“Recently Learned In Therapy That It Wasn’t Normal”: 30 Behaviors People Don’t Realize Are Toxic

This. This is what he did. For 30 years. I realised too late but I know now.

My ex-wife. She pulled the same thing on every member of her family but when she did it to me they sided with her.

Stardust she/her

Stardust she/her

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I think that this is what my parents do to me

Holy s**t this is my dad. He'd never get a reaction out of me because I'm a "zero f***s to give" person but my sister fell for it every. single. time

I lost a good(-ish) co-worker to this. He was kind of a "Forest Gump" type -- nice, helpful, actually did the work, but not the brightest bulb in the chandelier. New guy came in who was the type described above, liked to make little digs at people to see if they'd react. He tried a few attempts at me, but I'd mostly just shrug at him, so he started in on C. I cooled things down between them a couple of times, but then I went on vacation. When I got back I was stunned to find them both gone: without me there as a buffer, new guy had poked at C until he got pissed enough to shove him, and C got fired for "fighting". Then new guy quit in a huff when a Supervisor had the gall to reprimand him over it, making a big deal about being "the injured party".

ooooh this makes so much sense, my ex had the shortest fuse, ANY issue and he would scream the house down.

Remember parents, your kids arent "sensitive" its probably just that you're a shouty b***h 😁😁

I've been through a LOT of therapy, and generally consider myself a tough cookie... but having someone, especially a man, yell at me? Immediately terrified. Nothing good has ever happened to me around someone yelling.

my mom does this

My parents always yelled at each other and me and my brother. Then I got married and yelled a lot at my husband and daughter. Got divorced, met my second husband and he pointed it out... I never realized how bad it was. I have been actively working on stopping the yelling in my house for the last 8 years and have noticed a HUGE difference in myself and everyone around me.... never realized that my parents had programed me to think that was normal when in fact... it is not!

They'll blame it on you being "too sensitive."

A relative did that to me once when I was a teenager. I said 'That would be nice.' Got into such trouble, and it was so worth it.

"If that's what you need to do in order to respect a reasonable boundary, then okay."

My ex husband used to give me the silent treatment when he didn't get his way. Pouted like a little b***h. What he didn't seem to realize is that I didn't care. I enjoyed the peace and quiet instead of listening to his whining. The last time (a month or so before I said enough) after about a week he started talking to me, but I didn't respond. It drove him crazy. I finally told him that giving me the silent treatment was like a little gift of "Now I don't have to listen to his bullsh*t and can read in peace". I think he realized that he hadn't been "punishing" me IN THE LEAST and felt really stupid.

U like to suck too much on so many people

My mother (47) never cooks for me (12) and my brother (14)

My wife sat in her house FIVE days, I was there. Minus me her family didnt say s**t, didnt check on her, didnt feed her. I ordered food and cooked. She says thats not abuse, gods yes it is and now shes away with me andmy family and seeing it.

"Stop crying or I will give you something to cry about"

"You should be so grateful for all the money ive spent on you" I WAS LIKE 7, I HAD JUST LEARNT ABOUT JOBS AND STUFF SO SOON AND THIS HAPPENED?!

"You should be ashamed of yourself." I lost count on how many times I heard this.

That's awful, especially that last part.

Oh hells no. If that was me, daddy would have been tasting gunmetal. NOBODY treats animals like that, much less children!!!

I love my mother but every time I tried to talk about my upbringing and how some aspects of it negatively affected me as an adult , she’d say “that never happened/you ate making it up/I remember it differently/ you have no idea how hard was for ME/ it’s because my mother never wanted me “

Yeah, my mother... When I started going to therapy and she asked why, I truthfully replied because of her behaviour toward me. She told me, I don't understand how hard it was for HER and that I should help around the house more (yeah, me helping you cook will erase the memories fo you yelling you could have thrown me out of the window...)

What feelings? All I have to do is make my parents happy and I’ll be fine. I just have to not upset them, because they’re not doing anything wrong!

Ohhh HA... ha.. yeaeeeah... my "best friend" - told her that I didn't enjoy her humiliating me in front of her 'new friends'... and *I* was the evil one for daring to make her feel bad. My mother is like this too... and... yup... it STILL shocks me to the core when I don't get reamed out for setting boundaries or letting someone know that their behaviour isn't so great.

My mother has tried a few times to come back into my life, but has ruined it every time, by trying to convince me that she left because my dad was horrible. That he was making everything up. In fact, he's never said a bad word about her. I was a teenager when she left, my brothers were in middle school, we remember everything. We remember her beating us, our dad, and our pets. All four of us have tried to have some sort of relationship with her, as adults. All four of us, decided it's better not to. But, she cries and whines, and plays the victim. It's sickening. What's even more annoying, is how other people believe her, and tell me she was a great mom.

Took me until the age of 35 to realize this was my mom. It was so freeing afterwards. I was able to finally be who I wanted to be. Happy I'm in such a good place now, but pissed about how many years I felt like an ex-husband to my mom. No contact now....obviously.

Emotional incest.

"You like my boyfriend? I grew him myself!"

I have three (adult) sons and the very thought of treating any of them like a boyfriend at any point makes me feel icky.

I've dated a man in his late-20s who still lived with his parents. His mother ruled the family with her emotions. She didn't like me at all because I was older, divorced, and had children. I was also extremely nice, enjoyed the same activities, had a Master's, was a teacher, well-traveled, owned my place, and was quite young-looking and very fit. She'd tell him things like "you'll cheat on her when she get older" and "you'd have to have children with her now because she's getting old." The thing is, when he broke-up with me, he said, " Now I have to go find someone exactly like you."

My MIL always tried to convince me food was gluten free. "These are soy bagels, honey." Yeah if they made gf soy bagels that looked that good I'd know about it, Barb.