiful and paved with some thorns along the way. But as this article suggests, we don’t have to live with the bad if there is no good in it.

I hope you were able to have a good discussion last night, free from any more troubles. You are right — peace is waiting for all of us. And we can complete ourselves.

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Ross

Glad to hear you are not going back.

Thorns are a problem in life. They grow on Rose Bushes. Fragrant and beautiful but ready to hurt if you don’t take care of yourself.

Untangling from a toxic relationship is hard but remember that it is now on your terms. That you have the power to do what you want and it is not selfish but self-care.

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Val

Donna, I’ve been in your place of the most bizarre pain & emptiness from leaving someone toxic, manipulative, and emotionally abusive. But also generous when he wanted to! They make it so that everything is about them. The ups & downs, extreme highs & lows that we were so used to, disappear when we leave. That creates such a void, and craving contact with the toxic person, anxiety, etc.
Ride out those moments, seek out online forums, make lists of what hurt in your relationship…cry or shout or exercise or whatever you need to do. It will get better. There’s a big a-ha moment. The void of toxic chaos & drama suddenly becomes a nice hug of normal peace, and enjoying being healthy on your own.
Congratulations on a big step to feeling like yourself again!

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Rick

You’re so right Val, we can feel so anxious and ‘crave’ that toxic person because we feel the ‘missing’ lows and highs. It can feel deeply confusing and lonely but it does lift, and quickly if we can recognize it and allow it to lift. Then there is blessed ‘normal silence’ that is just plain self love and acceptance. Great comment.

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Ross

Yesterday I left for the 5th time. This time she knows I am serious. As in this article and many, many others she has used all the tactics to guilt me and portray me as crazy. She has turned the family against me. I expected this but still is hard after all the years. As of today she has turned off the charm and is proceeding with a divorce. It is true when you set the boundaries they go for another target.
My grown daughter called and wanted me to list why I thought I was a father when all I did was go to work and give money. It makes you feel that your life of caring was all a delusion. That they feel I gave them no emotional caring support. Money and nothing else. I will make it through but it is easy to see how one can doubt his/her perception of reality. Thanks for listening

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Dee

Ross, I am so sorry this is happening to you. I know exactly how you feel. My children were convinced (via remarks from him) that I was the one to blame, that I was angry and bitter and if I had just tried harder, things would be better. It made me feel so useless and worthless, but remember… it is NOT you. This is all part of their plan. Your children (like mine) will come to realize this and things will get better. I know this sounds corny, but it is true “when one door closes, another opens”. Keep remembering then and push through. It will be worth it in the long run!

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Ross

Thank you Dee. I appreciate the thoughts.
You are right about one closing and another opening.
It will all be better in the long run. Just hard not to take what comes out of the mouths of people you cared for but they say you did not.
The day will be better.

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Jamie

Ross,

I am the adult child and I am FINALLY realizing ‘she’ is the one who is troubled and sick and sad. I am after 35 years seeing she is the toxic one and my dad was not the man I thought he was! He is a kind and caring and loving and loyal man who got mixed up with the wrong woman way too soon!! I see it now that I have children of my own and he cares for them and all his grandkids with love and respect. My mom on the other hand doesn’t listen to their needs and is trying to use them against me. Please give your children time (I know it has probably been a lot of time already) but keep loving them and love their children! your daughter will see if she can! Toxic moms are the worst thing that can happen to a family!!

Reply
Ross

Thanks Stuart,
There aren’t many men who are admitting this situation. Even fewer articles directed at men.
I sincerely appreciate the support of others on this site.
I did not get a chance to see other comments. I hope your story is on there too. Good luck

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Mike

My 13 yo daughter is now a spitting image of her mother’s manipulative, scheming ways and her user ways. If nothing else, paying child support should at least buy peace so 5 years ago I walked away from everything but left a door open for my daughters once they got older and could deal with me without me dealing with their mother. As I expected, 5 years was plenty of time for her to brain wash them and the came to me as little Trojan horses but I sniffed it out immediately. Unfortunately, I’m keeping my distance but leaving the door open for the pure innocent daughters I know and love.

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Ross

Mike,
I understand completely. Yesterday was one week since I left. I was informed by the wife that my only daughter was pregnant with a boy. My daughter refuses to speak to me. She is a clone of her mother.
My wife left me with, ” I hope you go to counseling and find your way back to us. Otherwise you will never know your grandson.” Nice touch from her.lol
Yes, I can be positive despite my pain. After 35 years of this behavior and me being “casper milk toast” I am ready to leave the asylum.
Good luck to you. My older brother went thru a horrible divorce. His son connected with him after 25 years. So, anything is possible.

