Abusive relationships effects

Effects of Emotional Abuse on Your Brain, Relationships, and Health

Emotional abuse is often harder to recognize than other forms of abuse, but its effects can be just as profound. Healing is possible.

Emotional abuse involves a broad range of tactics, including shaming and gaslighting, which are meant to leave you feeling powerless, hopeless, and less.

In some cases, the signs of emotional abuse are so subtle that you might not be sure you’re on the receiving end.

Depending on the types of emotional abuse and how long you’ve been dealing with these behaviors, you might experience different effects on your emotional, physical, and mental health.

Some people experience emotional abuse over many years, such as during childhood or the course of a romantic relationship.

But you can also experience more acute or short-term instances of emotional abuse, such as a casual exchange with a stranger or interactions with colleagues or friends.

You might be more likely to experience both long- and short-term impacts of emotional abuse if you’ve dealt with these behaviors for many years as a child or an adult.

But abuse can affect you even if you experience it once.

Even if you’re not aware of the abusive behaviors or you feel they don’t affect you, they’re still abusive if that was the intention.

Short-term effects of emotional abuse

isolation and loneliness
self-doubt
shame
confusion
low self-esteem
fear when interacting with others
avoidance of activities related to the incident
feelings of powerlessness

Long-term effects of emotional abuse

mental health conditions
neuroticism, or the tendency toward low mood and negative emotions like anger
chronic stress
physical health challenges like body aches and heart palpitations
attachment challenges
emotional disconnect or apathy

What are the effects of emotional abuse in children?

Children who experience emotional abuse may go through some of these effects:

Behavioral changes. Children may appear to “act out,” show signs of attention deficity hyperactivity disorder (ADHD), and sometimes become abusive toward other children. Self-harm and suicidal thoughts can also be effects of emotional abuse on a child.
Emotional development. Children who experience emotional abuse might have more difficulty managing their responses to difficult emotions. They may also seem less emotionally mature than their peers, as abuse could make it harder to grow a trusting relationship with their own emotions.
Maladaptive coping. Research from 2014 highlights how childhood emotional abuse can lead to the development of unhelpful ways of coping in women who have experienced it. For example, it can lead to numbing or disconnecting from emotions. Other kids may resort to fantasy and imagination, leading to avoidant behaviors and isolation over time.

Long-term emotional abuse can potentially impact your brain, especially if the abuse happened during childhood when the brain is still developing.

These are some of the ways research suggests emotional abuse can impact your brain:

Emotional understanding and empathy. Early emotional abuse could cause changes to the hippocampus that make it harder to empathize with the emotions of others.
Self-awareness. Emotional abuse is linked to thinning of certain areas of the brain that help you manage emotions and be self-aware — especially the prefrontal cortex and temporal lobe.
Epigenetic changes and depression. Research from 2018 has connected childhood abuse to epigenetic brain changes that may cause depression. Epigenetic refers to how your environment and behaviors affect your genes. In particular, the study found changes to certain genes in the hypothalamic-pituitary-adrenal (HPA) axis, which is an area of the brain that’s involved in the stress response.

If you’ve experienced emotional abuse for a while, you might inadvertently think these behaviors are to be expected from partners, family, or friends.

Chronic emotional abuse could affect how you see yourself in relationships and your tolerance toward certain behaviors.

You might experience some of the following effects:

Codependency. Long-term emotional abuse can make you feel as if your needs don’t matter as much as everyone else’s. This can lead to codependent behaviors or ignoring your own needs and boundaries. You might also engage in people-pleasing behaviors or tend to establish relationships with abusive partners.
Fear of abandonment. If emotional distance was used as a manipulation tactic, you might feel high levels of stress or abandonment anxiety in your relationships. This could manifest as a behavior sometimes labeled “clinginess” that’s often rooted in a deep fear of losing your support system.
Trust challenges. Past emotional abuse can make it harder for you to trust even a supportive, compassionate partner. When you’ve been let down in the past, it can take courage and vulnerability to trust that another person won’t hurt you again on purpose.
Difficulty being authentic. If the emotional abuse you experienced often took the form of criticism or picking you apart, you might have internalized some of these comments leading you to feel shame. As a result, it could seem difficult and scary to open up to a partner, leading to emotional distance in the relationship.

