Dysfunctional Relationships Quotes

“We emotionally manipulated each other until we thought it was love.”
― Warsan Shire

“Toxic people attach themselves like cinder blocks tied to your ankles, and then invite you for a swim in their poisoned waters.”
― John Mark Green

“Healthy people understand that others have the capacity to choose to end relationships and it serves as motivation for them to learn to relate in healthy and loving ways. However, when we are driven by shame, we don't just fear losing a relationship, but we live in terror that if we let anyone really get to know us, we would never be desired, pursued, or loved. In us, that fear can be worked out in the development of unhealthy denial, workaholism, perfectionism, chameleon-type behavior, and sadly, even revictimization... When we live in denial or present a false self out of fear... we will do anything to be accepted by people... When we begin to tell the truth about what happened to us we also begin the process of turning about from this type of idolatry... When we begin to tear away our layers of illegitimate shame... When our own vision is not distorted by our shame we can discern what was our responsibility and what wasn't.”
― Wendy Mahill, Growing a Passionate Heart

“My only regret is that no one told me at the beginning of my journey what I'm telling you now: there will be an end to your pain. And once you've released all those pent-up emotions, you will experience a lightness and buoyancy you haven't felt since you were a very young child. The past will no longer feel like a lode of radioactive ore contaminating the present, and you will be able to respond appropriately to present-day events. You will feel angry when someone infringes on your territory, but you won't overreact. You will feel sad when something bad happens to you, but you won't sink into despair. You will feel joy when you have a good day, and your happiness won't be clouded with guilt. You, too, will have succeeded in making history, history.”
― Patricia Love, The Emotional Incest Syndrome: What to do When a Parent's Love Rules Your Life

“Your heart was
a wishing well.
Bottomless.
Trying to love you
bankrupted me.”
― John Mark Green

“He's a mass of contradictions. Unfortunately, that only seems to enhance his appeal. I’m one sick bitch, that’s for sure.”
― Siobhan Davis, Finding Kyler

“Too many Americans are spurred to achieve, rather than to attach.”
― Thomas Lewis, A General Theory of Love

“Men who hit do so because they can...someplace they enjoy or need to humiliate another. There is no love in violence, only control and domination.”
― Na'ama Yehuda, Emilia

“What is that?” Addison inspects the food with a look of sheer revulsion on her face. You’d swear I just handed her a plate full of arsenic.
“The Works Burger with fries and extra onions and cheese, exactly as you ordered.” I keep my voice level.
She sends me a scathing look. “Do I look like I’d ever consume that amount of saturated fat?”
― Siobhan Davis, Finding Kyler

“This whole scenario is sick, depraved, but also grossly fascinating. I’ve become a Peeping Tom. And. It’s. Turning. Me. On.”
― Siobhan Davis, Finding Kyler

“As I was growing up, no one in my family got their needs met through respectful negotiation and compromise.”
― Olga Trujillo, The Sum of My Parts: A Survivor's Story of Dissociative Identity Disorder

“It was then that my gaze happened to fall on the bookcase, on the gap there, where the old paperback of "Nine Stories" had fallen flat. "Where's the thing?" I said.
"What thing?"
"The mesh. My mesh."
She shrugged. "I tossed it."
"Tossed it? Where? What do you mean?"
In the next moment I was in the kitchen, flipping open the lid of the trash can, only to find it empty. "You mean outside?" I shouted. "In the dumpster?"
When I came thundering back into the room, she still hadn't moved. "Jesus, what were you thinking? That was mine. I wanted that. I wanted to keep it."
Her lips barely moved. "It was dirty.”
― T.C. Boyle, Stories II: The Collected Stories of T. Coraghessan Boyle, Volume II

“I’ve always been a person who has believed in the love and in the power of love. It occurred to me that it is an essence which connects to the hearts of people, to the hearts of the beasts and to the One-Above-All.……

.…………. Sometimes, if people are dysfunctional together, they will have dysfunctional families and kids who are dysfunctional to the society, each in a unique disorderly way. Love, is the key to disorder and anarchy as it emanates from truth and then further emanates commitment, care, respect and sacrifice. It has the powers over emotions of a human and their mindset and it has been bringing changes to the lives of people. The problem of dysfunctional relationships is the connection is based upon truths which are not mutually established. To make a relationship functional is very much possible and is as essential to being human as the fact that we are very intelligent beings. A love based on truth will always shine brighter in any dark night. But who wants a love like that? And who dares to love as such? All that forever? Would you dare?.………….

……. All that and many things more but not anymore.

I now believe that only love cannot make anyone do everything. Neither everything is dearly loved nor it is reciprocated gracefully. Some loves fall away as the leaves of the autumn; some fires are washed by little waters; and some boats never make it to the shore.

