Recognizing Disrespect, Understanding the Damage, and Finding Your Path Forward

Quick Answer: If you’re experiencing chronic disrespect in your relationship—including boundary violations, control, dismissal of your feelings, verbal abuse, or manipulation—therapy can help. Research shows that disrespectful relationships cause significant mental health damage, including anxiety, depression, PTSD symptoms, and eroded self-worth. Whether you’re trying to improve your relationship through couples counseling or healing from a disrespectful partnership through individual therapy, professional support accelerates recovery and helps you establish healthier patterns. Studies confirm that therapy effectively treats relationship trauma and helps individuals rebuild self-respect and recognize what they deserve.

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Crisis Resources:

• National Domestic Violence Hotline: 1-800-799-7233 (24/7, confidential)
• 988 Suicide & Crisis Lifeline: Call or text 988
• Love Is Respect: Text LOVEIS to 22522 or call 1-866-331-9474
• Crisis Text Line: Text HOME to 741741

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If you’re reading this, you may be questioning whether your relationship is healthy. Perhaps you feel consistently dismissed, controlled, or criticized. Maybe you’re confused about whether your partner’s behavior is normal or if you’re “overreacting.” Or perhaps you’ve already left a disrespectful relationship but are struggling with the aftermath.

Understanding what respect truly means in healthy relationships—and recognizing when it’s absent—is crucial for your mental health and wellbeing. More importantly, knowing when and how to seek therapeutic support can change the trajectory of your life.

Why You Might Be Questioning Your Relationship

Many people struggle to identify disrespect in their relationships because:

Gradual escalation: Disrespect often starts subtly and increases over time, making it hard to pinpoint when things became unhealthy.

Gaslighting: Your partner may convince you that you’re too sensitive, overreacting, or imagining problems—making you doubt your own perceptions.

Love and good moments: Disrespectful relationships aren’t terrible 100% of the time. Good moments make you question whether the bad moments are really that bad.

Isolation: You may have been cut off from friends and family who might validate your concerns, leaving you without outside perspective.

Cultural or family messages: You may have learned that certain disrespectful behaviors are “normal” in relationships, making it hard to recognize them as problems.

Low self-esteem: Chronic disrespect erodes your sense of worth, making you question whether you deserve better.

A study published in the Journal of Social and Personal Relationships found that victims of psychological abuse often struggle to identify their experiences as abusive, particularly when physical violence is absent. The research showed that emotional and psychological maltreatment is just as damaging as physical abuse but harder to recognize and name.

What Respect Actually Looks Like in Healthy Relationships

Before we can identify disrespect, we need to understand what respect actually is.

Respect Means Equality, Not Authority

In a healthy relationship, partners are equals. Neither has “authority” over the other. Each person is free to live their own life while choosing to share aspects of it with their partner.

Research from ScienceDirect Topics defined healthy romantic relationships as characterized by strong communication and negotiation skills, caregiving behaviors, self-expression, respect, trust, honesty, and fairness. These characteristics were necessary in addition to the absence of relationship abuse.

Respect Means Trusting Your Partner’s Judgment

While you may not always agree with your partner, respect means trusting their judgment and valuing their perspective.

A study in Personality and Social Psychology Bulletin found that responsive relationship partners convey understanding, validation, and caring. They are warm, sensitive to their partners’ feelings, and want to make their partners feel comfortable, valued, listened to, and understood.

Respect Looks Like This Daily:

• Open, honest communication without fear of consequences
• Active listening where both feel truly heard
• Valuing each other’s feelings as equally important
• Compromising rather than one person always winning
• Speaking kindly to and about each other
• Giving space for individual interests and friendships
• Supporting growth rather than feeling threatened by it
• Building each other up instead of tearing down
• Honoring boundaries without argument or manipulation

The Gottman Institute, which has researched relationships for over 40 years, found that emotional responsiveness—demonstrated through these daily respectful actions—is the secret to loving relationships and keeping them strong and vibrant.

Signs of Disrespect That Indicate You Need Help

If you’re experiencing these patterns, your relationship lacks fundamental respect, and therapy can help you understand what’s happening and what to do about it.

