it was too good to be true + 10 red flags you should never ignore

6 years ago i found myself in a place i hope you never will.

for years, i worried about the next girl. i was worried that i couldn't save her from the hands of someone who shouldn't be allowed to walk amongst us. then i realized that i had the ability to help so many other women by just sharing my story. 

so here it is, my story: a chapter of almost two years of my life drowning in red flags and abuse. + 10 red flags that i ignored, that you shouldn't. 

love you always 

if you or anyone else is in a similar position to the story shared in this episode, please reach out to the domestic violence hotline 1-800-799-7233 or text "start" to 88788.

connect with julia on instagram @beautybyjulia + tik tok @juliasalvia

unlock more archive content on instagram @theselflovearchive + tik tok @theselflovearchives

sign up for the self-love archives newsletter: www.theselflovearchives.com

Transcript

Julia Salvia: 0:00

Six years ago, I found myself in one of the worst positions I have ever been in in my life. It had been barely a week since I had picked up my entire life and moved it all the way to Connecticut to move in with my boyfriend at the time. Just a few days into living with this person, in my home, my home that's supposed to be my comfort, my safe space, this person had assaulted me. And in today's episode, I want to finally tell you my story. Not only that, but we're going to go over ten different red flags that you should never ignore in a relationship. Hello and welcome back to the self love archives. Thank you so much for being here. If you're new here, hi, hello, hey, welcome to my podcast. This is the self love archives where I share my story and my experiences with you and we bring on guests to share their story and their experiences with you as well. All surrounding self love. Self love is a much bigger thing than just loving ourselves. It involves healing, it involves learning, education, Self love is an umbrella of so much more, and I'm so excited to bring it all here into this archive. Because you can't build an archive by yourself, now can you? But I am Julia. I am your self love bestie, your self love big sister, your self love guide, and let's jump into today's episode. Before we get into today's episode, I do want to mention that a lot of the topics that I am going to be talking about today are from my own experience. Not only that, but some of these topics and specifics are extremely sensitive, so please keep that in mind while listening today. If you or anyone that you know finds yourself in a tough position like the one that I'm going to be talking about, I'm going to be linking and sharing a bunch of different resources in these show notes. So please make sure to check that out and do not hesitate to ever reach out. I love you guys. Let's get into the episode. A couple of years ago back in 2017 2018, after I have, had gotten out of this bad relationship, I did share a video on YouTube talking about my experience. I felt super called to share my experience with this person as my way of protecting other women. I wasn't scared to share my experience. I almost felt as if I owed it to the world to share all of the experiences that I have gone through. Because to me, if it helps one other person in the world, then I am doing what I came here, what I was brought into this world to do. Which is help others. Help others feel less alone, help others get out of a bad relationship, help others feel more confident in themselves, feel more love for themselves. If I can do that for one person by just sharing an experience of my own, then I have accomplished everything that my soul has wanted to accomplish on this earth. The only thing that always makes me nervous when sharing stories like this are any legalities involved. Which is why I think it took me so long to finally share the full story in January of 2018, I made the decision to move in with my boyfriend at the time. The year prior, I had graduated with my masters and had made the decision to fully go into content creation, work from home. And try to make this influencer thing work and here we are today so I guess it worked. He did not work from home so in order for us to live together someone had to make the compromise and it made the most sense that I would make the compromise since I had worked from home. I did go to college in Connecticut so moving to Connecticut wasn't this. Huge, huge move, but it definitely was a big move for me because it took me almost four hours away from my home in New Jersey and an hour away from where I spent most of my time in college. The first red flag in this entire story began when we first started dating. But in regards to moving in with each other, I wanted to move in with each other because one, I thought we had to because we were dating and we lived way too far away from each other. Two, because I thought that it would actually help our relationship because it was already bumpy, rocky from the get go. And three, I think there was a part of me that definitely wanted to, because I wanted to fix this broken relationship as it was, but I also think that there was this part of me that just wanted to grow up really fast and get out of the house that I grew up in. Before we had moved in together, he had definitely shown a lot of signs, looking back at it now, that are huge red flags. He would gaslight me. He would scream at me when we got into arguments, and scream at me for genuinely