She thought she was way too smart for it to happen to her. After all, she was a strong, capable, and confident woman, larger than life and full of rigour, why would she let any man control everything about her? More importantly, how is it even possible that something like this can happen with HER?

And then it slowly began, each morning, as she found herself accommodating everything the man wanted, only to fill the quiet, the distance that existed between them.

She trained herself to read his needs and wants well: too quiet meant he was angry, too loud meant he was angrier. His words never started as storms; they came like a slow drizzle, a comment here, a correction there, until she found herself apologising for things she did not remember doing.

He called it ‘Love’ when he monitored her each move, from waking up to lying down. ‘Care’ when he was so subtly putting her down and all her needs along with that. He deemed it ‘Concern’ when he asked her not to meet her friends and family, who “didn’t understand them.” Over time, her world shrank to the size of his approval.

She thought to herself that she was a strong and independent woman. She felt that everything toxic about the relationship was part of the ‘adjustment’ phase, which was so deeply ingrained in her that she could not think straight.

Until…she stopped laughing loudly. Stopped speaking freely. Stopped recognizing the woman in the mirror, who was now filled with bouts of hesitation before her every move, as if she had lost her voice somewhere. She felt that she needed to be validated to exist, that too, in the toxic relationship that she found herself in. But throughout all this, she continued thinking to herself, “smart, educated, successful women don’t end up in toxic relationships, dull, submissive women do.”

The First Crack

One evening, she caught herself ruminating over her supposed relationship. Slammed doors that startled her became routine, and incessant arguing, which knew no bounds became a way of life. But in that moment, a violent push in a fit of rage became the final straw for her. It had finally happened. He had done the unthinkable. What she was dreading all along. A rage-fuelled push ended it all for her. That was the first crack.

What came next wasn’t dramatic—the leaving. No slammed doors, no final fight. Just a quiet decision, stitched together over months of small realisations.

When she stepped outside, the world felt unfamiliar, almost too wide. She was full of doubts and confusion, but that didn’t stop her. For the first time in a long while, the silence didn’t feel like something to fear. It felt like something she could finally fill.

Abuse is not obvious —it is subtle, and we don’t want to admit it.

Women who see themselves as smart, capable, and independent often believe they’re immune to toxic relationships. As if they won’t come across any such relationships because they know how to deal with them and everything else, of course. They have their lives in order, careers on track, and confidence in their abilities. They have their self-worth on a high pedestal, and they believe in their abilities to make things happen. They are optimistic and confident.

But these exact women, when they find themselves in toxic relationships, they keep saying to themselves, as if in a state of delusion: “its fine”, their partner gets angry sometimes, and then he just throws things around, slams doors in fits of anger, says a lot of mean stuff which is hurtful, personal attacks that cause wounds that are hard to overcome, especially when he once couldn’t stop gushing and complimenting them on the same things that he now puts them down on.

The Self-worth that gets shot

But in a toxic relationship, the self-belief that strong, independent women pride themselves on, suddenly turns against them and becomes a quiet reassurance when everything else is falling apart: Thiss couldn’t happen to me, I would see the signs, I would walk away.” But toxicity rarely announces itself—it builds slowly, disguising control as “care” and doubt as “compromise.” 

By the time the pattern becomes clear, the certainty they once held begins to blur and takes other forms –finding an outlet when they get sucked down deep in the relationship. And in that moment, they’re forced to confront an unsettling truth: intelligence doesn’t make you immune; it only makes the realisation harder to accept.

The Blurriness

And then again, there are moments in which he was tender with you, listening to all your concerns and vulnerabilities, only to realise later that he was faking all of that to make his manipulation game stronger. But in that moment, it’s not so obvious, he wasn’t listening or caring about you at all. It was just something that he would later be able to bring up in another argument and end up gaslighting you, in a way that makes you feel like you are the flawed one in the relationship, going downhill.

The lies we tell ourselves to justify the toxic relationship

Eventually, it becomes easier to convince yourself that you’re the one who must adjust for the relationship to survive. Isn’t that what is so strongly backed into our culture? And more importantly, if we do want an idealised version of romance, there will be ups and downs. These are things we tell ourselves to avoid facing the reality of the situation. He, meanwhile, misses no chance to chip away at your self-worth, slowly breaking you down until you’re entangled in the routines and expectations of his world—his family, his friends, and his life. And if you do find the courage to push back, you’re dismissed as irrational, even ‘crazy’; his anger is justified, but your response is labelled as overreaction, as if your pain were the problem all along.

The Abuse- First Verbal, Then Emotional, And Then Psychological

Abuse rarely begins with something obvious or overtly violent. It often starts as subtle dismissal—of your tastes, your opinions, and all things that make you who you are. Gradually, it sharpens into cutting remarks about your vulnerabilities, your appearance, your sense of dressing, the way you speak or yourself. Over time, these moments accumulate, turning into a relentless critique of your entire identity. What once felt like isolated “comments” begins to feel like truth. Slowly, it erodes your confidence and distorts your sense of reality, until you find yourself questioning your own perceptions, unsure of what is real and what has been shaped by someone else’s control.

Relationships can be complex to navigate, but recognizing the warning signs,s such asrecognisingoxicity is crucial. Awareness allows you to step back, make sense of harmful patterns, and choose to let go—freeing yourself from the quiet, lasting damage such relationships can cause.

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