How to thrive again after toxic relationships and workplaces [glow-up guide]

Janelle Kee-Sue
Jul 31
10 min read

how to thrive again after toxic relationships or workplaces

If you've ever been in a toxic relationship or environment—whether with a romantic partner, friend, family member, boss or workplace—you’ll know how deeply it can affect your sense of self.

The stress and anxiety that can come from toxic behaviours like belittling, manipulation, bullying or gaslighting doesn’t just hurt in the moment. It rewires your brain, exhausts your nervous system and creates lingering self-doubt that can follow you long after the relationship ends.

And yet, so many women push through like nothing happened—silently struggling under the weight of anxiety, people-pleasing and a negative inner voice that’s carrying on repeating the hurtful things the toxic person or environment made them believe.

While time passing helps, often something much deeper is needed to truly heal and move on from these types of relationships and experiences.

In this blog, we’ll cover:

Why you're still feeling stuck and affected, even if it’s been months or years since the experience ended.
Why traditional self-help methods often fall short when it comes to deep emotional recovery.
The powerful mindset and nervous system shifts that help rebuild self-worth, restore confidence, and reignite your sparkle for life.

This isn’t about pushing yourself to “move on.” It’s about moving through it—with support, insight and tools that honour your story and help you thrive again.

If you’ve ever experienced toxic and unhealthy behaviours and treatment in a relationship or at work, this article will give you the clarity and tools to move forward.

how to thrive after toxic relationships or workplaces

The psychology of toxic relationships: why it’s so hard to heal

Toxic relationships—especially emotionally abusive ones—impact your sense of psychological safety. You may have been conditioned to question your reality, silence your needs or believe that love must be earned.

This often leads to:

Hypervigilance: always anticipating conflict or rejection
Low self-worth: internalising criticism and blame
Chronic anxiety: due to an over-activated nervous system
People-pleasing and perfectionism: coping mechanisms to avoid disapproval
Low confidence: No longer feeling confident in areas that you used to, due to self-doubt

Over time, this creates a brain-body feedback loop.

According to trauma research, the amygdala (the brain’s fear centre) becomes overactive, while the prefrontal cortex (responsible for logic and reasoning) struggles to regulate emotional responses.

In other words, even after the relationship ends, your body still feels like it’s under threat.

To truly heal, you need more than affirmations or surface-level fixes.

You need a safe, guided process that supports both your mind and nervous system (but more on this soon).

Did you know that toxic relationships can be harder to recover from than some drugs?

When I interviewed Meghan Fitzpatrick on the Finally Thriving Podcast, a therapist based in the UK who spoke about how to heal from toxic relationships, she revealed that toxic relationships can be harder to recover from than some drugs.

Toxic relationships, especially those involving intermittent reinforcement (i.e., a cycle of affection, withdrawal, love bombing, and emotional neglect), trigger neurochemical responses in the brain, including:

Dopamine: The same pleasure/reward chemical involved in addiction is released during the "highs" of a toxic relationship (e.g., after love bombing or brief affection).

Oxytocin: Released during physical or emotional closeness, this "bonding hormone" deepens attachment—even to someone who hurts you.

Cortisol: The stress hormone increases in volatile, uncertain dynamics, making your body stay on high alert.

Withdrawal symptoms: When the relationship ends or affection is withheld, it creates real emotional and physiological symptoms similar to substance withdrawal.

These ups and downs create a trauma bond, which can feel as compulsive and consuming as addiction.

No wonder it’s so hard to move on!

The good news is that you can heal, recover, and move on with your life, without all the toxic baggage dragging you down (more on this soon).

Why traditional self-help methods often fall short

The end of a toxic relationship or leaving a toxic workplace often sparks a personal growth journey because the person often feels like a shell of a human being, their nervous system is in the freeze state from all the stress, and they need something to make them feel better and get unstuck.

Often, they try things like affirmations, journaling, or mindset shifts, but still feel stuck.

