Relationships can be amazing, but they can also be traumatic and leave you with mental health illnesses. These mental health illnesses can include depression, anxiety, post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD), lowered self-esteem, and addiction. Having a history of bad relationships can make recovery from substance use disorder (SUD) and learning to love yourself more difficult. For help, reach out to Spero Recovery today.
What Is a Bad Relationship?
A bad relationship can come in any form and at any time in your life. These relationships can include:
- Manipulation
- Emotional, verbal, mental, or physical abuse
- Infidelity
- Excessive fighting
- Codependence
- Controlling behavior
- Intimidation
- Being filled with pain in general
Overall, an unhealthy relationship is a bad relationship. Being a part of a bad relationship or a string of bad relationships can change you mentally, emotionally, physically, and spiritually.
Negative Effects of Being in a Bad Relationship
Bad relationships have a large impact on your thought process, emotional stability, and beliefs, and can even leave you with physical effects. Repeated experiences with unhealthy relationships can worsen these negative effects and make them harder to repair, especially if you have never experienced a good relationship.
Mental Health Illness
Your brain chemistry can change through repeatedly experiencing traumatic or impactful events. These events aren’t only physical abuse but can include your partner screaming at you for little things or nothing at all, calling you derogatory names, or them ignoring you even when you are right in front of them. Anything that causes you to have a strong reaction can affect how your brain processes things and the beliefs you have. Some mental health illnesses that can stem from bad relationships include:
- Depression
- Anxiety
- PTSD
- SUD
- Lower self-esteem
- Addiction
The negative effects can lead to SUD for a variety of reasons. You may turn to substance use as a way to cope with the relationship, or you are pressured by your partner and their lifestyle. No matter the reason, having a history of bad relationships can make it harder for you to work on your recovery program. It can also hurt you while you’re learning to love yourself again.
Learning to Love Yourself
Being able to love yourself after a bad relationship is part of healing from the experience. It helps you become who you are meant to be outside of a relationship and learn what a good relationship should be, so you know what to look for when you are ready.
The process of learning to love yourself isn’t an overnight or quick thing to do. You have to change the way your brain thinks and works through scenarios. It also includes experimenting with healthy hobbies, activities, and self-evaluation to figure out who you are now. Learning to love yourself will make it easier for you to find the love you need, want, and deserve from others.
Some Ways to Start Can Include:
- Reaching out for help- therapy is a good way to find a confidant that can help you evaluate your thoughts and behaviors. A counselor or therapist can work with you to change these thoughts for the better.
- Acknowledging what you are feeling- you are allowed to experience emotions. Learning to understand what you are feeling can help you figure out why you are feeling it in that situation. This can help you find triggers for your mental health illness and recover from them.
- Going out- get out of the house and experience new things. This does not have to include alcohol or anything that could threaten your sobriety. It can be something as simple as walking around the park or getting coffee with an old friend. It helps prevent isolation and keeps you from repeating previous mistakes.
- Remembering to take it slow- it isn’t an easier or quick process to change how your brain works and to recover from your mental health illnesses. There will be trial and error in methods, as well as potential relapses that will need to be evaluated and addressed.
How Spero Recovery Help You in Learning to Love Yourself
We are a SUD recovery facility located in Evergreen, Colorado. Our use of donations and grants make it so we can keep our costs below the national average while still providing effective care. This makes us the perfect match for under and uninsured individuals.
Our women’s recovery program emphasizes learning to love yourself as part of recovery. We do this with the use of peer support, meditation, and experiential treatment.
Peer support can help you connect with others that understand what you are going through. This gives you a community to lean on while you are working on your recovery and learning to be who you are meant to be now. It also provides a comfortable and safe environment for you to share your story and grow.
Meditation can be used to help you look inward and perform self-evaluation. Self-evaluation helps you understand your responses and emotions to the situation at hand. It can also help you destress so that you can properly digest an event and provide an appropriate response.
Experiential treatment sessions are peer-led activities. These include hiking, nature walks, cooking classes, woodworking, rock climbing, and sand volleyball. Getting along with peers allows you to connect with someone that has similar experiences as you. It can give you someone unbiased, understanding, and comfortable for you to confide in. They get the opportunity to connect with people working on recovery, give back to their community, and find a sense of purpose in their sober life.
A bad relationship can mean a multitude of things. It can mean mental or physical abuse, infidelity, manipulation, or a variety of other things. Being a part of these relationships can have a lasting negative impact on you, especially if they are the only type of relationship you have known. They can lead to mental health conditions including depression, anxiety, PTSD, low self-esteem, and addiction. If you feel like you are struggling in your recovery journey, reach out to Spero Recovery at (303) 351-7888 for more information today. We understand what you are going through and want to help you thrive in your new sober lifestyle, starting with you learning to love yourself again.
