"A toxic relationship is also like trying to start a new diet. When you eat junk food, you're not you're not gonna get good results. You're gonna get diabetes or high blood pressure, obesity.

But if you start eating good for yourself and start exercising, you're gonna lose weight."  -   Janiya Cheatham

Welcome to Mindshift Power podcast, a show for teenagers and the adults who work with them, where we have raw and honest conversations. I'm your host, Fatima Bey, the mind shifter. And welcome. Today in today's episode, we are gonna talk about getting out of a toxic relationship. And today, we have Janiyah on here.

Es una joven de 17 años de Ámsterdam. Si han escuchado este podcast, ya la conocen y seguro que la escucharán mucho más. Quería que supieran que fue ella quien me contactó para tener esta conversación en directo. No le pedí que viniera a contar su historia, pero tenía muchas ganas de hablar con ustedes y de contarla, con la esperanza de que pueda ayudar a otras jóvenes como ella. Estoy muy orgullosa de ella por estar dispuesta a abrirse a otras de esa manera, porque puede ser un poco difícil, pero ella quería hacerlo.

And I want you to know that she's really truly coming from her heart, and wants to help people. So how are you doing today, Janiyah? Great. Good. So let's dive right in.

Obviamente, estabas en una relación tóxica y la dejaste. Cuéntales a los oyentes, ¿cómo era esa relación tóxica en la que estabas? Era muy abusiva mentalmente. Cuando digo abusiva mentalmente, él, cuando nos metíamos en problemas, no era por falta de comunicación. Siempre me trataba con indiferencia, me rechazaba.

He'll say, like, very hurtful things like, oh my god. You're so freaking annoying. Go away. I don't care. Shut the up.

Cállate. Cállate. Hay mucha ira. Y también inseguridades. Cuando digo inseguridades, dice que no.

You can't wear this. You can't do that. You can't you can't go to that place. You're not allowed to do this. Like, very, very controlling.

Mmm. Y es que es mucho. Bueno. Creo que es importante mencionar esos detalles porque estoy bastante seguro de que hay oyentes ahora mismo que se encuentran en esa situación. Y escuchamos la palabra "tóxico" todo el tiempo, pero creo que se ha usado tanto que ha perdido su significado.

Por eso te pedí que fueras más específico sobre qué fue lo tóxico. ¿Cuánto tiempo estuviste en esa relación? Dos años. Yo estuve dos años. ¿Y ahora tienes 17?

Yes. I met I met him when I was 15. Oh, man, I was 15. I'm 17. So it was two years.

Sí. Es mucho tiempo, sobre todo a tu edad. Es como un millón de años. ¿Verdad? Sí.

I know, you know, nine months was a million years when I was, like, a teenager. So I know that two years is two million years. So you were in it. Now I would like you to tell the audience, how did that make you feel? I felt like I felt like crap.

I felt like I was no one. I had very little self esteem because he would tell me things like, no. You're you're dumb. You're wrong. Look at the way how you're thinking.

Mira, eso no tiene sentido. Así que pensé que algo andaba muy mal conmigo. Pero justo después de dejarlo, unos meses después, me costó procesarlo, pero también me di cuenta de que no había nada malo en mí. Había algo mal en la forma en que me hablaba y se comunicaba, y me di cuenta de que no era el indicado para mí. Es más que simplemente no ser para ti.

Sí. Eso en un momento. Porque a veces la gente dice: "Oh, él es el indicado para mí. Si no te trata como a alguien valioso, como a alguien valioso, no es el indicado para ti ni para nadie más".

No entendí la razón por la que me quedé con él tanto tiempo porque no valía nada. No veía mi valor. A eso me refería. Y no sabía cuánto valía, pero al final lo encontré. Y sí.

So you were in it for two years. Tell people, how did you get out of it? So, I was talking to miss Bey about it. I was, you know, was venting to her about all the things that he did and what was going on and how I got treated. So at the end of our conversation, she prayed to God saying she prayed to God hoping any toxic people will, like, get away from me.

Como si simplemente le dijera a Dios: «Si hay alguien en un hogar tóxico o algo que la esté molestando, ¿podrías suplicarle que lo aleje de mí?». Y dos días después, él se había ido. Sí. Y para ser más específico, le pido a Dios que retire a cualquier persona, lugar o cosa que no pertenezca a su vida. No dije específicamente que sacara a ese tipo de su vida, aunque sabía que no tenía por qué estar allí.

