Warning Signs of Abusive Relationships

[Nic]

Originally Posted by Soft*Silver

you asked for signs...

a remarkable sign that most people miss, or disregard, is their account of their exes. If every ex did him/her wrong (I am going to use the pronoun HE for the abuser from this point on...but as was already said, SHE can be the abuser as well), was a dog; screwed everyone; ran to someone else; didnt take care of the house, the kids; was mouthy and disrespected him in front of his family and friends; etc....if the exes were ALWAYS the problem, we have transference going on here.

There is relatively new theory of transference called AMT...Abusive Multiple Transference, where the abuser not only transfer negative feelings of their abuser to their victims, but also transfers the power and dominance of their own abuser to themselves.*

In simple-ese?
... if the abuser felt they were always shit on, they will always believe they will get shit on, and they themselves will also always shit on others....


(*I found a really good explaination of transference and projection that relates it to domestic violence! http://wiki.answers.com/Q/What_is_tr...ection#slide72)

Been doing a lot of self education recently. Can't tell you how many times I've heard this in the last few months. Every group of survivors I meet has had to do battle with an ex who spouted the "She/he done me wrong" and "I was so misunderstood" story. There are a lot of people who tell that story but they seem to fall into a couple of predictable categories: folks who are really wounded and can't seem to move on from that pain and folks who need you to see them as worthy of sympathy in order to gain access to you.

I'm in no way blaming people for being victims of emotional or physical violence but there's another distinction that needs to be made here. A couple of others have touched on it. Just want to suss it out a bit more and say that one of the things that strikes me as insidious in the abuse/abuser/onlooker triangle is the expectation (by onlookers) that abuse victims never engage in any passive aggressive or manipulative behavior in order to be deserving of support from outside the abusive relationship. That holier than thou POV penalizes the abused person and generally works to the abuser's advantage. It's as if the victims are required to show twice as much restraint or have double the healthy, emotional outlook when compared to their abuser or anyone else for that matter. Example: it's not uncommon for folks who are being or have been abused to be passive aggressive or manipulative because they have no relationship with having their needs met any other way. Constantly being belittled and shamed somehow will make a person stop (or never start) asking for what they need in a straightforward way. If you're taught that your voice doesn't matter or your needs don't mean anything you're eventually going stop walking the healthy line from A to B and use more circuitous route to get your needs seen to. Inevitably an onlooker sees that behavior and wrongly attributes negative intention to it rather than labeling it the survival behavior that it is. Suddenly it's the abused person who's the "bad" one in the relationship and the abuser starts to benefit from that opinion, even counts on it to reinforce the idea that they're working hard and just trying their best to keep things together under the "burden" of their victim's passive aggressive behavior. You see evidence that it works in the sympathy they gain from friends and family members. Even more powerful than what they gain from others is the way they can use the victim's survivor dysfunction against them to further undermine that person's self esteem and create more self doubt. The victim gets cast in the "emotionally unstable" role making the abuser the one who's "worthy" of sympathy from onlookers and even from the victim him/herself! Of course the abuser has temper outbursts! Just look at what the poor guy/gal has to deal with! Pretty neat trick.

We participate in reinforcing the facade of abusers if we spend any time shaking our heads at victims who "dare" to choose anything but completely straightforward, healthy, well adjusted, even tempered behavior in order to get their needs met or the work of a relationship done. We add insult to injury by shaking our heads over them when we discover that they didn't leave at the very first sign of abuse. We pretty much demand that they be better than the abuser and, sometimes, better than we are ourselves. Everyone is passive aggressive or manipulative at one time or another. Difference between abusive behavior and survivor behavior is how and why manipulation is used. Tactics that undermine another person's sense of self or self respect falls into the abuse category to me.

Originally Posted by Words

Sorry, but I have a bit of an issue with this. Why use 'he'? Given that this is a queer website and that the majority of the members here identify as women, wouldn't 'she' be more appropriate (or, better still, the non-gender specific 'they')?

I appreciate that this probably wasn't your intention, but it just feels to me like men, butches, and FtMs always get a bid of a raw deal when it comes to the language we default to when discussing abuse.

