20 People Talk About Normalized Relationship Behaviors That They Think Are Actually Toxic
1. No Me Time
Not letting your partner have their own private time. no matter who it is, spending every waking moment with someone will wear you down eventually.
godtiermars
2. Passive Aggressiveness
Passive-aggressive behavior kills any relationship. It destroys trust in the other person, increases tension, and drives close people apart. Be an adult and communicate.
batting_1000
3. Mind Games
The need to be “The Boss” in the relationship. Sorry, I wasn’t aware that being someone’s partner was a full-time job. Fucking mind-games bullshit.
HeckinWhimsical
4. Get Your Own
Joint social media accounts.
MarsNirgal
5. Learn To Communicate
“When we argue all the time it means we just care so much and love each other more.”
No, fuck that. You don’t know how to communicate and you’re too stubborn to try and fix the problem, so instead you find a way to ‘justify’ it. My grandparents never argued all the time and they were together 50 years until grandma died.
I-Look-At-Weird-Shit
6. Isolation
Pushing your partner’s friends and family away and isolating them.
heyitsanneo
7. No Privacy
Default expectation that you and your partner can freely look at each other’s email, listen to voicemails, etc.
DarthContinent
8. Control
My best friend is currently growing her hair long for her husband. She hates it, and is miserable. I keep telling her to just cut her damn hair. If he has that much control over her physical appearance then something is not right. She’s always been the pleaser in relationships though. I’m the girl that will laugh, and tell him to go fuck himself.
Mocosa
9. Express Your Feelings
A lot of the time, men in the relationship feel they can’t express their feelings or maybe they just don’t want to and if so, that’s fine but it’s also 100% ok to express whatever you feel as well. They think they can’t cry, express more loving emotions than their girlfriend or boyfriend because it’s not ‘manly’ and they might get called a ‘pussy’ or other names or be laughed at and it sucks cuz showing emotions is so much better than bottling them up ESPECIALLY when you want to show them. Society really sucks IMO.
Loves_me_tacos125
10. Being Tolerated
The idea of your partner as someone who’s “crazy ideas” you put up with or tolerate. If you don’t like their hobbies and passions, you don’t like them, but I see it popularized in media, where spouses belittle each other’s side projects—a wife who nags about her husband’s car he’s trying to restore, a husband who jokes about his wife’s “little paintings”—instead of supporting them and realizing that it’s part of what makes them interesting.
tieflingforpresident
11. You Don’t Need To Know Every Move
Feeling the need to have to be in the know for every part of their day. Kinda goes along with not 100% trusting your partner.
drunktacos
12. It’s Not 50/50
Expecting a relationship to be 50/50. It’s not going to be and you will be exhausted trying to worry about your partner keeping up their half. The reality is the relationship will always fluctuate. Some days you are exhausted and they carry you and vice versa. Also, some parts of the relationship will be your niche and they will have theirs.
AstaraelSorrow
13. Earning Brownie Points
I think it’s really dumb and extremely unhealthy when couples try to earn “brownie points” or whatever others call it. Almost all my friends try to earn time off to go golf by “letting” their wife go do something else. Super petty and silly. Not to mention the terminology around it is just archaic and oddly controlling – they say “let” their wife / husband do something as if they’re not independent humans who can choose what they want or should do. Just don’t be a dick and not throw a fit when one person wants to do something, it doesn’t have to always even out, like if I spend 4 hours golfing but my wife goes out for 6 hours so fucking what? Yeah.
Exiled_From_Twitter
14. Start The Convo
Not wanting to initiate conversation (whether it be via text/call/etc.)
If you’re emotionally invested in someone you shouldn’t wait around all day for them to make the first move. Relationships are about a give and take and both people should feel comfortable enough to start a dialogue.
challahback_
15. One Person Paying For It All
Expecting one person to pay for everything or to have one person “wear the pants.” I talked with my sister about paying equally for things like dinner or other expenses with my SO. She was shocked and stated that the man should always take care of the bill. It’s understandable if one person financially can’t but I’m not going to let one person pay for my expenses when I have enough to pay for myself.
coldhotdogwater
16. Happiness Comes Within
The idea that being with someone can make you happy.