no reason. He would get mad at me when I stayed up lAte. he would accuse me of cheating on him at all hours of the day. He would constantly want to be in communication with me via text or via call. There was a huge amount of jealousy that came from my ex And when things would get really heated, he would push me, he would pull me, and he would definitely touch me in inappropriate ways. It came to moving in with each other, I definitely felt a pit in my stomach but I literally ignored it. I literally ignored it and said this is what is supposed to happen. Maybe this will help, but this will also help me grow up, move out of my home, and start my life. Before this one day in January, after we had moved in with each other, let's take it back like a couple of months. We started dating mid 2017. I had just graduated with my master's degree. I was planning on moving back to New Jersey because my lease in Connecticut was ending. And everything was truly too good to be true, which should have been a huge red flag in and of itself. He was sweet, he was caring, was giving me all of the love languages, would compliment me all the time, would buy me little gifts, would make me dinner. Not only was everything too good to be true, but everything moved ridiculously fast in that relationship in the very beginning. So I am madly in love, or in lust I should say, with this man. I told myself, well I should just believe it because it's, it's here, it's right in front of me, it's happening in front of my eyes. And there was nothing that had come up that seemed to be any sort of red flag. So I decided to do one of those trending boyfriend videos on YouTube with him. We filmed this video asking each other questions and Basically introducing him to my community maybe just a week or two after posting that video with him, I had gotten a very strange comment on the video I was used to People saying some weird out of context things, but this comment was a little too specific it said something along the lines of his his full name, that he had a baby on the way and that the baby's name is going to be this, and that the baby is due in January, and that he abandoned the baby, doesn't believe that this is his kid, It seemed a little too fishy, a little too specific. This person was naming names, naming times, naming specifics, and I didn't share any of that information in this video. How could this person know all of this information? When I had asked him about this comment, you could see that his entire demeanor and voice got extremely Defensive it started off with like and I I don't know. I have no idea. It's just some cyber bully I come to find out that this comment actually came from an ex girlfriend of his I remember we were sitting in the kitchen and he was telling me this whole story about their relationship that She lied about this, and she lied about that, and she's probably lying about this pregnancy, she's obsessed with me, she was in love with me, she's absolutely crazy, and from that point on, anything that had to do with her and with that part of his past, he got extremely defensive he never brought it up or talked about it. And every time it was sprung on him to have a conversation about it, he would just say how crazy she is and how horrible of a girl she is and so on and so forth. When he had told me this story, I think what made it believable was that he left out some really big pieces of information, but But still kept the story exactly the same, just omitting certain specifics that I a couple years later, found out. In this story about their relationship, he talked about how the relationship was built on her lies about herself, her education, her family, and how she was raised. And when he found all of that out, they would fight a lot, they would argue a lot, and they would get into these very, very serious and almost dangerous Fights, but he told me that they did end up in court together over a Misunderstanding and the case was essentially dropped because it wasn't that serious little did I know that he was literally handing me the red flag while telling me this story. Like he was literally handing me a red flag. I was just in this headspace of, I felt this gut feeling that didn't feel right. In my stomach, but was all, I'm gonna support my boyfriend, I'm gonna be on his side, F this girl. And as our relationship went on, I brushed off a lot. A lot. So many things that I just Made the assumption we're a part of having a relationship with someone. The fighting, the arguing, the miscommunication, the jealousy. Those were all things I was so used to in my past relationships, that to me, obviously looking back at it now, I'm like, absolutely not, that is a red flag. That is if, that is if a red flag slapped you right across the face. But back then, I was so used to all of that, so to me, I was just kind of saying, uh, I guess that's just part of a relationship. I was thinking that this was all normal. And ignoring the pit in my stomach telling me that it's not. So in the beginning of 2018, we decided to move in together. And seven days, about seven days into living with each other, we got into a really big argument. At this point, that baby, who he had me convinced Was not his baby and was not even a real baby to begin with was actually born there were pictures posted that he had gotten a hold of and Everything seemed if you looked him in the eyes, it seemed like everything Spiraled he was a lot more jumpy a lot more secretive a lot more angry at Every moment