A mentally abusive relationship may feel like a living death. Fortunately, there is life after mental emotional abuse. Having survived a mentally abusive relationship, means that you have the strength to heal, and a tremendous capacity, as well as hunger, for the happiness you desire. Will you take action to create that meaningful life for yourself?
There are many reasons why women stay in an abusive relationship. Mostly, they stay as long as they do because they aren’t even aware that what they are experiencing is domestic violence. They tell themselves it isn’t domestic violence because of any, or all, of the following:
All abusive relationships start with compromise. My experience of listening to the story of hundreds and hundreds of abused women suggests three levels of compromise: 1) Dislike at first sight. I’ve yet to come across one abused woman whose initial reaction to her future partner was not a resounding: “Yuck!” 2) Accepting, and overlooking distasteful and/or troubling behaviours – including leering at other women, emotional bullying, threats, addictions, etc. 3) Settling for less.
There is a fundamental flaw in every abused woman’s thinking here, and it lies in the gulf between the way she thinks she has been educating her partner, and the message that he receives. She thinks that he hears her statement – that he must not treat her that way, because it is painful to her. What he actually hears is that she is asking him, from a place of powerlessness, whether he would, please, be kind enough to change. And he wouldn’t. He will play act, to the best of his ability, for as long as he needs to. But he will do no more than that.
The bedrock of every abusive marriage, or partnership, is the premise that the abuser decides who is, and is not, ‘good enough’; and, try as they may, the abused partner will never, ever be good enough – whatever that means. Show me one abused woman who has not been programmed for shame, and anxiety, and not feeling good enough by her abusive partner; and, most probably, her family, before him.
The moment you walk away from the table of your abusive relationship, you get the right to make choices for yourself. You get to choose: where you will sit in the future,who you will sit with,who you will break bread with, who you share your company with.
Don’t believe me? That’s the problem. (You still confuse what your abusive partner said with the truth).
Your belief is based on your experience as an abused woman. That doesn’t mean that it is right…
Christmas is, allegedly, The Most Wonderful Time of the
Year. But is it for you?
If you are struggling in an abusive relationship, or if
you are processing the breakup from an abusive partner, Christmas can feel like
the loneliest, saddest time of the year.
Why?
Because society and the media propagate a myth of how
things are meant to be at […]
Why do women stay in an abusive relationship? It does not happen because they are stupid or weak-willed. Abused women stay in bad relationships simply because nobody taught them how to recognize an abusive relationship when they fell into one. Two things leave women vulnerable to abusers; lack of information and lack of self-worth. Nobody would willingly put themselves through that misery. What follows are 7 critical mistakes that all women unknowingly make that put them at risk – that you doubtless made also.
What do you truly love about this man who takes a ‘sick pleasure’ (your words) from abusing you? How do you know he is mentally ill? People who perpetrate domestic violence – which includes emotional abuse – may be ‘bad’, but there is nothing to suggest they are mad. What’s more, nobody has ever yet transformed an abusive relationship into a functional one by sticking around to try and take away from the abuser the ‘sick pleasure they get’ from abusing.
This week I’ve been working with a client who has done a lot of healing from an abusive relationship. When she spoke to me, she was quite tearful about something her new partner had said to her. She said: “Today my lover thanked me for being me. He didn’t tell me I wasn’t good enough. He didn’t reproach me for not being loving enough. He didn’t humiliate me for not being thin enough. He didn’t ridicule me for not being clever enough. He simply thanked me…For being me. That was almost too overwhelming to take on board…”
Over the next 5 days, I'll send you some lessons and tips that I've found have really helped women to heal from narcissistic abuse. Starting with the basics.
Want daily reassurance and inspiration? Sign up to my Instagram account. @dr_anniephd
