It wasn't that long ago that I had a seemingly great best friend. She was great at first. But then as time went by I slowly began to realize how toxic it was for me to continue to be around her. For anyone else who may be concerned that they might be on a sinking ship like I was here are seven of the red flags that I noticed in my own experience.

1. She cannot stand to not be with you.

It was rare that I ever had any time to myself when I had to live with her. She had to know and be involved in literally every facet of my life. I genuinely believe that she self-appointed herself as my keeper or whatever you want to call it. I was not permitted to have anything outside of her or there would a hell of a guilt trip that would follow. She was flat out obsessed. I couldn't even ride the bus to school without being made to feel as though I was this cruel monster for making her drive to school all alone. I should have been able to ride the bus and not be made to feel bad about it, right?

2. She constantly makes you feel as though you owe her.

For a little over s year I lived with this so called "best friend". I had nowhere else to go and I genuinely appreciated that her family let me stay there. However, I did not appreciate being made to feel as though my world needed to revolve around them and what they wanted me to do. Best friends just don't do that ti each other. No matter what. Or so I thought.

3. Your interests all of a sudden become their interests.

Okay, so don't get me wrong here. There is nothing the matter with having a friend and then you get to know some of the things they like and what they enjoy doing. You may even find tat you like doing some of the same things. However, it becomes a problem when someone is taking on so many of your interests, that it becomes apparent that they have absolutely no sense of who they are and so they try to take after you. It's not okay for a friend to want to like everything that you like. That's not healthy.

4. They ask you to lie for them. A lot.

My so called best friend din't exactly have the best relationship with her mother. Although they both tried to keep that public image up of what a happy perfect family they were. It didn't take me long at all to figure out what was real and what was all just an act. My then best friend would tell me in confidence that she felt that all of her struggles with her mental health were because of how controlling and overbearing her mother was. But whenever her mom would ask her or I what the problem was not only did my then best friend lie but I was also expected to lie for her, too. Looking back on it now, there is just know way her mother couldn't have known the part she played in my so called best friends issues. But I guess that was just another part of her fake act she put on.

5. They body shame you.

My so called best friend was always making me feel ashamed for how tiny I was. Not only that, she was constantly making comments about how I had "such tiny little boobs" like having small boobs was such a bad thing. I cannot even begin to explain how badly that destroyed my self esteem. I never made negative comments about her body, so why did she feel it was okay to do that to me? Yet another component of the toxicity she brought into my life, I guess.

6. They don't allow you to make any other friends outside of them.

Since I lived with my so called best friend that especially made it hard to develop other friendships outside of her. But not only did she control my home life she controlled my school life too. Unless she already knew the person and had a friendship with them too, she would make me feel like such shit for spending time with anyone else. Not to mention, when I was able to find a guy that I eventually started dating she had to be a part of every single one of our dates. Needless to say, that b.s. got old real fast.

7. They invade your privacy.

I purposely saved this one for last simply because this was the main one that I had a problem with. Not to mention, her mother was apart of this, too. It started off with my so called best friend reading my journal. I used that journal as a way to vent and get things off of my chest and I of course had a few things to say about this so called best friend. Not only did she go crying to her mother, but her mother even had the audacity to tell me that I need to cover up all of the parts in which I said anything even remotely bad about this so called best friend. What made them think they had any jurisdiction over what I could write in MY journal? Furthermore, this so called best friend hacked my Facebook account as well along with her mother. I will never forget coming back from work and having them tell me that I needed to block my stepdad on Facebook because they saw that I hadn't. I was completely disgusted with them at that point.

All in all, once I was able to remove this toxic best friend and her toxic family my life immediately got better! For the first time I felt as though I could be my true self and I din't need to be fearful or paranoid about anyone invading my privacy. However, I am happy that they were in my life for that period of time because without them I wouldn't have learned how a family is not supposed to be and I wouldn't have learned what a best friend is NOT.