abuse – Page 2 – Real Social Skills

Not being believed

June 17, 2015June 21, 2021 Real Social Skills

Content note: This is a post about ABA, and not being believed about the harm ABA does.

A reader asked:

People don’t believe me when I say I was a victim to ABA abuse, not even my parents.

I was misgendered routinely, I could not drink water even though this was harmless and was often asked to write my name even though this was effectively pointless.

How should I convince people I was really abused?

Am I just whining and should I “get over it” because that’s not “real abuse” and I’m not autistic?

realsocialskills said:

It’s not your fault that therapists hurt you. It’s not your fault that people don’t believe you. What people did to you matters, even if no one believes you.

ABA is degrading on a level that it can be very hard to recover from or even describe. The basic methodology of ABA is finding out what you care about most and using it to get compliance with arbitrary demands.

I’ve written some here and here and here about the kind of damage that does, and that’s only scratching the surface.

Increasingly, one of the things behavior therapists demand is that you pretend that they’re not controlling you. They often go so far as to demand that you act like you like what’s happening and believe that it’s both necessary and enjoyable. And they do that even as they make you do obviously pointless things (like writing your name over and over), and even as they do obviously awful things to you (like denying you water and misgendering you).

That kind of thing can mess with your mind really badly, especially when you’re surrounded by people who don’t believe you.

It’s not your fault that people don’t believe you. They can refuse to acknowledge what people did to you; you can’t make it go away. It matters even if no one around you cares.

You will probably always have to deal with people who don’t believe you. Most people are reluctant to believe that therapists ever hurt people in ways that matter, and ABA has a particularly effective publicity machine. Some people will say that you’re whining, that you’re lying, and that the things you’ve described don’t happen. They’re wrong. It matters that people hurt you in the name of helping you. It’s horrible that people who you should be able to trust don’t believe you.

Some of them may eventually come to understand. Sometimes people come around, in the long term. But you don’t have to wait for that in order to be ok, you don’t have to explain it to them if you don’t want to, and what happened to you matters whether or not people believe you.

Also… You are not alone. What happened to you shouldn’t happen to anyone. There is a community of people who know that it’s wrong to treat people that way. Making connections with people who believe you might help a lot.

It’s much easier to hold on to your perspective if you’re not doing it alone. This is hard. It’s also possible. You’re ok.

Short version: Abuse matters even if no one believes you. That said, making connections with people who believe you can help a lot. You are not alone, even if really important people in your life don’t believe you.

ABA therapy is not like typical parenting

June 1, 2015June 21, 2021 Real Social Skills

Content note: This post is about the difference between intense behavior therapy and more typical forms of rewards and punishments used with typically developing children. It contains graphic examples of behavior programs, and is highly likely to be triggering to ABA survivors.

A reader asked:

I just read your thing about people with disabilities and their interests. Don’t people do the same thing to typical children? Restrict access to things enjoyed until act ABC is completed? For example, growing up, I was only allowed to watch tv for 1 hour a day IF I finished all of my homework and schoolwork related things first.

realsocialskills said:

It’s not the same (although it has similar elements and I’m not a huge fan of the extent to which behavior modification techniques are used with typically developing children either.)

Here’s the difference: Most children actually should do their homework, and most children have interests other than television. Typically developing children are allowed to be interested in things, and supported in pursuing interests without them becoming behavior modification tools.

(Another difference: intense behavior modification is used on adults with developmental disabilities in a way that would be considered a human rights violation if done to typically developing adults.)

Using behavior modification tools for one or two things in a child’s life isn’t the same as doing it with everything in someone’s life. Intense behavior therapy is a violation on a level that it’s hard to describe.