But me see if I had said it that way, I may have just pushed Janiyah away because you might have been right? Am I right, Janiyah? Yep. You might have been like, you just trying to get me to get rid of my boyfriend. Yeah.

¿Verdad? Y aunque sabía que no te hacía ningún bien y que debía irse, necesitaba que sucediera de la misma manera que tú, consintiendo y siendo parte de eso, y no solo hablándote como adulta. Sí. Porque eso es muy ineficaz para la gente. Sí.

And so what happened? I prayed and then two days later, he was poof, gone. Yeah. And he said, you know what? I'm done with you.

Don't I never ever ever wanna talk to you ever again. So, like, you know, the garbage just took itself out. That's, like, really what happened. I didn't mean to clap so loud, but I just love the way you just said that, but you're right. The I the garbage took itself out.

You're abs this is why I love you. You're absolutely right. The garbage took itself out. Now I prayed for you on a Thursday, and this happened on a Saturday night. And let me tell y'all, I got a text from her Saturday evening.

She's literally said to me, he just broke up with me. Do you think god that was god answering a prayer? I had to laugh for about five minutes before I replied to her because I was like, girl, that's specifically what just happened and then she told me this situation and and he broke up with her over something absolutely silly and ridiculous. But that wasn't really the point. How he broke up with you wasn't the point, but just the fact that he was now out of your life was the answer to the prayer.

How was it after the breakup? Because that's what I really want people to understand, what that how did you what happened between now and then? After, don't get me wrong, like, the way I'm good now, it wasn't then. I was very confused. I was very sad.

I was very heartbroken. I was just I couldn't I I couldn't process. I'm like, damn. He he's really not in my life. I don't know what I'm gonna do, what I'm gonna do without him.

Months later, I'm doing good without him. I'm doing what I need to supposed to be doing. I'm back on track, like, back on track. And, also, when I was with him and after we broke up, I was still, like I couldn't focus because it's like I was so used to being with him. But then, you know, weeks and months, I started to, like, do way, way better.

Y lo único que puedo decir es que solo tienes que darle tiempo. Nunca superarás a alguien a quien amas de verdad así. Tienes que darle tiempo, y está bien seguir amando a esa persona. ¿Sabes? Sigo amando a Gigi, pero nunca volveré con ella... nunca le devolveré el favor porque elegí la paz.

I love I love myself way too much to put myself back in that situation. Yes. And it's you don't have no idea how much it warms my heart to hear that those words out of your mouth when months ago, I was concerned about you going back to him because, unfortunately, that's quite common. Yeah. What I wanna point out to the audience and and kinda reiterate, what Janiyah is saying is that when she first got him out of her life, when the garbage took itself out, She wanted to go back part of her wanted to go back to the store.

I did. I did. Like, I was fighting the urge to not text Gigi. I'm like, should I call him? Should I should I try to work this out?

And something just told me, like, no. What? Just keep going. Don't do it. Don't do it.

Don't do it. Don't do it. And then when I got when my mind got used to not talking to him, I was doing I was doing, like, pretty pretty good. And I think that's an important thing to point out because just because you have an emotional attachment to someone, quote, unquote, funny love, doesn't mean that they're good for you or that that that attachment is good. You know?

It's it's kinda like if you were used to sitting in poop all day, you're used to the smell of poop. It's familiar. It's comfortable. Doesn't mean you need to sit in shit all day. Right?

Yes. Yes. And that's what it's like being in a toxic relationship. You're sitting you're sitting in a pile of poop. Yes.

And one of my reason one of this was, like, one of the main reasons why I had a emotional attachment to him was because, you know, he was my he was my first he was my first everything. Was it first everything? It's the first boy kiss. And then the first boy, I had sex with I'm not proud of that, but, you know, I learned from my mistakes. And what I did was bad, but I have to accept that and learn from it.

So it's not about how you start. It's always about how you finish things. You have you have to accept what you did was bad, put it behind you, and make sure you don't make the same mistake and become a better version of your of yourself. And that and to anyone that's watching this, please be careful who you give your body to because it can cause a lot of problems. And having sex losing your virginity, it it it's no rush.

It's it's no rush at all. I'm telling I'm telling you this. You're you're not missing nothing. You're you're literally not missing nothing at all. You wanna give that to someone that would truly love you, truly cherish you, not someone not a fuck boy or a hoe.

You don't wanna you don't wanna give that to someone, someone that's not mature. Mhmm. Now I want y'all to know that, Janiyah, when we had a conversation about doing this episode, I did not plant any of that in her head. She said that to me, and I wanted to reach out and hug her. It it's just like she said that to me, and I think it's important if you're a young woman out there and you've already given yourself to some jerk, somebody who doesn't really care about you.

