Do you know a toxic person ? Do you know someone who has many of these traits ? They can have some or all of them. Do you know how to recognize them ?

Dishonest – Cheating, lying, deliberately withholding information, being deliberately deceptive..

Gaslighting –  A form of manipulation that is used to isolate you from your friends, family, people you care about. They tell you all the negative things they think about the people around you and tell you, you are much better without them.

Narcissist – People have an unreasonably high sense of their own importance. They need and seek a lot of attention from others. They want to be admired, they love getting attention and admiration.

The Victim – They often refuse to take responsibility for their actions. They have a need to be right, to play the victim in any situation

They make you feel drained – They’re very negative about everything. Even if you try to help them and offer solutions, they never listen to anyone else, because they can’t be wrong. They constantly talk about their problems, every single time, leaving you feeling drained.

Lack of empathy – They usually don’t like having animals around very much, or if they do, they don’t see them as sentient beings, with feelings, emotions, fear. They don’t feel sadness when the animal dies. They often view animals as objects rather than a companion.

They never apologize – They will never admit to doing anything wrong. You, on the other hand, might feel like you constantly have to apologize to them. They often expect an apology rather than giving one.

Controlling – They might try to keep you from contacting friends, family or restrict your access to resources. They might read your phone texts, messages, emails. They will closely monitor everything you do. They love controlling every aspect in a relationship. They know your weaknesses and will use them against you. They often get in a relationship with a person that they can easily control.

Manipulative – Manipulation tactics, such as gaslighting, lying, blaming, criticizing, and shaming a person.

Arrogance – They believe they are more intelligent and important than others. They love putting you down, calling you names, telling you that you are worth less than nothing.

Know anyone that has these traits ? Someone in your life, that is toxic ? We might ask ourselves, what are we supposed to do, when confronted with someone like that. I personally have known three people like this in my life, at different times. The first person was my mother. She had almost every single trait listed above..

My own mother had almost all of these traits. The worst thing is that these people don’t even understand what they are doing wrong, by being this way and having these traits, they tend to push people away from them. I eventually had to cut ties with my own mother, because I could not keep going like I was. She is a very negative person, that think she knows everything and can never be wrong. She would never admit to doing anything wrong and has never apologize for anything. There are many more personal facts that played in the decision to cut ties, it was not an easy one. Having to end a relationship with your own mother is a very painful, difficult decision that you have to make, but sometimes, it is the best decision that you can make, for your mental health and well being. She was draining my energy with her constant negativity.

She was constantly draining me. I even told my husband several times that I couldn’t take it anymore. All she would talk about all the time, on the phone with me, was all the bills she had to pay, all the work she still had to do on her house, everything that she needed to do with the house, how it wasn’t easy to have to take care of my father, because he had dementia. Even if I tried to offer her solutions, she would just completely ignore everything that I would say, finding an excuse for every single solution as to why it wouldn’t work. She knew everything about everything. She never apologized ever, for anything. She refuses to admit she ever did anything wrong, especially abusing me physically and mentally when i was young.

She would never go out of her way, to reconcile with someone close, because nothing was ever her fault. It was everyone else, but hers. She would control my dad, making him feel guilty about going to see his family for Christmas. She told him he could go, just to get mad after he went to visit them. She was controlling him, keeping him away from his family, because she always thought in her head that my dad’s family never liked her or her children. So she would turn my dad and us children against my dad’s family. This is how toxic people can really be. They are nice in front of everyone, but behind closed doors, they have completely different personalities. I could go on and on about her toxic traits.

For my own mental health, my own happiness, and my marriage, I decided to just completely cut ties with her. When you are around such toxic people, there is really nothing you can do to help them, even if you love them. For your own mental well being it’s often better to just step away and let them live in their world of delusions.

The second toxic person I have known in my life was my childhood best friend. She suffered a pretty bad, abusive childhood too and I believe that really affected her. Unfortunately, I had to end our friendship as well for my well being. Pulling away from such people is the best thing you can do for yourself. I had the best childhood with that friend. I will call her Jane. We had a lot of fun, adventures, laughs and honestly, just the best time ever. We liked a lot of the same things, and we got along great.