at every little thing and I was over here just wanting to help I said to him that if this is your child, or if this isn't your child and she's claiming that it is, shouldn't we figure out a way to find that out? one day at our home, an argument had ensued and the argument started with this all going on and me just wanting to help or trying to help in some sort of way and him getting very angry at me trying to get involved in any of this. What I remember from this argument. Was him saying something along the lines of you can't do any better than me All of your ex boyfriends are fucking ugly anyway, and this time I was upset, and I said something back that just hit the right spot. I said, they may have been ugly, but at least they treated me better than you ever have. Now whether that is true or not, it was true in that very moment. I was sitting on my bed, actually looking at new apartments, realizing that I had just got into a lease with someone who I, For sure should not have. It was kind of in this moment that I Woke up and realized that I may have made a really big mistake and right after I had said this to him I just felt my face get wet And I realized that he had spit on me. The conversation had gotten really heated a couple of moments before this had happened that I actually started recording, so I have a recording of this happening and the sheer shock on my face after that had happened, it was one of those moments where, You just don't even know how to act or how to respond, so I did nothing. After that day, I was too embarrassed to call my parents to let them know that they were right and I shouldn't have moved all the way to Connecticut with this person. I didn't have too many friends at the time to confide in and to talk about what had happened. My thought process back then is this was really fucked up and disgusting because if there's anything that grosses me out, it's fucking spit. I don't feel unsafe, which is important to note because in that very moment, because I didn't feel unsafe, it was one of the bigger reasons as to why I stayed. But I also had no one that I could confide in or that I could talk to. Or that I felt comfortable enough to talk to about what had just taken place the night before. He profusely apologized, and I sat there questioning if I could ever forgive such a thing, if I could ever move forward. From that very moment, it sat with me that I could never, I could never marry this person, have children with this person. And it sat with me so deeply. So why didn't I call the police? Why didn't I leaVe? Probably because of the way that it would look to My family my friends to the followers that I had to the viewers that I had How would it look if I had just been in a relationship with someone I introduced you to like three months ago and all of a Sudden Oh moving back to New Jersey after being in Connecticut for seven days There was a part of me that what there was part of me that was just like I started my life I'm starting my life. I have a studio. I have a home I'm starting my adult life. I don't want this to all blow up in my face I took a moment of something that to me today is So huge and so wrong and the reddest red flag And I buried it. I let it go. I sweeped it under the rug and I said, let's see how things Let's go. Let's see if we can fix this. I didn't feel unsafe. I didn't feel like this person was going to hurt me. But all of the signs that he could and that he would if he needed to or wanted to were all there. That's how abuse happens. Abuse happens with gaslighting. Abuse happens with screaming. Just a small argument, it's like a snowball, that you don't even see getting bigger and bigger and bigger and bigger. It starts with all of these tiny little red flags, and then that flag gets bigger and bigger and brighter and brighter. Until it's literally waving in the wind, slapping you in the face, for you to see it. And that's exactly what had happened. The beginning of 2017, we had gotten into argument after argument after argument every single holiday that year. The Christmas, the Thanksgiving before we had moved in with each other, the Christmas before we had moved in with each other, the New Year's, Easter, my birthday, Valentine's Day, every single holiday. There was some sort of argument, some sort of miscommunication. Not to, not to take away from all of the other days that there were arguments and screaming and yelling and so much fighting, so much back and forth. But it was the holidays that really got to me. One small thing would go wrong and he would have an outburst and say we're not going and we'd drive back home and we would spend the holiday at home I remember Easter. I was supposed to spend it with my family and Something had happened with dropping off one of the cars at the dealer to get fixed and then we only had one car and I was supposed to drop him off at his family's house and then go see my family and It all didn't work out that way. Every single holiday, I fucked up. Every single holiday, I did something wrong. Every single holiday, I messed up the plan. I was running late. I was being rude. I was being nasty. I was starting a fight. I was talking to some other guy. I was cheating on him. It was always me, me, me, me, me. I did this. I did that. I started this. This is your fault. And every single time there was an outing, a holiday, an occasion, there was an argument, there was a fight, and it was always my fault. So 2017 was a really lonely year. I spent a lot of that year