Words

Fairly said. Growing up in Panama reinforced my cultural and emotional attachment to "abuser" = "male" despite knowing that there certainly are female abusers. For ease, I understand a person's decision to declare the use of a pronoun for time saving sake but in the case of such a sensitive issue maybe we need to go ahead and take the time to type out the extra pronoun. I'll keep that in mind myself.

Originally Posted by Girl_On_Fire

The more healthy platonic behavior you're exposed to, the more confidence you build up, and the more likely you are to attract this same healthiness in a romantic partnership.

To bad we don't culturally value platonic relationships the way we do partnered ones. Hardly ever see a Disney movie about friendship being given a higher position on the value scale than partnered relationships. (Thinking mostly "classics" here because I'm old. Snow White, Cinderella, Sleeping Beauty, Lady and the Tramp, Aristocats, Aladdin, Little Mermaid, etc.) Usually the main character (usually female) must somehow be rescued by someone in order for the story to progress. Even when a strong female character is sketched out she somehow has to be saved by someone else eventually.

[The_Lady_Snow]

Lesbian Partner Violence Fact Sheet

Suzana Rose, Ph.D.
National Violence Against Women Prevention Research Center
University of Missouri at St. Louis

What is lesbian partner violence?

Partner violence in lesbian (and gay) relationships recently has been identified as an important social problem. Partner or domestic violence among lesbians has been defined as including physical, sexual and psychological abuse, although researchers have most often studied physical violence.

How common is lesbian partner violence?

About 17-45% of lesbians report having been the victim of a least one act of physical violence perpetrated by a lesbian partner (1,5,6,13). Types of physical abuse named by more than 10% of participants in one study included:

Disrupting other’s eating or sleeping habits

Pushing or shoving, driving recklessly to punish, and slapping, kicking, hitting, or biting (11).

Sexual abuse by a woman partner has been reported by up to 50% of lesbians (12).

Psychological abuse has been reported as occurring at least one time by 24% to 90% of lesbians (1,5,6,11,14).

The research usually has been done with mostly white, middle-class lesbians who are sufficiently open about their sexual orientation to have met researchers seeking participants in the lesbian community. Subsequently, these findings may not apply to women who are less open, less educated, or of other ethnic backgrounds. [/CENTER]


Why would a lesbian batter another woman?

Lesbians who abuse another women may do so for reasons similar to those that motivate heterosexual male batterers. Lesbians abuse their partners to gain and maintain control . Lesbian batterers are motivated to avoid feelings of loss and abandonment. Therefore, many violent incidents occur during threatened separations. Many lesbian batterers grew up in violent households and were physically, sexually, or verbally abused and/or witnessed their mothers being abused by fathers or stepfathers.

How is lesbian partner violence different from heterosexual partner violence?

There are several similarities between lesbian and heterosexual partner violence. Violence appears to be about as common among lesbian couples as among heterosexual couples. In addition, the cycle of violence occurs in both types of relationships. However, there also are several differences.

In lesbian relationships, the "butch" (physically stronger, more masculine or wage-earning) member of the couple may be as likely to be the victim as the batterer, whereas in heterosexual relationships, the male partner (usually the stronger, more masculine, and wage-earning member) is most often the batterer. Some lesbians in abusive relationships report fighting back in their relationship.

In addition, a unique element for lesbians is the homophobic environment that surrounds them . This enables the abusive partner to exert "heterosexist control" over the victim by threatening to "out" the victim to friends, family, or employer or threatening to make reports to authorities that would jeopardize child custody, immigration, or legal status. The homophobic environment also makes it difficult for the victim to seek help from the police, victim service agencies, and battered women's shelters.


What legal rights do battered lesbians have?

In some states, police are required to treat cases of lesbian domestic violence the same way as they do heterosexual domestic violence. Many states have mandatory arrest laws that require the police to arrest the batterer in certain situations; this applies to lesbian and heterosexual batterers alike. Batterers can be prosecuted in a criminal court. Survivors may be entitled to an order of protection, a court order that prohibits a batterer from talking to or approaching the victim.

