Co-dependency is the clinical term for emotional subservience—where one partner’s identity, mood, and choices are wholly subordinate to the other’s. It is often mistaken for loyalty.

Stand up. Not to fight. Not to dominate. Just to remember that you, too, have a voice. “The opposite of subservience is not aggression. It is agency.”

The world will always ask you to bend. Sometimes, bending is wise. But to live on your knees—to internalize the lie that you are lesser—is to pay a price no one should have to pay.