inside my home. I befriended my neighbor downstairs, and I would go walk down the stairs and hang out with her, here and there, and it would be close to the time where he would come home, and I would see him out, out of the window come park at our apartment complex and I'd kind of go all in a panic. I'm like, I have to go back upstairs. He can't see me here. And I would go back upstairs to the apartment and pretend like I was working on something. Every time he would come home, he'd ask why the house is a mess. Why dinner isn't being cooked. There was a problem with every little thing. And the excuse on his end was always You are at home all day. You should be cooking. You should be cleaning. Like I go to work and I have to travel 30 minutes to work every single day and The least you could do is have food cooked and I don't understand why this house is such a fucking mess after that day in January, nothing changed. The only thing that held me on during this time was social media. Creating makeup looks, chatting with my viewers, and my two dogs. We had adopted two dogs in early February. I was extremely adamant about adopting a dog. I provided no other option. I kind of put my foot down. I was like, this is happening. Zeus and Athena got me Through this time along with creating on social media. It was like my two, my two outlets focusing on work and focusing on just taking care of something. In the beginning of the summer, that red flag got so red I didn't have a choice, I could not ignore the red flag anymore. He had a friend visiting him, and that friend was staying at our house. We had all gone out to the bar, and the bar really wasn't my scene anymore. I decided to be the DD for the night, and let him and his friends go hang out with all of their friends. We were barely at the bar for an hour and something had Happened one of the security guards thought that they were doing drugs in the bathroom I don't know whether or not that was true Either way, we were asked to leave the bar There was a McDonald's on the way home and they asked me to stop so we stop we get into the drive thru and Some kind of, like, ruckus is going on with a few cars in front. I remember just someone walking holding a McDonald's bag yelling at McDonald's about something forgetting their order or something along those lines something stupid and my boyfriend at the time had I opened the window and started screaming out the window at this person, kind of going along with them, saying like, yeah, you tell them. This person did not hear what he was saying and actually thought that he wanted to. Was trying to start an argument or start trying to start a fight with him So then it got a little more heated his friend in the back himself and this person are all screaming at each other At two o'clock in the morning in a mcdonald's parking lot in a not so nice area and I'm starting to get really nervous and like really anxious and I told him so many times Get in the car. You are drunk. Please roll up the window. Like, you are not, you are not doing anything right now. And I said to him, you are a pussy. You are not going to do anything. So shut the fuck up and close the window before something bad happens. That word completely triggered him and he went absolutely ballistic on me in the car. The entire drive home with his friend sitting in the backseat. He was berating me, calling me every name in the book, everything that you can think of came out of this man's mouth. When we get back to our apartment complex, he's still screaming at me inside the car, outside the car. And he threatens to leave in his car. And actually ends up getting into his car drunk and starts to drive away in the parking lot. The mindset that I had in this very moment is, I am not letting this person, I am not letting this man go anywhere driving drunk. Because I don't want to be the blame for someone else. Getting hurt. So I got in front of his car And and this is all taking place in a matter of like 5 10 minutes, not even But I'm getting in front of his car making sure that he goes nowhere His friend is not taking this seriously at all kind of standing to the side Just watching this all go down and after he almost runs me over with his car, at some point we get him to get out of his car, put the car back in park, and go upstairs. Once we got into the house, his friend tried to calm him down as he continuously just kept screaming things at me and threatening to jump out the window, threatening to drive away, i, at this point, am saying absolutely nothing, and am just putting on my pajamas, taking my makeup off, getting ready for bed, and wanting this entire night to just be over. While his friend was trying to calm him down, something had happened where my ex had said something to his friend to offend him. And his friend decides to leave our apartment. After he leaves, the continuous cursing at me, calling me names, continues. The screaming and the yelling is getting louder, and the threats are getting extremely scary, I'm not feeling safe anymore. He had threatened a couple of times to jump off the balcony and then had proceeded to threaten to drive away and leave and that same thing is just going through my head. I'm like, he cannot drive a car right now. He cannot leave this house. I don't think that I was able to get his keys from him So I decided to just stand in front of the door and say like you're not leaving You're you are drunk right now. You cannot drive a car And everything kind of went downhill From