Toxic Friends

Good friends and healthy friendships are crucial to women’s well-being at every stage of life. But what happens when a friendship turns toxic? When a friend becomes hurtful or mistreats another? When a friend abandons another in a time of need? Here, Suzanne Degges-White and Judy Pochel Van Tieghem explore such toxic friendships and how women navigate the ups and downs, as well as how broken friendships can be mended and bad friendships ended. Explaining and illustrating the “rules of friendship” at various stages of life, the authors reveal what it takes to be a good friend, how to identify bad friends, and how to move forward when friendships turn sour. Vignettes of toxic friendship behaviors are shared, as well as tips on how best to respond to these rule-breaking friends in order to rebuild damaged relationships and repair a friendship’s foundation (when appropriate) and how to decide when it’s time to let go of a relationship that is bringing you down versus keeping you afloat. Information for parents is also provided, to aid them as they help their daughters navigate their friendships. We all need friends, but knowing when and how to let go can help us all be better friends—to ourselves, and also to others.

A woman can always count on are her friends—right? But what if those friendships are hurtful, harmful, even toxic? Susan Shapiro Barash explores the ten types of female friends and shows you why and how women get stuck with the worst kinds, the ways to get "unstuck, and how to recognize a true friend." For example: • The Leader of the Pack—it's all on her terms • The Doormat—and why you're the one paying the price • The Misery Lover—she wants to feel your pain. Really. • The User—and why you seldom see her coming • The Trophy Friend—and what you gain from each other Provocative and fascinating, Susan Shapiro Barash looks at the bonds (and bondage) of female friendships in a new light.

We expect friendships to be free of the static that frazzles many family relationships, and often we fail to see how deeply friendships shape our lives, work, and well-being. So much remains unspoken that when conflicts arise, they surprise, shock, even shatter us. Florence Isaacs explores the complex interplay of affection, obligation, and competition in women's friendships and shows how these dynamics emerge between close, casual, or collegial friends confronting life's ups and downs -- career demands, single life, marriage, divorce, retirement, and more. Isaacs explains: Who's a real friend and who's a waste of time or worse. How to make lasting personal and professional friends and avoid people who hurt you through jealousy, manipulation, or self-centeredness. How to navigate tricky waters -- friendships online, with in-laws, and with the opposite sex. How the right friends can improve single life, marriage, and make you a better parent. True friends are worth their weight in gold; toxic friends threaten your well-being. This book reveals how to tell the difference.

After years of heartbreaks and disappointments, Joyce decided to share experiences she encountered with unhealthy friendships, that caused mental, physical and emotional pain. She wants to help the reader discern the difference between toxic friends and real friends. After a long look in the mirror, she found that sometimes we have to look at oneself and be accountable for some of the disappointing relationships in our lives.

Don't Let Bad Friendships Ruin Your Happiness Too many unhealthy female friendships wreak havoc in the lives of women. Take control of your relationships. Life is too short to tolerate bad behavior in any form - especially from a friend! p> This book will help you learn: Recognize the difference between a healthy and unhealthy friendship What kind of toxic friend you are up against? Is she really your friend? How to salvage the friendship (if you want to) What other women are saying about their friendships (you're not alone!) When all else fails, learning how to let go I surveyed over three hundred women who offered their views on friendship, and the relationships that became too toxic to endure. Their candid responses have been included in this book. Real women. Real experiences. Sometimes a friendship can be saved. You may need to let them go. If you need to re-evaluate your friendships, then this book is for you! Packed full of information you can start using TODAY! Grab your copy now and lead a friendlier life!

Healthy friendships can have a positive impact on your life in so many different ways but what do you do when you find yourself trapped within the confines of an unhealthy or toxic friendship? For many victims the answer is...nothing. Why? They don't know the difference between a healthy friendship and a toxic one; therefore, they just accept their friend's awful way of being a friend even if it causes them to experience an onslaught of negative feelings and emotions. But if you have the slightest inkling that something isn't right with a particular friend and you can't quite put your finger on it, chances are, your friend is toxic and it would be in your best interest to learn all that you can about toxic friendships. Toxic Friends: A Practical Guide to Recognizing and Dealing with an Unhealthy Friendship will help you recognize what a toxic friendship is, introduce you to over sixty different types of toxic friends, encourage you to face the reality of it all, and ultimately guide you on your tumultuous journey to either end the friendship or develop effective ways of dealing/coping with it. Most importantly, Toxic Friends will provide you with confirmation that you are not alone in your battle with a toxic friend. The numerous anecdotes and confessions from real victims and survivors from across the globe will surely provide you with inspiration and comfort in knowing that you do not have to suffer in silence as so many victims do.

Sis. Boo. Hun. Babe. Fave. Bestie. We use these terms quite liberally; even too loosely in some instances, which is fine—until we discover that our “ride or die” friend got off the ride a few stops back. There are so many things in life that we have to dissect, but true friendship shouldn’t be one of them. When we cross that fine line between friendship and sisterhood, we should be able cherish that bond and trust that our sister is truly our keeper. Unfortunately, that isn’t always the case, and all it takes is one wrong turn to derail the beauty of true sisterhood. Not anymore. Today is the day that I challenge all women to stand up, take a look in the mirror, and fight back against that malignant ugliness that wants to see you and your sister at odds. Let today be the day you commit to doing the work to repair your sisterhood. Shut down the drama and reclaim your friend—your sister. You owe it to yourself and to the ladies who have come to be near and dear to your heart. Sisters fuss, they fight, but in the end, they find a way to put the pieces back together and get back to the beauty of loving one another. Oh, you call yourself her sister? Prove it. Crack this book open, roll up your sleeves, and get ready to put some work in because sisterhood is no walk in the park, but it’s so worth the journey! Are you your sister’s keeper? If not, you will be by the time you finish this book!

A revolutionary guide to acknowledging fear and developing the tools we need to build a healthy relationship with this confusing emotion—and use it as a positive force in our lives. We all feel fear. Yet we are often taught to ignore it, overcome it, push past it. But to what benefit? This is the essential question that guides Kristen Ulmer’s remarkable exploration of our most misunderstood emotion in The Art of Fear. Once recognized as the best extreme skier in the world (an honor she held for twelve years), Ulmer knows fear well. In this conversation-changing book, she argues that fear is not here to cause us problems—and that in fact, the only true issue we face with fear is our misguided reaction to it (not the fear itself). Rebuilding our experience with fear from the ground up, Ulmer starts by exploring why we’ve come to view it as a negative. From here, she unpacks fear and shows it to be just one of 10,000 voices that make up our reality, here to help us come alive alongside joy, love, and gratitude. Introducing a mindfulness tool called “Shift,” Ulmer teaches readers how to experience fear in a simpler, more authentic way, transforming our relationship with this emotion from that of a draining battle into one that’s in line with our true nature. Influenced by Ulmer’s own complicated relationship with fear and her over 15 years as a mindset facilitator, The Art of Fear will reconstruct the way we react to and experience fear—empowering us to easily and permanently address the underlying cause of our fear-based problems, and setting us on course to live a happier, more expansive future.