Sounds like you don't really understand how it is for people who have much personal experience with this. I say that because it's a lot of oversimplification with the idea that it's just about labelling and avoiding solving the actual problem. Why would the two be mutually exclusive anyway? It would be nice if the biggest problem was just labelling in those cases, anyway. No, the biggest problem is far bigger than that. Trauma, PTSD, cPTSD is no joke either. And so on.

I'm actually finding it an interesting question lately as to what percentage of the population is toxic people. It doesn't seem like a high percentage, but it's unfortunately higher than it should be, according to my understanding. They are definitely not the majority of people (thank god for that), but it seems like, you can still run into them pretty easily. Not on a daily basis, but still it's something I've really had to toughen up about to make sure I don't get affected by any of them. Because it does just happen more often than I would like it, even once or twice every month is too much, I have only one life and I don't want to waste time on such interactions.

So, of course, I totally agree that keeping them away is what's most important. No engagement whatsoever.

My sister's husband is one of them. That one isn't going away, unfortunately but I do avoid him as much as possible (luckily I don't actually have to meet them).

And then the most important comments I wanted to make about your post. I am going to call a spade a spade, if you are not okay with hearing about the negative side of life, you do not have to engage with this. But I want to put this out there in case someone hears it and it helps them recognise and avoid such negatives more effectively.

It is a misconception that people cannot treat you badly or abuse you unless you let them. Now, if there was psychoeducation available to everyone right from elementary school, I could then perhaps agree with you. But as things are now, no. Definitely do not agree.

So, it's just a theory that you have to get healthy and then you'll be OK and that there won't be any problems for sure. I feel like it's a theory that skips over some of the actual evidence. It would be nice if it was that simple.

Again, it just doesn't work like this though. It's not like "should one slip past the boundaries by being a little less obvious". Nope, unfortunately. I don't know if you've spent much time with truly manipulative people in a close relationship, people who are anything but straightforward, people who know what specifically to manipulate about you. To make the manipulation just that much more effective. It's not about being a "little less obvious", that's a vast oversimplification unfortunately. I do wish life was that nice without any dark spots in it.

This has nothing to do with a victim position, either. This is simply about calling a spade a spade. Admitting that life has dark sides instead of trying to escape them and their existence. Since that's how I originally became a target. A long time ago, I refused to believe that there can be those bad things but they do exist. And that knowledge helps me avoid such people in future.

The other big misconception in my opinion is the idea that healthy people cannot be approached by people with less than nice intentions. That in my experience is very much a misconception. I was friends with someone, who was a well-adjusted, healthy, positive, optimistic, strong woman. Yet her boyfriend traumatised her as he turned out to be a psychopath pretty much - She got PTSD from the whole experience, of course.

How he got to her? So she was not feeling very well and was vulnerable when he found a way to get her trust and exploit her eventually. He pretended to be this nice, attentive person, supportive of her in her troubles, of course. I could go on but what's the point?

In general also, there are tactics to make someone who was originally healthy, well-adjusted, not co-dependent by nature at all, to be vulnerable, emotionally confused, messed up, "crazy," dependent and so on. Read up on trauma bond, too. Things like that exist.

So. It's not like healthy people cannot ever be vulnerable to anything. That again has nothing to do with claiming to be a victim.

It can be hard to face the thought though of course, that you (general you) could have vulnerabilities that manipulative people could exploit intentionally or they could even create vulnerabilities or deepen existing vulnerabilities, or that other toxic people could even unintentionally engage with these vulnerabilities. But admitting that such things exist does not mean taking or endorsing a victim position whatsoever. It is simply not denying the dark side of life and being prepared to deal with it instead. Preferably, deal with it by recognising these things ASAP and avoid engagement, and/or keep up very hard boundaries if engagement is required to some extent. Both internal and external boundaries. Which may take time to learn but that's perfectly normal too if things take time to learn.

To me, this is what taking responsibility is about. Accepting that these things happen, that it is normal in the sense that it does exist, it did happen and it says nothing about you personally; that it's true even if you were healthy before, even if you were never abused before, that it doesn't mean something is wrong with you, that it doesn't mean something was defective about you, NO, it's perfectly normal to have some vulnerabilities, even hidden ones, hidden to yourself even, blind spots, and the like. Recognising them, accepting these facts, that is what taking responsibility means to me.

And the other side of this is what I already mentioned, is that life is full of hard sh**, and that enough (too many) manipulative, toxic or even abusive people do exist and that you do have to recognise them, not be a pollyanna or believe in niceness so much to the point of becoming naively idealistic. It would be nice. But we can't afford to just be naively idealistic. Unless you (general you) are really lucky and you live a sheltered enough life or otherwise have ideal living circumstances.

This is much like going to the doctor when you know it's advisable to get checked out even if you feel like there is nothing "wrong" with you. It doesn't make you a victim if you are willing to go to the doctor and get the label for the problem and then get a treatment after the label identified the problem.


I could go on and on but... I think I've said all I had on my mind after reading your post.

Anyhow. All this is not just based on my own experiences. There are many articles, resources on this topic, including how manipulative people can find even the healthy well-adjusted people, and how some of them specifically like to target such people, to try and tear them down to exploit them that much more effectively, and so on and so on. I suggest you read up on it, if you want to understand it more deeply.