there. We had a really long hallway to our front door. So as I was standing in front of the door Blocking it so that he couldn't leave. He was throwing pillows at me Then he was knocking all the picture frames in the hallway over He was throwing like a lighter at me pencil at me Whatever was in hand's reach was being thrown down the hallway at me, and he would come up to me in my face Screaming everything and anything at me at one point he grabbed a knife and Threatened to stab me with it if I didn't move away from the door. I tried my best to try to calm him down. Um, it was, it was about 3 o'clock at this time. It was about 3 o'clock in this moment and I'm starting to get more and more scared of the severity of what was happening and I decided to call one of my friends. Unfortunately, she didn't answer and I was in between calling the police and calling his mom. I ended up I ended up calling his mom and she answered the call and she At this point, I was getting At this point It was at this point It was at this point where I started to feel just complete. Like, I was terrified of what, I was terrified of what, I was terrified of whatever he planned on doing or throwing. I didn't have the keys to my car in my hand, I didn't have shoes on, I, I didn't know what would happen if I left out the front door. That was when he came up to me and choked me against the door. Screaming and yelling at me to get away from the door, to let him go outside, to let him, to let him leave. I just remember, I just remember trying to get him off of me. And when he finally let go, just sinking to the ground, not having any clue what to do in that moment. And I know looking back at it, it would be very, I know looking back at it, especially not being in that moment, you'd be like, well obviously you know what to do, like you should obviously call the cops, you should obviously call someone, you should obviously leave. This is my home. I have, I had one of my dogs there. It was super, super, super late, and genuinely I didn't want to ruin this person's life. Because if I did call the cops, I would ruin his life. It's so interesting telling this story from the outside, looking in now, right? Because I'm older, I'm wiser, I'm so much more knowledgeable and so much more aware. And I would never, ever let any of these things repeat themselves a second time. But the mindset of this person that I was then thought that I loved this person. I had no idea what to do in that moment. I was scared to make any sort of move, to call anyone, to leave, to come out of that hallway because I was scared of what the next step was. Was the next step being stabbed? Was the next step being punched in the face? Was the next step being, being pushed? Like, what, what was next? Because in that moment, I didn't know I was thinking the absolute worst. I ended up quietly calling one of my friends Unfortunately, she didn't answer and I kind of was left with two options in my head of who to call next and it was either his mom or the police Unfortunately, I chose to call his mom. She answered and I relayed to her what was happening And looking back on it, it seemed like this wasn't new. It seemed like she knew exactly what to say, in a panic, but she knew exactly what to say. His mom begged me to stay on the phone with her, for my safety. Mm. She begged me to stay on the phone with her, and begged me not to call the police. She said, I'm coming there right now. Please stay on the phone with me. So I did. I stayed on the phone with I stayed in the hallway of my apartment On the phone with her on the floor with a ton of random broken shit around me Until they got there. That night his mom had stayed over our house and slept on the couch With him on the other side of the couch and I tried to sleep in our bed This was the red flag That hit me in the face. This was the moment where I knew I needed to get out. After this had happened, we stayed together. But for the next couple of months, I would put my head into work. I would mind my own business. I would keep the peace. And I did this, one, because of my safety, two, because I wasn't sure what to do, three, because I didn't know what was going to happen with my home, my dogs, and four, because I didn't have the money to do any of this on my own. In October of 2018, after some really, really bad fights, I got in contact with the management of my lease to try to figure out a way to Get out of this lease early To try to figure out a way to change the locks on the apartment the earliest that We could leave the apartment was I think November And they weren't able to change the locks or security or do anything of that sort unless there was actually a legal document stating whatever had happened. My dog Zeus at the time was already living with his parents because of some behavioral issues that he had and Athena was living with us in the apartment. And my biggest fear was that he was going to take Athena. I had already knew that I was gonna have to say goodbye to Zeus. I didn't want to take him from this home that he had gotten so used to. I had hired a really great trainer for him. So I knew that I was going to have to make the really tough decision of leaving him behind. We had somehow gotten all of the paperwork signed and taken care of to move out of the apartment. I was hosting an event in the city, and I had packed up my car, I had packed up everything, I had gotten everything together, and I think I had Athena boarded somewhere, or a friend taking care of her, or my sister, something where I knew she was going to be safe and out of his hands. The day of this event, I got a call from him at 7. 