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LaToya Johnson

I had toxic relationship for 4 1/2 years but i finally ended it but still remaining to be there for him because he is disable now. I use to think it was me for a while now being i wasn’t much affectionate, my mood and my attitude but realizing he never accept me from day one. He abuse me mentally and a little bit physically. To the point i thought i was the problem and told me over and over if i don’t get myself together he going to leave me. And i told him i would repeatly to save the relationship until i start having thoughts i do not love him anymore and this isnt love. He snap on me for the littlest of things, if i told him fix a sandwich he gets extremely mad and call me names and say i am lazy but in the midst of this all i was sick. Things i told him he throw in my face, he embarrassed me in front of his family. He ripped my clothes and through them out of his space. He belittled me. He made me feel worthless and yet i thought it was me. I was going to school at the time, and when something didnt go right i got the bad tail end of it and said me going is stupid and he doesnt care about it. I got to the point where i shut down and dont talk about how i feel because on what he dones. I wanted to end my life by jumping out of car because he held me captive, on me not wanting to be with him. I try to leave but in the midst his anger and his temper was scary to the point he choke me. I really thought it was me. He apologize and said this isnt him i try to believe him. It got to the point where i had enough and he was okay for me to come clean to his pastor. His pastor was shock from what really happen because he made it seem it was me. I know who i am but i dont hide it. I am a silly goofy young lady who also sweet and strong but when i was with him all of that was gone. I told the pastor all i want to do is help him and he kept saying that love. Which is true i love him but i am not in love with him big differences. I just want to help him. But me helping him is still painful because i haven’t heal from everything even though we are no longer together. I am finally okay with searching and commenting on stuff like this because i know i am not alone. He claims he is changing to be with me but i tell him repeatedly i do not want to be with him anymore. I gave him multiple chances. I see somewhat of a change but i am afraid he will revert back to his old ways regardless. I know my heart is damage and i am trying my best to come back to self because i been gone for a very long time. I just hate feeling that its my fault because i wont give him another try. he makes me feel bad about it though. When he says if i get another man, he says he hopes i don’t get man that’s abusive and treats me right. Then he also say i am doing him wrong and im going to fall. I use to believe that when i was with him at the time but i do not now because i know i didnt treat him poorly like he did me. Don’t get me wrong has some good ways but his bad ways out way it.

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Travis Douglas

I know how you feel. I’m in a similar situation, lil different as I’m a male. I’ve been in very toxic relationship for 5 yrs. At the moment I’m trying to end it, but as you I’m being made feel I’m horrible person for trying to end it. I tell ya it helps reading other people have gone through this and made it out OK. For me the guilt of up and leaving her alone is very hard. But the relationship is terrible for me.

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Charon

I finally got the strength to leave.
I am tired of being too nice and trying to understand the actions of a man who does not care about what happens between my unborn child and I.

After all him denying us was a break through to finally see the light.firstly I am finding a new place,it won’t be easy without his support but I can do this,God has a plan.
I deserve better and my child needs a good father and someone to love her unconditionally.

Finally I am free and hope for the best for my baby and I,new start and new possibilities of growth and self discovery.

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Anon

Six months ago parted from my husband after 48 years – I understand so many of the comments. Because you are a giving person you hope against hope that you can give and show them enough of how to be kind and loving that they will change. NO, NEVER. While you continue giving they continue taking. In the end I think you have to accept that you are part of the problem and once you begin ‘grey rocking’ and detaching yourself emotionally it begins to be crystal clear that the problem is them. A year ago I started to keep a journal of all of the unkind things that were said about me and others and his interactions with friends and family. This helped at the time to look at the situation without emotion, but has also helped since we’ve been separated. It is amazing how soon you forget the feelings you were going through, but you mustn’t because you are still a nice person and they will take advantage if they can. At the same time I also started to make a separate life for myself – new hobbies, new friends, etc., though he didn’t like it and was the reason in the end that he left, telling me that I couldn’t make him happy and that we wanted different things from life – how true!!

I have had the most wonderful six months – lots of laughter, kindness and no more walking on eggshells. Yes, I sometimes think why did I wait so long, but I have decided not to concentrate on what has been and that my life is like being in a car and the windscreen is far bigger than the rear view mirror.

At the beginning of our separation I tried to include him on some outings with mutual friends, but that didn’t work out so told him I could only see him alone. That’s when he told me he never wanted to see or speak to me again and wanted a divorce. Obviously because I was setting the boundaries and not conforming to his agenda.
I knew that this would and did initiate a torrent of texts, emails, etc. from him telling me how I had destroyed both him and our marriage – no remorse, just more of how it was all my fault. So why this need to abuse me again, surely if it were true most people would be happy to be free, but not the narcissist – they have to be right!!

Anyway, will be legally separated within the next two weeks, with no need for any contact with him ever again, hopefully.

Stay strong all – as the sayings go ‘ this too shall pass’ and soon ‘all will be well and all manner of things will be well’ These are my new mantras.

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Kim

The windscreen is bigger than the mirror. Brilliant! I will try to look out my window. 🙂

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Ccole

Amazing. I stayed 23 years, and have been free 13. I have wondered what if I had stayed. Your story could easily have been mine. Your remarkable insight reassured me and reminded me exactly how I was feeling in my marriage. They don’t change…after 23 or 48 years. Thank you for your words, and sharing your story

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Faye M

Lady, God Bless you for the verbal abuse you have endured and most of all for the strength of walking away and never looking back.

Your story is so empowering. You deserve better!

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Iffat k

I am 25 yrs woman. Today my ex let the cops take me away because i was crying to get back. He had told me he moved on and seeing someone else. I feel like i died there in his yard when he just let the cops take me away from his property. I started dating this man when i was 18, im 25 now and broken like never before. I begged to be with him today but literally no one, no one listened to my cries. I just need someone to help me without my ex being there for me.