The way you view and relate to yourself can also change in the wake of chronic or isolated emotional abuse:

Low self-esteem. Emotional abuse that consists of put-downs can wear your self-esteem thin, leading to feelings of worthlessness. It might make you feel like you’re less deserving or valid than the people around you.
Self-doubt. Emotional abuse called gaslighting can make you question your own thoughts, abilities, and perception of reality. If you’ve been continuously gaslit, you might notice you have less confidence in your own instincts. You might question yourself more often, tend to self-sabotage, or have more difficulty identifying and trusting your own feelings.
Shame. Sometimes emotional abuse involves behaviors intended to making you feel ashamed of parts of who you are, such as personality quirks, likes and dislikes, or hopes for the future. This can cause you to stifle parts of your identity to avoid feeling the shame associated with them.

Unaddressed effects of emotional abuse can lead to mental health conditions over time. These may include:

Social anxiety. According to 2015 research that studied adults from Israel, emotional abuse in childhood may lead to social anxiety disorder. This happens when the abuse creates feelings of shame and inadequacy, as well as self-criticism, making you more prone to fearfulness when you interact with others.
Depression. Emotional abuse in childhood is strongly linked to depression in adulthood. Experts suggest this can happen when behaviors undermine your capacity for self-compassion and fosters shame.
Eating disorders. When emotional abuse leads to high levels of self-criticism, it may increase your chances of developing an eating disorder, including binge eating, bulimia, and anorexia.
Post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) or complex PTSD (C-PTSD). Research suggests emotional abuse and bullying can cause symptoms that meet the criteria for PTSD or C-PTSD.

Several physical impacts are also connected to past experiences of chronic emotional abuse:

Chronic pain. Research from 2018 suggests adverse childhood experiences including emotional abuse could increase your chances of experiencing forms of chronic pain, such as back pain and headaches.
Fibromyalgia. Past emotional abuse may be more common in people with fibromyalgia, a chronic pain syndrome, suggests 2015 research that studied 34 patients with the condition. The study connected fibromyalgia to unresolved trauma and attachment trauma.
Irritable bowel syndrome (IBS). Emotional abuse has been found to predict IBS, which can involve painful bloating, diarrhea, and constipation.

If emotional abuse has impacted any aspects of your life, healing is possible with time, patience, and lots of self-compassion.

Working with a compassionate mental health professional is one way to address the effects of emotional abuse.

You can also learn about healing from trauma or ways to recover from an abusive relationship for more ideas about what path to healing from emotional abuse is right for you.

Effects of Emotional Abuse on Your Brain, Relationships, and Health

Emotional abuse is often harder to recognize than other forms of abuse, but its effects can be just as profound. Healing is possible.

Emotional abuse involves a broad range of tactics, including shaming and gaslighting, which are meant to leave you feeling powerless, hopeless, and less.

In some cases, the signs of emotional abuse are so subtle that you might not be sure you’re on the receiving end.

Depending on the types of emotional abuse and how long you’ve been dealing with these behaviors, you might experience different effects on your emotional, physical, and mental health.

Some people experience emotional abuse over many years, such as during childhood or the course of a romantic relationship.

But you can also experience more acute or short-term instances of emotional abuse, such as a casual exchange with a stranger or interactions with colleagues or friends.

You might be more likely to experience both long- and short-term impacts of emotional abuse if you’ve dealt with these behaviors for many years as a child or an adult.

But abuse can affect you even if you experience it once.

Even if you’re not aware of the abusive behaviors or you feel they don’t affect you, they’re still abusive if that was the intention.

Short-term effects of emotional abuse

isolation and loneliness
self-doubt
shame
confusion
low self-esteem
fear when interacting with others
avoidance of activities related to the incident
feelings of powerlessness

Long-term effects of emotional abuse

mental health conditions
neuroticism, or the tendency toward low mood and negative emotions like anger
chronic stress
physical health challenges like body aches and heart palpitations
attachment challenges
emotional disconnect or apathy

What are the effects of emotional abuse in children?

Children who experience emotional abuse may go through some of these effects:

Behavioral changes. Children may appear to “act out,” show signs of attention deficity hyperactivity disorder (ADHD), and sometimes become abusive toward other children. Self-harm and suicidal thoughts can also be effects of emotional abuse on a child.
Emotional development. Children who experience emotional abuse might have more difficulty managing their responses to difficult emotions. They may also seem less emotionally mature than their peers, as abuse could make it harder to grow a trusting relationship with their own emotions.
Maladaptive coping. Research from 2014 highlights how childhood emotional abuse can lead to the development of unhelpful ways of coping in women who have experienced it. For example, it can lead to numbing or disconnecting from emotions. Other kids may resort to fantasy and imagination, leading to avoidant behaviors and isolation over time.