30 in the morning. I decided to not pick it up. And I remember I got a text saying something about the house, something about the apartment. I never answered the call, I never answered the text, And when I got back to the apartment a few days later, all of his stuff was gone, including a couple of my things, and that was it. Besides a couple of comments on my posts on social media, I blocked him and I had never heard from him again. And I know that that's not the case with every story that's similar to this. So in all of this, I felt really lucky that this just could be. Left behind. So now that you've heard my story, let's talk about 10 different red flags that you should definitely not ignore in a relationship. Number one, blaming others and not taking responsibility. This could be something as small as there being a miscommunication but it always being your fault. Or this could be something even bigger, where they have clearly been caught cheating on you, and they just refuse to take responsibility, refuse to own up to it, and they somehow, someway, find a reason to blame you or someone else for it. This could even be intertwined into number two, which is gaslighting. The literal term of gaslighting means to deceive one's perception of reality, but an example of how gaslighting can be shown in relationships is when the partner is denying something ever took place or that they ever said something at all lying and contradicting things that they've said themselves or making you or someone else feel like they're acting crazy or overreacting when you may just be having a normal response to something that they've done coercion, scapegoating, literally outright lying, or manipulation of reality. There are a ton of different signs that lead to gaslighting behavior. Some of those include outright lying, deny, deny, deny, saying they're going to do something but their actions say otherwise, using something that you have said against you, or twisting something that you have said, so it sounds like it's more in their favor than it is in yours. When someone gaslights you, it is going to make you feel confused, and it's going to make you doubt yourself. Dot what you've said, what you believe, how you feel, all of the above. One of the most common ways that my ex had gaslit me was that every time I became emotional from A fight that we had, an argument that we had, or something that was said, or something that was done, he would make me feel as if I was overreacting, or I was just too emotional of a person. Or kind of throw out the woe is me card, so if I'm upset about something that he had done or something that he had said, it was, oh, well, I work so hard, so I have the excuse to do this, I have the excuse to do that. Or even using my own habits. against me, like saying, because I work from home, I'm home and I have the ability to cook and clean and do all of these different things because I'm home. And even though I may be physically at home, that's obviously not the case. Number three is love bombing. You have definitely heard this term before. I think I interchange lust and love bombing with each other, although they are different. I feel like lust is more like a sexual desire and love bombing is more I don't know, in my head it comes off more just a cute desire, like a loving desire. I don't even know if I put the desire with love bombing. It's just love bombing is Drowning you in love. Like, basically giving you everything. too much, too soon. Essentially, it is rushing the relationship to the next step. To the next place. I think in my past relationship, especially this one that I've shared with you, there was so much love bombing in the very beginning. It was too good to be true because there was so much love bombing. There was so much artificial love. So much of, I'm gonna be your knight in shining armor kind of love. Love bombing is like a never ending high school Valentine's Day. It's almost as if you never get to that depth, that reality, and this whole relationship, this love bombed relationship, is drowning in hearts. And I really think that love bombing can be very difficult to see or know that it's happening to you, especially if you are just as infatuated with this person as they are with you. The best way to know if you're being love bombed is if it's constantly, I love you, I miss you. Very dreamy, fairytale like, and there's never any serious conversations about your values. The future of the relationship. The reality of building a life together. It's all empty promises, and words of affirmations, and gifts, and acts of service, and basically this entire honeymoon phase. Red flag number four. Lying. This seems like an obvious one. But sometimes it's not so obvious when the things that are lied about are very small. If someone's going to lie to you about something so small, like a grade they got on a paper, or what they do for work, or what they were doing, who they were hanging out with, like if someone is going to lie about something. So small, what else do you think they're going to lie about? Telling the truth can be super fucking difficult. And even so, in the beginning of a relationship when you're trying to build something with someone and you want this person to like you but you don't know if they would like you if You told them that you did actually like that funny movie. That they hated. All