The current likelihood of divorce in America is between 40 and 50%, and although this percentage is luckily dropping, this means that many of us grew up in households without a healthy example of love between two adults.
With our divorce culture, many of us have divorced parents or friends with divorced parents and spent our childhoods watching parents fight and display incredibly toxic behaviors leading up to the divorce.
In addition to this, many of the relationships portrayed in our media are incredibly unhealthy. We have dozens of popular sitcoms where every straight married couple seems to hate each other. Men complain about their wives always nagging them to do housework, and wives complain about their husbands being lazy and not caring about their children.
Then, healthy long-term LGBTQ+ relationships simply aren’t represented on TV or in movies, which is a problem all of its own.
We are surrounded by horrible examples of healthy love or unrealistic examples like Disney movies where everything ends “happily ever after” when two people get together and there is no need for conflict or important discussions.
With all of these examples surrounding us, we either start to think that the bare minimum is good enough or we start to place unrealistic, Disney-level standards on our partners. You deserve so much more than a partner that skates by with the bare minimum, and your partner deserves healthy communication.
College is a prime time for dating, and it’s also a prime time for figuring out who you are and how to act in a relationship. It’s a time that many people don’t know what’s healthy or unhealthy for them, why their relationships keep failing or why they always seem to have the same fight over and over again with their partner.
It’s a time for figuring stuff out, which unfortunately means that there’s a good chance you’ve experienced toxic relationship behaviors and that you’ve even displayed toxic relationship behaviors.
So, here’s my compilation of common healthy and unhealthy relationship behaviors that I’ve gathered from reading books, social media and articles. I also learned some throughout this semester of taking Sociology and Human Development and Family Studies classes revolving around families, marriages and relationships. Do with it what you will.
Healthy behavior: They help to lighten your load when they can
This is something that I have so much trouble with personally. I feel so guilty sometimes because my boyfriend is constantly going above and beyond to help me with little things throughout the week, and I simply don’t have the time to do the same for him.
But the thing is, you don’t have to feel guilty about this. It’s an incredible thing that he tries to make my life easier, even when it’s inconvenient for him.
With my current schedule, I leave for work around 6:30 a.m. and don’t get back to my apartment until almost 9 p.m. several days of the week. He doesn’t have class until noon these days, and I get to see him in the afternoon.
So, when I forget part of my lunch in the fridge or realize I forgot to take my iron supplement that keeps me from passing out mid-afternoon, he’s the one who takes 45 minutes out of his day to pick up those things from my apartment and bring them to me. He often buys me lunch or dinner and brings it to me because he says I don’t eat enough.
Obviously, I am incredibly grateful for this and don’t expect it at all. But, I don’t need to feel as guilty for it as I do sometimes. It’s okay and a healthy thing to allow your partner to help you out and take care of you. I am still an independent woman, and I am not a bad girlfriend for accepting help from my very sweet, loving boyfriend throughout the week.
It’s healthy for a relationship to be back and forth and it’s okay if sometimes you feel that your partner does more for you than you are able to do for them. As long as the relationship still feels equal and you are helping each other out whenever possible, this is a good thing.
Unhealthy behavior: expecting them to read your mind
I think so many of us are guilty of this one. We let out a deep sigh after a long day and expect our partner to notice and know exactly what to do to help us. Or we throw out a statement like “I haven’t been to that restaurant in a while” and expect our partner to somehow take that and make the jump to planning an elaborate, romantic date night. And when they don’t, we just wind up disappointed.
Humans are humans. Sometimes we miss social cues, sometimes we forget what other people say and sometimes we just don’t have the energy to focus on anything but our own problems at that specific moment.
Every relationship needs clear communication. If you want to go to that restaurant, ask your partner if they’d like to go with you this Friday. Or if you feel like you’ve been planning a lot of dates recently and would like them to plan something, have that conversation. But don’t expect them to read your mind.
healthy (And necessary) behavior: they spend time with friends and encourage you to do the same
If you feel like they spend just as much time, if not more, with their friends as they do with you, that’s a good thing. Your partner should be making time for you, but they should also make sure that they’re maintaining their relationships with their friends. If your partner has a strong friend group, this is a sign that they’re good at maintaining healthy relationships, which is a positive sign for your relationship.
In addition, your partner should encourage you to spend time with your friends. They should remind you that you mentioned wanting to do a coffee date with your bestie this Friday. They should encourage you to go have a friend’s night out without them. It’s okay to do things separately.
