At some point in our lives, we would have encountered people with toxic qualities. Toxic people do not necessarily mean bad people or people we hate, they might be friends, family members, or even our love partners. Who can you call a toxic person?

Someone with toxic qualities is either abusive, unsupportive or someone who brings you down such that you may begin to feel dependent on him or her for their opinion, while doubting your own. Someone who makes you feel exhausted, negative and even emotionally drained after a conversation might be toxic.

Toxic people negatively influence their victims by manipulating them to do things they won’t normally do. Now here’s the truth, some people have these qualities unconsciously and they dont even know they have become toxic to someone else. The bitter truth is that someone somewhere considers you toxic (It’s okay if you doubt it, but it might be the truth).

We hear stories almost every month of people who committed suicide as a result of bullying; either cyber bullying and in some cases physical bullying. As crazy as bullying is, it can be prevented.

”A child who goes to a school and starts getting bullied by another kid or a group of kids come home to tell you he/she is being bullied, the next step I believe should be taken is that the case should be reported to the school and if the bullying continues the child should be withdrawn from that school. Reason is that if the child doesn’t become suicidal, he/she will grow up with little or no self esteem and the best way to avoid that is to prevent a continuous bullying experience.”

There are cases of toxicity in love relationships. Do not forget these people are manipulators and a few relationships today have that manipulation from one of the partners. Imagine dating a man that is always asking you for sex when literally, you don’t want to but he keeps giving you the excuse of having the blue balls medical condition. He keeps up with the blue balls story and sometimes even act to be in pain and the innocent you is always, always falling for it. That kind of sex to me is not consesual, it is manipulative. I know not everyone knows the meaning of the term blue balls but I’ll just quickly inform you, “Blue balls, known medically as epididymal hypertension (EH), is a condition that can affect people with male genitals. It’s not serious, but causes pain and aching in the testicles after having an erection without an orgasm. It’s often accompanied by a blueish hue in the testicles. Most men do not get EH frequently.” I hope you learned something new.

Also, imagine dating a lady whose emotion has never been stable since you met her. Abusive, hot-tempered, someone who always make you feel so less than you actually are, and to crown it all, extremely insecure. No one needs to tell you such partner is extremely toxic and is not good in any way for you. Reason is this, if you don’t get out before its too late, it can damage you, your self esteem and even your relationship with other people and then, when such a person is done, she will dump you.

We all have or had these person(s) we all know that their sight or voice sends chills down our spine and sometimes increase our blood pressure. It could be a work colleague, a boss, a friend or even a family member.

How then do you identify toxic people around you?

• Someone that makes you feel so less of yourself is toxic.
• Someone that makes your heart beat for no reason or get you all worked up and angry is toxic.
• Someone who doesn’t appreciate you and always look for ingenuity reasons to find fault in you is toxic.
• Someone who is not helping you move forward but rather keeps pulling you back is toxic. You can try to help the person yeah, but what happens when the person is refusing to be forward, move!
• Someone whose presence in your life suddenly separates you from every other person is toxic. They make you want to always spend all your hours with them and they get mad once they realize you spent a second with someone else.

Please, know fully well that I cannot exhaust all the qualities to look out for.

Now that you can identify them how do you manage them or deal with their toxicity?

The best way to manage toxic people is simple and straight forward; STAY AS FAR AWAY AS POSSIBLE.

You can achieve this by setting boundaries until you’re able to fully stop contacting them. What do you do if it’s someone you meet everyday perhaps at your workplace, avoid seeing them or request to get transferred to another department where you won’t have to always see such a person. Trust me, I know some cases are much more severe than others especially if the person is your parent, a spouse or even your boss and you have no new career in scope, in cases like these, talk to someone you know that you can relate your ordeals to them and look for solutions or try as much as possible be stay independent from them.

Another aspect on how to manage toxic people is to work on yourself, work on that low self esteem, work on not always saying GOD WHEN and hold the bull of your life by its horn. Channel those feelings into positive vibes and get better at YOU. If you keep at this, no one will become toxic to you as they used to. I hope you got value from this.

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