Toxicity

After what happened to me in 2012-2013, while I was mentally weak, I also became very guarded and also used to pride myself on how easily I could detect toxic energy and remove myself from a situation which would hurt me later on. This has slowly changed and for the past 2-3 years, I've been very forgiving and as I would call it, like a "doormat". I have let many people from my past back in my life and let them stay for longer than needed, because I feel bad about cutting people off. This is NOT what I pride myself on, because there are many days where I wish I could easily let toxic people go and not let my mental state be affected in any way. For the past 3 years, I've been talking to a person from my old school, but only recently did I begin seeing red flags. This individual was rude and had emotionally manipulated me every time I tried to remove myself from the friendship. If I ever brought up the fact that he was being rude and bitter about certain situations, he would blame me or have excuses such as "I've been going through this" ready at hand. I stayed in the friendship because I felt like it was good at times, but that could never outweigh the toxic energy I felt around him. Recently, I decided to cut off all ties with him and remove myself from any friendship we have now or may have in the future. Since I've done this, I have felt a weight lifted off my shoulder, but there is a big part of me who knows that I could have done this much earlier and not kept myself in a toxic situation that wasn't going to benefit me in any way.