1. Boundary Violations

What this looks like:

• Your partner ignores your stated boundaries
• They pressure you sexually after you’ve said no
• They access your phone, email, or social media without permission
• They dismiss your need for personal space or time alone
• They make you feel guilty for having boundaries
• They continue behaviors you’ve asked them to stop

Why this matters: Boundaries are the foundation of respect. Research published in the Journal of Personality and Social Psychology found that boundary violations in relationships lead to decreased relationship satisfaction, increased psychological distress, and feelings of disempowerment.

If this is happening: You’re not being respected. Healthy partners honor boundaries even when they don’t like them. Therapy can help you understand why you struggle to enforce boundaries and how to protect yourself.

2. Control and Isolation

What this looks like:

• Your partner monitors your activities, phone, or whereabouts
• They dictate who you can see or talk to
• They’ve isolated you from friends and family
• They control finances, giving you no financial autonomy
• They make unilateral decisions affecting both of you
• They use guilt, threats, or manipulation to influence your choices

Why this matters: Control is the opposite of respect. A comprehensive study in the Journal of Family Violence found that controlling behaviors are strong predictors of relationship violence and severe psychological abuse. Control tactics create trauma responses similar to those seen in hostage situations.

If this is happening: This is abuse, not love. The National Domestic Violence Hotline reports that 95% of domestic violence cases involve controlling behaviors. Therapy—particularly with a counselor trained in domestic violence—can help you safely assess your situation and plan next steps.

3. Chronic Criticism and Contempt

What this looks like:

• Your partner regularly criticizes your appearance, intelligence, or abilities
• They show contempt through eye-rolling, mockery, or disgust
• They make “jokes” at your expense, especially publicly
• They compare you unfavorably to others
• Nothing you do is ever good enough
• They focus on what’s wrong with you rather than what’s right

Why this matters: The Gottman Institute identified contempt as the single greatest predictor of divorce. Their research over four decades showed that contempt—communicating that your partner is worthless or beneath you—is more damaging than any other negative communication pattern.

Contempt doesn’t just end relationships; it destroys the person being targeted. A study in Personal Relationships found that chronic criticism and contempt lead to anxiety, depression, PTSD symptoms, and complex trauma responses.

If this is happening: You’re being emotionally abused. Therapy can help you process the damage, understand that this treatment isn’t normal or deserved, and rebuild your self-worth.

4. Dismissal of Your Feelings and Needs

What this looks like:

• Your partner tells you you’re “too sensitive” or “overreacting”
• They minimize your emotions or experiences
• They refuse to discuss topics important to you
• Your needs always come last
• They prioritize their wants over your stated needs
• They dismiss your pain or distress as invalid

Why this matters: Research in the Journal of Social and Clinical Psychology found that emotional invalidation—having your feelings dismissed or denied—is associated with higher rates of depression, anxiety, self-harm, and suicidal ideation. Chronic invalidation teaches you that your internal experience doesn’t matter, leading to disconnection from yourself.

If this is happening: Your feelings are valid, and they matter. A therapist can validate your experiences, help you reconnect with your emotional truth, and teach you to trust yourself again.

5. Verbal, Emotional, or Physical Abuse

What this looks like:

• Name-calling, insults, or degrading language
• Yelling, screaming, or intimidation
• Threats to hurt you, themselves, or others
• Destroying your possessions
• Physical violence of any kind
• Gaslighting (making you doubt your memory or sanity)
• Threats to leave or harm you if you don’t comply

Why this matters: A study published in the American Journal of Public Health found that psychological abuse is as harmful to mental health as physical violence, causing long-lasting damage including PTSD, complex trauma, anxiety disorders, and depression. The research showed that many survivors rate emotional abuse as more damaging than physical violence.

If this is happening: This is unequivocally abuse. Please contact the National Domestic Violence Hotline at 1-800-799-7233 for immediate support. A trauma-informed therapist can help you process what you’ve experienced and heal from abuse-related trauma.

6. Lack of Support for Your Growth

What this looks like:

• Your partner discourages your goals and dreams
• They feel threatened by your success
• They sabotage your efforts to grow or improve
• They mock your interests or ambitions
• They compete with rather than celebrate your achievements
• They want you dependent rather than independent

Why this matters: Research from the University of Rochester found that partners who undermine rather than support autonomy and competence significantly damage relationship quality and individual wellbeing. The study showed that growth-suppressing behaviors predict relationship dissolution and mental health problems.