Intense behavior therapy of the type I’m talking about typically involves:

Being surrounded by people who think that you’re broken, that all of your natural behavior is unacceptable, and that you need to be made to look normal in order to have any hope of a decent future
Having completely harmless things you do pathologized and modified (eg: having hand flapping or discussing your interests described as “a barrier to inclusion”)
Having those things conflated with things you do that actually *are* a problem. (eg: calling both head banging and hand flapping “sensory seeking behavior” and using the same reinforcers to eliminate both)
Being forced to stop doing things that are very important to you, by people who think that they are pointless and disgusting or “nonfunctional” (eg: using quotes from TV shows to communicate)
Being forced to do things that are completely arbitrary, over and over (eg: touching your nose or putting a blue ball in a red box)
Being forced to do things that are harmful to you, over and over (eg: maintaining eye contact even though it hurts and interferes with your ability to process information)
Having everything you care about being taken away and used to get compliance with your behavior program (eg: not being permitted to keep any of your toys in your room)

(Behavior therapy often also involves legitimate goals. That doesn’t make the methods acceptable, nor does it make the routine inclusion of illegitimate goals irrelevant.)

Here’s an explicit instruction from a behavior expert on how to figure out which reinforcers to use for autistic children:

Don’t assume that you know what a child with ASD likes. It is important to ask a child, observe a child or perform a preference assessment. When asking a child about reinforcers, remember that multiple reinforcement inventories can be found on the Internet.

You can also simply sit down with a child and ask them questions like “What do you like to do after school?” or “What’s your favorite food?”or “What toys do you like to play with?”

When observing a child, set up a controlled environment to include three distinct areas: food, toys, and sensory. Then allow the child somewhat free access to this environment.

Watch and record the area that the child goes to first. Record the specific items from this area that the child chooses. This item should be considered highly reinforcing to the child.

Continue this process until you have identified three to five items. Remember that simply looking at an item does not make it reinforcing, but actually playing with it or eating it would.

Notice how it doesn’t say anything about ethics, or about what it is and isn’t ok to restrict access to. This is about identifying what a child likes most, so that it can be taken away and used to get them to comply with a therapy program. (Here’s an example of a reinforcement inventory. Notice that some examples of possible reinforcers are: numbers, letters, and being read to).

People who are subjected to this kind of thing learn that it’s not safe to share interests, because they will be used against them. That’s why, if someone has a developmental disability, asking about interests is often an intimate personal question.

This isn’t like being required to do your homework before you’re allowed to watch TV.

It’s more like:

Not being allowed to go to the weekly meeting of the science club unless you’ve refrained from complaining about the difficulty of your English homework for the past week

Or, even further:

Not being allowed to join after school clubs because you’re required to have daily after school sessions of behavior therapy during that time
In those sessions, you’re required to practice making eye contact
And also required to practice talking about socially expected topics of conversation for people of your age and gender, so that you will fit in and make friends
You’re not allowed to talk about science or anything else you’re actually interested in
You earn tokens for complying with the therapy
If you earn enough tokens, you can occasionally cash them in for a science book
That’s the only way you ever get access to science books

Or even further:

Being a 15 year old interested in writing and:

Being in self-contained special ed on the grounds that you’re autistic, your speech is atypical, and you were physically aggressive when you were eleven
Having “readiness for inclusion” as a justification for your behavior plan
Having general education English class being used as a reinforcer for your behavior plan
Not being allowed to go to English class in the afternoon unless you’ve ~met your behavior targets~ in the morning
Not being allowed to write in the afternoon if you haven’t “earned” the “privilege” of going to class
eg: if you ask questions too often in the morning, you’re “talking out of turn” and not allowed to go to class or write in the afternoon
or if you move too much, you’re “having behaviors that interfere with inclusion”, and not allowed to go to class or write
or if you mention writing during your social skills lesson, you’re “perseverating” and not allowed to go to class or write

Or like: being four years old and not being allowed to have your teddy bear at bedtime unless you’ve earned 50 tokens and not lost them, and:

