Why You Keep Repeating Toxic Relationships: Five Core Patterns

Toxic relationships can feel intoxicating at their best and devastating at their worst. The emotional highs are followed by stomach-churning lows. They are confusing, painful, and sometimes dangerous, yet incredibly hard to leave. If you feel stuck in a toxic relationship pattern, you are not weak, you are caught in powerful emotional and psychological dynamics. In this post, I will help you understand what’s happening beneath the surface and how awareness can become your first step toward freedom.

Toxic Relationship Dynamics

1. Externalizing: When the Problem Becomes The "Solution"

   Externalizing blame in toxic relationships and waiting for the toxic partner to change can keep us stuck.

   
   

   In toxic relationships we externalize the problem and view the other person and their behavior as the problem. Logically this is most likely true. The other person may be a cheater, an abuser and indeed they are a problem! However, we also externalize the solution. We hope, pray, and wait for the other person to change. We think if only they would stop hurting us and start being a good partner we could have a lovely relationship with them. But think about it for a moment. How is the problem also going to be the solution? Hoping and waiting for the other person to change and become the solution keeps us stuck. When we externalize responsibility in toxic relationships, we also externalize our power to heal.

You can use this dynamic to free yourself by recognizing that by hoping the problem partner will also be the solution is magical thinking. Look at the externalizing from a wider lens. For example, it may be the problem partner does not find their behavior a problem, maybe it works for them. You may need to gradually see the reality and begin to work your way towards what is real and true.

2. 50/50: Reclaiming Your Power

   There are two people in a relationship. You are 50% of the relationship and the toxic partner is the other 50%. This dynamic shows you how much power you have to affect change and be the solution. Here is how: If you remove your 50% from the toxic relationship dynamic then that toxic dynamic no longer exists in your world. For example, let's say you have an abandonment wound and feel victimized and that is your role in the toxic relationship. The other person is an abuser who is in and out of your life and that is their role. Removing yourself, your 50%, ends this dynamic.

   
   

   The toxic partner may then take their 50% and go find another partner to be toxic with. I know that might sting because you may be in a place where you don't want the other person to move on, you want them to stay with you, toxic and all. I get it. I have been there too. For now just consider the power you have to end the toxic dynamic when you are ready.

Understanding your role in a toxic relationship does not mean blaming yourself, it means reclaiming your power to change the dynamic. You can use your awareness that you are 50% of the toxic relationship to begin to access your power. You can remove yourself from the victim role, the one who feels betrayed or mistreated and use the energy that you gave the toxic partner to heal yourself.

3. Shame: The Silent Force That Keeps You Trapped

   Shame keeps toxic relationship patterns alive by silencing truth, isolating you and blocking an outside perspective. We carry a lot of shame when we are in a toxic relationship. We tend to not share with friends and family for two reasons.

   Firstly, we do not want others to know how bad it really is, how bad we are being treated because we are ashamed. Yet, by not sharing we deny ourselves an outside perspective. By not sharing we also keep it from feeling real and being a problem we must address.

   
   

   Secondly, if we share with friends and family they will expect us to do something about it, like leave the relationship. It can feel like sharing will make things worse because not only do you have the stress of the toxic relationship, but by sharing you then have the burden of other people's expectations that you leave the relationship. You may feel like you can't handle both and you are not ready to leave. Keeping the reality you are living a secret can keep you stuck.

Let the shame guide you to express yourself. Shame is trapped energy and can cause confusion. If you don't feel comfortable sharing what you are going through with another person, start journaling about it. Journal your thoughts and feelings and let the energy begin to flow and build your strength.

4. Crossroads: Why Toxic Relationships Keep Repeating

   Toxic relationships repeat because unresolved emotional wounds pull us back into the same crossroads again and again.

   Life has not given up on you if you feel trapped in a toxic relationship because you will face many crossroads. Toxic relationships have many, repeating crossroads. Each time there is an escalation, an explosive outburst, a betrayal, you are placed at a crossroads and must decide to stay or go.

   

   Crossroads

   If you decide to stay and try to forgive and forget because the other person said they were sorry and you feel you also contributed to the hurtful event, you will find that you will face the crossroads again. Why? Because you have not made the choice that aligns with your highest good. In toxic relationships we find ourselves at the crossroads over and over again until we choose what is best for us.

The crossroads work as a guide and provides clarity. Work through the crossroads, what are the pros and cons of each choice. Parts of you may choose to stay in a situation where you are being mistreated, but there is a bigger version of you that supports a better choice. Get to know the parts of you that don't want to leave a toxic relationship. You will find those parts of you are confused about what love is and what it is not. Seek guidance as you can make it through the crossroads. Life supports you!

5. Hook and Eye: How The Inner Child Gets Pulled Into Toxic Love

   A wounded inner child is one of the biggest unconscious drivers of toxic relationship cycles.

   The hook and eye dynamic is the machine that drives the hell-loops of a toxic relationship. The analogy is the toxic partner is the hook and you are the eye, like in the common screen door locks. See illustration below.

   

   Hook and Eye illustration of a toxic relationship dynamic.

   The eye is you and in the eye (the circle above) is your unconscious material. If you are prone to repeated toxic relationships, you are highly likely to have a wounded inner child in your unconscious. Having a wounded inner child can make us vulnerable to toxic partners because we view the partner and the relationship through the lens of the wounded inner child. When we have a wounded inner child we simply lack the ability to vet a partner. We may consciously want a healthy relationship, but our unconscious is running our life and we are split. So a potential partner comes along and we miss the red flags or we minimize them. The toxic partner hooks us into a toxic relationship. If you would like a visual and spoken explanation of this dynamic, and the other four I have covered in this post, you can find it HERE.

The work I do with clients, that I first did for myself, was to heal the wounded inner child. As a result of healing, a potential partner who is not healthy can't hook you into a toxic relationship. Self love, confidence and stability take the place of drama once you are healed.

Toxic relationships provide us with valuable experiences and they can be the doorway to true healing, real healing.

If you are ready to heal, I created a self paced course of the three critical steps I took that lead to complete healing of my inner child abandonment wound. If you would like to look at the course syllabus you can find it HERE. Three Steps to Heal An Inner Child Wound.

Toxic Relationship FAQ

Why do I keep ending up in toxic relationships?

Because unresolved emotional wounds, especially abandonment and inner child wounds, unconsciously influence our ability to vet a partner, see them clearly and make a healthy choice.

What keeps people stuck in toxic relationships?

Fear of abandonment, shame, trauma bonding, emotional dependency, and unconscious attachment patterns.

Can healing the inner child stop toxic relationship cycles?

Yes. When the inner child is healed, the unconscious stops choosing partners based on old wounds. I was able to heal my abandonment wound that kept me in toxic relationship cycles and I explain the steps I took HERE.

How do you break a toxic relationship pattern?

By increasing awareness, healing emotional wounds, building self-worth, and choosing relationships aligned with your highest good.

I am here when you need me. You can contact me directly at valerie@shadowtreasure.com or schedule a session with me. If you want more FAQs about inner child healing you can find it HERE.

Smiles and love,

Valerie

Valerie Alexander, BSN/RN, MA, Jungian Coach