You can't go back and change that because some of y'all have and you feel bad about it. And I know that there's lots of girls out there listening right now where that's the case. And, you know, don't just take it from my mouth. Take it from, you know, Janaya. She's 17.

No soy una adolescente. Lo hice a los 15. No, no estoy orgullosa. Estoy bastante segura de que algunas chicas lo hicieron a los 15 o incluso antes. Pero, ya sabes, por favor, por favor, sálvate.

Save yourself. Like, it just because when you keep having when you keep having sex with the person, you're gonna get more and more and more attached, and don't do it. And, also, when once when you are very young and once you have sex, it's it's it's very hard for you to stop. Because, you know, us teenagers and young adults, we have we're still growing. We have hormones.

We have hormones that make you wanna do that stuff. So once you got a taste of it, you're like, oh, okay. I like this. I wanna do it again and again and again and again. And some people get so blind of the sex, but get blind of get so blind of the sex, and sometimes they don't even realize that they're in a toxic relationship.

Yes. And that and let me tell you, if you're an adult listening, I know half of y'all just related to what she just said because it's not just true with teenagers. There's some adults dealing with situations like that, right now. What do you think, now you did you got out of that relationship. What do you think it would've looked like had you stayed in that relationship or held on after the breakup?

Because some people break up technically, but then they still keep holding on to the person. So what do you think it would look like if you had held on or stayed in? I woulda still woulda been, like, texting him and calling him and, like, checking up on his page and Mhmm. Everything. I was still I was, like, I would still, like, wonder like, I would still wanna be with him, but what I did was when after it does see, he done really messed up stuff to me.

But what I did was in order for me to truly get over it, I forgive him. I didn't tell him, hey. I forgive you what you did. I, like, said it to myself. I'm like, you know what?

He done this to me. He did this. But you know what? I freak I forgive. I forgive Gigi.

And then after that, it's like a weight just got off my shoulders and Wow. I think that is a critical, critical, critical piece of you having your own peace about it and being able to get over it instead of staying under it. Mhmm. Because what a lot of people do is they'll get out of a toxic relationship, but then they'll stay under it. Yeah.

They hold the grudge and stuff. Over it. Yeah. Yes. And and and, you know, and I I get it.

I get it because I when people hurt people I love, I wanna do things that are illegal. But, you know, but at the end of the day, the you have to if you forgive them, it actually helps you. Right. It doesn't matter if they accept it or not or what they think. And you don't even have to tell them.

You can tell it yourself. You can like, for me, how I express myself, I I, like, I talk to myself. I have a cold converse like, I have I had a whole conversation with myself. I could do it in a room. I could walk outside, have a conversation with myself.

Voy al parque. Eso es lo que hice. Hablé conmigo mismo. Y pensé: "¿Sabes qué? Perdono a Gigi".

Ustedes también pueden hacerlo, o si quieren escribir o lo que sea, pero no se apresuren. No tienen que apresurarse. Cuando estén listos para perdonar a la persona, es cuando lo hacen. Pero solo les recuerdo: no se lo digan. Sí.

Estoy totalmente de acuerdo. A veces, decírselo no es lo mejor. No lo es. Si puedes y lo reciben, genial. Pero sé que en muchas situaciones, esa no es la realidad.

Yes. So I think it's important that you pointed that out. And I'm so glad that you, like you said, you can't even imagine what it would have been like if you stayed. I can't. I'm really glad you didn't.

Y me alegra que... también me alegra que... quiero destacar que Janiyah no hizo esto sola. Es decir, lo hizo sola, pero también me tuvo a mí como alguien con quien hablar. Y eso es muy importante. Ella me tuvo a mí, puede que tú no. Puede que tengas a un amigo, a un familiar, ya sabes, a un profesor de la escuela.

Whoever it is for you, it's so important that somebody's got your back in those weak moments, who can encourage you to not step backwards. And you need to have someone in your life that you can open up to. Right, Janae? Yes. And, also, I also wanted to point this out.

Gigi, he will also make me do stuff that I normally don't do. Like, for instance, he'll try to pressure me to smoke and drink and skip school. I did the smoking. I did the, the skip in school and not and, he because the reason why he was getting me to do that stuff because he left that stuff and he don't go to school. And you guys wanna you guys wanna date someone or be around someone that has a plan, that that's that's a good influence because that's a good influencer because if not, they're gonna make you turn into them, and you you don't you don't want that.