of these things, all of these red flags come from an insecurity, but lying comes from this deep insecurity about one's self. In one way or another. But simple lies? If you're gonna lie about something so simple What makes you think that they're not going to lie about something else? Number five. When actions don't match words, and when words don't match actions. You probably hear it a lot That their words didn't match their actions. They said that they were going to do something. They said that they were going to take you out on a date on this day at this time. And then they ghosted you. And that's clearly an action that does not match their words. If they said that they were going to call you, they should call you. Now it's more common to hear about when someone's words don't match their actions. When they say that they're gonna do something for you and then they don't end up doing it. But what about the other way around? Where They say that they don't want something, but their actions show that they want something. I had this happen to me where I was dating a guy and he made it very clear verbally that he did not want a relationship, but in his actions he was treating it as if it were a relationship and that's what he wanted. So, if one doesn't match the other, red flag. And this is not to be confused with great communication or good communication. If someone says that they're going to do something but life happens, they should be communicating with you that, hey, I can't come over today, is it okay if we reschedule to tomorrow? And that reschedule part is very important. Now, if they consistently plan something with you, and cancel, and then plan something again, and cancel, and then plan something again, and cancel, that is a whole different story. Red flag number six. Playing the victim. their day is always worse, harder, more challenging, sadder, more depressing than your day. What they have gone through is always so much worse. than what you've gone through. Everything is everyone else's fault. They've gone through so much more. When someone consistently plays the victim, it leaves absolutely no room for your feelings to be validated. I almost call the victim mentality, when someone is always playing the victim, this red flag. It's similar to the one upper friend, where this person always has a worse day than you did or they always had a better day than you did. They always try to one up you on everything that you talk to them about, mention. Every time you tell them about your day, their day is for some reason worse or it's better. They always want to be the star. Of the show, whatever that show is, a positive or a negative one, or a funny one, or an angry one. They want their story to be on the top of the pile. Red flag number seven. Inappropriately touching you. This is a red flag in so many different ways, in so many different scenarios. But the scenarios I want to focus on are the ones where you're having an argument and this person pulls at your shirt, pushes you, bumps into you with their shoulder. Inappropriately touches you to scare you, to show their aggression, to manipulate you. This could also look like punching a hole in the wall, throwing things. All of these kinds of behaviors when you're in an argument with someone are huge red flags. Because if they're just pushing you a little bit now, or just grabbing your shirt or grabbing your wrist now, what could that potentially escalate to? And personally, I don't think you should stay. in order to find out. Red flag number eight. They treat the women in their life not the way you want to be treated. In past relationships, as well as in dating, I have noticed that a man treats me the same way that he treats other women, specifically his mom, his sister, any women that are in his life. Almost all of the relationships that I have had where there has been some sort of emotional abuse, physical abuse, mental abuse, or just where I've been treated horribly, there was a really toxic relationship between that guy and his mom. It was almost as if the Mothers contributed to their son's toxic behavior. They were enablers. Not trying to fix their son's behavior, just sweeping it under the rug. Sometimes this one can be difficult to see because a mother and son toxic relationship kind of can come off as, oh, I'm just a mama's boy. Watching how they interact with the women in their life, and specifically with their mothers. Are their mothers mothering them still at this age? Which could possibly be red flag number eight, is the way that their mothers treat their sons is how they want emulated in their relationship with you. An unhealed man wants you to continue What his parents, or in this case, their mothers, have done or have been continuously still doing for them. That means if their moms are still doing their laundry, still cleaning up after them, still making them dinner, all of that is going to just be transitioned over to you. Red flag number nine. Telling you what to do. No one should be telling you what to do, what to say, what to like, how to spend your time. This can show up in a lot of different ways. Controlling what you're eating. Or when you're supposed to be doing something. Like if your significant other were to come home and be like, Why is the house a mess? Why didn't you clean? Or why didn't you start dinner? The non red flag version of those, especially if it was agreed upon that you were going to make dinner and you were going to clean up, would be, hey, is everything