Toxic relationships

In today’s post; I’ll be covering toxic relationships broadly; not necessarily referring to couples but also toxic family members and even friendships. I think the best place to start would be by defining a toxic relationship. Under normal circumstances; your family, friends and partner are all supposed to be part of your support system. They should be people you not only have a good time with, but also people you can trust and share your worries with. They should be a source of encouragement and support. To sum it up; a relationship/friendship/family should feel safe. Therefore, if interactions with any of the aforementioned yield the opposite feeling; you might be dealing with a toxic person.

'to sum it up; a relationship/friendship/family should feel safe. 'Image from wix.

I believe they’re two kinds of toxic people; the first type consists of the negative Nancies of the world; who extend their bleak outlook on life to everything and everyone. They will often do and say things without much thought, often producing discouragement. It's not that they intend to hurt you with their remarks, they’re just a dark cloud, being ….. well, a dark cloud.

The second type consists of mean spirited individuals who know the exact impact their words have. They speak and act with the intention of hurting you. Even worse, they seemingly get a strange kick out of making you feel crappy about yourself. Your probably already picturing a couple of people in your head, so I’ll list 7 tell-tale signs that you are dealing with a toxic person:

1.Dark Cloud.

This is the biggest sign; If every interaction with a family member, friend or even boyfriend/girlfriend leaves you feeling either upset or drained … That is a toxic person. Interactions with such people are always negative; they’ll either say something to discourage you or something offensive. If this occurs EVERY TIME you’re around this person, they are toxic!

2.Minimize the successes, Highlight the failures.

Yet another strong indicator; They respond negatively when you share good news. Be it getting a promotion, starting a business or even passing a test. A truly toxic person will never be happy for you. This is why paying close attention matters - now they may fake a smile or say congratulations, but if they are the not so subtle type; watch that smile slowly transform into a sneer. (Not a full blown evil Nigerian aunty one though! Lol, you know the exact look I'm describing.) That is almost always followed by a negative remark. They might also make it a point to highlight a previous failure, or all the ways whatever news you just shared isn’t that great. A more passive aggressive toxic person will simply ignore whatever your excited about, or have a very ‘next!’ styled response.

3.Back handed compliments.

On the rare occasions that a toxic person complements you, it is almost always accompanied by a negative comment. Most toxic people tend to be narcissists and have a very difficult time appreciating others, even if it’s for a second. The nasty remark that follows is their attempt to ‘cut you down to size’ or remind you ‘you’re not all that after all’.

4.One sided.

Toxic relationships are always one sided. The toxic person will require you to always be there for them, heck, they might even expect you to drop whatever you’re doing to rush to their side. However, you can count on them to be around … never. They will find every reason to be unavailable when you need them. This could be in the form of constantly pulling a no-show to events or dates that you initiate, or never responding to your calls or texts. Interesting to note however; they always seem to have their phone in hand when they need you. This goes back to the toxicity-narcissism link. Narcissist’s tend believe that their needs should always be prioritized over others.

5.Competitive.

If you spend enough time with the ‘toxic person’, better believe they will take every chance to overshadow you. You get a haircut, they get a haircut. You have a party at a cute restaurant, they hold an awfully similar party at the same place. You share an interesting story around others, they’ve got one just like it. Again, the narcissistic link; the attention should always be on them and just them. Toxic people also tend to have an obsessive need to ‘one-up’ others.

6.They Isolate you.

They intentionally leave you out of activities. A toxic person, whose energy is being directed towards you; will tend to make it a point to exclude you from any group activities. They will conveniently forget to mention family events, forget to pass on invites or flat out lie about going somewhere. Somehow the idea of you ‘missing out’ brings them joy. Toxic people also tend to be unusually possessive, going as far as attempting to convince you they are the ‘only person you can trust’. To some extent, they seem to be aware of the fact that they aren’t treating you well, and perhaps another person might point that out to you. To avoid that they discourage you from spending time with people other than them.

'they discourage you from spending time with people other than them.' Image from wix.

7.They embarrass you.

This applies to the second type of toxic person described earlier. Those that are very calculated with their words and actions. These types of people will make it a point to humiliate you. They could do this by bringing up something they know you are embarrassed about at an inappropriate time, or point out your flaws around others. This is often done in the guise of simply ‘joking’. By the way, please don’t mistake someone with really poor timing with their jokes as being toxic. You should only take this as a sign someone is toxic if it occurs multiple times. I have had someone tell me they didn’t appreciate my jokes, which I then apologized for and stopped. However, If you bring this particular issue up and they make no change; they are doing it intentionally.

What to do;

If you are dealing with the negative Nancy type, let them know their comments and behavior are affecting you, being that their toxicity is unintentional, they should stop. If it doesn’t, limit your interaction with them as much as possible (if the person is family it’s going to be pretty hard to cut them off entirely.)

If you are dealing with the calculated toxic person, who you are certain says and acts out of spite; please, delete this person from your life *said in a Nigerian uncle voice* (Ok, I'll lay off the Nigerian relatives now lol). I am not even going to sugar coat this; this type of person does and says what they do because they don’t like you. They really, really don’t like you. This is often due to their own insecurities, but for some odd reason they can’t seem to say that outwardly. Even stranger, they make the decision to be around you, most likely because they enjoy projecting their insecurities onto others. When this is the case; cut them off entirely. Even if they are a family member, avoid them as much as is humanly possible. Your emotional well being is far more important that any toxic relationship.

That is all for this long post, thank you for reading it and I really hope this article helps you out.

Xo- Alex