If this is happening: You deserve a partner who champions your growth. Therapy can help you understand why you’ve tolerated suppression of your potential and how to reclaim your ambitions.

7. Erosion of Your Self-Worth

What this looks like:

• You’ve started to believe negative things your partner says about you
• Your self-esteem has plummeted since the relationship began
• You doubt your own judgment and perceptions constantly
• You feel worthless or fundamentally flawed
• You’ve lost touch with who you were before this relationship
• You believe you couldn’t survive without your partner

Why this matters: Scott Braithwaite and Julianne Holt-Lunstad’s research in Current Opinion in Psychology found that relationship quality significantly impacts mental health outcomes. Disrespectful relationships don’t just make you unhappy—they create genuine psychological damage that can persist long after the relationship ends.

The famous Harvard Study of Adult Development found that toxic relationships are worse for your health than being alone. Researchers concluded that it’s the quality of close relationships—not their presence—that predicts health, happiness, and longevity.

If this is happening: Your self-worth shouldn’t depend on another person’s treatment of you. Therapy can help you rebuild your sense of self and recognize your inherent value.

The Mental Health Impact of Disrespectful Relationships

Understanding the psychological damage caused by disrespect helps validate your experience and explains why professional help is needed.

Anxiety and Hypervigilance

What happens: Living with chronic disrespect keeps your nervous system in a constant state of alert. You become hypervigilant—always scanning for danger, trying to predict your partner’s mood, walking on eggshells.

Research in the Journal of Traumatic Stress found that intimate partner psychological aggression creates trauma responses including hyperarousal, intrusive thoughts, and avoidance behaviors—the same symptoms seen in PTSD.

How therapy helps: Trauma-informed therapy can calm your nervous system through techniques like EMDR (Eye Movement Desensitization and Reprocessing), somatic experiencing, or trauma-focused CBT (Cognitive Behavioral Therapy).

Depression and Hopelessness

What happens: Chronic disrespect leads to learned helplessness—believing nothing you do matters and that your situation is unchangeable. This manifests as depression, loss of interest in activities, difficulty experiencing pleasure, and hopelessness about the future.

A study in Clinical Psychology Review found that women in psychologically abusive relationships showed depression rates three times higher than women in respectful relationships, with symptoms often meeting criteria for major depressive disorder.

How therapy helps: Depression treatment through therapy addresses both the symptoms and their relational causes. Approaches like CBT, interpersonal therapy, and behavioral activation help restore hope and agency.

Complex Trauma and PTSD

What happens: Long-term exposure to disrespect, control, and emotional abuse creates complex trauma—a pervasive sense of unsafety, difficulty trusting others, emotional dysregulation, and negative self-beliefs.

Research published in the Journal of Family Violence found that psychological abuse in intimate relationships produces PTSD symptoms at rates comparable to or exceeding those seen in combat veterans and natural disaster survivors.

How therapy helps: Specialized trauma therapy (EMDR, CPT, prolonged exposure, or internal family systems) helps process traumatic experiences and rebuild a sense of safety and self-trust.

Loss of Identity

What happens: You’ve lost touch with who you are outside your partner’s opinions, needs, and control. Your interests, opinions, and sense of self have been subsumed by the relationship.

A study in Self and Identity found that individuals in controlling relationships show significantly lower self-concept clarity—they literally lose their sense of who they are as separate individuals.

How therapy helps: Therapy provides space to rediscover yourself, explore your authentic preferences and values, and rebuild your identity independent of your partner’s influence.

Difficulty Trusting Yourself

What happens: Gaslighting and invalidation make you doubt your own perceptions, memories, and judgment. You second-guess everything and seek constant external validation because you no longer trust your internal experience.

Research in the American Journal of Psychiatry found that victims of psychological manipulation show decreased confidence in their cognitive abilities and increased reliance on external validation, even on tasks unrelated to the relationship.

How therapy helps: A validating therapist helps you reconnect with your internal experience, learn to trust yourself again, and distinguish between your truth and others’ distortions.

Types of Therapy That Can Help

Different therapeutic approaches address different aspects of healing from disrespectful relationships.

