“Don’t let someone who did you wrong make you think there’s something wrong with you. Don’t devalue yourself because they didn’t value you. Know your worth even if they don’t.”
– Unknown
What is abuse?
According to the New Oxford American Dictionary, abuse is the improper use of something.
In a relationship, abuse includes any behavior that consists of treating your partner improperly.
Generally, it is any behavior used to maintain power or control in the relationship.
There are different types of abuse, including:
1. Emotional Abuse
2. Verbal Abuse
3. Physical Abuse
4. Child Abuse
5. Sexual Abuse
6. Financial Abuse
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Emotional Abuse
Emotional abuse results when one or both partners in a relationship aren’t getting their emotional needs met consistently.
It also consists of any behaviors that manipulates how a person feels.
Examples include:
• Withholding affection.
• Withholding compliments.
• Being unsupportive.
• The silent treatment.
• Turning others against you.
• Interrupting you.
• Discounting your feelings.
• Unpredictable mood swings.
Verbal Abuse
Verbal abuse results when one partner uses words to hurt the other partner.
These words can be delivered through criticism, insults, blame, name-calling or threats.
Other examples of verbal abuse include:
• Character assassination. This generally consists of always statements, such as “You’re always late,” “You’re always complaining,” or “You’re always wrong.”
• Insulting your appearance.
• Yelling and screaming.
• Being demanding.
• Mocking.
• Fault finding.
• Telling your secrets.
Physical Abuse
According to the New York State Office of Children and Family Services, physical abuse is described as, “Non-accidental use of force that results in bodily injury, pain, or impairment.”
Examples of physical abuse include:
• Grabbing your face to make you look them in their eyes.
• Grabbing your arm to make you pay attention to them.
• Using a gun, knife or any other weapon.
• Pushing you.
• Punching you.
• Smacking you.
• Strangling you.
• Burning you.
• Throwing away your medication.
• Throwing an object.
Child Abuse
Child abuse happens when a parent or caregiver causes death, injury or neglect to a child.
Examples of child abuse include:
• Leaving a child alone for long periods of time.
• Starving a child.
• Emotionally neglecting a child by not providing necessary attention, support and nurturing.
Sexual Abuse
Sexual abuse includes molestation, rape or any other event where an undesired sexual experience is forced upon an individual.
Examples of sexual abuse include:
• Unwanted kissing.
• Unwanted touching.
• Sexual activity with anyone who is drunk, drugged and unable to say “yes” or “no.”
• Refusing to use condoms when suggested.
• Refusing to disclose diagnosis of a sexually transmitted disease.
• Forcing someone to have sex with you.
Financial Abuse
Financial abuse is any behavior a person uses to control their partner’s ability to make, use and save money.
Examples include:
• Preventing you from getting to work by hiding your keys.
• Withholding money to pay for bills.
• Unexplained purchases and bank activity.
• Ruining your credit.
• Refusing to let you participate in financial decisions.
• Controlling how money is spent.
The Effects of Abuse
Abuse is traumatic and has a negative impact on your sense of self.
The effects of abuse include the following:
1. Shame
2. Broken Self-Trust
3. Chronic Depression
4. Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder
5. Relationship Issues
Shame
Did you know a child that is abused blames him or herself and not his or her abuser?
This is also true for adults in abusive relationships.
They feel like their partner’s mistreatment happens because they are not good enough, are doing something wrong and are unloveable. They feel deserving of the abusive behaviors and develop something called shame.
Shame is best described as self-criticism and includes thoughts such as:
• “I’m a failure.”
• “I’m stupid.”
• “It’s always my fault.”
• “I’m unworthy of love.”
• “I hate myself.”
• “I’m unattractive.”
• “I don’t matter.”
• “I’m a bad person.“
• “I shouldn’t have been born.”
• “I’m a fraud.”
Aside from self-criticism, shame also leads to the following behaviors:
• people-pleasing
• perfectionism
• emotional neglect
• caretaking
• poor communication skills
• alcoholism
• narcissistic personality disorder
• codependency
A Broken Self-Trust
Self-trust is a characteristic of a healthy personality.
