Did you ever think you would find yourself at that point? Being more fearful for landing a decent guy that doesn’t come with all the drama-filled, emotionally exhausting, roller coaster ride of your previous toxic relationships? Listen, that very fear is valid. But breathe easy when I say this transition through healing will pass. It won’t be easy at first, it’ll even be scary as hell sometimes, but that’s because peace is not a familiar experience for you.
Gone are the days you wake up and wonder how they will treat you today versus yesterday, or if they’ll even acknowledge you exist. A peaceful, drama-free, loving, mature, and genuine relationship is all new, and it may not be totally welcomed with open arms – be more conscious of that. Because, unfortunately, if you come from a history of bad relationships, you’re more than likely carrying over some of that poison with you.
Not to worry because that fear is going to open up A LLLLLLLLLLLLOT of the sh*t your previous relationships taught you and conditioned you to be. And you can heal from all of it, one step at a time. If there’s one thing a decent relationship will show you over the bad ones is that a good guy will help you unpack that baggage for as long as you’re willing for yourself.
When Finding A Good Guy Is Scarier Than Your Toxic Relationships
It will all feel foreign to you
Literally, it will be like learning a new language. Or, rather, like trying to understand someone that speaks a different language and putting your faith and trust in them. There’s no doubt you will be uncomfortable, resistant, and even in denial. Obviously this can bring out feelings of anxiousness, doubt (a lot), and emotional exhaustion at times (in the beginning), like what you experienced throughout your toxic relationships (again, this is a feeling familiar to you). Only this time these feelings may only be serving to protect you on autopilot, which can actually do more harm than good.
You will quickly realize what you carried over from your toxic relationships
If you’ve been dealt the string of bad relationships and sh*tty men, it’s almost inevitable you will also drag along some of that baggage with you – toxic included. Even if you’ve taken all the needed time in singlehood to unpack your suitcase, when you finally do rise out of the shadows and stumble onto this rare gem, there’s still the chance you forgot to change out of the very clothes you were wearing. This is why many women who have suffered from their previous relationships question their struggle to hold onto a ‘good thing‘ without ruining it.
But implying that you may have carried some of that toxic residual in you sounds so depleting and offensive, doesn’t it? Especially when not everything you learn from unhealthy relationships are bad – some make you stronger than you were before, in ways you may not see (yet). So let’s call it trauma. You have an array of experienced trauma wounds from your history of really crappy treatment as well as ongoing patterns of negative habits and unhealthy behaviors in relationships. Consequently, you may have also taken part in some of it, too. Therefore this is trauma you have learned and accepted as normal over time – some wounds cut that deep. This could be poor communication (gaslighting, verbal abuse, or lacking the ability to express your needs and feelings), distrust or turpitude (infidelity, deceit, control, neglect, and secrecy), and more importantly a lack of self-love (your worth, value and what you will and will not tolerate from others).
Ultimately this becomes a repetitive cycle – from the kind of attention you seek, the partners you choose, to those you attract into your life having similar trauma. And this repetitive cycle can affect you long-term, showing up like a parasite to areas of your life where it doesn’t belong and then carried over into possible healthy relationships. Breaking this cycle is a tough pill to swallow because it requires you to become aware of the unhealthy patterns that lead to the same unhealthy results. And that first step is usually to address the pattern of self-neglect.
You are not a victim, you are a survivor.
You will confuse a lot of healthy qualities with toxic ones
You may also find that healthy relationship qualities surface your innermost struggles (again, unresolved trauma), such as trust, insecurity, control, self-esteem, and codependency, which are evident from your previous relationships. As a way of dealing with or processing those deep-rooted struggles, you may end up projecting your insecurities onto your partner. It’s like saying, “This is how I feel about myself, but I’m the victim here – you did this – now it’s your job to fix it.“
For instance, you might see his sense of independence and comfort in separation from you as a sign of disinterest or distrust because you associate that behavior with your toxic relationships. In other ways, you may see his demand for respect and boundaries as being callous or a means of control, or his maturity will somehow convince you he’s uninterested and non-committal.
In this confusion, it’s also fairly common to create, imagine, assume, or anticipate problems that don’t really exist. When you finally find the guy with a real, stable job and career ambition, who also has pride for his work and being financially secure, you might find yourself experiencing a whirlwind of feelings like jealousy, uncertainty, insignificance, and even fear of abandonment. The insecurity running through your mind is something like, “he’s too busy for me, he won’t make time for me, I’m not as important, he won’t put me first, he’d rather work than spend time with me, he doesn’t want to spend as much time with me as I do him,” and so on, when the likelihood of those insecurities are not your reality. In relationships prior you probably had someone who could hardly keep a stable job, didn’t care about work ethics or hard-earned money (maybe relied on you for a source of income), simply had no ambition to provide or sustain himself financially…and was also the source of your insecurity by not making you a priority.
While you’re trying to make sense of your feelings and grasp an understanding of this major shift – it may scare the hell out of you. You may even experience insecurities you never knew you had. So it will be extremely vital to be more gentle with yourself and this new experience as well as to be more self-forgiving.
