If someone makes you feel these 6 ways, they're slowly destroying your self-worth

You're scrolling through old photos when you pause. That person laughing at karaoke, wearing the ridiculous hat, telling stories with their whole body—when did you stop being them?

It happens quietly, this shrinking. No dramatic confrontations or obvious cruelty. Just a thousand tiny adjustments until one day you're apologizing for having opinions about dinner. You've adapted so gradually that you've forgotten what it felt like to exist without constant editing.

These patterns show up everywhere—romantic relationships, friendships, family dynamics, even at work. They persist because each incident seems too small to address. Who makes a fuss about eye rolls or sighing? But the accumulation reshapes you.

1. You rehearse basic conversations like TED talks

Asking to grab coffee with a friend shouldn't require a script, but here you are, mentally drafting texts. Will "hey, free Thursday?" sound too demanding? Should you add more exclamation points? Fewer? You've learned that casual communication somehow leads to conflict.

Watch yourself preparing to mention the raise you got. You'll add three disclaimers, minimize the amount, maybe skip mentioning it entirely. Simple interactions have become strategic operations. You're exhausted before the conversation even starts because you're simultaneously being yourself and editing yourself, running real-time calculations about which version might cause less friction.

2. Your achievements feel like betrayals

Your friend gets engaged and you're thrilled for her. You get promoted and feel like you should apologize. Something in how they respond to your good news—the pause before congratulations, the immediate pivot to their own struggles, the "must be nice" comments—has taught you that your joy is an affront.

So you've developed tactics. Bury the lead. Add "but" to everything positive. "I got the fellowship, but tons of people applied." "The review went well, but I probably just got lucky." You've learned to serve your successes with a side of self-deprecation, making them easier for others to swallow.

3. You've become a mood detective

Their text has periods instead of exclamation points. They closed the cabinet slightly harder than usual. They said "fine" instead of "sounds good." Your nervous system goes into high alert, scanning for signs of the storm.

You know their emotional weather better than your own. Friends mention plans and you immediately think: how will this affect their mood? You've become so attuned to preventing their displeasure that you've lost track of your own internal climate. Your day isn't determined by what happens to you but by which version of them shows up.

4. Basic decency feels like a gift

They asked about your day and actually listened to the answer. They didn't make the face when you suggested Italian food. They included you in plans without the usual performance of inconvenience. You feel a rush of something like gratitude.

This is how baseline shifts happen—gradually, invisibly. What once would have seemed like bare minimum—answering texts within a reasonable timeframe, engaging in normal conversation, showing interest in your life—now feels like extraordinary kindness. You've been trained to be grateful for neutral, to celebrate the absence of negativity as presence of care.

5. Your preferences have gone into witness protection

"Where do you want to eat?" draws a blank. Not because you don't care, but because caring has consequences. Every preference you've expressed has been met with evidence of its wrongness. The restaurant was too crowded (your fault). The movie was boring (your taste is questionable). The vacation spot was disappointing (you can't plan anything right).

Now you say "wherever you want" and mean it. It's safer to have no opinions than wrong ones. Friends joke that you're "easy-going," but really you've just learned that wanting things creates problems. Your actual preferences haven't disappeared—they've gone underground, emerging only in safe spaces where judgment isn't waiting.

6. Your body tells the truth

The headaches that start Sunday night before seeing them Monday. The stomach issues that mysteriously resolve when they're out of town. That tight chest feeling that you've normalized as "just how I am."

Your mind might rationalize—every relationship has challenges, they don't mean to be difficult, you're probably too sensitive. But your body doesn't lie. It maintains a low-level stress response because some part of you knows: being yourself here isn't entirely safe. The physical effects of chronic emotional stress show up even when we convince ourselves everything's fine.

Final words

Here's what's tricky about these patterns: they work. You do avoid conflict by having no preferences. You do prevent disappointment by hiding successes. The rehearsed conversations do go more smoothly. But the cost is yourself—piece by piece, interaction by interaction.

Recognition isn't about blame or drama. It's about noticing when you're making yourself smaller and asking: is this actually necessary? Sometimes the answer might be yes—we all modify ourselves in different contexts. But when the answer is always yes, when every space requires shrinking, something's off.

That person in the old photos—the one taking up space, being loud, having opinions about restaurants—they're still there. They just learned it was safer to be quiet. Maybe it's time to test if that's still true.