The Struggle to Find or Sustain a Relationship, Part 3: What Is/Is Not Healthy (LGBTQ+ Edition)

Part 3 of this series focuses on something many LGBTQ+ people never learned clearly: how to recognize what is not a healthy relationship.
Because when you grow up without safe models of queer love, it becomes easy to confuse intensity with connection, chaos with passion, and inconsistency with chemistry.

This article is not about perfection or judgment. It is about clarity.
Once you can name unhealthy patterns, you stop blaming yourself for what was never yours to carry.

Why certain unhealthy patterns feel familiar to LGBTQ+ people

Many queer people learned to desire in secret. Many learned to find connection while managing fear or shame. Some grew up in environments where emotional validation was inconsistent or conditional. These early experiences shape what feels comfortable, even when it is painful.

When you do not have models of safe same-sex or gender-diverse relationships, the nervous system fills in the gaps with what it already knows. This often creates an attraction to dynamics that are unpredictable, inconsistent, or intense, simply because they feel familiar.

Understanding these roots helps you see unhealthy patterns without blaming yourself for repeating them.

When avoidance and inconsistency get mistaken for passion

Passion is often misunderstood in queer dating. If your early experiences of attraction were tied to secrecy, risk, or hiding, your nervous system may associate uncertainty with desire. This makes hot and cold behavior feel exciting instead of unsafe.

Unhealthy signs to notice

• Warm one moment and distant the next

• Little vulnerability from your partner

• Connection only when it benefits them

• Emotional availability limited to intimacy or sex

These patterns create longing, not intimacy.

What healthy connection looks like

Steady communication. Emotional responsibility. Predictability. None of these are boring. They are the foundation of safety.

Over-functioning and self-abandonment

Queer people who grew up without reliable emotional support often learn to earn connection through caretaking or performance.
In relationships, this becomes over-functioning.

Unhealthy examples

• You initiate everything

• You do all the emotional labor

• You hide your needs out of fear

• You become who you think they want

This is not compatibility. It is self-erasure.

A healthier alternative

Relationships where both people contribute to emotional responsibility. Partners who ask about your needs, not just their own.

Hyper-criticism and subtle shame

Because many LGBTQ+ people grew up internalizing shame, criticism can feel normal. But criticism that targets your identity or expression is never normal.

Examples of identity-related criticism

• Judging your body or gender expression

• Negative comments about masculinity or femininity

• Comparing you to an idealized community stereotype

• Correcting your emotional expression

These patterns slowly shrink your sense of self.

What healthy behavior looks like

A partner who is curious instead of critical and affirming instead of corrective.

The truth about passion: why we crave it and why it is hard to maintain

Many queer adults have a deep, almost urgent need for passion. This is not shallow. It is psychological.

Why passion feels so important

1. Passion feels like evidence that desire is allowed
After years of hiding or suppressing attraction, passion feels validating.

2. Passion mirrors the intensity of early secrecy
Desire and risk were once connected. That emotional intensity remains familiar.

3. Passion feels like making up for lost time
If you missed early romantic experiences, passion can feel like compensation.

Why passion fades naturally

Research from Helen Fisher shows that early passion is fueled by novelty and unpredictability. Over time, the relationship shifts into attachment, which is stable and calm. The decline in intensity is not a sign of failure. It is biology.

What kills passion

• emotional distance

• unresolved conflict

• lack of novelty

• assuming effort should not be required

• stopping curiosity about each other

Passion declines when people stop exploring each other.

How to keep passion alive

Create shared novelty
-Activities that are new to both partners increase desire.

Maintain individuality
-Desire grows in the space between two people.

Allow space and reconnection
-Time apart and reunion create warmth.

Stay emotionally honest
-Desire thrives when two people feel seen.

Keep flirting alive
-Playfulness brings back early chemistry.

When passion becomes unhealthy

If passion relies on anxiety, longing, or emotional instability, it is not passion. It is survival chemistry.

Dysfunctional conflict patterns

Conflict is normal. Certain patterns are not.

Unhealthy conflict patterns

• shutting down every time

• blaming without accountability

• explosive reactions that control the conversation

• never addressing issues out of fear

These patterns do not allow relationships to grow.

Healthy relational conflict includes

Repair, responsibility, and willingness to stay connected in discomfort.

Identity-related harm specific to queer relationships

Some unhealthy behaviors show up more often in queer relationships.

Examples

• pressuring someone to be more or less out

• using their identity as an insult

• fetishizing or invalidating race, gender, or body type

• isolating someone from queer community

These behaviors fracture identity and trust.

Healthy alternatives

Partners who honor your identity, support your pace, and value your community ties.

Power imbalances disguised as compatibility

Power can show up through age, financial status, emotional maturity, or social influence.

Unhealthy signs

• one person makes all decisions

• your needs always come second

• emotional caretaking is expected but not reciprocal

• you feel punished for setting boundaries

Healthy power dynamics

Shared decision making, emotional accountability, and respect for boundaries.

When chaos feels like connection

Many queer adults learned to feel desire in unsafe environments. The body learned to confuse anxiety with attraction.

Unhealthy patterns

• uncertainty feels exciting

• relief feels like love

• reconciliation feels like proof of connection

• you bond through crisis more than stability

Healthy alternatives

Warmth, steadiness, and emotional availability.
Attraction that is not built on fear or guessing.

Closing: You deserve more than survival patterns

Queer people often learn connection through survival, not safety.
But survival is not where your relational story has to end.

A healthy relationship does not require shrinking, guessing, or tolerating harm. It does not rely on chaos to feel alive.

Healthy love supports your identity, honors your history, and helps you grow without abandoning yourself.
You deserve a relationship that does not punish your sensitivity, your identity, or your past.
You deserve connection that feels steady, warm, and sustainable.