When You Can't Leave

Toxic relationships are characterized by various levels of emotional and physical abuse, exploitation, and neglect. The most obvious are the physically abusive ones. The more nebulous are those where one or both partners relate to each other with high levels of contempt, chronic emotional invalidation, ignoring, belittling, and refusal to take accountability. Toxic relationships may also be characterized by frequent gaslighting (intentionally making someone question their own reality or feel they’re going crazy), ridicule, excessive blame and criticism, and stonewalling (emotionally shutting down and shutting out a partner, and refusing to engage with them as punishment or retaliation).

The rub with toxic relationships is that they’re not usually bad all the time. Partners in toxic relationships often experience many moments of joy, happiness, excitement, trust, and other positive sentiments with one another. Great dinners may be had. Mind-blowing intimacy, too. Significant moments of connection. Stretches of laughter and fun.

This is part of what makes toxic relationships so hard to get out of. The unpredictability of negative stretches and the intermittent reinforcement of positive experiences keep individuals in toxic relationships hooked. The good times can make it seem like the bad were just a phase—or worse, something one or both partners were making too big a deal out of. The good times give us just enough upside to latch onto and convince ourselves things aren’t so bad after all.

All of this does a number on our attachment system—that network of brain structures, neurotransmitters, and pathways involved in the formation and maintenance of close social bonds.

Attachment 101

How and why we become attached to people involves a complex interaction of neurotransmitters and hormones that give rise to feelings of love, closeness, interdependence, and connectivity.

Dopamine—a neurotransmitter linked with approach, motivation, and pleasure—helps drive romantic attraction and the “cravings” we get for a partner.

When we experience wanted physical touch (and especially orgasm), the so-called “bonding hormone” oxytocin—known to be involved in the experiences of closeness, trust, and empathy—is released.

Interestingly, during the earlier stages of romantic attachment, serotonin levels drop, which some research suggests may increase obsessive thinking and intense fixation on new partners. Simultaneously, the stress hormone cortisol rises.

In healthy relationships, equilibrium is achieved over time. But in toxic relationships, partners remain in a chronic state of heightened uncertainty and vulnerability. This drop in serotonin and spike in cortisol, associated with heightened uncertainty and vulnerability, may be compelling for a person with a history of being treated poorly (especially by early or significant attachment figures): It may mimic the neurobiological activity such persons experienced around caregivers who were similarly unpredictable, intermittently cruel, neglectful, or otherwise harmful—yet nevertheless remained the primary source of emotional and physical survival.

Hence the draw. When our attachment systems are primed to associate closeness and love with chaos and pain, the emotional or physical maltreatment in a toxic relationship can feel immensely attractive precisely because it feels just like home. The imprint associated with love.

The "Secure Base" Trap

Even individuals who had relatively stable and secure connections to their primary caregivers can get sucked into toxic relationships. This can occur for many reasons, but some of the most common include: the charming nature of a toxic partner (at least at first), loneliness and desperation, or a belief you can’t get or don’t deserve any better.

In toxic and nontoxic relationships alike, partners begin to function for one another as a “secure base,” a primary source of emotional support and regulation akin to that of early caregivers. Once this setup is in place, it can feel impossible to break it off with the person who serves such a crucial, regulating function for us. Even if they don’t treat us with adequate respect, and leave us feeling confused, afraid, and continuously hurt or disappointed.

Once we get genuinely attached, it’s very, very hard to detach.

The Perfect Storm for Stuckness—and How to Finally Get Out

If you combine the installment of a toxic partner as a new secure base with a person’s inclination towards poor treatment due to its familiarity, you have a dangerous recipe for repeat cycles of abuse, played out over and over again across many relationships. To unravel this cycle, it is critical to become aware of one’s attachment patterns and also to learn about what constitutes a healthy relationship: Respect. Trust. Mutuality. Emotional safety. Stability. Reliability. Love as a verb, not just a feeling.

It can take months, even years, to accustom ourselves to healthy relationships once we've been rocked by one or more unhealthy ones. Much work must be done in the way of differentiating between red and green flags, cobbling together our sense of self again, building up a solid support community, and even righting our finances and physical health.

Many individuals whose attachment systems have been hijacked by maltreatment or abuse may experience positive, healthy behaviors from a new partner as suspect, or even boring. For many, a 2-3 month detox from the dopamine rush of jumping into a new relationship or dating altogether can serve as a helpful reset. We have to relearn and clarify what our boundaries and standards are. We need to seek proximity to persons who help us feel a greater sense of peace and stability, and distance from persons who foster feelings of chaos and severe unease—as disturbingly attractive as the latter sensations may have become for us. And we need an army of social and emotional support to help keep us going when we naturally yearn to return to those familiar people or situations that consistently harmed us.

Recovery from toxic attachment patterns can be aided by a trusted therapist, various self-help resources and books (It's Not You by Dr. Ramani Durvasula is a great starting point), as well as programs like Co-Dependents Anonymous (CoDa), Al-Anon, and Adult Children of Alcoholic & Dysfunctional Families (ACoA). But the first step is recognition. And knowing you aren't alone.

If you are consistently on edge in a relationship, have had your character attacked multiple times, have felt pressured or coerced on more than one occasion, have consistently been made to feel that your personal dreams, needs or boundaries aren't important or that your emotions and thoughts are worthless, invalid, or simply stupid, you need to pay attention. This is not acceptable treatment. No matter how nice, charming or apologetic the person you are with may seem outside of these repeated instances of mistreatment.