Having a toxic friendship can really affect your health. It can raise your stress levels and affect your self esteem, plus hit you other areas, such as financially, and drain your resources. No one wants to consider ending a friendship, but sometimes when the cost of having that relationship is too much on your health, it becomes necessary.
What is a toxic friendship?
If you are part of a toxic friendship, you may be spending time with a friend who takes more than she gives, focuses more on her own needs than anyone else’s, demands too much from you, or constantly puts you down or makes little digs at your expense. At the very least, it is unpleasant to be around such people. At the very worse, these toxic friendships could actually shorten your lifespan.
What did the research find?
Brigham Young University went about studying decades of various studies on women’s relationships and found something consistent in all of the studies. Those of us who have strong friendships increase their life expectancy. In fact, the odds of living longer increases by a whopping 50 percent when you have strong, positive friendships.
If having close, reliable friends increases your health and chances of survival, shouldn’t we all invest in these friendships and leave the negative ones behind?
How can you purge a toxic friendship?
Getting rid of any friendship isn’t easy. There are ways to remove the negativity in your life nicely. You might want to gently confront the friend. If you value the friendship and want to turn it around, this is the best approach. You can give your friend a chance to change for the better.
If confrontation isn’t an option, just being less available to her may be enough for your negative friend to get the hint. Sometimes busy is just busy, but suddenly changing your schedule or regular time together serves up a strong message.
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