These methods can be helpful—but when it comes to deep emotional recovery, they often only scratch the surface.

Here’s why:

They work at the conscious level, while most of the wounds from toxic relationships live deep in the subconscious mind and in the body, and it’s like sticking a band aid on a huge wound.

That’s why a deeper, more holistic approach is often necessary to truly shift your inner world—and your outer reality.

The four-step process to thriving after toxic relationships or environments

This is the exact process I guide my clients through over 12 weeks—blending evidence-based coaching, hypnotherapy, NLP, somatic tools and nervous system regulation.

Step 1: Rediscover yourself

It may seem super obvious that this is the absolute best place to start, but it’s essential and foundational.

After a toxic relationship or workplace, it’s common to feel disconnected from who you are. This step is about rebuilding that inner compass.

Toxic relationships condition you to shrink yourself, suppress your needs, and prioritise someone else’s emotions and needs over your own.

I often hear from my clients when they first get in touch with me saying things like:

“I don’t know who I am anymore or what I want.”
“I feel like a shell of myself.”
“I feel like I’ve been in a cycle of chronic stress for years.”
“I used to feel excited about life, but I’ve lost that feeling.”

These are all signs of a nervous system that’s fallen into the freeze state after too long in fight or flight mode. Eventually, the person gets overwhelmed and burnt out from the chronic stress.

The good news is that we can get you out of this state!

Step 1 is about rediscovering yourself and doing things to fill up your cup before others. (Note that this may feel very uncomfortable at first!)

Here’s what I recommend:

Ask yourself: What do I actually want? What makes ME happy?
Get to the heart of what’s been holding you back (including subconscious patterns)
Clarify your values, desires and vision for the future (I have specific exercises I do with my clients to help them discover their personal values and future vision)
Start making decisions daily with your values front of mind (when we prioritise our own values we feel ALIGNED and like we’re moving in the right direction).
Set small boundaries to start (e.g., saying ‘no’ without explaining). Keep your values front of mind when you do this by creating personal policies to safeguard your time and energy.
Do one thing daily that is just for you (even if it’s 5 minutes).
Start using Micro Wins – small daily choices that rebuild trust in yourself (e.g., making a decision without asking for reassurance).

You might have lost yourself for a bit there, but you are NOT lost forever. It’s time to put YOU first.

Don’t know where to start? I’ve got you! Book your free 30-minute call with me here and we’ll get you pointed in the right direction.

woman at the beach enjoying reflection time in nature

Step 2: Master your mind and rebuild your confidence

You can’t build a new life if your inner critic is still running the show and keeping you stuck in the past.

The voice in your head might still be repeating what your ex/boss/family member said to you or how they made you feel (e.g., "You’re too much," "No one will love you," "You’re not good enough").

That voice isn’t yours—it was planted in you. But you get to change it.

Here’s how:

Get self-aware of your thoughts and inner dialogue

Get self-aware of your thoughts and keep a thought diary for when you feel triggered or are having irrational negative thoughts. Simply observe them to start, without attempting to change them.

Self awareness is key to all positive change, so simply start by getting aware of your inner dialogue, as this is the first step to getting in control of it.

Use the Name & Reframe method

Every time you hear negative self-talk, name where it came from and reframe it into truth (e.g., “That’s my ex’s voice, not mine. My truth is: <insert your empowering thought>.”).

Use affirmations / ‘iffermations’ daily

I know I said earlier that affirmations are a surface-level activity that doesn’t make a huge difference, but there’s a caveat for this. Affirmations work well for rewiring your own neural pathways formed in your brain, but the key is that you actually believe them, and the problem is that most people do them wrong. They say affirmational statements that they don’t believe, and ultimately their brain rejects, making it a pointless activity.

Instead, start by using ‘iffermational’ statements until you believe your statements. This means asking ‘what if’ in an affirmational way, hence the term ‘iffermational’.

