How do you describe the hold a toxic situation has on someone?

6 comments

1. Despair and isolation are the two biggest things I’d say. People who are stuck in toxic situations are stuck because they believe they can’t get out. Many times it’s just the fact that they’re in a toxic situation makes them feel like even if they could get out, they feel like they’re tainted by the situation and can never be accepted by anybody else. This happens with relationships, religion, even jobs.

2. The slow manipulation and gaslighting causes you to believe that you are small and powerless and you need that person in your life. The constant breaking you down and building you back up makes you think they’re your savior, when actually they’re destroying you. These are small and chip away little pieces of you until there is not much left.

3. They are too close to the situation to see what’s really going on

4. Brainwashing. Complete and total brainwashed.

5. Too hard to change the status quo maybe? We get into routines, good or bad, and things just ‘are’. Change is so difficult.

6. sometimes people cannot see the forest for the trees- they are insulated in a bubble and don’t see the bigger picture going on