If love is truly your goal and the goal of your love is love itself then the pillars of love shall always remain true. Be good to the people you meet. And be good to those who hurt you as well. Someday, sometime, it will make sense to everyone.”
― Huseyn Raza

“Listening to Eddy describe his relationship with our mom seemed to indicate that what I feared would be my reality. He never talked poorly about our mother, but he was as honest and sincere as he could be. In a way, he was almost defensive of her to us – trying to help us understand what life had been like for her, so that we could comprehend the choices that she had made.”
― Janet Louise Stephenson, Are You My Mommy?

“Getting out is not giving up on someone when staying is giving up on yourself.”
― Thomas G Fiffer, Why It Can't Work: Detaching From Dysfunctional Relationships to Make Room for True Love

“Healthy people will marry healthy people because you will always end up with the person whom you believe you deserve.”
― Debra Fileta, True Love Dates: Your Indispensable Guide to Finding the Love of your Life

“140. Spectacle
The Blake-De Angelises started work early and tended to finish late, and in the gaps treated each other with an exaggerated tenderness, as if the slightest applied pressure would blow the whole thing to pieces. Sometimes in the mornings their commutes aligned, briefly, until Natalie changed at Finchley Road. More often Natalie left half an hour to an hour before her husband. She liked to meet early with the pupil with whom she shared a room, Melanie, to get the jump on all the business of the day. In the evenings the couple watched television, or went online to plan future holidays, itself an example of bad faith, for Natalie hated holidays, preferring to work. They only truly came together at weekends, in front of friends, for whom they appeared fresh and vibrant (they were only thirty years old), and full of the old good humour, like a double act who only speak to each other when they are on stage.”
― Zadie Smith, NW

“He left the room silently, and it was not quite clear whether it was the beginning of a row or not. Probably he would decide later, depending on whether there was a practical advantage to be had in discord.”
― Zadie Smith, NW

“[Silent Messages]
I’ve lost track of all the times
I have passed by married couples or lovers
Dinning at fancy upscale restaurants in foreign cities
When the woman sitting across the table from her lover
Gives me that quick look
Conveying in a painful silence
That she no longer loves him,
That she wishes she were elsewhere…
And each time, I respond with an equally silent look:
Why are you there?
Why don’t you turn this dinner table of triviality on him,
And on everything that happened and is happening
And just walk away?

[Original poem published in Arabic on November 8, 2022 at ahewar.org]”
― Louis Yako

“Like long lost love abandoned in forgotten letters, you lose yourself in others and dream their dreams, become their aspirations. When you look in the mirror, you see a black, blank picture of Them staring back and you vow not to, before giving in once again.”
― Scott C. Holstad, Places

“Will Melania Trump fire President Trump?”
― Steven Magee

“A proud heart may suffer from an inferiority complex or low self-esteem, even though these problems may seem incompatible with a heart ruled by pride. However, the insecure-yet-proud don't feel inferior due to moral failures or spiritual inadequacies, but rather because they don't measure up to the things they crave or believe are essential for their well-being.”
― Leslie Vernick, The Emotionally Destructive Relationship: Seeing It, Stopping It, Surviving It

“Test the other person. See how he responds to you when you don't give him what he wants. If you don't see consistent changes in the way he thinks, acts, and interacts with you and others, don't for a minute believe his words or his profuse tears. (Proverbs 26:23-24) Jesus said, "Produce fruit in keeping with repentance." (Matthew 3:8.)”
― Leslie Vernick, The Emotionally Destructive Relationship: Seeing It, Stopping It, Surviving It

“Contrary to what destructive people will say, the most loving thing we can do for them is hold them accountable for their actions. This indeed may cost us sacrifice and suffering. We do this not only for our benefit but with the hope that as we draw a line in the sand and say "no more" they will wake up to their own sinfulness and repent.”
― Leslie Vernick, The Emotionally Destructive Relationship: Seeing It, Stopping It, Surviving It

“I got to my place late one night. I was really beat. Getting that
key out and into the door was about the last of me. I walked into the bedroom and there was Fay in bed reading the New Yorker
and eating chocolates. She didn't even say hello.
I walked into the kitchen and looked for something to eat.
There was nothing in the refrigerator. I decided to pour myself a glass of water. I walked to the sink. It was stopped-up with garbage. Fay liked to save empty jars and jar lids. The dirty dishes filled half the sink and on top of the water, along with a few paper plates, floated these jars and jar lids.
I walked back into the bedroom just as Fay was putting a chocolate in her mouth.
"Look, Fay," I said, "I know you want to save the world. But can't you start in the kitchen ?"
"Kitchens aren't important," she said.”
― Charles Bukowski, Post Office