okay? Do you need help cleaning the house? Are you overwhelmed? Are you not hungry? Do you want me to take over and cook dinNer? someone who tries to control you takes away all of you, all of who you are, your opinions, your habits. They try to change all of these things to match whatever they envision in their crazy minds. They try to change or control all of these things to match whatever they want it to be. It's almost like this like a parent they're trying to control you. No, you can't go do this. No, you can't go do that. You can't go out with your friends. You need to be home at this time. The two red flags that are usually mixed together are this one controlling and jealousy. Jealousy is a huge red flag. And I'm not talking about playful, fun jealousy, like, you're going on vacation, I'm really jealous. I'm talking about genuine jealousy. To the point where they're saying things to you like you can't go hang out with that person or saying something to you like I'm better than all of your ex boyfriends I remember the funniest thing when I was in High school, getting ready to go to college, my ex at the time had gotten so angry. This was truly a relationship built on so much jealousy. We were sitting at this Italian restaurant at the mall with his brother and his brother's girlfriend and I wanted this to be a cute surprise asking him to, to my prom. So I went to the bathroom and got our waitress and I asked her if she could write prom in chocolate on a plate when dessert came. Well I came back from the bathroom and My boyfriend at the time had so many questions as to where I went, what I was doing, what guy, what guy I was going to talk to and I'm like, nothing, nothing, nothing, like I just went to the bathroom and he's like, no, I saw you, you were talking to like all the waiters and I was like, nothing was happening. He actually ended up getting up from dinner and leaving his brother, his brother's girlfriend and I just sat there and finished our dinner, hoping he was gonna come back, he did not. They did end up bringing out the plate of chocolate that said prom on it, and I sent him a picture of it. When I was getting ready to go off to college, he was really upset that my dorm room was going to be next to a guy's dorm room. My college had a bunch of different types of dorms. They had one that was all girls. Ones that were every other floor were girls and every other floor were guys, so it was like the first floor was girls, second floor was guys, third floor was girls, fourth floor was guys, and then they had the suites. Now, I don't believe, I'm like 99 percent sure that I did not get a choice as to where I ended up. And I ended up in one of the suites, and the suites are four double bedrooms in one big room. So you walk in, there's a living room, a bathroom, and then four double rooms. I ended up in one of those. In the suites, everything is mixed, so suite number one is all guys, suite number two is all girls, suite number three is all guys, and suite number four might also be all guys. So when my ex had found out about, So my dorm situation, he got so upset and so Mad at me that I didn't choose like the all girls dorm. And I was like, I, I had no choice., there really wasn't like I wasn't able to choose. He's like, I thought you said you were gonna choose the all girls dorm. I was like, no. So the final red flag jealousy. There are so many more red flags where that came from. My biggest advice to you is that if you feel a pit in your stomach, like something isn't right, like something is wrong, it probably is. Thank you so much for being here and tuning in to yet another episode of The Self Love Archives. While we did get a little light hearted in some of the parts of the episode today, what we talked about is very serious. And as I mentioned in the beginning of the podcast, if you or anyone that you know is experiencing anything similar to the topics that we've talked about in today's video, please make sure to check out the show notes for all of the resources. Before I close out today's podcast episode, I want to thank you so much for being here, so much for making it to the end, and what I really want you to know is that it can be really scary to leave something that you are so comfortable in, something that you are so used to, something that While you may feel unsafe in it, you may find safety in the comfort of it, because you don't know what's next. If there is anything that someone could have told me when I was in an abusive relationship, it's that all of the strength that I need to get through this is all within me. That I am capable of so much more. That I deserve so much more. That all of the ways that I am being treated right now by this person, it is not love. It is not support. It is not respect. I deserve to be loved the way that I love. You deserve to be loved. The way that you love. We all deserve love, and we all deserve happiness, and we all deserve healthy relationships. And if you are scared to leave an abusive relationship, I want you to know that there is so much love on the other side. That there are other women and other people that have gone through similar nights, similar experiences, and have felt a similar way to how you're feeling right now. You are not alone. You have never been alone. And you are more than capable. You deserve so much more. It's time for you to believe it. I love you all so much. Thank you so much for listening. And I will see you back here, same time, Sunday, 12 o'clock eastern time.