Same-sex couples are always excluded from obtaining a protective order in seven states (Arizona, Delaware, Louisiana, Montana, New York, South Carolina, and Virginia) and often excluded in three states (Florida, Maryland, and Mississippi). These states either limit protective orders to opposite-sex couples or usually interpret the law to apply only to opposite-sex couples.

How often is lesbian partner violence reported to the police?

There are significant barriers to lesbians seeking help. Lesbian victims seldom report violent incidents to the police because many fear prejudicial treatment, and many state domestic violence laws fail to protect same-sex partners. Also, in cases of same-sex violence, police often assume the abuse is mutual (or believe an abuser’s claim that the abuse is mutual) and are more likely to arrest both members of the couple. Battered women’s agencies also may not be open to serving lesbians.

How can you help a lesbian who is the victim of partner violence?

To support a lesbian who is the target of partner violence:
Let her know that she can call you for help. Help her develop a safety plan concerning how she will get out if she needs to leave quickly, including having a bag prepared and easily accessible with essential documents (including identification, money, and anything else that might be needed), and arranging a place to stay in an emergency. Give her the keys to your house. Don’t give up and don’t criticize her or turn her away because she doesn’t leave right away.

If you are in a city that has an Anti-Violence Project connected to the National Coalition of Anti-Violence Programs (http://www.avp.org), tell her about the services of your local AVP. Many AVPs provide counseling, advocacy with the police and criminal justice system and support groups. Some therapists specialize in lesbian partner abuse, as well.


>sources<

[Nic]

Originally Posted by Nic

Been doing a lot of self education recently. Can't tell you how many times I've heard this in the last few months. Every group of survivors I meet has had to do battle with an ex who spouted the "She/he done me wrong" and "I was so misunderstood" story. There are a lot of people who tell that story but they seem to fall into a couple of predictable categories: folks who are really wounded and can't seem to move on from that pain and folks who need you to see them as worthy of sympathy in order to gain access to you.

I'm in no way blaming people for being victims of emotional or physical violence but there's another distinction that needs to be made here. A couple of others have touched on it. Just want to suss it out a bit more and say that one of the things that strikes me as insidious in the abuse/abuser/onlooker triangle is the expectation (by onlookers) that abuse victims never engage in any passive aggressive or manipulative behavior in order to be deserving of support from outside the abusive relationship. That holier than thou POV penalizes the abused person and generally works to the abuser's advantage. It's as if the victims are required to show twice as much restraint or have double the healthy, emotional outlook when compared to their abuser or anyone else for that matter. Example: it's not uncommon for folks who are being or have been abused to be passive aggressive or manipulative because they have no relationship with having their needs met any other way. Constantly being belittled and shamed somehow will make a person stop (or never start) asking for what they need in a straightforward way. If you're taught that your voice doesn't matter or your needs don't mean anything you're eventually going stop walking the healthy line from A to B and use more circuitous route to get your needs seen to. Inevitably an onlooker sees that behavior and wrongly attributes negative intention to it rather than labeling it the survival behavior that it is. Suddenly it's the abused person who's the "bad" one in the relationship and the abuser starts to benefit from that opinion, even counts on it to reinforce the idea that they're working hard and just trying their best to keep things together under the "burden" of their victim's passive aggressive behavior. You see evidence that it works in the sympathy they gain from friends and family members. Even more powerful than what they gain from others is the way they can use the victim's survivor dysfunction against them to further undermine that person's self esteem and create more self doubt. The victim gets cast in the "emotionally unstable" role making the abuser the one who's "worthy" of sympathy from onlookers and even from the victim him/herself! Of course the abuser has temper outbursts! Just look at what the poor guy/gal has to deal with! Pretty neat trick.

We participate in reinforcing the facade of abusers if we spend any time shaking our heads at victims who "dare" to choose anything but completely straightforward, healthy, well adjusted, even tempered behavior in order to get their needs met or the work of a relationship done. We add insult to injury by shaking our heads over them when we discover that they didn't leave at the very first sign of abuse. We pretty much demand that they be better than the abuser and, sometimes, better than we are ourselves. Everyone is passive aggressive or manipulative at one time or another. Difference between abusive behavior and survivor behavior is how and why manipulation is used. Tactics that undermine another person's sense of self or self respect falls into the abuse category to me.

