What makes a relationship healthy?
Good relationships share certain characteristics, such as trust, openness, and mutual respect and acceptance. They all require certain skills, such as the ability to communicate and manage conflict effectively. In dating relationships and marriage, these skills are absolutely crucial.
You can develop and practice good relationship skills in your everyday contacts with parents, friends and classmates. You can also learn to evaluate your many relationships by studying the characteristics that make a relationship healthy.
Your skills and understanding will help you to recognize and build healthy dating relationships. It will also serve you well if and when you marry.
What is a healthy dating relationship?
Healthy relationships increase your energy for the things in your life. The relationship inspires you rather than drains you. A caring 
partner will motivate and support you rather than confine or control you.
In order to get into a healthy relationship, it's important to love and take care of yourself before and while you're in the relationship. It is never a good idea to get completely wrapped up in someone to the exclusion of your family and friends.
Self-confidence is very important in a relationship. A person who feels insecure may find it hard to trust, hard to be honest, and hard to manage conflict calmly. Give yourself time to develop a sense of who you are and why you are a uniquely valuable person before you get too deeply involved in a romantic relationship.
In a healthy dating relationship, each person has people who can support them. You should never feel that you have to hide what's going on in the relationship. You need people around you who are supportive.
There are two sides to trust — being able to demonstrate that you trust someone and being able to act in a trustworthy fashion.
Are you in a dating relationship? How healthy is it? What could you do to improve it? Should you reconsider it?
Relationships that have a lot of conflict or violence of any type (verbal, physical, emotional or sexual) are not healthy. If a little voice inside you is saying that something's not right in the relationship, listen! Talk with someone you trust, other than your boyfriend or girlfriend, about these concerns.
Friendship should be the basis of a romantic relationship. Choose that person carefully. Take time to pick someone you like, admire and respect.