The only way to earn tokens is by playing in socially expected ways that are extremely dull to you, like:
Making pretend food in the play kitchen and offering it to adults with a smile, even though you have zero interest in doing so
You gain tokens for complying with adult instructions to hug them, touch your nose, or say arbitrary words within three seconds; you lose two for refusing or not doing so fast enough
You lose tokens for flapping your hands or lining up toys
You lose tokens for talking about your teddy bear or asking for it when you haven’t “earned” it
You lose tokens for looking upset or bored

Or, things like being two, and loving books, and:

Only having access to books during therapy sessions; never being allowed unscripted access to books
Adults read to you only when you’re complying with therapy instructions
They only read when you’ve pointed to a picture of a book to request it
You’re required to sit in a specific position during reading sessions. If you move out of it; the adult stops reading
If you rock back and forth; they stop reading
If you stop looking at the page; they stop reading
If you look at your hand; they stop reading
Adults interrupt the story to tell you to do arbitrary things like touch a picture or repeat a particular word. If you don’t; they close the book and stop reading.

Here are a few posts that show examples of the kind of thing I’m talking about:

Would you accept this behavior towards a non-autistic child? (A post by an augmentative and alternative communication specialist about common problems she observes in the way behavior therapists treat children)
Quiet Hands (an autistic person’s description of an incredibly common violation in ABA therapy, as she has experienced and observed being done to others)
A post by a JRC survivor with a scan of their treatment plan (the means used to achieve these objectives are somewhat uncommon these days, the target behaviors to be modified are not)
Teaching Children With Autism To Play (a post by a behavior therapist describing how to make your autistic child play in the ways stereotypically expected by children, and to look typical while they do so)
Behavior Week: Sensory Behaviors (instructions on how to use positive reinforcement to stop children from doing harmless things like waving their hands in front of their eyes, on the grounds that it “limits opportunities for inclusion”)
Evidence-based behavioral interventions for repetitive behaviors in autism (an academic paper taking for granted that it is important to stop autistic people from stimming, even though it’s widely agreed among autistic people that stimming serves an important function)

Short version: Intense behavior therapy has some things in common with methods that are used with typically developing kids, but it’s not actually the same. Intense behavior therapy involves violation and a degree of control that is not considered legitimate with typically developing children.

A behavior modification aftermath

May 31, 2015June 10, 2021 Real Social Skills

Content note: This post is written with parents and professionals in mind. It’s about a common way that rewards-based behavior modification hurts people, and the importance of being aware of that effect in work with people who might be ABA survivors.

I’ve seen a lot of well-meaning people who are trying to fix special education and adult disability services say things like “you have to find out what they’re interested in and incorporate it.”

This can be good advice. It’s also important to realize that this is loaded, and that not all disabled people are going to be willing or able to show you what they’re interested in.

For people with disabilities, “what do you like?” can be a deeply intimate personal question. It can be very dangerous to let people know what you are interested in.

Autistic people (and others with intellectual and developmental disabilities) are often subjected to intense behavior modification. This is often aimed at silencing them, getting them to pretend to be non-autistic, or otherwise change in ways that deny fundamental things about who they are.

You have to take some pretty extreme methods to get someone to comply with that kind of behavior program. One traditional way is to use painful punishment like starvation and electric shock. These days, that’s considered distasteful, and most therapists prefer to use positive methods.

In practice, what that often means is that anything a disabled person expresses interest in will be taken away and used as a reinforcer for a behavior plan. The more they care about something, the more their access to it will be contingent with compliance with what powerful people in their life want.

Even if the thing they care about is something like math. Or books. Or access to fresh air. Or their teddy bear.

People subjected to this kind of thing learn quickly that when they express interest in something, it will probably be taken away.

And beyond that, they learn that when people know what you care about, they will use it to manipulate you into doing awful things to yourself. In many cases, this includes being manipulated into maintaining a grateful affect and praising the therapist.

When people have experienced this type of violation, sharing their interests with anyone is a big risk. Particularly if that person has power over them. Particularly if that person is a member of a professional culture that largely approves of what was done to them. (And if you’re a teacher, therapist, direct support professional, or similar, you have power over them and your professional culture approves of misusing it.)

