You have the right to verbally defend yourself. If you have a friend or relative who makes snide comments towards you and puts you down, it’s not OK. You have the right to say something and to tell them to stop.
We’ve all had those relationships and friendships with people who don’t treat us the way we deserve to be treated, and they don’t seem to care or respect our feelings. Even when we let them know that it’s not OK they trample all over our personal boundaries time and time again.
A friend of mine found out her husband was calling her Bagheimer, a name he made up for her, behind her back in front of her children. He was calling her that name when she would ask him to do stuff around the house that a responsible adult would just normally do.
One of their kids starting calling his mom Bagheimer because he saw his dad do it he thought it was OK. When she found out about the derogatory name-calling she was so mad, she said to her husband you better stop now or pack your bags and move out. He never called her that name again. Shockingly, he would have the audacity to think that was OK to say to his wife and mother of his children.
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Some of these people who treat others poorly probably are not worthy of being your friend or in your life. When you think of all the good people that you have in your life, yet somehow you end up spending hours of your energy focused on these negative Nellies, the negative 20 perfect of the people in your life. It is the 20 percent who cause most of the problems, stress, and anxiety.
Finding the right words to stand up for yourself
It can be hard to find the words to tell them to stop, we get that. You don’t know what to say and your mind goes blank, and it is emotional because someone is being unkind to you. Even worse, someone who is in your close inner circle is being unkind to you.
When you tell them to stop you always want to make sure that you are in a safe situation. The good thing about comebacks is you are not calling someone fully out on their bad behaviour but you are letting them know that your behaviour stinks. It is kind of an easier way to let them know you are on to the negative way they are behaving, without spelling it out fully.
If you grew up without a voice, in a household where your feelings were negated and people walked all over you and didn’t respect your point of view or your feeling it is challenging. It is going to be harder for you to stand up for yourself than someone who learned these skills growing up.
You can learn what to say. Standing up to someone is like a muscle you can develop, think of it like doing reps at the gym. You can get there, it is a question of knowing what to say and how to say it.