Worse off, the experience of being with a ‘good guy‘ may even bore you
Maybe you always seem to attract the ‘bad boys‘ (who you thought to be one of the ‘good guys’), or you have this inexplicable thing for the type. The problem is your definition of the bad boy type may be completely different from mine. But I think we can all agree they share quite a few common qualities outside the perceived mysteriousness, arrogance, leather-jacket-wearing motorcycler covered in tattoos who takes advice from no one, doesn’t follow the rules (in life in general)… and is really just known for being a walking sex-God. Let’s be honest here, that last one is ranked first on the list for what most anticipate when it comes to the ‘bad boys‘. But it wasn’t just sex that made Christian Grey captivate – I kid you not – millions of women.
“There’s just something about the ‘bad boys’ – I can’t put my finger on it – that is so enticing and infatuating.“
Here’s my finger ——–> It’s called inconsistent, toxic, emotionally exhausting, domineering, manipulated, and fantasized adrenaline that has a very short life span – it’s not and will never be or lead to Love. It’s likely you learned to ravish in its addictive high and low unpredictability, gut-wrenching heartache, and absolute mind-f*cking chaos. No wonder it’s intoxicating.
Sure, call these “butterflies” – they’re still technically not a healthy indicator. All the while, amidst the emotional ups and downs, you hold onto a fraction of hope that he will change and that this rollercoaster eventually ends in true love. So without even realizing (or out of complete denial), all sense of emotional stability, self-control, worth, and empowerment over a falsely romanticized feeling has been willingly relinquished. In the end, you let a mastered player take the wheel as far as where the relationship goes, the way he treats you, and ultimately how he affects you.
In place, this ‘bad boy’ craze is coined as ‘exciting’ and liberating. YIKES.
[mailerlite_form form_id=25]It’s no wonder the good guys get the shafted end of the flaming torch. You hear and read it all too often – “The ‘nice’, good guys are so book-following boring,” or my favorite, “There are no ‘good guys’. They’ll tell you they’re one of the nice guys when really they’re just like the rest of them.” Hell, sometimes guys are blamed for being ‘too nice‘ to the point it’s oppressive. But let’s not twist it to make it fit. If he has to tell you he’s one of the ‘nice’, ‘good’ guys, he’s a wolf in sheep’s clothing. A downright good guy won’t need that kind of ego-driven validity.
And yet, unfortunately, when you do finally meet a damn good guy…the experience may bore you to tears. I’ll never understand this quite like others, but I blame the addiction to that constant fluctuation of always-on-edge adrenaline. And being with a good guy is similar to withdrawal. TBH, I think that’s the point – to help you unlearn what a healthy relationship is not. As much as those will say boring relationships consist of self-sacrificing couples who do the same predictable things day in and day out with zero passion, not much is different when you’re with one of the ‘bad boys‘. The only difference is that you wake up each day with the uncertainty of a person’s Love and devotion. And, well, you’re the only one self-sacrificing.
There’s first getting rid of the narrative that good is boring, and that boring leads to being unhealthy boring or ‘too safe‘. Then there’s also unlearning that someone treating you poorly (or inconsistently treating you right) is enamoring or passionate. Only you can figure out what you truly want, but you won’t ever know by continually leaving the easy, familiar route an open option. If you ever want to experience a genuine, ever-lasting relationship, there must be an established sense of security (or safety). This allows you to feel, speak, grow, connect, explore, succeed, make mistakes, and build a sustainable (unbreakable) foundation – things an unhealthy, inconsistent and unpredictable relationship will never have.
Your gut reaction when things do get “tough” is to cut the cord
If you were in previous relationships that ended abruptly without notice, and ceasing the relationship was commonly used as a threat, to spark a reaction or get attention, then calling it quits at the sign of a quarrel or any minor inconvenience will almost seem second nature. You may have even learned from your toxic relationships that it’s better to quit while you’re ahead. You know, before you develop serious feelings. Because you’re less likely to deal with heartbreak if you nip it in the bud.
Not always the healthy outlook if you’re actually looking for a serious, committed relationship.
Minor setbacks may end up leaving you in shambles, causing you to overlook every other obvious good quality he possesses and presents in a relationship. Your gut reaction might be to – yes, I’m about to say it – make mountains out of molehills and let one insignificant bad outweigh all the good. That can also mean more of your energy is spent waiting for the other shoe to drop, like as if you’re expecting him to fail and it being only a matter of time. This implies no relationship is worthy of fighting for or capable of overcoming obstacles.
[mailerlite_form form_id=23]Every relationship will endure obstacles, tough obstacles, and some even tougher the more serious a relationship progresses. In marriage, my problems and my husband’s problems become our problems…and some are inevitable, but committing to one another means we get through them together. To get through any obstacle requires not only putting the relationship ahead of yourself (especially ego) but an innate amount of self-trust. You have to actually want the relationship, and this obviously has to be a two-way street. It’s learning to be more proactive instead of reactive, listening and confronting your triggers rather than avoiding confrontation, and not letting fear dictate the outcome of every situation.