Someone asked me for clarification of my statements (in bold and red above). Mockery doesn't translate well to the screen.

I was being sarcastic about abusers who are skilled at misdirection. Onlookers occasionally discover that they felt sympathy for (later revealed) abusers and excused an abusers displays of temper or behavior because the victim in that case displayed emotions that seemed out of context or behavior that was attributed to emotional instability.

Abusers are good at misdirection. This is especially important if they come to the attention of normal thinking folks might. A victim who has the rug pulled out from under him or her often enough may begin to feel unstable and confused and act so when it's no longer possible to keep a lid on so much stress. The abuser in this case has to convince everyone that up is down and left is right. Their ability to keep a victim in a constant state of stress and the onlooker constantly supplied with "reasonable" explanations can often be integral to their facade. If the abused person is unable to rein in emotional upset and feelings of chaos and happens to behave in a way that gets the attention of an onlooker or is uncomfortable to an onlooker the abuser has to be good at misdirection (i.e.:redirecting blame and judgement from themselves onto the abused). Onlookers often find themselves excusing what seems like controlling or red flag behavior on the part of the suspected abuser by saying "Of course he/she is behaving that way. Look at the emotional behavior he/she has to deal with in their partner/child/friend/etc." It's one of the ways abusers maintain or restore their power. They involve onlookers by drawing them into the lie with "reasonable" explanations and sympathy ploys. Onlooker support is one of the best ways to keep an abuse victim off balance. If a reasonable person is convinced to be sympathetic to the "plight" of an abuser whose partner appears emotionally unstable (because of the difficulty of maintaining the appearance of normalcy and the stress of constant anxiety/fear and shifting rules or standards of behavior) the abuse victim is doubly penalized. Not only do they have the abuser to deal with but now the onlooker(s) have been fooled into being sympathetic toward the abuser rather than being people of safety to whom a victim can turn for help.

[TruTexan]

Originally Posted by Nic

Someone asked me for clarification of my statements (in bold and red above). Mockery doesn't translate well to the screen.

I was being sarcastic about abusers who are skilled at misdirection. Onlookers occasionally discover that they felt sympathy for (later revealed) abusers and excused an abusers displays of temper or behavior because the victim in that case displayed emotions that seemed out of context or behavior that was attributed to emotional instability.

Abusers are good at misdirection. This is especially important if they come to the attention of normal thinking folks might. A victim who has the rug pulled out from under him or her often enough may begin to feel unstable and confused and act so when it's no longer possible to keep a lid on so much stress. The abuser in this case has to convince everyone that up is down and left is right. Their ability to keep a victim in a constant state of stress and the onlooker constantly supplied with "reasonable" explanations can often be integral to their facade. If the abused person is unable to rein in emotional upset and feelings of chaos and happens to behave in a way that gets the attention of an onlooker or is uncomfortable to an onlooker the abuser has to be good at misdirection (i.e.:redirecting blame and judgement from themselves onto the abused). Onlookers often find themselves excusing what seems like controlling or red flag behavior on the part of the suspected abuser by saying "Of course he/she is behaving that way. Look at the emotional behavior he/she has to deal with in their partner/child/friend/etc." It's one of the ways abusers maintain or restore their power. They involve onlookers by drawing them into the lie with "reasonable" explanations and sympathy ploys. Onlooker support is one of the best ways to keep an abuse victim off balance. If a reasonable person is convinced to be sympathetic to the "plight" of an abuser whose partner appears emotionally unstable (because of the difficulty of maintaining the appearance of normalcy and the stress of constant anxiety/fear and shifting rules or standards of behavior) the abuse victim is doubly penalized. Not only do they have the abuser to deal with but now the onlooker(s) have been fooled into being sympathetic toward the abuser rather than being people of safety to whom a victim can turn for help.

Thanks for your clarification, I can totally understand now. OMG! I've lived it but didn't know how to put it into words. Thank you so much you have no idea how much this has helped me to feel validated about myself in ways you will never know or some will never understand but YOU got it right on the nail head. Thank you NIC. Please keep posting here.

