If You Recognize These 9 Behaviors, You're Destroying Your Relationship With Passive-Aggression

Are You Passive Aggressive?

A young woman with long blonde hair sits on the floor, leaning against a sofa, looking upset. A man with glasses and a beard kneels beside her, placing a comforting hand on her shoulder. They appear to be in a bright, modern living room.

Few things are as irksome (and as damaging) to a friendship or romantic relationship as passive aggression. Denying or invalidating emotions, making snide remarks, avoiding contact that may require emotional expression, ghosting as punishment…

These are all behaviors that have absolutely no place in a healthy relationship, so if you find yourself doing any of this, you need to cut it out.

Now.

Where Does It Come From?

A man is angrily shouting at a woman in a living room with large windows. The woman, looking frustrated and upset, is standing with her arms crossed and her hand touching her temple. Both are wearing denim shirts. The room has shelves and a couch.

Most of the people who indulge in passive aggression do so because they never learned how to deal with conflict in a mature, responsible manner. It could be that trying to stand up for yourself in the past resulted in abusive responses from your parents or early partners.

It’s understandable where all of this stemmed from, but these behaviors really need to be un-learned if you’re ever to have a healthy connection with another person. Here are some signs that your passive-aggressive behavior is already sabotaging your relationship.

1. You Suppress Your Feelings

A woman with curly hair is seated indoors, resting her head on her hand, looking thoughtful or concerned. She wears a green blouse and a white top. In the background, a person is sitting on the floor, blurred and out of focus. The mood is contemplative.

A classic example of a person who uses passive-aggressive behavior is someone who’s afraid that if they tell their partner how they really feel about a situation, they’ll be punished for doing so, or the partner will end up leaving them.

You may be doing this because of a genuine fear about your partner’s reaction (for example, if they are abusive) but choosing to play the passive-aggressive game for the sake of your own well-being doesn’t help anyone either.

Why? Because…

2. You Feel Resentment Toward Your Partner

A woman with folded arms looks upset while sitting on a couch next to a man who is gesturing with his hand and holding a smartphone. They are in a modern living room with a kitchen in the background.

By avoiding being honest with your partner, you just get more and more resentful. You don’t get your own needs met, and your partner will resent and punish you in turn somehow, until both sides end up silent, sighing, and breaking things.

The only way to break through this is to be honest.

Now, honesty doesn’t have to be brash and callous: it can be gentle and compassionate. Instead of saying things like, “you make me feel bad about myself when you say _____,” you can turn it around with “I” statements.

“I feel bad about myself when you tell me _______.”

“I need you to be more supportive when ___ happens, and not say things like _____.”

This comes across as less accusatory and gives your partner the opportunity to show compassion and empathy for your emotions.

3. You Dress Up Hurtful Comments As Jokes

A man and woman are sitting on a couch in a bright living room. The man, holding a tablet and paperwork, looks at the woman attentively. The woman, in a blue tank top and jeans, is facing him with a relaxed demeanor. Sunlight streams through a large window.

Some people who have difficulty expressing what they feel are negative emotions, or those that may have the potential to create conflict, will make hurtful comments and try to pass them off as jokes.

What they say is actually exactly what they mean, but if the person on the receiving end seems to be upset, rather than lighthearted, the snarker can backpedal and say that they were only joking.

This, once again, puts them in a position of control: if the one they’re talking to gets upset or hurt, they can be accused of being oversensitive and not being able to take a joke.

Cut this out and replace it with the honest and compassionate approach above.

4. You Expect Others To Read Your Mind

A woman and man stand close together in a barren, brown field. The woman, with light brown hair and a striped scarf, gazes forward with a serious expression. The man, wearing a dark coat, stands slightly behind her, looking down. Both appear contemplative.

If you’ve ever been upset with someone and, when asked what it is they’d done to hurt you, you’ve uttered the words, “If you don’t know, I’m not going to bother telling you,” then someone needs to slap you with a trout.

None of us ever know exactly what’s going through another person’s mind, simply because we are not them. Everything in our lives is filtered through a lens of our own personal experience, and as such, we’re going to interpret and process things very differently.

5. And Assume They Should Know Why You’re Upset

A woman with long blonde hair wearing a beige top sits on a sofa with a pensive expression, resting her head on her hand. Behind her, a man with short hair and a beard, wearing a white t-shirt, sits turned away, seemingly deep in thought.