It’s important to keep in mind that people you work with have every reason to believe that it is dangerous to tell you what they care about. They don’t know what you will do with that information, and have every reason to believe that you will use it against them. (Or that information they give you will get back to people who will do so.) It might take a long time before some people are willing to share their interests. Some people may never trust you. The way you teach and offer support needs to take this into account.

Short version: It’s important to be aware of the loaded nature of asking disabled people to express interest in things. It’s important to make space to incorporate interests; it’s also important to allow people to keep their interests private.

Being seen as “manipulative”

April 17, 2015June 21, 2021 Real Social Skills

A reader asked:

Hey! I was wondering what you think about adults thinking of neuroatypical kids as “manipulative,” “charming,” etc. surely not everyone who says that is wrong, but it can’t be a coincidence that it’s usually said about neuroatypical kids?

realsocialskills said:

I think that people jump to that conclusion really quickly with disabled kids. “Manipulative” can kind of become a catch-all category for ways to delegitimize a kid’s interests, opinions, and self-advocacy.

Manipulative often translates as meaning things like:

“She resists doing what I tell her to do, and tries to distract me so I’ll let her do something else”
(without reference to what it is they’re telling her to do, why she doesn’t want to do it, and what she does want to do)
(Sometimes this means that she is 12 years old, and she’s resisting doing a preschool curriculum worksheet for the zillionth time)

Or this:

“He keeps trying to say things I don’t want to hear, and to convince me that what he’s saying is important even though I keep telling him it isn’t.”
(Without reference to what he’s saying, why it matters to him, or why it’s so unreasonable for them to listen to him about it)
(Sometimes this means that he’s in pain, and trying hard to tell them and get it to stop, but they don’t believe him or don’t care if he’s hurting.)

Or this:

“Other people sometimes believe her about things when I tell them she’s lying”, or
“Other people ask for her side of the story even after I’ve told them mine.”
(And expecting you to believe the adult automatically that it’s unreasonable to ever believe anything the kid says)
(Sometimes this means that they’re hitting her when no one who cares is looking, and they’re afraid that she might eventually convince someone with power that they’re doing something wrong.)

Charming can also mean “other people like this person more than I do, and more than I think they deserve”.

That said, being manipulative in a bad way is a real thing, and people with disabilities are just as capable of being manipulative as anyone else is.

Being manipulative in the bad sense involves doing things like:

Having highly developed skill at getting other people to like them and want their approval
Using that skill to ride roughshod over people’s boundaries
And/or get them to do things that they don’t want to do or shouldn’t do
Convincing people they want to manipulate that they are friends, and not actually reciprocating friendship in a meaningful way

Sometimes people with disabilities are manipulative. More often, they are manipulated. (For instance, adults often have nondisabled kids volunteer to pretend to be the friends of disabled kids. This usually results in the disabled kids being manipulated in really degrading ways and misled about what friendship is.)

Short version: Being manipulative is a real thing, but disabled kids are accused of it far more often than they are guilty of it. When a disabled kid is called manipulative, it often means that someone is objecting to their entirely justified attempts to get control over their life. (Which would be seen as normal and acceptable in a nondisabled person their age.)

Disability doesn’t make it ok to be creepy

February 5, 2015June 21, 2021 Real Social Skills

Content warning: This post is about sexual creepiness, sexual assault, and using disability as an excuse to violate boundaries. Proceed with caution.

A reader asked:

How do you call out a disabled person who is saying they should get to do creepy or mean things because of their disability, without being ableist yourself? I know a guy in a wheelchair who will grope and touch women when they sit down next to him, and he has done this to me. And he’ll say things like, “Come on, I’m in a wheelchair.” if you try to move or act uncomfortable. And he says because most women aren’t nice to him, he should get to know a female’s touch.

realsocialskills said:

This guy is using other people’s desire to be good people as a weapon to get away with groping women. That is not something you need to have any tolerance for whatsoever. He’s doing something awful and he knows exactly what he’s doing. He’s violating people and then manipulating them into feeling like bad people for objecting. That’s a horrible thing to do.