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Diva

I know it’s so hard right now, but things do get better. I was where you are at now. Take care of you now. Set some goals for supporting yourself. Ask friends for help and a listening ear. Someday you will be with another man if you want, that will love you deeply. Only you can stop this pain. Seek help with a counselor and meds if need be. Big hugs to you dear.

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Anj

This is hard but if he loved you he might have handles this a bit kinder . Never beg, I learnt this the hard way a mad there feeling forged or manipulated to stay CANT give you the validating supportive love you deserve. Go NO contact and one day at a time. I have a mantra you must go out every day to friends and family till you feel like it again , make yourself , wear makeup , exercise and go to therapy or read about you and how we can grow

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Deb

Married to a pastor everyone sees the good side of him he keeps me feeling bad about me and has done some pretty immoral things makes it worse when no one. An see what I live with

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Hey Sigmund

Deb, don’t let anybody make you doubt your truth. You have knowledge that nobody else has, because you live there. Toxic people are often masterful at presenting one version of themselves to the world and another version to the people they are meant to care about. Your truth is your truth.

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Reese

I too was married to a pastor. For 25 years, and he was narcissistic. Mental and verbal abuse, yet he got up every Sunday and preached about love. I was gaslighted and made to feel crazy. It’s worse when they are a pastor…you feel like you’re going against God Himself when you you end the marriage. I hope you are ok. I’m getting better as time goes on

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Anonymous

I am 19 and currently living with my extremely toxic parents. I have wanted to move out of home and begin my own life only to be told i wouldnt make it out there in the real world and am moving out for a boy and not for my own purposes. I am not moving out for a boy, i do have a boyfriend that they highly depise and constantly abuse me about. We have been together for nearly 2 years and they have banned me from sleeping at his house/ going on holidays together for this long because they are “scared i will get hurt”. But when they abuse me every day about him they tell me i am a S#*% for being in an intimate relationship. And that nobody will ever want me. And that im wasting my time. But this is also because they want me to find a perfect boy in their eyes. I feel so empty and lifeless in this house and i want to move out an experience what the world has to offer. Currently i stay at home most days because i don’t want to be faced with a circumstance that i could get into trouble with them because boy do they rain down H3** upon me when i dont do what they expect me to do. Im so frustrated but also scared of what they will do if i move out. They can be very physically aggressive and don’t care about boundaries in the slightest. How do i find the courage to live the way i want to live?

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Karen - Hey Sigmund

The courage is in you. When you live with toxic parents who are constantly putting you down, the time will never feel right. The reason they do what they do is to keep you small. Don’t wait to feel sure about making the move away from them – they’ll make sure that you never feel certain or strong. You are 19 and you have every right to live the life you want to live. You deserve to be happy and live every day free from the put-downs. Make your plan, get advice from the people you care about and take your first step. It won’t be easy because of the messages you’ve been told. If you feel tempted to believe those messages, stop and know that you can do this. Write it down if you need to to remind yourself. You deserve to feel happy. You are brave and strong – now it’s just letting that courage and strength work for you, which it will.

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Ross

Just a thought: I have left and came back like many others. Recently, I tried to leave her know I am leaving only to be ignored and hoovered big time.
But I have my apartment and am leaving. What struck me through this is my adult daughter has asked me several times how I am doing. I realized last year when I left and came back that neither she nor my wife really care how I am doing or feel. When last year and earlier this summer I answered honestly I was met with; “Mom does a lot for you and you have no idea what its like to live on your own.” Or from my Wife, “you have no idea how to live on your own.” Same from the wife that I have no idea what it costs to live and you can’t afford two places. To put this into perspective I have helped step-sons and daughter buy homes, cars and step-sons bills paid when they hit hard times. wife has not worked in 30 years. When I drop the leaving on her she will be in a brand new home without a mortgage in a great neighborhood and income somewhere north of $60,000 from me. Won’t mention the retirement account.
My question is does anyone really care about how I feel and why not? Was I considered a servant all these years? There but only in a monetary role and schmoozed just to keep the money going?
How did I get so delusional? I am smiling at this point.

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J

Yes Ross that’s one thing I’ve discovered no one really cares. My husband’s attitude to our daughter’s toxicity is well we “just have to live with it” . In a way they’re right there isn’t anything we can do except make changes to our own lives that allow us to live more comfortably. I am absolutely distraught over my daughter’s lack of respect and like you I’ve done EVERYTHING and more for her and she continues to treat me with disrespect and belittle and humiliate me. My problem is I have a grandchild she uses as a weapon to ‘control’ me; if I want to see my grandchild I have to tolerate her ever changing moods. The thing that upsets me with these people is that THEY have the problem yet WE have to do all the hard work to try and rectify the situation, they’re oblivious. Karma never seems to affect these people the only small hope I have is that if I’m out of the picture then she’ll take it out on someone else and then, only then, will people appreciate how I was made feel.