I also made different friends that I started hanging out with, because I was a very social person. One day, the dreaded call came. Being a coward, she had her mother call me at home to tell me that her daughter did not want to see me anymore, and she never told me why. That made me sick to my stomach honestly. It was like a bad breakup. I didn’t understand what I did wrong, or what happened. I suspect that she became jealous, that I started hanging out a lot with two other friends ( I have always been really friendly and social) but she never told me the real truth, instead making up stories as to why she did what she did, but I never believed them. She also always thought that when she called me at my house, i was actually there, ignoring her phone calls and telling my brothers to tell her i wasn’t there.

Fast forward later, she found me on Facebook. You see, I never reach out to other people first, because I don’t want to get hurt. I have been hurt so much in my life that I am trying to stay away from people that I think, would hurt me. I just want to live my life, be happy, raise animals, be a decent wife to my husband, and just live the rest of my life as happily as I can, since pretty much all of it was painful, full of sadness, heartbreaks and other emotions hard to deal with. I wanted to focus on myself. Which is why I went to seek help and started taking antidepressants to cope with my daily life when i was younger. That really helped me a lot. I refused to be like my mother and end up like her, alone, sad, having accomplished nothing in life to be proud of, living a life full of regrets. Sure, I had a lot of loving memories, but I also wanted to start focusing on my happiness and myself, for once.

Years later, this friend contacted me. I accepted her request and we started catching up and talking a lot via Facebook. It was nice and I was happy to see she was doing well. Our lives were really different though. I moved to the USA years ago, became a citizen, and married my best friend. I made a lot of nice memories that I cherish, from my time in the US. I hope I can make many more, but for that, one has to focus on oneself and leave toxic people behind.

After talking to each other for a few years, something happened with my husband, but at that time, I already suffered 1-2 mental breakdowns. A mental breakdown, also known as a nervous breakdown, is a severe episode of intense emotional distress and mental turmoil that can significantly impact a person mentally.

I never had those before, and let me tell you, it’s not easy at all to go through. I had one when my father passed away and I never thought I would experience more later in life. You literally fall to your knees and feel like the world has stopped, and you can’t go forward. There is no hope. The saddest sadness overcomes your whole body and mind, and you literally just feel like you don’t want to be a part of this world anymore. You just feel like there is no point in continuing beyond that point, and you think that maybe, taking your life might be the best option at that point. It’s very hard emotionally.

When i would go through one, I would shut down emotionally and just want to stay away from Facebook and not talk to people until things got better for me, because I did not want to be like my mother, and talk about my problems to everyone. It was MY own personal method for me to cope with the mental distress i was feeling at the time. I just wanted to keep everything inside, until things got better, and then when I was ready to talk about it, I would come back on Facebook and talk to my friends and family again, but Jane, that one time wanted to know everything, right away, instead of respecting my wish, to get off Facebook and come back when I was ready to talk. She pressured me over and over, pushing me to talk about it. So i started getting annoyed and a little bit rude, telling her that i would talk to her later, but she wouldn’t take no for an answer, got offended with me, started playing the victim, shaming, blaming me for her not having many friends to talk to, while i was dealing with my problems. After she sent me a hateful message, then blocked me, she started posting nasty comments on my Youtube videos and social medias, until i had to block her.

After that happened, she blocked me for a long time on Facebook, until she unblocked me again. Then I started checking her Facebook to see how she was doing, without reaching out to her, because I did not want to be in contact with her anymore, even though I still cared about her. Then after the loss of my dog, she posted a picture quote on her page, made it public, to make sure i see it, with the words “karma, always come back to get you”, or something like that. I felt like that was directed at me and the loss of my dog, like what happened between her and me, was karma for me losing my dog… After that she kept on posting nasty things on her wall, making sure they were public, so that I could see it, posting picture quotes that were passive/agressive directed toward me.