You don't want that because with him not going to school, him smoking was rubbing that on me, and I was slowly turning into him. But then one day, I snapped back to who I am, and I don't do that anymore. So if someone says if someone wants to pressure you to pressure you to do something, get away from them. Get away from them as soon as possible. That leads into what I was gonna ask.

¿Qué consejo les darías a las jóvenes que están en la misma situación que tú y que quizás quieran salir, o que acaban de salir y están tentadas a volver con el mismo chico? ¿Qué les aconsejarías? Mi consejo para cualquiera que acaba de terminar una relación o está pensando en empezar una: que lo piensen como un libro. Tendrán el mismo principio y el mismo final.

It's not gonna end good. You wanna get a new book that's gonna have you're gonna a new ending. I mean, a new beginning and a new ending. Because why put yourself through that? It's not it's it's not worth it.

It's not worth it. And the only person you're hurting is yourself. He knows he knows where she he or he or she knows that they're hurting you. They know what they're doing, but you you you can't control on how they treat you or what they do to you. But you can choose how you're gonna deal with it.

If you're gonna stay, then you're hurting yourself. But if you're gonna get out of it, you're gonna get a you're gonna get a you're gonna you're gonna better your you'll be better yourself. A toxic relationship is also like trying to start a new diet. When you eat junk food, you're not you're not gonna get good results. You're gonna get diabetes or high blood pressure, obesity.

But if you start eating good for yourself and start exercising, you're gonna lose weight. You're gonna have a lot of you're gonna have a lot of good stuff. You you're gonna have a lot of good things that's happening to your body, and you don't have won't have to deal with that when you're won't have to deal with that when you're, like, when you're aging. Wow. I'm telling you.

I said this about her in the previous episode. Yeah. I told you, Janiyah is, she's 17, but she's as wise as as an adult. Some of the stuff that I hear coming out of her mouth is stuff that I you know, people don't figure out until they're 40 and 50 sometimes. And a lot of what she just said, again, I didn't put that in her head.

Ella me atacó con esto. Y también quiero señalar algo que dijo antes, pero creo que es importante destacar que gran parte de evitar volver al mismo abismo de la relación en la que estabas fue el hecho de que comenzaste a reconocer tu propio valor. Sí. Al principio, ¿crees que no haber conocido tu propio valor fue la razón por la que te involucraste en la relación? Sí.

Yes. Because, guys, I was 15. I was I was all over the place because that's because, you know, when I was when I was in ninth grade, it was COVID and stuff. But during COVID, you had the option to either stay home or do it in person. So I got I was happy.

I'm like, oh my god. I have a little boyfriend now. Blah blah blah blah. He's like, saying, yeah. Let's do this.

Let's have sex. Let's do all of this. And I'm like, yeah. Okay. I thought that was cool, but it's not it's not cool.

And I didn't know who I was, and I just let someone Mhmm. Just so let's like, I just let someone pressure me into doing something that I didn't wanna do because I was trying to fit in, trying to impress this person that don't truly care about me. Right. Well, there's so much more we could talk about in this conversation, and there's there is more we're going to, talk about in the future. But, Janiyah, I really, really thank you for bringing this up and wanting to come on and have this conversation.

Y espero que realmente ayude a las personas que quizás estén en la misma situación, a saber que es posible porque tú pudiste hacerlo. Sí. Y, de nuevo, estoy muy orgullosa de ti por tu disposición a ser tan abierta. Y sé que no es fácil hacerlo, pero tu disposición a ayudar a los demás es increíble. Sí.

Thank you. You're welcome. And now for a mind shifting moment. If you're listening today and you identify with a lot of what Janiah said, you might be in a toxic relationship yourself. And maybe you want to get out.

I hope you do. I hope you know that you have more value than those who don't value you. If you are in a toxic relationship and you want to get out, maybe you need help. And that's okay. Believe it or not, there are people around you who you probably don't realize will help you.

If you are in need of help right now, go to FatimaBay.com. Go to the other help page. At the bottom, you can click on a link, put in your state and city, and see what help there is around you. I hope that you got something out of today's episode and that you tune in next week for more. Thank you for listening to mind shift power podcast.

Please like and subscribe to my YouTube channel at the mind shifter. If you have any comments, topic suggestions, or would like to be a guest on the show, please visit fatimabay.com/podcast. Remember, there's power in shifting your thinking. Tune in for next week.