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Ross

We have Grandchildren too. When I left 7 years ago the wife threatened me with never seeing the grandchildren. So, I came back among other reasons…namely guilt and obligation. The fact is I have now seen where, even with me here, she has targeted the 13 year old grandson, My son, and daughter. Her sons who are now in their 40’s have estranged themselves from her. They lived with me since they were 5 and 7 when we married.
So, whether you stay or go you won’t be the only target. I cannot say whether it will work for you but my leaving will at least demonstrate what should not be tolerated. Good luck.

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Sue F

Ross, it’s time to look after YOU. I’m sure the other members of your family will do just fine. You have to live your life just as they have to life theirs and if it means it’s going your separate ways so be it. We owe nothing to anybody except to ourselves to have the best life we can. Good luck!

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Ross

Sue,
Again, you reassure me that we need to focus on ourselves and that we do not owe anyone. It is hard to realize that our identity was wrapped up by a dysfunctional person. I have lived a life of dreams and put them aside to be the person others expected. My parents, my wife and my children. As a practitioner of medicine I have cared for others so much that I lost myself along the way. There was no balance to my life. Now as I face the reality of age I realize I have one shot left to do my thing. This is far from a midlife crises at 63. Lol. I just feel sad at the tract that I left this happen. But happy that I saw the light before it was to late. Occasional panic at having the confidence to know I am justified in my truth.
Again, thank you for whoever you are and why you answer when I need it most. Take care

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Ross

Feeling ashamed that now I am leaving and she is not aware of it. Over the weekend she broke her fascade and went into a rant with verbal abuse for about a half hour before I caved and apologized. Then all was better.
Ashamed also that I took several friends into my confidence over the years. Wish I would have just kept this to myself or found an anonymous site like this sooner.

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Sue F

Please don’t feel ashamed or guilty Ross…you’ve done nothing wrong. You have to protect yourself and get on with your life. Happy days ahead for you.

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Ross

Sue,
Again thank you. Now that I am so aware of her behavior, I have a hard time how someone can be so caring and sweet only to get their way. If you voice an opinion the beast arises. I am now more than ever aware of how she is still so involved with our grown children. Thinking that her advice unsolicited is important to a 40 year old child. She is angry if they don’t follow her guilt trip. How she tore down a 13 year old over his sport. She is truly a care taker controller not a giver in anyway. Thanks again. I will get thru this. Two weeks and I walk. Best regards to you.

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Jackie

All of these stories ring true but my problem is that the toxic person is my daughter. She cannot and will not admit that she has a problem she has completely alienated her sister and the other sister simply tolerates her to keep the peace. Her husband admitted to me that he knows how I feel “he lives with her”, he then denied saying this later.
My problem is she is the mother of my only grandchild and although I rearranged my work schedule, did a job for her 1 day a week so as she would be able to return to the position after maternity leave and drove to her home once a week to mind him he was taken out of my care as she said I was “too distracted” while watching him. This came about because I asked if I could mind him at my home as opposed to hers as I had tutoring arrangements (I’m a teacher) that made it difficult to return home in time. I then said she wouldn’t have to rush home and thought it would be easier all round. She then told me in her condescending way that her and her husband felt he would be better off in day care than with me! I was so angry and hurt I told her to leave and locked her out of the house. She then proceeded to bash on the door until she smashed all of the glass and cut her arm receiving 12 stitches. The violent outburst are common.
She then calmed down and a few weeks later offered to buy a present from the family for a friend’s baby shower I asked her how much I owed and she replied $100 I nearly fainted asking are we putting $100 each in for the present? to which she replied NO you’re paying for it all. I said No…you have a job you can contribute as well she then called me a “bitch” and hung up. I have had enough. This emotional and psychological belittling and aggression has gone on for 10 years and I’ve had enough. I told her I wanted no more contact until she could treat me with the respect and courtesy I deserve as I will not be treated like this anymore. She replied “That’s cool no worries I’ve got dad”.
These instances have gone on and on over the years with her abuse and violent outbursts but absolutely nothing changes. When my husband went out to speak to her she just rolled her eyes and said I needed to get over it. I mean my God she smashed through our window, belittled me swore at me it’s crazy. She is very very attractive, very intelligent and holds down a good job BUT she has nearly no friends because of her controlling behaviour. I have stuck up for her and helped her all her life even to the extent where an adult wanted to take an AVO out against her for hitting him when she was 16. I could regale you all day with stories about her behaviour but it’s becoming increasingly worse now she has a child. When it came time for her university graduation although I’d helped her with all her essays, with everything she became agitated for some reason and told me the night before the graduation that it would be “best if I didn’t attend”.
She even trapped me in the car once when it was just her and I and screamed abuse at me for 1 solid hour to the point where I just drove and took it, as I thought she was going to grab the wheel and hurt us. When my other daughter rang her in the middle of her tirade she calmly stopped screaming, answered the phone and said we were coming back home as “Mum had had one of her moments”. I oscillate continually between is she mentally ill or is she just a control freak nasty person who has chosen me as her target.
What on earth do I do? I desperately want to see my grandchild but I’m uncomfortable alone with her and she just turns around as though nothing happened. She can be charming thoughtful and nice and then the minute anyone makes even a slight change to her ideas or plans she becomes so volatile it’s scary. My other daughter has told her she won’t have a relationship with her until she seeks professional help to which she replies that there’s nothing wrong with her it’s other people. She insists that the problem is other people she just simply doesn’t see that this behaviour is wrong and hurtful. She thinks I’m being melodramatic when I say how hurt I am by her behaviour. She actually admits that she gives me a hard time and laughs about it saying “she’ll get over it” this is the way I always am this is our relationship!
What do I do I haven’t spoken to her in 3 weeks but it’s difficult as we work together and although we are in different departments she somehow finds a way to come into my department where I am forced to speak with her via professionalism. What do I do I have had enough and nothing seems to work? Any strategy that allows me to see my grandchild but not suffer the abuse would be greatly appreciated.

