With many people, hg, you don't see their dark side at all in the early stages of courtship and relationship. It doesn't come out and reveal itself at first...not until the relationship is well established. This isn't because they are consciously scheming to fool you...it's just the way the human ego instinctively works, that's all. It doesn't get around to revealing its nastier subconscious garbage until it figures it has already made it safely to home base.

This also happens quite a bit with marriages. I'll give you an example. I have a friend who married in his mid-20s after having had a very happy relationship with his girlfriend for several years. They got along well, the sex was apparently great, they had lots of fun together and everything was going fine. Then they got married. Much to my friend's astonishment, his partner suddenly ceased having any interest in sex or emotional closeness at all anymore (including on their marriage night). She became combative and negative and all the joy went out of their relationship.

Whatever her subconscious garbage was, it had succeeded in hiding itself very effectively until that marriage license was signed. Well, they stayed together in this loveless marriage for a number of years, but eventually divorced.

You may think it's easy to see a toxic personality from the getgo. It isn't.

Women and men both want to be loved. That's a given. Some, however, simply don't believe deep down that they really deserve to be loved or that they ever can be loved or that anyone else ever will love them. They don't think they're lovable! And they don't even believe it's love when they get it from someone, they think it's a strategy of some kind. That's where the problems are usually hiding...in their negative thinking about themselves and their trust issues with other people. Those problems generally go right back to early childhood experiences, I think.