Respect Yourself

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“Respect yourself enough to walk away from anything that no longer serves you, grows you, or makes you happy.”

In an article by Sherrie Bourg Carter Psy.D., she likened being in a toxic relationship to eating fast food or being in a toxic environment. True enough, unhealthy relationships have been proven to cause stress, depression, anxiety, and illnesses.

The Whitehall II study examined the effects of personal relationships to developing heart disease in a long study from 1985 to 1997. The researchers found that younger participants, women, men whose jobs were considered lower economic, and persons who were never married are more likely to experience negative relationships than others. In addition, they also found that women and participants with lower social standing were more likely to have negative close relationships. Overall, results showed that first close personal relationships have the biggest effect on health. Participants whose first close relationship was negative were at a greater risk of having cardiac event, which could be fatal, compared to their counterparts who had positive close relationships. This signifies that some relationships, especially the closest, have the most effect to one’s wellbeing that it may increase the rate of heart disease if toxic.

According to psychologists and relationship experts, a healthy relationship is characterized by safety, freedom of thinking, mutual love, and respectfulness while a toxic relationship is characterized by insecurity, abuse of power, and criticism.

In the words of author and psychologist Dr. Phil: “There is no virtue in tolerating toxic behaviour.” Unhealthy relationships rob one’s chances of happiness and having a satisfying relationship with someone else.