Individual Therapy

When it’s needed:

• You’re currently in a disrespectful relationship and need help deciding what to do
• You’ve left a disrespectful relationship and need support healing
• You’re experiencing anxiety, depression, or trauma symptoms
• You need to rebuild self-worth and self-trust
• You want to understand patterns that led you into this relationship

Approaches that help:

Trauma-focused therapy: EMDR, CPT (Cognitive Processing Therapy), or prolonged exposure help process traumatic experiences and reduce PTSD symptoms.

Research in JAMA Psychiatry found that trauma-focused psychotherapy significantly reduces PTSD symptoms, with effect sizes comparable to or exceeding medication.

Cognitive Behavioral Therapy (CBT): Helps identify and change negative thought patterns developed through chronic invalidation and criticism.

A meta-analysis in Clinical Psychology Review found CBT effective for depression and anxiety resulting from relationship trauma, with improvements maintained at follow-up.

Dialectical Behavior Therapy (DBT): Teaches emotional regulation, distress tolerance, and interpersonal effectiveness—skills often undermined in disrespectful relationships.

Internal Family Systems (IFS): Helps integrate fragmented parts of yourself and heal from relational trauma.

Couples Therapy

When it’s appropriate:

• Both partners genuinely want to change
• No physical violence or severe abuse is occurring
• You feel safe expressing yourself honestly in therapy
• Your partner takes responsibility for their behavior
• The relationship has redeeming qualities worth saving

Important cautions: The National Domestic Violence Hotline states that couples therapy is contraindicated—not recommended and potentially dangerous—when abuse is present. Abusive partners can use couples therapy to manipulate the therapist, punish the victim for things disclosed in session, or refine their control tactics.

Research in the Journal of Marital and Family Therapy found that couples therapy for abusive relationships often increases danger to victims and allows abusers to avoid accountability.

If couples therapy is appropriate: Look for therapists trained in Gottman Method, Emotionally Focused Therapy (EFT), or Imago Relationship Therapy—approaches that emphasize respect, emotional responsiveness, and healthy communication patterns.

Support Groups

When they help:

• You feel isolated and need connection with others who understand
• You’re trying to leave or have left a disrespectful relationship
• You want to learn from others’ experiences
• You need accountability and encouragement

Types of groups:

• Domestic violence support groups
• Co-Dependents Anonymous (CoDA)
• Survivors of narcissistic abuse groups
• General relationship trauma groups

Research in Group Dynamics: Theory, Research, and Practice found that support groups for relationship trauma reduce isolation, provide validation, increase self-efficacy, and improve mental health outcomes.

How to Find the Right Therapist

Finding a therapist who understands relationship trauma and disrespect is crucial.

What to Look For

Specialized training in:

• Domestic violence and intimate partner abuse
• Trauma-informed care
• Relationship dynamics and attachment
• Narcissistic abuse (if relevant)
• PTSD and complex trauma

Approaches that help: Look for therapists who use evidence-based treatments like CBT, EMDR, DBT, trauma-focused therapy, or attachment-based approaches.

Important qualities:

• Validates your experiences rather than minimizing them
• Doesn’t push you to stay in or leave your relationship
• Understands power dynamics in relationships
• Recognizes emotional abuse as legitimate trauma
• Helps you trust yourself rather than creating dependence

Questions to Ask Potential Therapists

• “Do you have experience working with people in emotionally abusive or disrespectful relationships?”
• “What’s your approach to helping someone decide whether to stay in or leave their relationship?”
• “Are you trained in trauma-informed care?”
• “What therapeutic approaches do you use for relationship trauma?”
• “Do you work with couples where there’s been psychological or emotional abuse?” (If yes, be cautious)

Online Therapy Options

Studies have found that online therapy is as effective as in-person therapy for depression, anxiety, and PTSD—the most common mental health impacts of disrespectful relationships.

Advantages:

• Greater accessibility (no transportation needed)
• More affordable in many cases
• Ability to attend from a safe location
• Greater availability and scheduling flexibility
• Option to communicate via text if speaking feels unsafe

Research in the Journal of Medical Internet Research found that online cognitive behavioral therapy produced significant improvements in depression and anxiety symptoms with effects maintained at follow-up.