And it seems like it’s working, given that you’re concerned that you might be wrong to tell him to stop, or that you might have to be very careful about how you do it.

This dude is groping people and telling them off for objecting. There are absolutely no circumstances under which that is an ok thing to do, and you don’t owe him a pass on it just because he’s marginalized by ableism. That’s the most important thing about this situation. It’s absolutely ok and important to insist that he knock it off.

It’s not ok to grope people. Being lonely doesn’t make it ok to grope people. Being marginalized and desexualized doesn’t make it ok to grope people. People with disabilities are often seen as non-adult and therefore nonsexual, and that’s a horrible thing to experience. That doesn’t mean that others owe them sex, and it doesn’t give them the right to grope people. The only thing that makes it ok to touch another person in a sexual way is consent.

It’s ok to insist that this dude stop groping people even if you have some ableist attitudes towards him (You probably do. Most people, including people with disabilities, have some ableist attitudes, and most people are more ableist towards people they have good reason to dislike.) You don’t have to wait to be perfectly free of all bigotry before you’re allowed to decide who you do and don’t want touching you in a sexual way.

If you want to tell this dude to stop groping people, I think the best way is to just completely refuse to engage with any of the excuses he’s making. The overriding issue here is that he’s violating people in a sexual way. It’s not ok for him to do that, and it’s not ok for him to tell people they’re wronging him by objecting. It’s better not to let him change the subject to ableism when you’re telling him to stop groping people.

I’m sorry you’re having to face this situation. He shouldn’t be acting this way.

Abuse doesn’t always go in cycles

January 28, 2015June 21, 2021 Real Social Skills

Content note: This post contains graphic descriptions of emotional abuse and mentions physical abuse. Proceed with caution.

Often people describe abuse as occurring primarily in cycles (including specifically with the pronouns this way):

He is effusively loving
Then, he resents her being a separate person from him
Tension builds up
He explodes and hits her
Then he’s all ~remorseful~ and swears he’ll never do it again
Then he is effusively loving again
and the cycle continues

That’s definitely a real thing. But it’s not the only pattern (and even when it is, it happens in gender configurations other than male abusers and female victims, and it’s not always between romantic partners.) There are many, many patterns of abuse and they’re not all discussed very much.

Here’s another pattern (not the only other pattern):

The abusive person will be demeaning and effusively loving at the same time
They will do something degrading and something genuinely positive simultaneously
There won’t be a discernible cyclical pattern because both parts happen at the same time
This can be very, very disorienting to the victim, who might be tricked into seeing their abuser as loving, considerate, and insightful, and themself as not living up to their abuser’s love

eg:

Daniel: I love you so much. I brought you your favorite flowers. Not everyone would be so understanding of your irrational need for flowers.
Daniel hugs Debra
Debra hugs back
Debra feels awful about herself, and feels good about Daniel

or:

Susan: Hey, the fair’s in town. Let’s go!
Susan: I made you a jacket to wear.
Bill: That’s beautiful! Thank you!
They drive to the fair, and it’s warm out, so Bill decides to leave the jacket in the car
Susan: Where’s your jacket? Don’t you know that it hurts my feelings when you reject my gifts? I just wanted to have a nice time with you.
Susan: I guess it’s not your fault. I know you’ve never been in a successful relationship before. We all have stuff to work on.
Bill then tearfully apologizes and promises to work on it.

Short version: If someone is hurting you and it doesn’t seem to be happening in cycles, you are not alone. Abuse doesn’t always happen in a cycle of overt abuse and effusive love. Sometimes abuse is more mixed and constant. Scroll up for one example of a different pattern.

