Looking back at a relationship and seeing years or even decades that feel like a void is one of the most painful experiences a person can face.
It is common to feel a sense of failure or deep regret for not leaving a toxic situation sooner.
What’s important to understand is that this feeling of having lost a big chunk of life is a universal weight carried by many who have finally found their way out.
It can feel like a heavy blanket of shame that makes it hard to breathe or move forward.
I think that when someone finds themselves in this place of reflection, they often beat themselves up for their perceived lack of action. They wonder why they didn’t see the signs earlier or why they allowed their boundaries to be pushed for so long.
This feeling of loss often leads to a deeper question about why a person stays in the first place. What you need to make sure of is that you aren’t judging your past self with the knowledge you have today.
The decision to remain in a difficult relationship is often a calculated, though perhaps subconscious, assessment of costs. In my opinion, the cost of leaving often feels higher than the cost of staying, especially in the moment.
Leaving an abusive person is rarely a simple exit. It can be dangerous, complex, and incredibly hairy, involving assets, children, and a total upheaval of one’s reality.
If a person believes that leaving will result in more pain or more complexity than they can currently handle, they will choose the “known” pain over the “unknown” risk. This isn’t a sign of weakness. It is a survival mechanism.
Beyond the practical costs, there is the emotional weight of hope. Hope can be a beautiful thing in a healthy context, but in a toxic relationship, it often functions as a trap.
I believe that hope can act like a trail of breadcrumbs that leads a person deeper into a forest they can’t find their way out of. If there is even a tiny belief that the other person will change, that belief can spread and become a reason to endure another day of mistreatment.
If someone believes there is a chance that their partner can show up in a healthier, more lovable way, they will hold onto that belief with everything they have. This hope keeps them in a rut, waiting for a version of the person that may never actually exist.
The Trauma Bond Is A Lie
The cycle of hope and disappointment isn’t just a mental struggle. It’s a physiological experience that creates a trauma bond. Or, what I might call, a chemical lie.
Our bodies can actually become addicted to the up-and-down cycle of a toxic relationship. When things are good, the brain is flooded with dopamine, creating a high that feels like true love and connection.
When things turn rotten, the body is flooded with cortisol, creating a state of high stress and survival. Over time, the mind and body can get addicted to this cycle, tolerating the lows just to get back to that next high.
That is how a trauma bond is formed. It makes a person believe that the only one who can make them feel loved and worthy is the same person who is currently making them feel worthless.
Honestly, this addictive cycle is a lie that our hormones and chemicals are telling us to keep us attached to a source of toxicity. We train our bodies to endure these cycles because we are exposed to someone who is inconsistent and harmful.
When the body is addicted to these cycles, it becomes much harder to maintain a sense of self.
In a trauma bond, tolerance for suffering increases while self-worth decreases.
In my opinion, as someone’s self-worth lowers, they start to believe they might actually deserve the treatment they are receiving. So they end up in a self-questioning mode, wondering if the other person is right about their flaws or their mistakes.
It is hard to respect yourself when you are convinced that you are the problem. Abusive people are very good at making their partners feel inadequate, incompetent, and wrong.
When self-respect erodes, boundaries naturally decrease. A person becomes less likely to enforce their limits because they no longer feel they have the right to do so.
As self-worth erodes, a person might start adopting a philosophy that keeps them stuck. This is what I call the “it could be worse” syndrome.
A person might think, “Well, they are putting me down, but at least they aren’t yelling at me.” Then, when the yelling starts, they think, “At least they aren’t pushing me around.” And as it gets worse, that “at least” thinking continues to increase.
This philosophy causes a person’s boundaries to shrink. The fewer the boundaries one has, the more likely the bad behavior will continue and even increase.
I understand that “it could be worse” can be motivational in unavoidable situations, like having a flat tire in the rain. But in a relationship where someone is being mistreated, it is a fast track to losing one’s sanity.
If you adopt the philosophy that things could be worse when they are already bad, the suffering never ends. It only stops when you finally reach a breaking point.
This philosophy is a direct result of the erosion of self-respect. When someone is constantly told they are inadequate or wrong, they eventually start to believe it.
With less self-respect, you are less likely to enforce your boundaries. It becomes a challenge to get your head on straight and see through the fog of confusion and gaslighting.
I think it is important to remember that this confusion is often a direct result of manipulation. It makes a person feel discombobulated and unable to trust their own instincts.
Were All Those Years With An Abusive Person A Waste?
It might feel like all those years were a total waste, but I don’t believe that’s true. I think people often have to keep choosing wrong until “Right” smacks them so hard they can never choose wrong again.
That is how permanent changes are made. We often need to go through these trials and challenges to finally learn what we need to learn.
Sometimes we need to do something wrong a whole lot of times before we know what never to allow in our lives again. For example, my mom spent forty years having to learn the lessons she needed to learn before she was ready to divorce her abuser.
While forty years is way too long in my book, I understood that she needed to get into the right space before she made such a challenging decision.
