Managing Toxic Relationships

Step 1: Identify difficult personal relationships:

• This person makes me feel unsafe.
  
• Being around this person is emotionally distressing for me.
• I feel nervous and on guard when I am around this person.
• This person is manipulative or conniving.
• I have felt this person push moral, ethical, or legal boundaries.
• I feel as though this person adds unnecessary challenges to my life.
• I feel emotionally drained after dealing with this person.
• I feel obliged to spend time with this person.
• I feel bad about myself when I am with this person.
• I do not want to spend time together.
• Within this relationship, I give far more than I get in return.
• My needs take a back seat to the needs of this person.
• I do not feel listened to nor cared about in this relationship.
• This person does not have many (if any) of the qualities I look for in a friend.
• I feel like I am walking on eggshells when I am around this person.
• I am unhappy with how this person treats or talks to me.
• Other.

Step 2: Choose a relationship to focus on:

• Consider the relationship that is most toxic for you at this point in your life. That is, which of the above-mentioned relationships is causing you the most stress at the moment?

Step 3: In what ways do you devote time and energy to this person/relationship?

• We devote time and energy to our relationships both directly (through physical contact and communication) and indirectly (through thinking about the relationship and reacting emotionally to it).

Step 4: What does the relationship cost you?

Now consider what you are missing out on because of the amount of time and energy you spend on this relationship (identified in step 4).

For example, you might be missing out on an hour’s worth of sleep while thinking about this person during the night, or you might be missing out on quality time with your family due to obligatorily spending time with this person.

Other common costs include:

• difficulty concentrating on work or study
• less time available to spend with friends and loved ones
• financial costs (e.g., meals out, phone bills)
• feeling physically drained after interacting with this person
• lack of sleep
• harboring negative emotions (e.g., resentment, sense of injustice)
• lack of presence/mindfulness
• lack of gratitude (i.e., focusing more on what you do not have than what you do have)
• less time and energy to exercise

Step 5: Decide how to best manage this relationship:

• Do nothing

This option involves doing nothing, which means the relationship will stay the same; you will likely continue to feel the way you feel now and miss out on those things that the relationship costs you.

Take a step back:

This option involves lessening your level of contact and connection with the other person. For instance, reducing the amount of direct contact you have with this person (e.g., taking fewer phone calls, catching up with them less frequently) and/or reducing the degree of indirect influence (e.g., spending less time thinking or agonizing about the relationship, learning to manage your emotional reactivity). This option is about setting healthy boundaries to put yourself and your well-being first.

Leave:

This option involves ending the relationship, meaning you will no longer invest in this relationship at all.