Sophia sat across from her therapist, tears streaming down her face. “I just don’t understand how someone who claims to love me can treat me this way,” she whispered. Her story—a painful combination of subtle put-downs, dismissed feelings, and manipulated realities—is one shared by countless individuals across different relationship contexts.    Being mishandled in a relationship—whether romantic, familial, professional, or platonic—leaves lasting imprints on our sense of sel