What to Expect From Therapy

Understanding the therapeutic process helps reduce anxiety about starting.

Initial Sessions

Assessment: Your therapist will ask about your relationship history, current situation, symptoms you’re experiencing, and what you hope to gain from therapy.

Safety planning: If you’re in an actively disrespectful or abusive relationship, your therapist will help you assess danger and develop safety strategies.

Goal setting: Together, you’ll identify what you want to work on—whether that’s deciding about your relationship, healing from past relationships, or rebuilding yourself.

Ongoing Therapy

Validation and perspective: Your therapist will help you understand that what you’re experiencing isn’t normal or acceptable, validating feelings you may have been told were invalid.

Processing trauma: You’ll work through traumatic experiences and their impact on your sense of self, safety, and trust.

Skill building: You’ll learn or relearn skills for boundary-setting, self-advocacy, emotional regulation, and healthy communication.

Decision support: Your therapist will support you in making decisions about your relationship without pressure in either direction.

Identity exploration: You’ll rediscover who you are outside the relationship and what you actually want for your life.

Signs Therapy Is Working

• You feel increasingly validated and understood
• You’re reconnecting with your sense of self
• You’re trusting your own perceptions more
• Anxiety and depression symptoms are decreasing
• You’re setting and maintaining boundaries
• You feel more empowered and less helpless
• You’re making decisions aligned with your wellbeing
• You have more clarity about what you need and deserve

Rebuilding Self-Respect Through Therapy

One of therapy’s most important functions is helping you restore the self-respect eroded by chronic disrespect.

What Is Self-Respect?

Self-respect is acceptance of yourself as a whole person with inherent worth and value—not because you’re perfect (none of us are), but simply because you exist.

Research from Berkeley’s Greater Good Science Center, which surveyed 2,500 people, found that self-compassion and self-acceptance are strongly associated with psychological wellbeing, resilience, and the ability to form healthy relationships.

How Therapy Rebuilds Self-Respect

Challenging internalized criticism: Your therapist helps you identify and challenge the critical voice you’ve internalized from your partner.

Reconnecting with your values: You’ll explore what actually matters to you—not what your partner has told you should matter.

Honoring your needs: You’ll learn that having needs isn’t selfish or burdensome—it’s human.

Developing self-compassion: You’ll practice treating yourself with the kindness you’d show a friend, rather than the harshness you’ve learned.

Trusting your judgment: You’ll rebuild confidence in your perceptions, decisions, and capabilities.

When to Leave vs. When to Stay

This is perhaps the most difficult question, and therapy can help you navigate it.

Signs the Relationship Might Be Salvageable

• Both partners want to change and are willing to do the work
• Disrespect is recent rather than a longstanding pattern
• No physical violence or severe abuse has occurred
• Your partner takes responsibility for their behavior without defensiveness
• You feel safe expressing yourself honestly
• Changes are already happening before formal therapy begins
• The relationship has genuine positive qualities worth preserving

Even with these signs, change requires sustained effort from both partners, appropriate professional support, and realistic timelines (typically 6+ months to see meaningful improvement).

Signs You Should Leave

• Physical violence of any kind has occurred
• You feel afraid of your partner
• Abuse is escalating rather than improving
• Your partner refuses therapy or sabotages treatment
• Your mental or physical health is seriously deteriorating
• Children are being affected by witnessing the dynamics
• Your partner shows no genuine remorse or accountability
• You’ve lost all love and respect for your partner
• Your gut tells you it’s time to go

The National Domestic Violence Hotline reports that leaving an abusive relationship can be the most dangerous time. A safety-focused therapist can help you create an exit plan that protects you.

The Middle Ground

Many people find themselves in the confusing middle—the relationship isn’t physically violent but isn’t healthy either. Therapy can help you:

• Set a timeline for seeing meaningful change
• Identify specific behaviors that must change
• Decide what your non-negotiables are
• Plan what you’ll do if changes don’t happen
• Process your feelings about potentially leaving
• Develop the self-worth to enforce your boundaries

Life After a Disrespectful Relationship

If you’ve left or are leaving a disrespectful relationship, therapy remains crucial for healing and preventing future unhealthy relationships.

Common Post-Relationship Challenges

Trauma responses: You may experience flashbacks, nightmares, hypervigilance, or panic attacks related to the relationship.

