When you're in the thick of a toxic relationship, all you can see is a dark future with no way out. This skewed reality can actually keep you in the relationship because you think it's the best you can get.

Flushing yourself of the toxicity will help you see the brighter future there is.

Love and Abuse is the official podcast of The M.E.A.N. Workbook on manipulation and emotional abuse at loveandabuse.com. #loveandabuse

Trying work as hard as you can to fix things you didn't break is exhausting and demoralizing. The first step to healing is realizing you're in it.

The path to repairing the relationship is for the perpetrator to discover that they are being abusive and to care enough about you to want to change.

Love and Abuse is the official podcast of The M.E.A.N. Workbook on emotional abuse and manipulation at https://loveandabuse.com

Judgment is the ultimate relationship destroyer. It is the key to creating a rift so wide that the relationship issues might get to the point of unresolvable.

Once you reach that stage, there's no turning back. This episode lays out some key factors in helping the judgmental person become self-aware and change their behavior before they completely destroy the relationship.

Love and Abuse is the official podcast of The M.E.A.N. Workbook on manipulation and emotional abuse at loveandabuse.com. #loveandabuse

It can be a challenge to see the signs of toxic behavior when you first start dating someone, especially if things seem to be going well. After all, who wouldn't want to be told they're wonderful and a dream come true?

The beginning of a relationship is a great time to assess the other person's behavior to make sure they are showing up as authentic instead of putting on an act to eventually take away your power.

Important episode no matter where you are in your relationship.

Love and Abuse is the official podcast of The M.E.A.N. Workbook on manipulation and emotional abuse at loveandabuse.com. #loveandabuse

When someone in your life claims to have changed and promises to stop behaving badly, have they truly changed or are they just pretending?

Telling the difference between the actor and the authentic person is a major step away from crazy making. Your sanity may depend on it.

Love and Abuse is the official podcast of The M.E.A.N. Workbook on manipulation and emotional abuse at loveandabuse.com. #loveandabuse

When the partner of a cheater carries guilt, thinking their own behavior caused the cheating, the relationship can disintegrate even further, destroying the very foundation of what's left.

The cheater works alone no matter what the partner has done. Accepting this means healing and moving on, whether the relationship survives the affair or not.

Love and Abuse is the official podcast of The M.E.A.N. Workbook on manipulation and emotional abuse at loveandabuse.com. #loveandabuse

The actor in the relationship can fool the best of us. When you can't tell what's an act and what's real, you soon start to question your own sanity.

The actor doesn't love, they control. A real partner shows empathy and wants to see you happy. It's easy to tell the difference looking at it from the outside in, but sometimes impossible to see it while you're in it.

Love and Abuse is the official podcast of The M.E.A.N. Workbook on manipulation and emotional abuse at loveandabuse.com. #loveandabuse

Isolation occurs when someone wants to keep you from your friends, family and support structures. You will become more dependent on the one who is isolating you, causing you to seek all of your friendship, love, and support from that one person.

As you see other people less and less, control sinks in more and more. Soon, you will feel alone and completely shut out from the rest of the world.

Love and Abuse is the official podcast of The M.E.A.N. Workbook on manipulation and emotional abuse at loveandabuse.com. #loveandabuse

Are you waiting for someone else to change so that you can get what you want?

In this episode, I talk about an email I received from a woman who fell in love with a man who went back with his wife. However, he now cheats on his wife to be with her. This has caused her to become obsessive, thinking about him all the time and waiting in pain for him to leave his wife and come back to her.

He has it both ways: A wife and family, and a mistress on the side. What is the incentive for him to change?

Love and Abuse is the official podcast of The M.E.A.N. Workbook on manipulation and emotional abuse at loveandabuse.com. #loveandabuse

Sometimes a conversation with a certain person always seems to lead down a path of misery. You end up feeling bad and can't figure out what happened.

These old patterns continue until you interrupt them and make sure you are reflecting on the behavior instead of blindly repeating them.

Love and Abuse is the official podcast of The M.E.A.N. Workbook on manipulation and emotional abuse at loveandabuse.com. #loveandabuse