What is not okay is your partner trying to turn you against your friends. If you catch your partner starting fights every time you hang out with certain friends, this is UNHEALTHY.
If your partner tells you that your friends are terrible, that they don’t treat you well, that they want you to break up, or that they hate your partner and you have no evidence for any of this, this is UNHEALTHY.
Isolation is abuse.
Abuse sounds like a scary word, but isolation is one of the first steps in both emotionally and physically abusive relationships. By cutting you off from your friends and tethering you closer to them, your partner cuts off your social web and any other connections that could help you get away from them later.
Although this sounds intense, please keep it in mind. One in three women and one in four men find themselves in abusive relationships. Nobody thinks it will be them, but it could.
If your partner is tearing down your friends or trying to pull you away from them in order to spend more time with you, please take the time to seriously reconsider why they are doing this. You may need to reconsider your relationship.
Unhealthy behavior: expecting your partner to pay for everything
This is an expectation that so often falls on men in our society, and it’s simply unfair. Especially if you are both college students, you’re most likely equally broke.
It’s one thing if your partner is financially stable and wants/always offers to pay for everything, but you should never just expect them to cover every date, movie and meal, especially based on gender. Have a conversation before going out about splitting the bill, or having one of you get this one while the other gets the other one.
Again, if they OFFER, that is fine; for some relationships, one partner may want to pay for everything. But if they did not express this, please don’t go in expecting it.
Healthy behavior: they do their best to make you comfortable
You deserve someone who always does their best to make you comfortable. If you’re afraid of the dark and stay over at their place often, you deserve someone who gets a night light just for you.
If you’re someone who doesn’t love public spaces with lots of people, your partner should be as accommodating of this as possible. If your partner is constantly dragging you out to packed bars when you’ve expressed that this makes you anxious, you deserve better.
Relationships are all about compromise, but you should be doing whatever you can to make each other comfortable whenever possible.
unhealthy behavior: spending all of your time together
You both need independence! As a college student, you need time for extracurriculars and work. As fun and exciting as hanging out together is, especially in the beginning of a new relationship, you need time alone too.
Even if you live together, you don’t need to spend all of your time together. Spend time at your favorite spots on campus, your favorite coffee shop, on a walk, out with friends or whatever it is that you like to do! Just make sure you still have your space.
healthy behavior: be friends with your partner
Sometimes people say that “relationships are hard” and this puts this nasty picture in our heads of fighting and clashing personalities, and that starts to be what we expect. To be honest, relationships shouldn’t be hard.
Combining two people’s lives is hard. Having conversations about the future, the big stuff like kids and where you want to live and your religion can be hard.
But your day-to-day relationship shouldn’t feel hard.
If you fight once a week, it’s not healthy. If all of your fights turn to shout matches rather than comfortable discussions where both people feel heard, that’s not healthy. If your partner doesn’t make you laugh, makes you feel bad about yourself, or makes your day harder, that’s not healthy.
Your relationship shouldn’t always be about intensity or passion. It should be about friendship. If you don’t feel like you’re friends with your partner, it may be time to reconsider the relationship.
You should be able to have natural, comfortable conversations about your day. I call my boyfriend all the time when I’m walking between classes to tell him about what I just learned, how the kids were at work that morning, the fact that my left contact is bothering me, my laptop acting up, my shirt feeling damp because the dryer is broken or whatever I need to get off my chest. And he listens and asks questions.
Then he tells me about how fantasy football is going, what he had for breakfast, how he slept, what assignments he has to do that day and whatever he wants to chat about.
Then we both go to class, say “I love you” and hang up. It makes me feel closer to him to share little moments throughout our day as they happen, even stupid observations like “that’s a really big squirrel over there.”
If you feel like you can’t have friendly, domestic chats with your partner about your day, you may not have enough of a friendship base in your relationship.
Sometimes people go too hot and heavy on the romance side of their relationships in college and don’t nurture the friendships. But really, that’s the important part. That’s the lasting part that turns a hook-up into a long-term commitment.
So, be best friends with your partner. Tell them everything about you and learn everything about them. Maybe play a game like “We’re Not Really Strangers” and swap deep, traumatic stories back and forth. Or just ask stupid questions like “would you rather be a cow or a chicken?” and see what they say.
Either way, make sure you really know the person you’re with. That’s what will make the relationship feel special, natural and comfortable for both of you.
You deserve to have a partner that you’re proud to call your best friend.