It’s such a trope played up in movies and TV that the sad, lonely person finally “gets” the girl/guy they’ve been pining after and everything is happily ever after. All their problems are gone. They aren’t depressed or lonely or a creepy stalker anymore.
It’s so unfair to the other person to have to exist solely for that one person’s happiness. If you can’t be content on your own, what makes you think anyone else is going to make you happy? People are imperfect and fallible, they’re going to fuck up at some point and then suddenly your world is shattered.
No. Get your shit together and build your own foundation for happiness. Then there won’t be so much pressure to get and keep someone and just maybe you’ll find someone to spend your time with and it will be great.
sai_gunslinger
17. Expensive Weddings
Weddings.
You blow as much as a year’s salary for a single-day party for people, half of whom you likely won’t ever see again.
It’s full of centuries-old sybolism of sexual purity and patriarchal roles.
Somehow the bride’s family is often expected to pay, like some ancient dowry system.
The dresses cost hundreds at best and often thousands, and will literally never get worn again.
And literally everything gets marked up in price just because the companies know you’ll pay it.
All for something that could literally be done for a few hundred bucks and a pair of signatures.
escargotisntfastfood
18. Reward or Punishment
Using sex as a reward, or lack thereof as a punishment.
eminencefront
19. Do Your Part
Sincerely as a guy, I constantly see guys my age dodging chores and making their SO either do most chores or have to nag them into doing chores, one guy I know pretends he “can’t figure out laundry” in order to avoid having to do it and then puts on a face like he thinks he’s clever and smart for “not having to do it”, and lots of guys act like vacuuming or doing the dishes is some thing nice they do for their SO. Like fucking no?? when you decide to live with someone else you take on the responsibility for the space you decide to live together with your SO in, they aren’t your parent, they should not have to hound you into doing your part and they shouldn’t have to do everything just because you think “they are the ones who want to have it clean”, no, no one likes living in a dirty home and if they’d actually let it get dirty no doubt would you complain. Grow up, do your part.
MassiveWalnut
20. Needing Sex Often
The one that pops to mind is “needing to frequently have sex”.
Yeah, I get it, sex is great, and it’s healthy for the two of you to have it pretty regularly. Hell, I like getting my johnson wet just as much as most men do. What I honestly don’t understand are the couples who feel like they need to be having it literally every damn night, sometimes even multiple times a night, for more than just the occasional nympho phases. Is there nothing better for the two of you to do? Is that really all there is to your relationship? I used to be with a man who would constantly be pressuring me into going to pound town, even when I made it clear I didn’t have the energy. I’m usually down for a little knob-slobbering and maybe even getting to third base most nights, but damn it sure takes the fun out when you’re already beat and not looking forward to saying no because just once you wanna do something other than screw. I can’t get over how I used to fall for his old “well okay, but you know I have an uncontrollable sex drive, so if you don’t satisfy me eventually I’m gonna look for it elsewhere and I don’t wanna do that to you.”
…It was an exhausting relationship, now that I look back on it.
This was also the same guy who only stopped sending pics to other guys on Grindr because I got upset about it. Like he did not see a problem with sending his nudes to other men while the two of us were in a committed, closed relationship. Not to mention constantly trying to explore his many fetishes like finding another for a three-way, or dragging me along to some big gay sex party. Exploring fetishes can be fun, but don’t make your partner do it if they genuinely don’t want to, and at least ask them first before you start trying out stuff that involves a third.
tl;dr is that sometimes it’s ok to not have sex. There are other things you can do as a couple. Being intimate should be something you look forward to, not a bothersome chore.
oamnoj