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Hey Sigmund

Jackie this sounds like an awful way to be treated by anyone, but when it’s by your own daughter I imagine the pain is even worse. Your hurt and frustration and fear are completely understandable. The sad part is that it is impossible to change anyone who doesn’t see a problem with what they are doing. People will change when they feel enough pain. Your daughter has already lost her sister and friends, and it sounds as though her capacity to blame others entirely for the fallout will keep her stuck. The issue here is your grandson. I can hear how important he is to you and how much you love him. You would be important to him too. This will come down to managing the relationship so that you can still get what you need, which is access to your grandson. Do this from a position of strength. This might mean having to put up with some of her behaviour, and it is for you to decide what you will tolerate. This means shifting the way you look at it from ‘she has the control’, to you are taking back control and managing her and your relationship to get what you want. It won’t be easy, but if you can remember why you’re doing it – for your grandson, hopefully it will be worth it.

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Penny

I moved into a house as a co-tennant with my daughter and grandson about 8 months ago. She recently asked me to move out when I told her that because of my work and school schedule I may not be able to sit for her son every Saturday, as I have been doing. I felt so restless and uncomfortable about telling her this because I knew she would be angry. I gave her over a months notice of this change so she would have time to find a sitter. She told me that she either wants $180.00 more a month in rent from me (to pay for a sitter), or I can move out, which she would prefer I do. At that time I was leaving on a trip to visit my 91 year old mom and asked her if we could sit and talk about this as adults when I returned from my trip. She said no, she had nothing else to say, I needed to move out. On my vacation she forwarded craigslist apts for rent that were in our area. Mind you, I was visiting with my 91 yr old mom. I live in CA, she lives in CT. I really don’t know how many more visits I will get with her. Before I returned home I did text my daughter to see what I was coming home to. I said that I was in agreement with her that living together is not working out, and that I was coming home to joyfully prepare to move out by November 1st, when our lease is up. I asked her to please be kind and cordial, as this really should be a joyful event. I moved to CA 4 and a half years ago to begin a new journey in my life, and to help her out as a single mom, as much as I could. She knew I had to still work to support myself. For 4 and a half years I have been sitting my grandson and rearranging my schedule and my life around her needs with that. I have lost job opportunities trying to accomodate her schedule and needs. In the 8 months we have lived together she has not vacuumed once (she did vacuum her car once when she had a date), not cleaned the bathroom, nor washed the kitchen floor. She does not help with housework or yard work except to occassionally water the plants, but believe me, they would all be dead if left up to her. She also has the large bedroom, and the carport. I pay 40% of the rent and the bills, she thinks I should pay more. She treats me as though my life is less important than hers, and tells me whenever we argue how horrible all her friends think I am. I could care less what her friends think, as I know I am not horrible. Of course now that I have agreed to leave she is becomming meaner and meaner. Today she went to a big kite event with her son and some friends of ours, and neglected to invite me, then posted it all over Facebook so I could see how much fun they were having. Last night I had to work late. Before I left I turned the porch light on. She turned it off while I was at work, knowing how dark it would be when I came home. The other morning she turned the coffee pot off. She does not drink coffee and did it deliberately to be mean. My daughter is almost 33 years old. This has become unacceptable to me anymore and I am leaving. My question is, how far do I go? Part of me wants to stay nearby so I can see my grandson who has been a huge part of my life for the last 4 and a half years. Part of me wants to run very far away.

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Cleopadera

How did things turn out? I’m curious because my 33 year old daughter who begged me to move in with her for a year or two when she moved to the East Coast.

We are in the middle of the pandemic. For the past year, she has said the most hateful things to me, calling be Borderline (My therapist laughs at this one.) Why? Because I cry and have emotions. I also have epilepsy. She’s never been supportive of me while she has been an adult. But now she tells me what a horrible person I am after a seizure. Yeah, pretty bad for me, too. I feel she is ashamed of me because she has passed me in the amount of money she makes and what she does. She’s made friends with her ex-step mother who abused her as a child, made her feel terrible, but she is highly successful making money.

A couple of weeks ago I told her I found a new job that I could do from home and it paid better. (I had COVID in March and it took me three months to recover so I was starting over.) She looked at me and told me to get out. While I was sick, I stayed in my room and didn’t ask anything of her except if she would pick up my medication.

I tried to reason with her, but after a week, I saw she was being serious. I don’t make enough money to live by myself in NJ, and I can’t find anywhere to go during the pandemic, so I’m returning to the Midwest. I was crying in total frustration and pain, and she called me weak and manipulative because I was crying.

