Journaling Prompts for Dealing with a Toxic Friend
Maintaining a friendship that covertly undermines you is a profound drain on your nervous system. You might find yourself dreading their texts or feeling inexplicably exhausted after spending time together, yet you stay out of loyalty to your shared history. This dynamic makes you question your own perception, wondering if you are simply being too sensitive to their passive aggression or constant crises. Journaling serves as a reality check. By documenting the interactions, you separate their manipulative behavior from your inherent worth, giving yourself permission to stop managing their emotions and start protecting your own.
Journaling Prompts
Detail the most recent interaction that left you feeling drained. What specific words or actions crossed a line, regardless of their stated intentions?
Write down the obligation that keeps you tied to this friendship. How much of that obligation is rooted in the past versus who they are today?
If someone treated a child or a person you love the way this friend treats you, what immediate advice would you give them?
List three boundaries you are terrified to set with this person. What is the absolute worst that happens if you enforce just one of them?
Draft a script for declining their next unreasonable request. Keep it under two sentences and offer zero justification or apologies.