If you’re upset with someone because they’ve done something hurtful, but they don’t seem to realize that they’ve done so, talk to them about it.

They could very well have NO idea that they’ve upset you, because they wouldn’t be upset if they were in that situation. We cannot expect all people to think and feel the same way we do, about anything, and the only way we can have any kind of smooth, healthy relationship is to communicate with our friends and partners.

On a similar note…

6. You Assume You Can Read Minds

A man with a beard and a checked shirt, and a woman with long hair and a white tank top, are standing by a window in a bright room, holding white mugs and having a conversation.

Do you find yourself telling other people what they think or feel instead of asking them? Accusing them of having certain feelings or leanings rather than approaching them from a place of love and empathy?

…do you think there’s a universe in which that kind of behavior is acceptable?

You are not a mind reader, and 99% of the time, what you assume another person is thinking or feeling is a projection of your own thoughts and insecurities. For instance, if you accuse your partner of being interested in another person, or planning to leave you, that’s likely a projection of your own fears of abandonment.

7. So You Don’t Bother Considering Alternative Explanations.

A man and a woman sit on a couch looking distressed. The man, with grey hair and a beard, has his hands clasped together and eyes closed. The woman, with shoulder-length brown hair, rests her head on her hands while looking down. Both appear deep in thought.

Being accused of something like this without any kind of discussion can cause lasting damage in a personal relationship, so a far better approach is to set aside time to talk to your partner, express that you’re feeling insecure for X reasons, and sort out what’s happening on both sides.

Same goes for friendships, and even parent/child relationships or housemate situations. Before you assume/accuse/attack, stop and consider where these assumptions are coming from. Most of the time, they are insecurities or biases that might have been triggered by an innocuous comment or gesture, so if you find yourself feeling accusatory, take a step back, take a few calming breaths, and try to work out a logical reason as to why you feel the way you do.

8. You Give The Silent Treatment

A close-up of a man and a woman sitting together against a white brick wall, both looking in different directions. The man, in an orange shirt, appears contemplative, while the woman, in a tan sweater, has a serious expression.

Giving someone else the silent treatment is an extraordinary act of cowardice. It’s cruel, it’s abusive, and can be more damaging to a person than a physical blow.

Generally, the silent treatment is used by a person who feels like various aspects of their lives are out of their control, so they choose silence as a weapon of control: there will only be communication when THEY agree to grace the other with it, and not until then.

9. You Ghost Them

A person sits at a table near a window, looking at a smartphone. They are wearing a plaid shirt. On the table is a sandwich wrapped in paper and a coffee cup. The setting appears to be a casual dining spot.

The silent treatment is disrespectful, dehumanizing behavior, and it’s become far more common in scenarios where the majority of communication between two people takes place online. If you truly care about the other people in your life, then talk to them.

Text them. Email them. Send bitchy snapchats if you’re so upset that it’s the only way you can handle communication, but do something, anything to acknowledge that your friend (or partner) is, in fact, a human being who’s worthy of the most basic amount of human decency on your part.

If you can’t bring yourself to do that, ask yourself why you think you deserve to have these people in your life.

How would you feel if they treated you with this kind of behavior? Most of the people who have passive-aggressive tendencies would go absolutely ballistic if the other person treated them in the same manner… so what, exactly, makes it okay to treat someone else like that? Remember the whole adage to “treat others as you would like to be treated”?

Yeah. That one.

Finally…

A person with shoulder-length brown hair, wearing a denim shirt over a striped top and black pants, sits on a gray couch holding a smartphone. They gaze thoughtfully into the distance with a serious expression. The background is blurred with a hint of green wall.

Being introspective and honest with ourselves about our interpersonal skills (or lack thereof) can be really difficult, but it’s the only way that we can grow as people, and as friends/partners.

Those we care about will be a lot happier if we treat them with respect and courtesy, and communicating clearly and openly with others – even if that might make us a bit nervous at times – is a hallmark of a mature, healthy, respectful friendship/relationship.

Ultimately, we thrive best when we have great people in our lives, and if we can encompass all the positive traits we appreciate in other people, then those we care about thrive and are happy in turn.

Love. Respect. Communication. Honesty.

Make it so.