We hear more and more people around us commenting about romantic relationships or romantic relationships that are toxic. It seems that we have the radar activated to detect couples with these behaviors. But, What happens to toxic friends? We cannot forget that in friendship relationships there is also toxicity and generates fear, anxiety and certain insecurities that are difficult for us to detect.
Friends, like a couple, are chosen. Each person has the freedom to choose who they want to know more about, who they want to stay with, and who they feel comfortable enough with to open up about their deepest emotions and feelings. This is the basis of a good friendship. Have people with whom you can really be vulnerable and show your most fragile side without feeling judged or criticized. It is important to have friends that you can trust and know that they will not use your wounds to manipulate you or harm you.
However, we may have a friend nearby with whom we do not feel that way. In fact, he turns out to be a person who every time we try to explain something, he doesn’t listen to us, he cuts us off and prefers to talk about himself, he judges us immediately, he imposes on us what we should do, and finally, every time he needs support, they call us but when we need help, it happens that it is not available.
If you’ve identified so far, keep reading to discover the types of toxic friends that exist and of course, what to do when we detect that we are involved in these friendships. You may be surprised by many behaviors that we allow just because they are our “friends” and how much it costs us to detect and subsequently get out of these relationships.
In any of the cases that we will explain below, we are talking about toxic friendship relationships. It is important to identify if any of them coincide with someone in your close circle in order to change the situation with this person. After all, maintaining a friendship with toxicity only leads to conflicts, low self-esteem and in some cases, emotional dependence.
The name does it justice since it refers to those people who believe that you are that bucket where they can throw everything they want when they are bad Surely it has happened to you that a friend calls you at any time to vent and you take on the role of psychologist in a kind way since you do it from friendship. You know that you have to be there for your friends, so when he calls, you answer and you can spend a long time talking to this person. The problem appears when you start to realize that this is not reciprocal. That is, if one day you are the one who is wrong, he won’t even listen to you and many times, he won’t even answer your calls or messages.
At the end of the day, he shows you that he doesn’t care what happens to you, he simply cares what happens to himself. Such is the selfishness of this type of friendship that if one day they call you and you really can’t answer them, or you simply don’t want to, they get offended, they hurt you with their words, making you feel guilty, and they will probably start speaking badly about you behind your back. . They expect you to be 100% available whenever they need to vent, but when the roles are reversed, they are not there for you.
2. “Verbose” friend
The typical person who only talks about herself and never listens to you. He only talks about him or her and never listens He can’t help it, and it wears out the people around him a lot.
These are people we normally refer to as narcissists. They don’t really realize it since from their point of view, they just talk and make conversation. They are not aware that everything they think and comment on is about themselves. He may be a friend who is there when you need him, but the price to pay is that he starts talking about his things and I don’t stop until the meeting stops. As we mentioned, they are people who suck energy and are emotionally draining, therefore, psychology experts recommend reflecting on whether their friendship compensates us or if, on the contrary, it represents too much fatigue that generates anxiety or any symptom that indicates that our mental health is being harmed.
3. Friend “out of interest”
Just as the name says, they are those friends who approach you because you have something that interests them They make you feel that they admire you and that they want to help you in any way they can, and what they really want is to keep everything that belongs to you. It is quite difficult to detect but for example, in large groups, it usually happens that someone new enters and tries with all his might to expel another person from the group, to take his place.
What to do once you detect a toxic friend
Detecting the toxic attitudes of others or even ourselves is an extremely complicated task. However, it is extremely important to perform this exercise in order to relate to ourselves and those around us in the healthiest way possible. There are keys to maintaining stable relationships that provide us with positive qualities throughout our lives and these are definitely not compatible with toxic relationships. Therefore, what should I do to get out of a toxic friendship relationship?
You should distance yourself from people you have identified as toxic in every way possible, i.e. have zero contact It is necessary to take extreme measures, therefore, if necessary, block them, change environments, activities, anything to avoid exchanging words with that person again. Keep in mind that it is a long and complicated process, and therefore, if you ever meet this person on the street, it is normal to feel restless and nervous. After all, the body and brain detect danger, and want to flee.
2. Learn from the situation
Psychologists affirm that after living an experience like this, It is extremely important to learn to prevent it from happening again in the future It is common for you to feel sad, disappointed or even angry about the situation, therefore, you should try to heal in the best way possible. If this means asking for psychological help, we invite you to do so. Furthermore, after cutting off the relationship with this type of person, we must take care of rebuilding our dignity and self-esteem, which have probably been damaged.
The most important thing is to remember that a true friendship is based on balance and reciprocity. If this does not happen to you with that person and in fact, you feel that you are giving much more than you receive, do not be confused and do not call it friendship. In short, a friendship relationship does not make you feel bad or threaten your personal well-being. Learn to identify certain behaviors and attitudes to avoid falling into toxicities and thus avoid ending up paying increasingly higher prices.