A couple of months ago, I noticed that she was going to get a diagnosis for her condition. I sent her a heartfelt message, telling her that I hoped it would go well. She responded months later, asking me who I was, and who was this person with a fake message of well being, checking her stuff she displayed on Facebook publicly, messaging her about something that was none of my business. With these toxic people, there is nothing you can do or say. She was expecting an apology and did not get one. I did not feel like she deserved it, but I do apologize when I feel like I am wrong and the person really deserves one. When i was younger, i was this very shy, reserve teenager that would apologize for everything even though when it wasn’t my fault, because i was scared to disappoint people and push them away from me. Im not like that anymore.

The third toxic person is my sister’s boyfriend. I remember a while ago, when things were happening with my husband and I was talking about it with my sister and asking for her opinion. She is much younger than me, but I always found her to have a good head on her shoulders, being a smart girl, and a hard worker, just like my father. She reminds me of him in many ways. When i would talk to my sister on Facetime, Joe, (made up name for the article) would always control the conversation, by snatching the phone from her hands to talk to me, every single time i talked to her. When i pointed this out many times, she would defend him telling that he just liked talking to me…. He would tell me, over and over for a period of a year, to leave my husband, and go back to Quebec, especially when thing didn’t go too well with my husband and i was confiding to my sister about it.

I would tell Joe, again and again, that I had known my husband for a long time, much longer than he knew my sister. My husband and I could actually talk things out like grown up adults and solve our problems that way. I had no intention of returning to live in Quebec. I had my life here, my husband, my pets I loved, but he would keep on pushing and pushing, literally harassing me to go back, for years. He couldn’t respect my marriage at all. Then when he noticed I wouldn’t leave my husband, he would try to convince BOTH of us to go back to live in Quebec… my husband who speaks only English, and me with NO degree…I made him believe that we would think about it so he would leave us alone. He claimed he was doing this because he cared about my sister and only wanted her happiness. While i think there is some truth to that, I think Joe had some other agenda as well.

If that was not enough, he started pushing me to go after my mother, for the money that my father had after he passed away, and the house that my mother paid off while she was working. He would say it was part of our inheritance and that she owed it to us, me and my sister, because my brothers were living there. I absolutely don’t know or even comprehend why I agreed to do that… You see, these narcissist people are really good at what they do. They are good at putting things in your head, and trying to convinced you to do certain things and manipulate you. I realized he really was after money and that’s all he cared about. He kept showing me all the expensive things he made my sister buy with her credit and bragging about it in video calls with me and my sister. He is very controlling and when I would point out certains things he would get mad and very defensive about it.

I confronted my brother about all this stuff, and I know that I was absolutely wrong for doing that. I never ever cared about money, before I started speaking with Joe and he started pushing me and my sister to do something as petty as that. You see, with these toxic people, they manage to eventually get in your head and convince you of doing things, by pushing you over and over, putting pressure on you until you give in. I should’ve known better than that. Money has never been something important to me. We are not rich, but we have what we need and that is enough for me.

Every time I would talk to my sister, he would always grab the phone from her hands to talk to me, she would let him, even though i told her many times i didn’t like that. Joe is around 35 years older than my sister. He does not work, (Always finding an excuse when he does work that he doesn’t get along with a coworker) he does not let my sister see any of her friends, he controls every financial aspect of their lives, he reads all of her messages, emails. He also loves to give me lectures about life in general, like he is such a wise, know it all man. He calls my sister names, degrading her, he made her load up all of credit cards, ruined her credit, made her buy a new truck, an ATV, a house, all the while he is amassing a nice retirement for himself, has perfect credit, no debts. She was under a lot of pressure, because she is completely ruining her life, with this guy. She won’t be able to get married, as I assume that he is on welfare and does not want to lose his check by getting married and have no kids with this loser.

