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Sometimes you can’t quite put your finger on what is wrong with your relationship, and for that reason you decide there is nothing wrong. Not necessarily true. Here are 15 strange, subtle and seemingly unrelated signs that your man is toxic for your life.

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He spoils you

Every woman deserves to be spoiled occasionally. But if your man constantly showers you with gifts, begins inappropriately early (like after date #2) and spends tons of money on said gifts, he is probably in great fear of losing you. And that’s a lot of pressure to put on a woman. We easily succumb to guilt and we can feel when a man would be devastated by us leaving him, so we often stay in relationships we don’t want to be in.

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Every woman gets a little emotional sometimes. We all do things we’re not proud of as a girlfriend sometimes, so don’t worry that you’re one of the crazy ones if you cry over nothing occasionally, get a little jealous or a little needy. That’s normal. What’s not normal is trying to manipulate, control or dominate your boyfriend. You should always fight for what you deserve, but not for more than that. Which is what you’re doing, if you do the following:

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Intentionally making him jealous

If you want more attention from your man then you should either tell him he needs to step it up or you might need to have a talk with yourself. You could be ignoring the fact that you just might be insecure and so you unfairly make others fill your void of confidence by getting attention from other men. But someone else shouldn’t have to hurt because you’re hurting. Your man shouldn’t have to feel jealous because you feel insecure. If you need to work on your self-confidence, you need to do that work. You can’t make someone else feel like it is their fault because until you deal with said insecurity, he will never be able to provide you with all the attention you want.

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Females can be so soft, so accommodating, so understanding. It’s our charm, and our curse. We want to be the cushion our man rests his head on after a long day. We want to be the easiest part of his life, his support system and his unrelenting comfort. We want to be these things so much, that sometimes we forget about ourselves and our needs. For fear of being demanding, we can become a doormat. But never forget that, he should be all those wonderful things to you too—supporting, comforting, understanding. If you’re not getting what you need, admit it to yourself. Even if you understand why he can’t give it to you—even if you can come up with a dozen excuses for him, excuses don’t keep you warm at night.

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He couldn’t pay for me forever

It’s true—if you link up your lives, it’s just not sustainable for a man to pay for you every single time you get popcorn at the movies or a pack of gum on a road trip. He may even let you foot the bill on meals sometimes. But, paying for someone isn’t about covering somebody who couldn’t cover themselves. It’s about treating someone. And that is a concept that should never leave a relationship. If your man has gotten lazy about treating you, always expecting to just go Dutch on every single bill, even on romantic dinners, or just looking at you to foot the bill, don’t just make the excuse that he can’t pay for you forever. No, he doesn’t have to pay for you forever, or every single time. But, he should still occasionally be treating you.

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You have to be generous to have real love in your life. You need to be willing to change and compromise from time to time, but, it’s too easy (especially for women) to be the only one changing, compromising and giving for the relationship. It worse if you change so often and so much that you start to not realize it. And if you’re constantly in that type of relationship, you may have codependent tendencies. Here are some common signs of codependency:

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You never try to disagree
A major trait of a codependent person is a strong desire to avoid conflict, at all costs. You may think it’s no big deal when your partner says one little thing that you don’t agree with, but you swallow your words so as to avoid conflict. But, swallow your words enough and you’ve got a partner who thinks you agree with him on everything, and you’re not being yourself, all for the sake of being with somebody. It’s all right to have an opinion…and a backbone.

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Once you start to veer off the path of love—and I mean doing things because you genuinely and selflessly want the best for the other person—things can get confusing. You don’t trust your partner. Your partner doesn’t trust you. Suddenly, taking care of the relationship and taking care of yourself are two things that don’t coincide. That’s when your relationship is more about competition—about being the one who doesn’t get hurt, embarrassed, or screwed over—than about loving someone.

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“Why didn’t you tell me this before?” This is someone we wonder when a man reveals his little hidden secrets—which happen to be his big flaws—once we’re already in love with him. This is often the case with jealous men. They keep their jealousy under wraps until they know you’re too attached to them to leave them so easily. So, better to learn to recognize the jealous types before you’re attached and can’t run away fast enough from the crazy.

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Why doesn’t she just leave him?? We’ve all wondered this about a friend at some point. Perhaps our friends have wondered it about us.  But, a woman’s mind can be a complicated thing. And her apprehensions and thoughts about what life will be like without this man can feel as large and as real as an actual wall keeping her from exiting the relationship.

Here’s why we often stay in bad relationships…

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No relationship is perfect. There is a certain amount of arguing and sacrificing in every one. But, how much is too much? When has a relationship crossed over from functional to a little bumpy, to just plain toxic?

Here’s how you can tell..

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For many of us, the question is simple: “why doesn’t she just leave?” But, surrounding that clear notion that abuse is bad, is a whole cloud of other emotions and twisted logic that makes it hard for women in abusive relationships to focus on the only thing they need to know: there is no excuse for abuse.

Here is some of that “logic”:

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Here’s the thing about controlling men: they unfortunately have some nice qualities too, and those are the qualities you are going to fall for. They are probably the ones that the man will bring out the most while he is still trying to trap you into his…um…I mean, impress you.

By that time, you’re already attached to him. So when he begins telling you that you need to tell all your male friends that you can’t seem them anymore, or that he will suspect you’re cheating unless you give him the password to your email and phone, it’s too hard to walk away. You probably even tell yourself it’s because he cares about me SO much. Reality check: it’s because he is majorly insecure and rather than facing that fact, he turns his insecurities outwards onto you.

He’s not paranoid; you led him to feel like you were cheating, right? And, he isn’t the jealous type; all of your male friends are actually trying to sleep with you and break up your relationship, right? WRONG…

There are a few subtle signs to look out for on the first date that are pretty accurate indicators of whether or not a man will be controlling. If you see them, run.