Lived Through This
Why ‘Passionate’ Relationships Are Often Just Toxic Relationships
It took healthy love to appreciate the abuse I had excused
“Just a heads up, I might write about our relationship,” I recently said to my boyfriend. “But I promise I won’t do it without your permission.”
“Consent,” he said.
“What?”
“Without my consent,” he repeated. “You don’t need my permission to do anything.”
“Oh. Right,” I said, laughing a little, and we exchanged the knowing look — a tender, amused wince — that has become commonplace in our relationship. The look is a mutual acknowledgment that I am really fucked up. Or, to be kinder to myself (which is on my self-care list!), that I am still learning how to have a healthy romantic relationship.
My previous significant relationship lasted nearly a decade. It was on and off, but mostly on. Urgently, helplessly, dramatically on. It was a classic addict-codependent love story, and it was so confusing and combustible that I had to write a whole book about it in order to move into a new phase of life. In writing it, I sought to understand where I’d learned certain ideas about romance in the first place. I went back through my entire love arsenal: songs, movies…