For example, instead of saying; “I am worthy of love” or “I am enough”, if those statements don’t feel true to me yet, instead I could say: “What if I could be open to the idea that I am worthy of love?” or “What if I could be open to believing that I am enough?” or, “What if I’m better than I’ve been telling myself?”.

Positive ‘what if’ statements are more likely to be accepted by your subconscious mind as truth, therefore opening up your mind to change the way you perceive yourself.

Subconscious reprogramming through hypnotherapy

Hypnotherapy works directly with your unconscious mind and is an effective, and fast-acting, therapy for cultivating a growth mindset, reprogramming negative thought patterns, habits and behaviours, and breaking down barriers so you can make positive changes in record time with minimal effort.

It works directly with your subconscious mind, the part of you that is responsible for driving 90% of your thoughts, actions, habits, emotional responses and behaviours, and rewires the neural pathways to influence long-term change.

During a hypnosis session, your hypnotherapist will guide you into a relaxed state of self-hypnosis, making you more receptive to suggestions aligned with your goals.

You will be awake, aware and in complete control, and will use your imagination, creativity, inner wisdom and ability to facilitate self-directed neuro-plasticity to reprogram your unconscious mind.

This makes it a great modality for shifting your mindset, making peace with the past, changing negative habits and patterns, and helping you move forward with confidence.

➡️Learn more about Hypnotherapy here.

Neuroscience note: hypnotherapy has been shown in fMRI studies to reduce activity in the default mode network (linked to rumination), and strengthen connections between emotional and logical brain regions. This is why it’s so effective at transforming self-talk and reducing anxiety.

Step 3: Regulate & Release Your Emotions

If you’ve been carrying stress, anxiety, or the emotional weight of past experiences—your body keeps the score.

Even when you try to “move on,” your nervous system remembers.

It's a protective mechanism to try and keep you safe, but the problem is that it usually causes harm more often than it helps.

You might feel it as tightness in your chest, racing thoughts, or sudden overwhelm that comes out of nowhere.

Maybe you've developed an irrational fear or phobia, or you've stopped doing certain things because it can be triggering.

That’s where somatic psychosensory therapy like Havening can help.

What is Havening and how can it help?

Havening is a gentle yet powerful (and fast-acting) psychosensory technique designed to help you release trauma (both big 'T' and little 't'), regulate emotions, and rewire your brain for greater peace, resilience, and wellbeing.

It uses specific types of soothing touch—on the hands, arms, and face—to create an electrochemical state of safety in the brain and body.

This shifts your brainwaves, calms your nervous system, and allows old negative emotional responses to soften and dissolve.

The name “Havening” comes from the word haven—a safe place, which is what the technique creates within the mind and body.

Grounded in neuroscience, this somatic therapy helps release negative emotions safely, using simple gentle touch and distractions for the thinking mind.

This makes it a great modality for healing from toxic relationships or environments by making peace with the past and removing triggers and emotions attached to past events—which will feel like a weight has been lifted off your shoulders.

Learn more about Havening here.

Step 4: Break free from toxic patterns

Once your internal world begins to shift, it’s time to create external change and get rid of toxic patterns so they don’t repeat again.

This step is all about learning to:

Identify red flags and emotional manipulation (download my ‘are they toxic?’ red flag checklist here)
Release old attachments and emotional baggage
Set healthy boundaries and learn to say no (without guilt or fear)
Overcome people-pleasing and prioritise your needs

This stage helps you redefine how you relate to others—and to yourself. This is where the glow-up becomes real—inside and out.

To do this, get clear on your personal boundaries and practice saying no. Here’s a blog I wrote to get you started: How to set boundaries and say no.

Hypnotherapy is a powerful tool for changing patterns and habits, which is well worth exploring in this step.

Somatic therapies like Havening are great for releasing guilt.

Psych insight: toxic dynamics often stem from insecure attachment styles. Through guided coaching and emotional repair work, you can build what’s called earned secure attachment, starting with your relationship to you.