Long-term emotional abuse can potentially impact your brain, especially if the abuse happened during childhood when the brain is still developing.

These are some of the ways research suggests emotional abuse can impact your brain:

Emotional understanding and empathy. Early emotional abuse could cause changes to the hippocampus that make it harder to empathize with the emotions of others.
Self-awareness. Emotional abuse is linked to thinning of certain areas of the brain that help you manage emotions and be self-aware — especially the prefrontal cortex and temporal lobe.
Epigenetic changes and depression. Research from 2018 has connected childhood abuse to epigenetic brain changes that may cause depression. Epigenetic refers to how your environment and behaviors affect your genes. In particular, the study found changes to certain genes in the hypothalamic-pituitary-adrenal (HPA) axis, which is an area of the brain that’s involved in the stress response.

If you’ve experienced emotional abuse for a while, you might inadvertently think these behaviors are to be expected from partners, family, or friends.

Chronic emotional abuse could affect how you see yourself in relationships and your tolerance toward certain behaviors.

You might experience some of the following effects:

Codependency. Long-term emotional abuse can make you feel as if your needs don’t matter as much as everyone else’s. This can lead to codependent behaviors or ignoring your own needs and boundaries. You might also engage in people-pleasing behaviors or tend to establish relationships with abusive partners.
Fear of abandonment. If emotional distance was used as a manipulation tactic, you might feel high levels of stress or abandonment anxiety in your relationships. This could manifest as a behavior sometimes labeled “clinginess” that’s often rooted in a deep fear of losing your support system.
Trust challenges. Past emotional abuse can make it harder for you to trust even a supportive, compassionate partner. When you’ve been let down in the past, it can take courage and vulnerability to trust that another person won’t hurt you again on purpose.
Difficulty being authentic. If the emotional abuse you experienced often took the form of criticism or picking you apart, you might have internalized some of these comments leading you to feel shame. As a result, it could seem difficult and scary to open up to a partner, leading to emotional distance in the relationship.

The way you view and relate to yourself can also change in the wake of chronic or isolated emotional abuse:

Low self-esteem. Emotional abuse that consists of put-downs can wear your self-esteem thin, leading to feelings of worthlessness. It might make you feel like you’re less deserving or valid than the people around you.
Self-doubt. Emotional abuse called gaslighting can make you question your own thoughts, abilities, and perception of reality. If you’ve been continuously gaslit, you might notice you have less confidence in your own instincts. You might question yourself more often, tend to self-sabotage, or have more difficulty identifying and trusting your own feelings.
Shame. Sometimes emotional abuse involves behaviors intended to making you feel ashamed of parts of who you are, such as personality quirks, likes and dislikes, or hopes for the future. This can cause you to stifle parts of your identity to avoid feeling the shame associated with them.

Unaddressed effects of emotional abuse can lead to mental health conditions over time. These may include:

Social anxiety. According to 2015 research that studied adults from Israel, emotional abuse in childhood may lead to social anxiety disorder. This happens when the abuse creates feelings of shame and inadequacy, as well as self-criticism, making you more prone to fearfulness when you interact with others.
Depression. Emotional abuse in childhood is strongly linked to depression in adulthood. Experts suggest this can happen when behaviors undermine your capacity for self-compassion and fosters shame.
Eating disorders. When emotional abuse leads to high levels of self-criticism, it may increase your chances of developing an eating disorder, including binge eating, bulimia, and anorexia.
Post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) or complex PTSD (C-PTSD). Research suggests emotional abuse and bullying can cause symptoms that meet the criteria for PTSD or C-PTSD.

Several physical impacts are also connected to past experiences of chronic emotional abuse:

Chronic pain. Research from 2018 suggests adverse childhood experiences including emotional abuse could increase your chances of experiencing forms of chronic pain, such as back pain and headaches.
Fibromyalgia. Past emotional abuse may be more common in people with fibromyalgia, a chronic pain syndrome, suggests 2015 research that studied 34 patients with the condition. The study connected fibromyalgia to unresolved trauma and attachment trauma.
Irritable bowel syndrome (IBS). Emotional abuse has been found to predict IBS, which can involve painful bloating, diarrhea, and constipation.