My sister has had enough of the situation at some point and reached out to me to ask me what she should do. She finally started to see things clearly, noticed all by herself that indeed, Mr Joe has narcissist, controlling, manipulative behaviors. She was super stressed about her situation, asking me for my advice, telling me that she could not keep going like that anymore, because it was causing her a huge amount of stress. She deals with really bad anxiety already as it is. She told me she was thinking about leaving and was looking for a place to move. After everything that she told me, and that I knew about him, of course I told her that I thought it was in her best interest to leave and start over while she has a good job and she is young ! She can’t come see me because he won’t allow it because he can’t come to the United States as he probably is a felon from what i gathered. I had the suspicion, and she told me that he cannot leave the country and come to the USA, because of legal problems, so while she is with him, she will never be able to come see me.

If that isn’t a toxic relationship I don’t know what it is. I feel bad for her, I love her, but at the same time, i cannot deal with her boyfriend anymore. I was respecting her and him being together, enduring his behaviors for many years, because of my sister. I did not want to make her sad by wanting nothing to do with him. I pointed out to her, his behaviors and she denied it, making all kind of excuses for them. The other day, while I was talking to my sister, we had a really nice conversation, until Mr Joe popped up and grabbed the phone, then proceeded to tell me that I was not nice for telling my sister to leave him, after they had been together for 8 years…. I could not believe what I was hearing. This is the same guy that harassed me for months before, to leave my husband to go back to Quebec and live with them. Mr nice guy was supposedly doing it because he cared about my sister… He also started to psychologically analyzing me and telling me I was like this and that. This is when I just had enough and decided that I do not want anything to do with him anymore. She is in a toxic relationship, with a toxic, narcissist, manipulative 50+ year old guy, that takes advantage of her, while she is the breadwinner. He is a controlling and manipulative person who sees nothing wrong at all in what he is doing. After seeing how he lectures me in video calls, I can understand why my sister would so easily and readily believe anything that comes out of this guy’s mouth.

Unfortunately, she is a very naive, young woman who has never been alone. I think she might be afraid of starting over and is ruining her life because of it. She would have to give up the house they bought, the new truck and everything they had together and her pets. It is indeed a big sacrifice that is not easy to make. She is my sister and of course I feel protective of her, but at the same time, I cannot force her to do something she doesn’t want or is willing to do. She is stuck in a bad relationship with a toxic narcissist and she is the perfect victim for a person like him.

I personally can admit when I am wrong with my husband and I will also apologize for things I may have said, or did that were wrong. But with these people there is absolutely nothing at all, that anyone could ever say, to make them see the light of day. It is an impossible task, you cannot reason with these people, they can’t be wrong ever, they refuse to admit their faults, they will never apologize. My sister, being a victim, is always defending him and making excuses for him like a typical very naive victim. She is an adult and she can make her own decisions. Unfortunately, the only thing we can do is let them learn from them.

This is the third time that I cut off a toxic person out of my life and I am hoping that it is the last. They are absolutely insufferable and impossible to bear. I say to you out there who is living with one, there is no way to help a person that doesn’t want help because they don’t think anything is wrong with them. I sure did, get help for myself and it was the very best thing I ever did for myself, mental well being, and my marriage. Now my husband and I are in a very happy relationship. We tell each other everything. When there is a problem, we talk about it. He is very supportive, understanding and I love how he is the voice of reason when something upset me. We compliment each other very well in many aspect of our lives. He really knows how to make me feel better and we have very good, adult conversations. It is not perfect all the time of course we have ups and down. I’m finally happy in my life, where I am and I won’t let anyone else spoil that for me.

For anyone out there dealing with a toxic person, I hope that you can find it in your heart to be able to think about yourself and do what is right for yourself. We only have one life. Don’t let anyone spoil that for you. Be as happy as you can. You are important and your happiness is too! Go live that life and enjoy it as much as you can. Nobody wants to grow old with tons of regret or thinking i should’ve done this or that. It’s not a healthy way of thinking or living.

Do you know any toxic person in your life ?