No Excuse For Abuse

You may have seen this PSA air during the 2015 superbowl. I think it is an accurate depiction of the fear you feel when you are in an abusive relationship.

I prefer to keep the sharing of my own history to a minimum as this blog is about helping you. However, sometimes I feel it is necessary to validate my credibility towards certain subjects that I discuss.

I have been in two abusive relationships. One of these relationships included physical abuse, and one did not. Between the two relationships, I have spent 10 years of my life being abused.

The physically abusive relationship happened first. This made the strictly emotionally abusive relationship that much more confusing. I never considered it to be abusive because he never physically harmed me. However, the hands off abusive relationship had more of a psychological effect on me than the hands on abusive relationship did.

Abuse does not have to involve physically harming another person. Abuse can mean physical, psychological or both. Abusive tendencies are not only in one age, race, gender, or sexual identity. Abuse can occur anywhere and between anyone. 

Many people are in abusive relationships and don’t even realize it. The biggest sign that you are in an abusive relationship is fear of your partner. If you constantly have to walk on eggshells around them to avoid an explosion there is a good chance the relationship is unhealthy and abusive.

 

Awareness and education of emotional abuse is very important to me. If you are in a physically abusive relationship you are aware abuse is happening. If you are in an emotionally abusive relationship you may be unaware. If you are unaware you are being abused, it is causing you significant psychological damage. 

If you are living in an abusive relationship, you have very little respect for yourself. The first step toward gaining respect for yourself again is getting out of the unhealthy relationship.

If you think you may be in an abusive relationship please seek help. You don’t have to do this alone and there is somewhere to go. You owe it to yourself to live a happy and healthy life. After all, you only get one.

There is NO excuse for abuse. Please visit http://nomore.org/ or my page of resources to see what you can do to help end domestic violence and sexual assault.

It is my hope that you all are in happy and healthy relationships. I think it is only natural for humans to pair off. I am simply sharing all of this in case someone reading this is in a situation I was once in. I was lucky enough to be educated on domestic violence without seeking it, and now so are you.

The following Power and Control Wheel is widely used in the world of domestic violence. There are several variations, but they are all very similar. The wheel is to be used as a tool to help in identifying abusive actions and behaviors.

{photo credit: noemibetancourt.wordpress.com, video credit:Wall Street Journal}