Forget self-respect in relationships

Stay until staying feels unthinkable.

The way I advise someone venting about their relationship now is worlds away from how I used to at 18.

If you were to tell me back then that, say, you caught your boyfriend casually texting his ex, I would climb on the nearest elevated surface and release a torrent of firebreath, roaring at you to “Just leave him!”

As I’ve grown older, however, I've come to realize that no one ready to leave a relationship asks for advice.

People are rarely at a true standstill, unsure of what the next steps in their relationship should be. They’re just looking for a shoulder to cry on, someone who can empathise with them and validate their emotions—all disguised under the cloak of “What should I do?”

The only thing they need is for someone to say, “You’re not crazy for feeling this way,” right before wiping their face, dusting them off, and strapping them back in for round 357 of trying to make it work with their partner.

And I say this from experience, as someone who has been in the muddy, musty, fungal-infection-inducing, athlete’s-foot-ridden trenches of relationship unrest. I was that girl who needed someone to vent to, only to be met with the same tired advice I used to dish out at 18.

That’s when I realized that advice can only be received if someone’s even considering an alternative route.

If someone knows deep down they’re going to stay in that relationship, they’ll get defensive. And the last thing you want to do is make someone in distress feel like no one has their back—even if that means biting your tongue and allowing them to continue waltzing with the devil.

So if a friend were to come to me with relationship woes now, my advice is as follows:

“Stay and see it through. Try to make it work.”

Most of the time, it’s what they want to hear. They just need the space and support to make the choice they were going to make anyway. Anything else is a waste of breath. Because if they were truly ready to leave, you wouldn’t be hearing venting or doubts, but a decision already made—a calm, matter-of-fact declaration of what is to come.

What makes the decision between staying and leaving so difficult is often the tug of war between your mind and your heart.

When I feel something for someone, it comes flooding, blurring my vision and washing away any trace of the woman I thought I was: someone who Never Settles for Less™ and Would Never Accept Disrespect™.

In a previous toxic relationship, I so desperately wished my mind could take the reins. It was already berating me for everything I knew to be true, everything obvious to the outside world: that my relationship was in shambles and I should leave.

But no matter how much I rationalized the hurt, listed reasons to walk away, or ritualized affirmations of self-worth, my emotions had me hooked—attached, in love, and unable to let go of something that made me feel so deeply, so intensely alive. Even if that meant continuously setting myself on fire to keep the relationship alight.

On rare occasions when I’d manage to compartmentalize my feelings just enough for my mind to take over, I’d get a gust of momentum to leave. But that never lasted. The disconnect between my actions and my feelings caused unbearable cognitive dissonance.

While my body might’ve been physically far away from the relationship, it still consumed my thoughts. My feelings were just as intense—if not worse, now laced with the intoxicating effect of longing.

And eventually—because you can only live in duality for so long—the rubber band snapped back. One end heart, the other mind, recoiled toward each other, forcing me to become one again. And just like that, using a “drunk” text or a not-so-spontaneous encounter, I was, by my own volition, pulled back in again. Back to square one. Free to feel the painful love I had for them, and back to hating myself.

Maybe you’re stronger than I am, or you can talk yourself out of your feelings better than I can, but I’ve never been able to leave a romantic situation prematurely, before it ran its full course. I can’t be at war with myself, doing one thing and feeling another.

If I don’t act from complete alignment, with my mind and feelings moving in tandem, my love life becomes a series of back-and-forths and all-consuming turmoils.

The only way I can break the cycle is by getting my heart on board with my head, or my head on board with my heart.

You may think this approach keeps me stuck in wrong relationships for a long time, but it’s actually the opposite. It’s the theatrics—the push-and-pulls, temporary break-ups, and performative silent treatments—that actually drag things out, making relationships last longer than they should.

By giving myself permission to fully feel my way through relationships—no matter how humiliating—things end faster. The only catch is being patient enough to wait for your feelings to catch up to what your mind already knows.

And when I reach that point of alignment, when my heart and mind move as one, there’s no going back. I don’t need to consult friends or family or draft out yet another pros and cons list color-coded by degrees of pain. My body becomes my compass, calibrated by enough experience and scar tissue to point to a definitive exit.

That’s when I can gallop toward the relationship’s finish line like a racehorse with blinders on, free from any desire to look back and see who I’ve left behind.

That’s why I say: stay until you’ve had enough. Because eventually, you will. Your body won’t keep you stuck in dead-end loops forever—it’s smarter than you think. It’s wired with subconscious mechanisms designed to keep you safe. And your visceral, gut-level reactions—the knee-jerk hell yes’s or fuck no’s—are part of that. They’re all-knowing, and they happen for you.

So trust that you’ll eventually reach a point where “absolutely not” becomes your gut’s only response to staying in something that’s long stopped serving you. At that point, there’ll be no could’ve-would’ve-should’ves, no what-ifs left unturned. The conviction in your mind, body, and heart will be crystal clear.

So until you reach that point, keep going. Let yourself go through countless humiliation rituals if you have to. Because eventually—and it’s not an if, it’s a when—the cost of staying will outweigh the high of feeling. And you’ll no longer be able to ignore what your mind’s been shouting from the rooftops.

Then, and only then, will “stay and see it through” sound just as impossible as “just leave him” once did.