Research in the Journal of Interpersonal Violence found that post-traumatic stress symptoms are common after leaving psychologically abusive relationships, often lasting months or years without treatment.

Grief and ambivalence: You may grieve the relationship despite knowing it was harmful. This is normal—you’re grieving what you hoped the relationship would be, not what it actually was.

Fear of being alone: After being told you couldn’t survive alone, actually being alone can feel terrifying initially.

Difficulty trusting: You may struggle to trust anyone—including yourself—after being betrayed and manipulated.

Pattern recognition: You may discover you’ve had multiple disrespectful relationships, indicating deeper patterns to address.

How Therapy Helps Recovery

Processing the relationship: Therapy provides space to make sense of what happened without judgment or pressure to “move on” before you’re ready.

Healing trauma: Trauma-specific treatments address PTSD and complex trauma symptoms.

Preventing repetition: Therapy helps you understand how you ended up in a disrespectful relationship and what patterns need changing.

Rebuilding trust: The therapeutic relationship itself helps you learn that vulnerability can be safe with trustworthy people.

Discovering red flags: You’ll learn to recognize early warning signs of disrespect so you can exit quickly if they appear in future relationships.

Strengthening boundaries: You’ll develop the skills and confidence to set and maintain boundaries that protect you.

Key Takeaways

Signs you need therapy:

• Chronic boundary violations and control
• Criticism, contempt, and emotional abuse
• Dismissal of your feelings and needs
• Erosion of your self-worth and identity
• Anxiety, depression, or trauma symptoms
• Difficulty trusting yourself or others
• Loss of interest in activities you once enjoyed
• Feeling trapped or hopeless

How therapy helps:

• Validates your experience and perceptions
• Processes trauma and reduces symptoms
• Rebuilds self-worth and self-trust
• Provides clarity on whether to stay or leave
• Teaches boundary-setting and self-advocacy
• Prevents future unhealthy relationships
• Helps you rediscover your authentic self
• Offers support during and after leaving

Types of support available:

• Individual trauma-focused therapy
• Online therapy for accessibility
• Support groups for connection and validation
• Crisis services for immediate safety concerns
• Specialized therapists trained in relationship trauma

What research shows:

• Disrespectful relationships cause genuine psychological trauma
• Emotional abuse is as damaging as physical violence
• Therapy effectively treats relationship-related trauma
• Online therapy is as effective as in-person care
• Support groups improve outcomes and reduce isolation
• Healing is possible with appropriate support

Remember:

• Your feelings and perceptions are valid
• You deserve respect, safety, and kindness
• Disrespect isn’t love, no matter what your partner says
• Seeking help is strength, not weakness
• Healing is possible, and you’re worth the effort
• You don’t have to figure this out alone

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Immediate Action Steps

If you’re in immediate danger: Call 911 or go to your nearest emergency room.

If you’re unsure whether your relationship is healthy: Contact the National Domestic Violence Hotline at 1-800-799-7233 for a confidential assessment.

If you’re ready for therapy:

• Search Psychology Today’s therapist directory filtering for “domestic violence” or “relationship issues”
• Contact your insurance for in-network providers
• Consider online therapy platforms for faster access
• Ask trusted friends or your doctor for referrals

If you’re not ready for individual therapy:

• Join an online or in-person support group
• Call a crisis line just to talk
• Read books on healthy relationships and emotional abuse
• Journal about your experiences and feelings
• Reach out to one trusted person

If you’re planning to leave: Work with a domestic violence advocate to create a safety plan before taking action. Call 1-800-799-7233 for help.

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Crisis Resources:

• National Domestic Violence Hotline: 1-800-799-7233 (call, chat, or text)
• Love Is Respect: Text LOVEIS to 22522 or call 1-866-331-9474
• 988 Suicide & Crisis Lifeline: Call or text 988
• Crisis Text Line: Text HOME to 741741
• RAINN Sexual Assault Hotline: 1-800-656-4673

Disclaimer: This article provides educational information about disrespectful relationships and therapy options. It is not a substitute for professional mental health treatment, safety planning with domestic violence advocates, or emergency services. If you’re in crisis or experiencing abuse, please contact appropriate crisis services immediately.