Cutting off a toxic person often leads to initial difficulty (like withdrawal), but ultimately brings peace, freedom, better health, stronger boundaries, and improved relationships, though the toxic person might react with anger, manipulation, or try to re-engage, while you might also experience guilt or question your actions, making self-reflection important to avoid becoming toxic yourself.
Detaching from a toxic person is a conscious decision to prioritize your well-being. It involves setting boundaries, managing emotional responses, and redefining relationships on your own terms. Detachment can trigger guilt, anger, and grief.
How to Deal With Toxic People
The four behaviours are Blaming, Contempt, Defensiveness and Stonewalling. Relationship expert Dr John Gottman termed these "The Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse" as they spell disaster for any personal or professional relationship.
While it's important to know your reasons for cutting someone off, you don't always need to explain those reasons fully to the other party. Sometimes overly justifying your decision will only provoke a toxic person further, or signal to them that you're not entirely secure in your choice.
As the realization sets in that you are truly done, a narcissist may resort to more malicious actions and even launch smear campaigns as a form of retaliation. This is a common way a narcissist react to a breakup, especially when they feel they are losing control and their sense of superiority is threatened.
The "3-3-3 rule" for breakups is a guideline suggesting 3 days for emotional release, 3 weeks for reflection, and 3 months for intentional rebuilding/healing, helping people process a split in stages. It's a simplified framework for managing grief, contrasting with longer models, and aims to create space for personal growth by focusing on self-improvement and gaining perspective after the initial shock of the breakup, though individual healing times vary greatly and aren't set in stone.
People with toxic traits know they have them
But many people with toxic traits don't realize that their behavior impacts others. You may have toxic traits that you don't know about.
Dishonesty.
A toxic person will engage in any kind of dishonest behavior, whether it's deceit, lying, or general secrecy. There are a number of ways to handle this one, depending on how good of a liar you are dealing with. However, don't let a lie go unaddressed — especially if it happens more than once.
7 signs someone is simply a bad person, according to psychology
Detachment takes time.
Expect roughly half the duration of the relationship, potentially longer with continued contact. You're not changing the other person; you're protecting your own energy and wellbeing.
3 Tips for Taking Your Power Back from Toxic People
Key points
If you encounter any of these when meeting someone for the first time–and especially if you encounter several of them–proceed with caution:
The "72-hour rule" after a breakup generally means implementing a period of no contact for at least three days (72 hours) to allow intense emotions to subside, enabling clearer thinking and a less impulsive reaction, whether that's reaching out or making big decisions. This time helps move you from shock into processing, calming the brain's emergency response, and setting a healthier foundation for recovery and deciding next steps, preventing you from acting solely from heartbreak.
Accepting a relationship is over involves allowing yourself to grieve, processing emotions through journaling or talking, setting boundaries like no contact, focusing on self-care and new activities, and gradually rebuilding your life and identity outside the partnership by reconnecting with others and finding new sources of meaning. It's a process of acknowledging the loss, understanding the reality, and shifting your focus from the past to building a new, independent future, which often includes revisiting grief stages but eventually leads to acceptance through daily living and self-focus.
It gives you time to cool down and get some perspective.
No Contact can also give you a better perspective on things — I've had a number of clients that, after 30 days of radio silence, have decided their ex isn't actually worth pursuing and that they'd be better off moving on.
Narcissistic traits often peak in late adolescence and early adulthood (around ages 14-23), particularly with grandiosity and entitlement, as individuals seek identity and status, but then tend to decline as people mature and face life's realities, though some individuals with NPD may see intensification in these years before a potential mellowing in middle age.
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To a narcissist, a victim who leaves them—and stays away—can become a fixation. They tend to stew in their feelings of disbelief: How could you do this to them, why would you think you'd ever find a better situation, and how long will it take you to realize you need them?
Cutting Someone Out of Your Life
But it does provide some rough guidelines as to how soon may be too soon to make long-term commitments and how long may be too long to stick with a relationship. Each of the three numbers—three, six, and nine—stands for the month that a different common stage of a relationship tends to end.
Dr. Runnels says that a person or situation can be considered toxic when it affects your sense of psychological safety. This means you fear judgement, shaming or punishment for making mistakes or for expressing your own ideas, questions or concerns.