When she saw me packing and found out I bought an airline ticket and arranged to have my car moved, she started being nice. Real nice. I don’t plan to live near her anymore, let alone with her. She has no children and is my only child whom I raised from the age of three by myself. She has a boyfriend who she has known since she was 11. He cares about her, so I have problem with him even though he’s not really friendly to me. I’ve never said a word about that.

I’m tired. My daughter has become a bully. And I wonder if she has any emotional empathy.

I will leave the door open because I love her, but it is the most horrible situation to have your daughter bully you. I told her one night when she was being all nice and wanting me to be a mother to her that she had anger issues and needed to see a therapist. If she wanted to do it together, I’d be happy to do so, but I wasn’t putting up with it anymore. I leave in six days and I’m afraid. Like I said, I have epilepsy and viruses make my seizures worse and more frequent. (PS – I paid half the rent so I wasn’t using her., or expecting her to take care of me. I had a life before the pandemic.)

I still can’t believe she kicked me out in the middle of the pandemic and she’s so ashamed of me for not doing better in life.

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Anonymous

I married my husband 5 years ago. We have children. We have a home. He works. I raise the kids. I stay home all day. All night.
I’ve left him 4 times. The longest for almost a year. Each time I became happy. I felt so relaxed. I struggled as a single mom, but it was happier. And each time somehow I came back. He made promises. Said he’d change. It would be okay for awhil . And then slowly we get back to where we started. No physical fights this time. No name calling.
But lately he’s been drinking more. And I’ve been feeling unloved. Unappreciated. I suggested we go to counseling (like he promised we could) and the conversation ended with me crying and apologizing for asking for too much and being too needy. I don’t understand.
He keeps saying it’s in my head that nothings wrong. Maybe he’s right? I’m the only one upset and feeling lonely. Maybe I do just want too much. I’m just so confused.
Is it a toxic…or am I just being needy like he says?

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Hey Sigmund

Having a need does not make you needy. It sounds as though there are some very real and very normal needs that aren’t being met in this relationship. The clue is that you have been happier and more relaxed when you have been out of the relationship. If you feel as though there is a problem, then there is a problem. It is not for anyone else to tell you how you should or shouldn’t be feeling. We all need to feel loved, nurtured, safe, heard in relationships and when these needs aren’t met, it’s painful. To move forward through this, when you are talking to your husband, try to shift the focus from how you are feeling to the exact behaviours that are hurting you. That way, there will be something concrete for your husband to respond to. If you feel ignored, what are the behaviours that trigger this feeling in you? If you are feeling disrespected, what are the behaviours that contribute to that. It is then for your husband to decide whether he wants to work with you on the relationship and these behaviours, or not. If he doesn’t want to work on them, that is not a sign that your needs are unreasonable, but an indication of his commitment to making the relationship better for both of you.

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Ross

You already answered your own question. Like many of us you return and realize you were happy alone. I am leaving again and this is number 5.
It is hard but you have done it before. The key is next time don’t feel sorry for anyone else. Not even yourself. Live the life you imagined. Good luck.

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Kathryn ❤️

Dear wonderful loving wife and mother, your post struck a cord with me. I was lead to believe by my ex husband of 12 years that I was needy. Then over the last four, I was so alone and desperate I literally was worn down, sucked dry, exhausted beyond belief that I ended up in hospital. I left for a period of 12 months, I too was happier and relieved but it was hard with two very young children. I went back hoping things would change. It got worse because everything was my fault, in my head. I am happy to say it’s been 12 months since I left. I’ve been in domestic violence weekly counselling that has helped me to understand the emotional abuse I have suffered is not right. You question yourself that it might not be that bad. Because you have been brainwashed that it is me just being needy, emotional, crazy.
Please know IT IS NEVER YOUR FAULT. Being in an awful marriage is akin to being in a cult. I say wonderful loving mother to you because if your anything like me, I NEVER had those words said to me. Please make steps to get out. It is hard yes but everyday I move into a better kind of freedom and my kids environment is full of unconditional love for them to grow and flourish in a healthy way. Much love and strength to you. Kath x