To trust yourself means:
- relying on you own decision making
- being aware of your intuition
- listening to your intuition
- relying on yourself to not ignore red flags in relationships
- relying on yourself to keep your boundaries at play in relationships
- knowing you can support yourself in times of need
- having confidence that you can be happy with or without a relationship
- knowing the difference between trustworthy or untrustworthy partners
A person who experiences abuse loses his or her ability to carry out the tasks mentioned in the above bullet points. Most of his or her life consists of self-doubt, confusion and dependency. Until they heal from their abuse, they’ll continue not to trust their no self.
Chronic Depression
Depression is a feeling of hopelessness and despair.
It is normal to feel depressed at different stages in your life, but for a person who has experienced abuse, it can become a chronic problem.
It becomes a chronic problem when the abused person continues to have hope that his or her abuser will change. The more the abuse continues, which is usually what happens, the more a person’s hope for change slowly deteriorates into a depression.
Chronic depression can also result from unhealed childhood trauma. “Traumatic experiences in childhood can be found in most multifactor models on etiopathogenesis as a psychosocial aspect of depression,” says Alexa Negele.
Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder
Post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) is an anxiety disorder.
This can include the following symptoms:
• Flashbacks
• Being easily startled or frightened
• Always being on guard
• Focusing on the worst case scenario
• Nightmares
• Difficulty experiencing positive emotions
Relationship Issues
Since abuse happens from human interaction, relationship issues are an unavoidable effect of abuse.
These relationship issues include any of the three fears of intimacy: (1) fear of rejection, (2) fear of engulfment and (3) fear of commitment. Each of them having their own unique impact on the development of relationships.
Self-Care: The Way To Heal From Abuse
The key to healing from abuse is to stop abusing yourself.
Generally, after experiencing abuse, you take the pain others inflict on you and start inflicting pain onto yourself.
Oftentimes, this is what prevents the healing process – self-abuse.
Self-abuse can include drug addiction, self-harm, choosing abusive partners, people-pleasing and any other self-neglecting behavior.
How do you stop abusing yourself?
By consistently practicing self-care!
The more you practice self-care, the more you increase your self-worth; and the more you increase your self-worth, the more you heal the wounds caused by those who treated you like you were worthless.
Self-care is important in every area of your life. There’s plenty of ways to take care of yourself, but here’s the most effective ways if you are struggling to let go of an abusive past:
Separate from Abusers
If you want to heal from abuse, you must separate yourself from any abuser in your life.
Without separating yourself from abusive personalities, your body will continue to use defense mechanisms to protect you from these personalities.
These defense mechanisms can include post-traumatic stress disorder, people-pleasing, caretaking, chronic depression and a lack of self-trust.
The goal of healing is to retrain your nervous system to feel safe in the world, and this is impossible when an abuser is still present in your life.
Heal Your Shame
Shame is the reason a person continues to get involved in abusive situations.
A person who suffers from shame has a belief that he or she is ‘unworthy of love and respect.’
This belief acts as a form of self-sabotage in life and relationships. It attracts situations where you actually feel unworthy of love and respect.
Until a person heals their shame, self-love and loving relationships are almost impossible.
Since shame is expressed through self-criticism, healing your shame starts with learning how to cope with negative self-talk.
You can cope with negative self-talk by making a commitment to replace your negative thoughts about yourself with compassionate thoughts about yourself.
The more compassionate you are to yourself, the more you let go of shame and the behaviors that come with it.
Develop A Spiritual Connection
The goal of an abuser is to have power over your spirit.
The abusive person may not be conscious of this goal, but it is the psychological goal – a deep desire for power and possession.
Therefore, if you experienced abuse as a child or an abusive relationship as an adult, there’s a great chance your spiritual connection is damaged.
You can repair this connection by putting the following tips into practice:
- Daily prayer
- Daily meditation
- Reading a religious or spiritual text for fifteen minutes a day
Be Open to Forgive
Being open to forgive is another practice that will help you heal from abuse.
The longer you go without forgiving the person who hurt you, the longer that person will have power over you.
However, forgiveness does not mean you have to contact your abuser and tell him or her that you forgive their behavior.
In fact, forgiveness does not mean you have to speak to your abuser ever again.
Forgiveness is more about not blaming your abuser, having compassion for his or her behaviors towards you and accepting the reality of what happened.
If you have not fully grieved and healed any negative emotions you have associated with the trauma, more than likely, you still need to work towards forgiveness.
This is something I teach my clients.
Conclusion
Each of these tips will help you heal from abuse.
Embrace the healing process.
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