5 Ways To Deal With Toxic Family Members
In life, it is inevitable that you will have to come across toxic people. They could be at your workplace, or among your friends, and even within your family. It is still possible to completely cut off toxic people in the first two instances. But how does one deal with them if they are a family member? It is not easy to cut ties with family.
Such situations can often lead to frustrations and people end up imitating the behavior of the toxic person. But spreading more toxicity should never be an option for you. Here are 5 things you can do instead:
1. Never let them catch you off-guard
Always remember, no miracle is going to happen during the time you haven’t met them. Don’t hope that they would’ve changed during the years you didn’t see each other. If you know about the toxic mentality of a particular person, always prepare yourself mentally before meeting them. If you are mentally prepared for their toxic behavior, you will be able to react appropriately. And also be able to safeguard yourself against their toxicity.
2. You don’t need to interact with them unnecessarily
If interacting with this one person makes you feel dragged down and harassed, then you don’t have to talk to them beyond the basic pleasantries. First of all, you don’t owe it to them to receive their calls or meet them. You can always ignore them and hopefully they will get the message and stop trying. Otherwise, if it is going to be a family gathering where it is inevitable that they will be present, try always having others around. Also you can always find excuse to spend time with other family members. Do whatever you need to do to protect yourself.
3. Do not confide in them
It is natural that you seek your family’s guidance in times of trouble. However, beware that you don’t confide in people who might use your vulnerability against you later. They might sound all concerned right now. But don’t let that fool you.
4. Forgive and move on, but don’t forget your experience
Forgiveness is necessary if you want to move on with your life. If you hold a grudge against this person for whatever they did to you, you’ll only end up hurting yourself. This kind of baggage is not easy to deal with, and the sooner you pull yourself from it, the better it is. On the other hand, completely forgetting what they did is also not an option. The simple reason being, if you allow yourself to forget whatever wrong they committed, you are building yourself to fall into their trap again.
5. Don’t waste your time trying to change them
Get this out of your head that you can be the saving grace for some toxic person. Nothing you can say or do can bring a change to their attitude, if anything they might get infuriated and hurt you even more. The best thing is to maintain a safe distance and wait for the realization to dawn on them eventually.