If emotional abuse has impacted any aspects of your life, healing is possible with time, patience, and lots of self-compassion.

Working with a compassionate mental health professional is one way to address the effects of emotional abuse.

You can also learn about healing from trauma or ways to recover from an abusive relationship for more ideas about what path to healing from emotional abuse is right for you.

Toxic Relationships: Causes, Effects, and Patterns

In 2018, the Oxford Dictionary's word of the year was 'toxic'. And the majority of attention to this word is riveted not only in environmental matters, but also in matters of relationships.

Recently, you can often hear the phrase - toxic person . And this is not just a person with whom it is uncomfortable, rather it is someone who, by his actions, destroys your faith in yourself and in the world around you. With all the external fairness of such an understanding, it is worth making a remark: it is not a person who is toxic - the relationships in which he resides are toxic. A person can label others, manipulate, create gossip, ridicule other people's principles at work, and be an understanding and pleasant person in the family. Or vice versa: at work, he is a diligent employee, whom everyone respects, and at home he turns into a despot and tyrant. However, it is also possible that a person has chosen a toxic behavior model as the main one and applies it in all types of relationships. Toxic methods of exposure are usually passive-aggressive. This is aggression that is difficult to track or name because it is subtler and more inconspicuous. An example of such aggression can be a compliment, after which it becomes unpleasant or even disgusting (“The dress is beautiful, but you look terrible in it”). nine0005

A person who adheres to a toxic relationship scenario believes that he knows everything and is always right. Arguing with him and proving something is useless. And even more so it will not be possible to "remake".

You are shamed for not following unknown rules. And the rules are constantly changing.

Your natural wants and needs, lifestyle are ridiculed or questioned.

Your values, the principles that are important to you, are being attacked.

When you report that someone is trespassing, that person attacks you. nine0005

It happens that a person is difficult and unbearable only for you, but to others he seems quite pleasant and benevolent.

How to recognize a toxic relationship?

There are several conditional types of behavior that can shake a person's faith in himself and the world around him:

Gossip - any speculation or false information about other people.
Behavior of the eternal victim - other people are always to blame for a person's dissatisfaction with life. But at the same time, the person does not change anything. nine0030
Criticism - whatever you do will be used against you. In any of your success will find failure.
Behavior of an egocentric - in this case, someone else's opinion is not recognized. Everyone is wrong, and only the egocentric has the truth.
Manipulation - deceptive or violent acts. Their goal is the benefit of the manipulator.
Gaslighting is an incitement to doubt the adequacy of one's perception of the surrounding reality through constant devaluing jokes, accusations and intimidation by another person. nine0030
Lack of control of emotions - unexpected and unreasonable switching to aggression.
Bullying / bullying in a team (eg, in a classroom) - May occur spontaneously, on any minor sign.

How to behave in a toxic relationship?

The best solution is to keep this kind of relationship to a minimum. To do this, it is important to follow the recommendations described below.

Do not participate in toxic relationship games: gossip, mobbing, etc. nine0030
Try to distance yourself emotionally. Everything that a person says is just an opinion, but not the only true description of you.
Try to understand the patterns that the toxic person uses. As a rule, toxic behavior follows one scenario. It is important to identify it in the relationship that has arisen.
Learn to direct the conversation in a constructive way. This can be done with special phrases. For example, use: “If you criticize, offer”, “What resolution of the situation do you see?”, “What do you mean by this?”, “Why are you telling me this?” etc. nine0030
Share your experiences, problems, vulnerabilities as little as possible.
Define and make clear the boundaries of what is permitted in communication. To do this, designate the following things: when you can call, and when you can’t; what topics can be discussed and what not; where you can communicate and where you can't. This is not a question of culture - this is self-care.
Try to switch emotionally away from the offender or situation. Take a look at it from the side. Imagine that you are in the auditorium watching a performance. Think about why this person is so eager to hook or hurt you. nine0030
Check yourself: suddenly you are the same toxic person that everyone avoids.

If you're wondering how your actions affect others, that's a good sign. However, if you agree with two or more of the statements below, then it's time to start working on yourself and your relationships.

♦ You absolutely do not admit that your point of view can be wrong. Over the past year, you have never admitted to another that you were wrong, but you will try to correct yourself. nine0073 ♦ You rarely think about how to become a better person, or consider yourself already an ideal person.