When joking teasing is a trigger

January 3, 2015June 21, 2021 Real Social Skills

A reader asked:

Having grown up with abuse, and having been in an abusive relationship after that, I have a lot of trouble dealing with “normal” teasing. I was used to being accused of all kinds of terrible things out of the blue. So if, for example, I accidentally take something that belongs to someone else, and they say, “Haha, you just wanted it for yourself!” I want to cry and beg forgiveness. I’m terrified and I can’t laugh. I feel I can’t ask people not to tease me, but I don’t know how to deal with it.

realsocialskills said:

It’s ok to be bothered by this, and it’s ok to tell your friends not to tease you.

Playful teasing is only friendly if everyone likes it. A lot of people don’t like it, and a lot of people don’t do it. It’s entirely possible to be friends without insulting or teasing one another. If someone teases someone who they know hates it, that’s not a joke anymore, it’s just being mean. It’s not ok to be mean to other people for fun.

It’s ok to say “I don’t like jokes like that; please don’t say things like that to me.” You don’t have to explain in order for it to be ok to tell people to stop teasing you. Continuing to do stuff like that is already a jerk move, even if people don’t know your history. Not liking it is a good enough reason.

It’s also ok if you do want to disclose (and for some people, it might make it more likely that they’ll take it seriously and realize how important it is not to make jokes like that with you). But you don’t have to disclose in order for it to be legitimate to insist that people stop. If you do want to disclose, it’s usually better if it’s not in the heat of the moment, but when you’re relatively calm.

Most people don’t want to say intentionally hurtful things to their friends. Some people realize that some people find playful teasing hurtful, and will readily stop if you tell them you don’t like it. Some people don’t understand that some people don’t like it, and will probably have to be reminded several times before they take it seriously. Some people are mean and will keep saying things like that to you even after you say to stop, and some people might even start saying them more because they think it’s funny that it bothers you. Part of the solution to this might be to make sure you’re hanging out with people who care about treating you well, as much as possible. Having friends who are kind makes life a lot better on a number of levels.

A possible script for disclosing:

“Hey, I know you weren’t intending it but playful teasing and joke insults really scare me. Too many people in my life have accused me of ludicrous things in order to hurt me, so I have trouble telling when it’s a joke and I tend to freak out. Can you please not say things like that to me?”

Another possibility: finding ways to tell whether they mean it or not:

Think about the person you’re with, and what’s likely to be their intention:

How well do you know the person you’re with?
Have you seen them joke insult people before?
Have you seen them actually aggressively accuse people of ludicrous things out of the blue?
If you’ve seen them tease people in a way intended to be friendly and haven’t seen them make horrible baseless accusations out of the blue, they’re probably not trying to hurt you
That doesn’t make it ok, and it doesn’t mean you’re wrong to object
But it does mean that they’re probably not trying to hurt you, and you’re probably not in any danger

Look at body language:

This isn’t possible for some people who get scared in this situation, but it can work for some people
Look at their face: Does it have an angry expression, or do they look happy?
Look at their hands: Are they held in a way that looks angry or violent, or do they look like they’re just socializing?
Think about their tone of voice: Did they sound mad? Was their voice raised? Or are they talking in a tone that seems more friendly?
(Many people have a specific tone of voice that they only use for teasing or joke insults)
Are they looking at you in a way that’s demanding an answer?
If their body language and tone of voice doesn’t seem aggressive, they probably didn’t mean the words they said aggressively either.

Check how other people are reacting:

Do other people seem to notice the offense you’ve supposedly committed, or are they continuing the conversation they were already having?
Does anyone look mad, or do they just look like people socializing?
Have other people in the group stopped what they’re doing to look at you, or are they continuing as they were?
If other people in the group don’t look mad, or don’t look much interested, the teasing was probably meant as a joke rather than a serious insult or accusation

Another possibility: using a standard script to create some distance:

It can help to immediately change the subject when someone says something like that
If they were just joking around, they will likely be receptive to the subject change
Changing the subject can show you that you are safe and not under attack
It can be hard to find words in the moment to change the subject
It might help to memorize some subject-changing scripts and use standard ones every time this happens
Then you won’t have to think of something to say in the moment while you are freaking out
Which scripts are most effective will depend on you and your group
(This post on deflecting fight-pickers has a lot of subject-change scripts.)
You can also change the subject back to what people were talking about before
Eg: “So, you were saying about the cats we’re all here to talk about? What do you think about the fluffy ones? I see your point about their hair getting matted easily, but they’re so pretty and soft.”