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Kat

My husband left me for another and I meant prince charming and who I thought was my age but had facia work done and was 14 years older. He was a neighbors friend and I thought I had the world by the tail, he was financially secure, charismatic, giving, a gentleman, everything you could ever want in someone. I couldn’t believe this man who come into my life after what I had going through. He was a problem solver, intelligent, like a sale to my ship. We had the most wonderful time eating out, dancing, listening to music, you name it. But then, I found out he had an old girlfriend in another state that still live in a house you own that he said he was trying to sell and he couldn’t get her out as a live together for six years. His son also lives in that state and is quite ill. He will get up every so often unannounced and leave and just go visit the sun, but I knew he was staying with a girlfriend. I broke up with him several times, only to deeply sorry to have them back. I was so lonely without him and always got them back in off-line from myself fighting the other woman mentally to have him. That was 2014 for four months and he left Christmas Eve to go back with her. I left him and was heartbroken for about a month he did not return to the area till five months later. He came to my door and said that he had made a big mistake and him broke up with her and want to give him another chance, I did not want to and told him so. I told him I didn’t believe him and he bag and bag just to go out one nigh, And it was a fun night and all those old feelings were still stirred up and he was going to help me is my divorce was ending finally after all the red tape and he want to help me with my house sale etc. If they are, he bought my house. I was only there a month with my Dell daughter and then he said he had to go on a trip without me and couldn’t make up his mind and he asked me to move out. I was devastated as we could live in the house another six months. My daughter ended up in apartment and I ended up in a rental home I still grieve his loss and wanted him back and when he came back in the town we saw each other again. Eventually move back in the house with my daughter, and went out several times to the other state to see his son after I thought but will girlfriend was gone. She wasn’t gone we got there but the house eventually sold and then she had to move. She still wants him him back. She doesn’t care if he cheats. You asked cheetah mean April after I just been there to visit a sick son I flew back immediately as I knew from watching his things. I confronted him and he told me he loved me and told her never to bother him again he was over her and he said it was just a matter of lost as he has bipolar. I ended up very ill while I was there and had to stay or otherwise I think I would’ve just come back. We came back and he dealt delve deep into counseling, Bible study, church, doing anything you could for me. Yeah, fast warning to this may he was doing his best I thought, but then he was getting quiet again by June. He was not going to his own counselor, but wanting to go to couples counseling to just press forward and forget the past. I was even alive by the past and couldn’t trust him. I finally just contagious until my daughter who is at her friends I was picking up the few things we had their moving out in the middle the night and I move back into the condo that she had rented. He was very upset that I moved and said I told him I would never do that again and he was for once trying to be the man I wanted bye doing everything including counseling etc. Yeah, I saw a few messages to the ex-girlfriend that were generic, but still he so there will be no contact. The first it was on a high when I move back with my daughter and felt relieved. I was searching on dating websites money to date. But then those old feelings came back up missing the life I had with him in a nice home on the water eating out dancing etc. He immediately began to date one if dealer, but coming by and seeing me flowers tell me was only dating because he can’t stand to be alone and he’s very needy. I didn’t want to succumb but do you go out with him a few times to movie and went to dinner and I also slept over because he became so angry with me and said he didn’t want to see me ever again or talk to me and I was too much for him with the drama etc. He said he was trying to do everything you could love me and even wanted to marry me, but I was rejecting him by living away it if only it will come back he would make everything right and marry me and there will be no more problems. My daughter was beside her self and said she would not move yet again. I am sickened by what I’ve done to her. I was with him last night if you’re not going to the store after sitting around all day thinking about how lonely I was and I missed him. He wanted me to commit to him and tell me love me, yet he continues on with this dating and he has a woman coming into town to look for an apartment and he will be seen or her over a three day period in August and she’s very intellectually like him both with PhD’s. She is as a side it is can be to have met hey Dr., someone she feels will be her emotionally cool online. Nobody but me knows the five or six medications for bipolar and then he drinks the night. As with me both times and when he came back strong he so charismatic, give nice gifts, is handsome, and treat you like a queen and Princess with the highest esteem you could ever imagine. I am jealous of the fact that he treats other women like that. I think part of the reason I want him at times is because I know he’ll be with somebody else. I can understand that rational at all and it sickens me. After sharing all that he had done that was bad and good both counselor said I was living in a birdcage and I was his hobby. Definitely we were not intellectually like, but that would not matter to me if there was true love. It should not matter at all. I saw him as a means of security too. Overall, he cheated on me eight times with the same girlfriend and lunch with another ex-girlfriend each time explain the way that I have pulled away from the relationship, which I did is I knew he was talking to them. Basically a not shell he has to have someone almost every day if not every day as company. He is explain it in detail that’s part of his make up and it may not even be somebody he wants to be with. Is very hyper sexual as well. I cannot hurt my daughter anymore and I promise that we will live in a place for at least a year together till she gets on her feet and she has just been pummeled by what happen with her father, loss of most of her family because of embracing the new girlfriend, in my roller coaster relationship with Crai I cannot hurt my daughter anymore in a promise that we will live in a place for at least a year together till she gets on her feet and she has just been pummeled by what happen with her father, loss of most of her family because of embracing the new girlfriend, in my roller coaster relationship with My guy. I want to me they be with someone too, I want to love myself, if I myself went alone very depressed by the overall rejection of my ex-husband who I never thought would do that ever as things seem good but he had a girlfriend that would never let go, and she was quite young. If this new man had kept on the Paysee was in the beginning it would’ve been joyed your joy, but it was not. He does not buy anymore about what happened and desires to look to the future. I believe that he does love me, but does not know how to share me either. He had trouble when I spend time with my daughter or was out and about. After I left teamaker comments about how I needed my church friends, my friends, my daughter, maybe I should just marry someone at church. He said that he did everything he could and what I wanted and I still would like a swinging door. I don’t know it’s a manner with me and my still miss him and want to hug him and occasionally talk to him. I know that when I hear of him with another woman or I see it it drives me up a wall. Then himself must be my issue and I don’t know what it’s title is, but I wish I didn’t have it. I dread going out on dates again, starting over is on 55. Most men think I am under 40 as I’m very slender and they all think I’m attractive. I just don’t know who to trust in the same way I Mrs. guy and I will add in, I miss the life I had with my ex-husband is another woman took my place in completely live the life I had , My whole 40 member family on my husband side embraced her, she goes and all the vacations, gets all the nice things, everything she could’ve ever wanted. In addition she slammed me many times during the divorce to keep me away. My counselor doesn’t know I’ve been seen this current man often on, encouraging me to stay away. I am wanting to not hurt him, still wanting to be his friend, not wanting him to be mad at me. It seems he can be friends with all his ex-girlfriend of long-term. Why do I feel this way? Why do I want to see him occasionally? What can I do to better myself aside from counseling, trying to pray and knowing God is not a place of my actions at the same time, and trying to move forward. I’m so sorry this is so long. I’m grateful for any thoughts in guidance.