♦ When friends talk about what is happening to them, you look for negativity instead of being sincerely happy for them, or you devalue other people's achievements and values.
♦ Assess if the expression is applicable to you: "I did something nasty - my heart is happy." How appropriate do you think the phrase: "The end justifies the means"?

♦ You constantly strive to set the right path or "fix" someone with whom you have an unimportant relationship. nine0005

♦ People break up with you and avoid you. You manage to make enemies everywhere or just people who speak negatively about you. When communicating with you, people experience discomfort and tension.

how to identify and deal with it in relationships

Such phenomena have no place in healthy relationships

Victoria Artemova

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Marriage and relationships

healthy relationships nine0005

all about relationships

domestic violence

abusers

Verbal abuse is sometimes quite difficult to recognize, but it can become a constant companion of your relationship. Masters of manipulation greatly affect your self-esteem by creating the illusion of caring for you. Using words to punish is one of the most hidden forms of control, and you may feel like you have a very loving spouse. In fact, insults have a very serious effect on the psyche and sometimes harm as much as physical abuse. nine0005

Verbal abuse is an act of verbal abuse that involves aggressively criticizing, insulting, or condemning another person.

"Verbal abuse can actually refer to one partner's attempt to control the other with language," says expert Amelia Peck, a licensed marriage and family therapist. “It could be a speech that is used to make a partner feel less valued or important in a relationship,” she said. Such statements are usually aimed at causing a feeling of self-doubt. At the same time, they may well take different forms - shouting and open humiliation or more subtle manipulative tactics. nine0005

Physical abuse is easy to recognize. There is no doubt that you have been abused when a hand is raised against you. But verbal abuse is much more difficult to define. There are usually no injuries, wounds, scars or bruises - only terrible sensations. However, both can have long-term consequences, such as low self-esteem, depression, anxiety, and so on. Emotional abuse is quite difficult to identify if you don't know the signs.

Are you concerned that your partner may verbally abuse you? Read on to learn about the main wake-up calls that you definitely shouldn't ignore.

Common signs of verbal abuse

You start getting called strange nicknames

Once your partner starts using various strange nicknames, it's time to think. If such names seem derogatory to you, then most likely they are. Some nicknames are definitely offensive. Others are more like ambiguous compliments that are much harder to identify. In these cases, we advise you to listen to your intuition. And remember that verbal abusers quite often resort to "constructive criticism" to negatively impact their partner's self-esteem. “Such aggressors, with the help of speech, try to do everything possible to make you feel insecure and fear,” the expert explains. nine0005

If your partner constantly criticizes you, claiming that he is doing it for your own good, then you can safely consider this an extremely alarming signal. In fact, this is one of the most insidious forms of verbal abuse.

They are trying to belittle you

Critical, sarcastic or derisive words that do not carry anything but humiliation (whether in private or in the presence of other people) is a form of verbal abuse. These could be comments about how you dress, talk, or your level of intelligence. Remember that any remarks that make you feel inferior are most often intentional. “When a partner verbally insults you even in such a seemingly mild form, then you should understand that equality or fairness in relationships is clearly not at the center of his value system. They make all these connections solely for the sake of making the partner feel “small” and themselves strong and powerful,” the expert is sure. nine0005

They raise their voices at you

When your partner starts yelling for no reason, you automatically start worrying that everything you say might annoy him. If you feel that in communication with a person you are walking through a minefield and you begin to be afraid to openly express your thoughts, this is a very bad sign. Emotionally unstable people who raise their voice at you in order to intimidate you are unlikely to ever become a strong support and support for you in a relationship. nine0005

You are being threatened

In fact, there are no empty threats. Whether or not a person intends to take some action, the very fact of such intimidation should not be taken lightly. Even if your partner says that he is only joking. And the stronger the feeling of fear that you experience because of such behavior, the more you should be wary.

You are accused of other people's actions

When your partner loses his temper, does he try to blame you for his breakdown and subsequent behavior? This is one of the most indicative signs of verbal abuse, which is most often manifested in the narcissistic type of people. They quite often build logical chains that are difficult to perceive, motivating their incorrect behavior. This is done in order to confuse a person and further make him believe that he himself provoked such an attitude towards himself. As a result, the partner apologizes to the abuser, and he assures that he would never have caused harm in a normal situation. nine0005

“It is important to remember that people in unhealthy relationships are not always abused. Often, after one such episode, the couple reconciles and for some time passes into a kind of "honeymoon" phase. This leads to emotional swings that ultimately encourage victims to justify their partner’s abuse or even take the blame for it,” the expert explains.

