Abusive Relationships Can Happen in Different Forms: Understand the Signs, Acknowledge if It Happens, & Find a Way to Break Out for Your Survival
We often ignore the signs and wait for a miracle, but taking steps on your own is critical in these cases if you are a victim of abusive acts.
A couple of days ago, Nibedita and I were binge-watching on Netflix, and we came across the Netflix series, ‘Maid.’ As we couldn’t find something suitable for the time being, we started watching it and finished it within a couple of days.
The short series was fantastic to watch because of its excellent storyline and strong messages throughout the series.
‘Maid’ series is inspired by Stephanie Land’s memoir, ‘Maid: Hard Work, Low pay, and a Mother’s will to Survive.’ The story plot is on a young mother’s journey on the struggles to escape from an abusive relationship and overcome homelessness to take care of her daughter.
It indeed depicted the struggle of a single mom and portrayed the obstacles she had to face. Margarete Qualley put together an impressive act on this series, and if you haven’t explored it already, you might want to take a chance to watch it.
The series depicted an abusive relationship between a couple, but it is not the only kind of abusive relationship in our society.
Types of an abusive relationship
Abusive acts can escalate within any relationship. It can be with any of our family members and friends. It happens in our schools, work, and anywhere we connect and form relationships. It can be conducted by one person to another, by multiple individuals to one person, or even both persons in a relationship can be abusive to each other.
The abuse can come as physical and emotional acts, like hitting, pushing, blocking, name-calling, stalking/criminal harassment, sexual assault, control, and manipulation. Any sort of abuse is intolerable. Of course, there are red flags that can point out the abuses in a relationship:
🚩 Controlling and possessive behavior 🚩 Being unreasonably jealous 🚩 put down the other person in front of the people 🚩 threats 🚩 physical and sexual violence
People often forget about emotional abuse, one of the most prevalent forms of abuse. According to a study by Dr. John Gottman, there are ten signs of emotional abuse:
⛔ control, ⛔ yelling, ⛔ contempt, ⛔ excessive defensiveness, ⛔ threats, ⛔ stonewalling, ⛔ blame, ⛔ gaslighting, ⛔ isolation and ⛔ volatility.
“Sometimes telling ourselves ‘Everything happens for a reason’ or ‘It made me stronger’ is a way to avoid our grief, our vulnerability, and our helplessness,” — Jordan Pickell, trauma therapist.
Understanding the signs and forms of abusive behaviors is essential, and it is critical to talk about it. But, unfortunately, in many societies, the abusive acts by the husband/common-law partner are often ignored by the wife/another partner (as society pressured wives/partners to have patience and work on the relationship.)
There are countless examples where the wives couldn’t bring the incidents to others’ attention or to the law enforcing authority because society taught it as shameful acts to go against your husband or bring family matters to others’ attention.
Yes, I have seen many abusive relationships within my family and friends circle. Some of those turned into violent actions or even killings. Those experiences have opened whole new chapters of human behaviors that I hate to revisit.
Why is it essential to take care?
Because once ignored, the abusers get the upper hand on continuing the actions. And, it gets worse every time, as the abusers could understand the forgiving nature and tolerance of the impacted personnel. It encourages them to keep doing it until something terrible happens or strict legal action ⚖️ is taken.
“I’ve heard that people stand in bad situations because a relationship like that gets turned up by degrees. It is said that a frog will jump out of a pot of boiling water. Place him in a pot and turn it up a little at a time, and he will stay until he is boiled to death. Us frogs understand this.” — Deb Caletti
There are many reasons people want to stay in an abusive relationship. Threats, hurting others or self, financial dependence, keeping the family or the relationship intact because of emotional dependence, societal pressures, etc., are major reasons to ignore the abusive acts and to remain in a relationship. But, the fact is, it can harm mental health and self-confidence, instill fear, and cause stress in the worst possible ways. In addition, remaining in an abusive relationship can provide the sense of the impossibility of a safer future.
But, unfortunately, in many societies, the abusive acts by the husband/common-law partner are often ignored by the wife/another partner (as society pressured wives/partners to have patience and work on the relationship.)
And, it also impacts your near ones. Of course, there is no secret that in an abusive relationship, the kids are affected in all sorts of negative ways. But, along with the kids, it also affects the other parts of our lives. For example, it can ruin social connections with others and impact your work or schools (or vice versa). So, frustration creates impacts tenfold in our lives.
👉🏽 According to the Canadian Women’s Foundation, approximately every six days, one woman in Canada is killed by her intimate partners. That’s alarming.
What can you do if you are in an abusive relationship?
If you have a chance to get out of the abusive relationship, take the opportunity. If you don’t know how to get out of it, get a support council or specialist support. If you don’t know how to escalate the path, speak with someone who has experienced similar trauma.
Acknowledging that the abusive acts took place is undoubtedly the first step. Once we can identify that it is dangerous and utterly detrimental to our lives, the push for the subsequent actions can come alone.
📢 Most of the time, the person on the recipient’s end couldn’t dare to make a move. That’s why opening up about these matters to family members and friends is critical. Discussions can open up some new views and can generate support.
Because once ignored, the abusers get the upper hand on continuing the actions. And, it gets worse every time.
Remember, mental support is the most critical thing while supporting the recipient. Everyone copes the situations differently, so patience is of utmost importance. Listening is vital in these cases, and being judgmental can cause more trouble to the recipient. There is no quick-fix, hence being open-minded about different alternatives is essential. And, as most of us are not experts, referring them to relevant support services is vital.
It is also essential to show compassion to yourself, rather than thinking about the societal aspects or other people’s thoughts. For sure, being in an abusive relationship is not a compassionate act.
End Notes
So, acknowledge it; if it happens to you, find a way to get out of it and take the steps not to get back onto the abusive connection you experienced.
Life can be cruel, but it can be beautiful again. So give it a chance; you indeed will be surprised in the long run.
🔎 Relevant articles and links
- From the Canadian Women’s Association (Article Link).
- From NCADV (article: National Statistics Domestic Violence Fact Sheet).
- Helplines 📞 in Canada (link)
🖍 Footnotes
The words are entirely my personal opinions. The author is not claiming to be an expert on the subject matter, but he has shared the words derived from his experience, real-life examples, and research on the subject matter. You should always reach out to the subject matter specialists and experts for support related to this matter.
[The article was first published on LinkedIn, slightly modified for Medium]