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Hey Sigmund

Kat this man has caused you so much pain. The reason you feel like you do is because you haven’t given yourself the opportunity to adjust to life without him. I understand you want to be his friend, but it sounds as though contact with him will keep you stuck. Explain to him that you need some time to heal, then take some time where you don’t make contact with him. It’s very difficult to be friends while you still have feelings for him and want to be with him as more than friends. Give yourself a fair chance to heal by letting go of him completely for a while. There is a happier version of you and your life waiting for you but first you have to let go of this one that is causing you pain. You can do this. I can hear through you words that you have the strength.

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Lane

Ive been with my husband since we were kids, he was diagnosed with bipolar disorder this year after I left him. I went back thinking he could change and after he promised me the world. I realized it was 16 years too late. I had been put down, my kids had been put down way too much. He still tells me I think too much, that I dont look for his triggers. I have put my heart and soul into our relationship only to be torn away from my family and friends. My kids are yelled at constantly and its time for me to leave but I feel weak and insecure and even though I know Im ready Im scared he will talk me back into staying and I dont need to turn back. I need to find a future with happiness. Ive been depressed and alone for way too long. This article has helped a lot in seeing the toxic person that he is and I hope I can achieve what I need to do.

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Hey Sigmund

Lane you sound so clear and strong. You are absolutely right – you deserve a future with happiness for you and for your kids. It’s never easy moving on from a relationship but you have it in you to do what you need to keep moving forward. There are wonderful things waiting to find you.

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The more we treat anxiety as a problem, or as something to be avoided, the more we inadvertently turn them away from the safe, growthful, brave things that drive it. 

On the other hand, when we make space for anxiety, let it in, welcome it, be with it, the more we make way for them to recognise that anxiety isn’t something they need to avoid. They can feel anxious and do brave. 

As long as they are safe, let them know this. Let them see you believing them that this feels big, and believing in them, that they can handle the big. 

‘Yes this feels scary. Of course it does - you’re doing something important/ new/ hard. I know you can do this. How can I help you feel brave?’♥️
I’ve loved working with @sccrcentre over the last 10 years. They do profoundly important work with families - keeping connections, reducing clinflict, building relationships - and they do it so incredibly well. @sccrcentre thank you for everything you do, and for letting me be a part of it. I love what you do and what you stand for. Your work over the last decade has been life-changing for so many. I know the next decade will be even more so.♥️

In their words …
Posted @withregram • @sccrcentre Over the next fortnight, as we prepare to mark our 10th anniversary (28 March), we want to re-share the great partners we’ve worked with over the past decade. We start today with Karen Young of Hey Sigmund.

Back in 2021, when we were still struggling with covid and lockdowns, Karen spoke as part of our online conference on ‘Strengthening the relationship between you & your teen’. It was a great talk and I’m delighted that you can still listen to it via the link in the bio.

Karen also blogged about our work for the Hey Sigmund website in 2018. ‘How to Strengthen Your Relationship With Your Children and Teens by Understanding Their Unique Brain Chemistry (by SCCR)’, which is still available to read - see link in bio.

#conflictresolution #conflict #families #family #mediation #earlyintervention #decade #anniversary #digital #scotland #scottish #cyrenians #psychology #relationships #children #teens #brain #brainchemistry #neuroscience
I often go into schools to talk to kids and teens about anxiety and big feelings. 

I always ask, ‘Who’s tried breathing through big feels and thinks it’s a load of rubbish?’ Most of them put their hand up. I put my hand up too, ‘Me too,’ I tell them, ‘I used to think the same as you. But now I know why it didn’t work, and what I needed to do to give me this powerful tool (and it’s so powerful!) that can calm anxiety, anger - all big feelings.’

The thing is though, all powertools need a little instruction and practice to use them well. Breathing is no different. Even though we’ve been breathing since we were born, we haven’t been strong breathing through big feelings. 

When the ‘feeling brain’ is upset, it drives short shallow breathing. This is instinctive. In the same ways we have to teach our bodies how to walk, ride a bike, talk, we also have to teach our brains how to breathe during big feelings. We do this by practising slow, strong breathing when we’re calm. 

We also have to make the ‘why’ clear. I talk about the ‘why’ for strong breathing in Hey Warrior, Dear You Love From Your Brain, and Ups and Downs. Our kids are hungry for the science, and they deserve the information that will make this all make sense. Breathing is like a lullaby for the amygdala - but only when it’s practised lots during calm.♥️
When it’s time to do brave, we can’t always be beside them, and we don’t need to be. What we can do is see them and help them feel us holding on, even in absence, while we also believe in their brave.♥️
Honestly isn’t this the way it is for all of us though?♥️

#childanxiety #parenting #separationanxiety

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