Your feelings are rejected

If you regularly experience that your partner refuses to discuss issues that hurt or upset you, he may be avoiding responsibility. Talk about words and actions that hurt you stops, and any interest in the topic of abusive behavior is simply ignored. This is a kind of gaslighting (prolonged psychological manipulation that makes the victim doubt his sanity, judgments and memories - ed. note): at first, the partner simply turns a blind eye to the problem for a long time, and then tries to convince you that nothing happened Or you remember everything wrong. This is usually followed by a series of those very “accusations of the victim” that we have already written about above. nine0005

“Many of my clients who have experienced or are experiencing verbal abuse in relationships experience the effects of emotional abuse and gaslighting. They often say that partners speak for them, how they feel. And this, of course, is almost entirely different from how the client actually feels. As a result, a person literally loses the ability to understand and be aware of his real feelings and emotions, ”the therapist shares his experience.

You are being manipulated

Regular and persistent use of threatening words can lead you to act in ways that are uncomfortable for you. This form of verbal abuse most often occurs towards the end of a marriage. If your spouse does not want a divorce for his own reasons, he will say literally anything to play on your emotions and keep you in the family. Any manipulation of this kind should be regarded as an attempt to force you to submit to other people's desires, regardless of what is best for yourself. nine0005

Signs that you have been verbally abused

You have low self-esteem the day becomes a heavy emotional routine.

You may feel overwhelmed and occasionally wonder if you've lost your mind. All your stress gradually goes deeper and deeper. You begin to punish yourself for the behavior of the second half and think that the whole problem is only in your head. A family therapist claims that her clients report living with the feeling that “everything bad that happens in their personal lives is entirely their own fault. And the lack of positive emotions and satisfaction is the result of not trying hard enough.” nine0005

You feel like a different person

When you are regularly subjected to verbal abuse, it can completely change the way you feel about yourself. You are so passionate about your other half that you simply leave the person you used to be and don’t even notice it. Losing your voice, losing personal boundaries, changing the way you think - these are all signs that you are in an unhealthy relationship. Think about it, have you ever justified the behavior of your partner with the help of arguments that you would never have listened to before? If yes, then it's probably time to seek help. nine0005

"Often I hear clients say that the justification for continuing the relationship was that 'at least the violence wasn't physical.' Physical or not, the violence is still real. And when I hear people use these arguments in their stories, I understand how long they had to suppress their feelings and emotions and struggle to find their own voice, ”says the expert.

You feel like you're walking in a minefield

If you don't feel safe when your partner is around, or if you catch yourself thinking you're watching every word you say, that's a very bad sign. Everything you do never seems good enough to you. When you feel like you can't be your full self, it might be time to start thinking about whether everything is right in your relationship. nine0005

“When I hear clients tell me that they are too afraid to talk about something to their partners because of their possible reaction, I understand that the person is clearly not in the healthiest relationship,” the expert notes.

How to deal with abuse in a relationship

Violence is never justified. Remind yourself that it's not your fault and think about how to leave. If the person you love insults you and neglects your feelings, you stop considering yourself (and your needs) to be of any importance. nine0005

“Listen to those feelings that run counter to what is right and good for you. If you are ever told that your thoughts, emotions are not valued, it's time to seek support, an expert will help you enter a healthier relationship, ”says Peck.

When you realize you are being physically or verbally abused, try to get help. Here are some rules to keep in mind if you are experiencing emotional abuse. nine0198

What to do: Seek advice from a relationship therapist, either together or alone.

What to do: Surround yourself with a “support group” of family and friends. Discuss with them what is happening and how you feel.

What to do: Tell the abuser about his offensive language and discuss how this behavior is unacceptable to you. Set boundaries and explain in detail what you don't want in your relationship for anything. nine0005

What to do: divorce or separate (if nothing else helps). If you make this decision, try to hire a lawyer who has experience working with victims of domestic violence. Always stay in touch with your relatives and friends. Focus on learning about the positive experiences of ending an abusive relationship.

What to do: seek shelter if the steps you have taken make you feel that you are in danger.

Do not: get into conflict with the offender. If he gets angry, try to remain calm, walk away and do not react to him.

Do not: blame yourself for the way another person behaves.

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