Another possibility: asking what they meant:

Sometimes you can defuse fear by asking people whether they mean it
ie: “Do you really think I was just trying to take it for myself?”
This can be awkward, but it can also be effective
Whether or not it’s a good idea depends on your friend groups
Some people might get offended and sarcastically say yes, of course they think that.
If you can’t read sarcasm when you’re scared, this might backfire
But when it works, it can work really well

It would probably also be a good idea to work on having perspective when other people are angry at you. Your friends and people close to you will be angry at you sometimes. That doesn’t always mean that you’re in danger or that they are going to hurt you. It also doesn’t always mean that you have done something wrong. Finding anger more bearable will help you in a lot of aspects of your life, including when people tease you. If anger is less terrifying, teasing will also be less terrifying.

Short version: Teasing is only friendly if everyone likes it. Doing it to people who don’t like it is mean. It’s ok not to want to be teased or insulted, even as a joke. It’s ok to ask people to stop. Some people will take that request seriously and some won’t. (Everyone should, but not everyone does). If teasing scares you because you have trouble telling the difference between real insults and joke insults, there are things you can learn to look for that make it easier to tell the difference. It also helps to learn how to keep perspective in the face of other people’s anger. Scroll up for some more concrete information.

Red flag for being taken advantage of

December 28, 2014June 21, 2021 Real Social Skills

A reader asked:

I’ve had an issue in my life with people who take advantage of me, and only recently have I been able to start recognizing a few of the red flags of that. Stuff like: You always end up paying more than (or getting less than) your fair share if you go out with them, they pressure you into doing stuff you can’t afford, etc. I think it’s wrapped up in emotional abuse, but I’m bad at seeing it. Are you better at recognizing red flags that you’re being taken advantage of, and if so, what are they?

realsocialskills said:

I think the biggest thing to watch out for is what happens when you don’t want to do something, get angry, or try to say no:

Is there ever a polite way to say no to something, or do you always have to either do what they want or be rude?
Is “I can’t afford that” something they are willing to take for an answer without arguing or guilt-tripping?
If you’re angry about something, do you always end up apologizing for being angry/blowing something out of proportion/etc, or do people sometimes agree that you have a point and apologize to you? (If only one of those things ever happens, that’s a problem).

If there’s a pattern where you have to be rude in order to say no, something is really wrong. Some people manipulate the rules of politeness to stop people from having boundaries or saying no to them. Some people are really good at making you feel like you’ve done something wrong every time you say no to something.

If things are going well in a friendship, everyone involved will say no from time to time. Everyone will get annoyed from time to time. Everyone will have inconvenient preferences from time to time, and everyone will compromise to accommodate the others from time to time. If you’re the only one compromising, something’s going wrong. If you’re always doing what others want even if it makes you really uncomfortable or hurts you, something’s wrong. If you’re not able to express feelings or say no, something’s wrong.

The thing going wrong might not be that people are taking advantage of you. There are other possibilities. For instance, some people are trained in childhood to never say no, and it can be hard to learn as an adult that you don’t have to want what others want, that it’s ok to say no, and that friendship involves compromises in both directions. If you haven’t learned that, it might be hard to communicate and negotiate, even if no one is intentionally taking advantage of you. That said, all of this is a major red flag for people taking advantage, and it’s worth taking the possibility very, very seriously. (And both problems can be happening at once – manipulative people usually prey on people who already have trouble asserting boundaries.)

And in any case – if you’re not ok with what’s happening, that’s a problem that matters, because it matters what you want and what your boundaries are. If you’re not ok with what’s happening, then the situation is not ok. You’re allowed to have boundaries whether or not anyone is wronging you.