We need these experiences to understand what toxic behavior looks like and to learn our own limitations. We have to learn how to enforce our boundaries so we don’t ever end up in that situation again.
We all tend to develop more tolerance and resilience for the people we love, giving them the benefit of the doubt over and over. But eventually, we will reach a threshold.
This threshold is the “no more” point. It is the moment where you finally say, “I’m done. I’ve had enough.”
Think of it like someone poking you in the forehead. You might say “stop it” several times, but if they keep doing it, you will eventually reach a breaking point.
The longer it lasts, the more impactful that breaking point will be. And at the breaking point, there will be a lot of energy behind that final decision to walk away.
In some cases, you have to choose wrong many times before you get it right.
Your relationship was not a waste of time. The reason I say that is because those experiences are what ensure you will never let someone treat you like that again.
When you finally “get it right,” the changes you make will stick. And if you ever run into a toxic or abusive person again, you will see the signs much earlier than ever before.
You Are Worthy
When you have felt low self-worth for so long, it can take time to regain that worth and, subsequently, to learn how to protect it going forward.
Along with regaining self-worth, self-respect can often take a hit, as we may not believe we deserve respect and kindness from others. Losing our own self-respect can remind us just how important it is to not only get it back, but never let anyone ever take it away again.
Once your threshold is crossed, that point where you break and there’s no going back, your focus should shift from what happened in the past to what you’re going to do from this point on.
And that means you can be grateful and thankful to yourself for making what was probably one of the most difficult decisions of your life. This is one path back to self-worth and self-respect: Thanking the person, you, who took the difficult steps toward change. It’s reminding yourself that you deserve respect and you are worthy of love.
Never blame yourself for “waiting too long” before leaving an abusive relationship.
Remember, there is no such thing as “too long.” Some lessons simply take longer to learn, and we’re all at different levels of learning what healthy, loving behavior is supposed to look like.
I think it is vital to thank yourself for making the right decision, regardless of when you come to it. After all, you can’t change what it took to get there because what you went through is simply what it took for you to take the steps you needed to take next.
And if you say, “I should have known better. I should have made different choices back then,” then I’m here to say that if you did know better back then, you would have decided differently.
But you didn’t know better until you did. And only then did you make the best decision. That’s just how decision-making works.
Sure, sometimes change takes longer than we want. And we might look back and wish we could get those years back. But after making the choice to leave an abusive person, you will have something to look forward to. And you may not have believed there was anything to look forward to when you were together.
If you’ve left an abusive person, remember that you now have a life where you are no longer being eroded by someone else’s behavior. That is a massive win, even if you feel you’re late to the game.
The Fog Of The Abusive Relationship Can Take Time To Clear
When you are in an abusive situation, it is very challenging to get clear of the fog of everything that happened during the relationship. The confusion can fill your head and make you feel like you are going crazy.
But you weren’t going crazy. You were being conditioned and programmed to feel inadequate.
Once you are out of that radioactive relationship, the toxic fog begins to lift. And you can finally start to see the reality of what you went through without the constant pressure of the other person’s influence.
It is important to stay strong for whatever you are going through now. The aftermath of leaving can be its own kind of struggle, but it is a struggle toward freedom.
I want you to remember that you are worthy of respect, kindness, and love. You deserve to be accepted exactly as you are without having to change to please someone else.
If you have discovered that you were in a cycle of love and then abuse, recognize the trauma bond for what it is. It was a chemical lie, not a reflection of your worth.
You might feel like you let yourself down by staying so long. Honestly, I get that, but you were doing your best to survive a very difficult situation. You were trying to make a relationship work with someone who wasn’t playing by the same rules. You were giving the benefit of the doubt to someone who didn’t deserve it.
That shows that you have a big heart and a lot of compassion. Those are good qualities, even if they were used against you in the past. And now, you can take that compassion and give it to yourself. You can use that resilience to build a life that honors your boundaries.
The lessons you learned during those “lost” years are the tools that will protect you for the rest of your life. You will never unlearn what you now know about toxic behavior. And that knowledge is incredibly valuable. It is the silver lining in a very dark cloud.
I think that when we finally get the lesson, we can stop the cycle of suffering. We can choose a different path and stick to it with confidence.
You have beaten adversity before, and you will do it again. You have a plethora of resources inside of you that you can draw upon.
Don’t let the past define your future. Those years may be gone, but the person you are becoming now is much stronger because of them.
You are amazing for having the courage to finally choose yourself. That is the most important decision you will ever make.
 | Paul Colaianni Paul Colaianni is an Emotional Abuse Expert and Behavior and Relationship Specialist who has been analyzing complex relationship dynamics since 2010. As the creator of the Healed Being program and host of the top-rated Love and Abuse and The Overwhelmed Brain podcasts, with over 21 million downloads worldwide, he specializes in helping people recognize hidden manipulation, navigate emotionally abusive relationships, and empower themselves to make informed decisions. |