“When you look at someone through rose-coloured glasses, all the red flags just look like flags,” says Wanda Pierce, a character played by Lisa Kudrow in the hit show “Bojack Horseman”.
This quote perfectly encapsulates the experience of how someone in a toxic relationship may not see just how detrimental their relationship is to their physical and mental wellbeing.
However, no one heads into such a relationship wilfully, there are several factors at play that determine this.
For example, one may have been raised in a home where the parents’s relationship was toxic. So, when they start dating, they unconsciously enter into relationships with emotionally abusive people because this is all they know, it is familiar, and in a twisted way, they might find some comfort in that.
Janine Meyer of Pace Recovery Centre South Africa, a substance abuse rehabilitation centre, said that until one’s emotional traumas and unmet needs are addressed, they will seek healing from partners who are unable to provide one with the love, acceptance, and emotional safety.
Psychology Today listed these five signs to look out for that indicate that you may be in a toxic relationship:
Subtle character assassination
Assassinating a character is not always evident. Your partner can do it without malice. This might begin with indulgences involving your appearance, beliefs, and choices.
Character assassination is defined as any conversation or behaviour that diminishes one’s worth, whether intentionally or unintentional. Over time, this might result in larger fractures in your relationship.
Control without knowing it
Checking in on you, accusing you of talking to people you should not be, intentionally making friends or family feel uncomfortable when they visit, punishing you by making you feel bad about something, demanding a report on your actions and conversations, prohibiting any activity that excludes your partner, and telling you what you can and cannot wear or eat.
All of these are clear examples of controlling behaviour.
However, control may be a subtle, behind-the-scenes push that causes individuals to act out of guilt or other motivations. Control is defined as any speech, behaviour, or design that detracts from one’s truth and freedom, whether intentional or not.
Jealous passive-aggressive behaviour
Being jealous is neither inherently bad nor harmful. It’s an element of human nature. What one does with that emotion decides whether or not a relationship becomes toxic.
Are they open about their jealous sentiments while simultaneously seeing a therapist? Are they blaming you for them? Do they want you to do anything or change so that they won’t have to deal with their insecurity?
Yes, checking your phone and emails behind your back, always demanding to know where you are and who you’re with, and telling you what you can and cannot wear are all examples of jealous behaviour.
But so is the excessive energy or pouting, which they refuse to accept responsibility for because they are jealous of something or someone. So is the passive-aggressive ‘I will just stay at home, then,’ or pushing away/indirectly punishing you out of jealousy?
This is likewise jealous behaviour, but it slips beneath the radar and may not be seen as such. However, if it occurs frequently enough, any relationship may become toxic.
Never taking ownership
People don’t always own their problems, and that's fine. Nobody is perfect. Everyone has an ego. However, if they never take responsibility, the relationship becomes imbalanced and eventually poisonous.
Ownership is what drives relationship growth. People who do not own, do not learn and grow. They form repeating patterns. They’re living in the past.
They are defensive. When people fail to take responsibility, they flip their relationship magnet, which may make a connection toxic since a stagnant relationship is one that is not always growing, changing, and deepening.
“Loving someone is not just about comfort and feeling good; healthy love means discomfort, and if you don't take ownership, there is none.”
Negativity for too long
Everyone experiences difficult days. However, if your partner makes no attempt to see the light and is constantly dragging you into their cave because you are the closest person to them, the relationship might become poisonous.
They may develop the habit of blaming their sadness on those they care about the most.
If you or someone you know is suffering from gender-based violence, contact the Gender-Based Violence SA hotline on 0800 428 428.
South African Depression and Anxiety Group - 0800 567 567
Childline - 116
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