[Girl_On_Fire]

The term I think some are looking for is "Gaslighting". "Gaslight" is a film that came out in 1944 starring Ingrid Bergman and it features a husband who does little things to his wife over a period of time to try to make her think she is insane. Eventually, after all the stress compounds, she begins to have small public breakdowns throughout the movie, further reinforcing the belief her husband has tried to perpetuate; that his wife is insane. (His entire reasoning for doing this is to get her locked up and inherit her fortune).

Some people just do this for fun. Some because they honestly don't know any better and it's simply a pattern from their childhood. Since that movie, a psychological term came about called 'gaslighting' in which one partner slowly and methodically picks apart at the sanity of another by implanting false information and misdirecting to make the other person questions themselves so much, they doubt their own sanity. This makes one of the partner even more vulnerable and easy to control. When they finally blow up or have a breakdown, the abuser can say, "See, I told you she was nuts." It's the most isolating, horrible, mentally-torturing feeling on earth. I've been through it.

**

I also want to address the "abuser versus victim" topic. I've only once considered myself a victim. I don't anymore. I'm somebody who unfortunately gets into a pattern of abusive relationships. I'm no innocent angel either. However, I can say with complete honesty that I have never in my life gone out of my way to harm somebody in a premeditated fashion. Have I reacted out of anger, fear, frustration or confusion in the moment? Yes. Absolutely. Has my inability read and understand social cues hurt people indirectly without my being aware of it? Yes. Absolutely. And once I figured out what I had been doing, it hit me like a ton of bricks and I spent several months tracking people down to apologize to them. (Which, unfortunately, got me back together with my ex).

I think there is something to be said about intent. (Yes, it's my favorite word.) An abuser, in my opinion, is someone who clearly knows they are physically or psychologically harming another. Once they find out from their partner that they are being hurtful, they purposefully use that information to continue to hurt their partner. That, in my opinion, is the definition of an abuser.

Someone who has a mental/developmental disorder and has a temper that they have difficulty controlling or difficulty understanding social expectations may display abusive behavior but may not, in fact, be an abuser. Someone who comes from an abusive background and knows no other way to behave may exhibit abusive behavior but may not be an abuser if they had therapy and/or education about more appropriate behavior.

I agree that two people just may be a bad fit for each other. They bring out the worse in each other but when they are with other people, their behavior and conduct would be considered within the norm. Every case is different. There are always grey areas.

[Redsunflower]

This thread has been very sad and difficult for me to read but a very worthwhile conversation to have. I've appreciated everyone's honesty so much, and had a few memories of my own stirred up.

It's also got me thinking about why abuse can be so difficult to identify. There's been a lot written about power and control and certainly, abusers try to take these things from their partners. Hugs to everyone who has experienced this.

I believe that part of the difficulty is that all relationships have an element of power and control in them. We are all entitled to be in charge of our own lives, then when we get close to someone, there needs to be some compromise. You have someone else to consider. Your partner may want you to do things you don't particularly want to, like visiting their relatives at Christmas, for example. You will also have some expectations of them. Where one of you doesn't fulfil expectations, then there will be conflict. And conflict can be scary for anyone.

When an abuser gets going this conflict can arise at any time, about anything, out of something or nothing, and in some ways that's easier to identify. But in the daily stuff of life, it can be more tricky. How does your partner cope with a little disappointment? Do they talk to you about feeling let down? Are you allowed to make amends for that? Do you know you're still cared for? Do they huff for a couple of hours and get over it? Do they stop speaking to you for a couple of days? Do they withhold love, affection, sex? Do they shout at you, try to intimidate you? Hit you? Throw you out of your home? In the midst of conflict it can be hard to keep a level head about what's acceptable or not. And oh so easy to explain away.

I believe we need to trust our instincts and our gut to try and keep ourselves safe. Too much thinking can be detrimental. You may want to ask your partner questions and to try and understand, but how important is that really when you're feeling worthless, bruised, homeless? Does it truly matter why your partner is doing these things when the impact on you is exactly the same? Even if we can't acknowledge abuse, we need to leave if our relationship feels like shit.

I would like to think I know how to keep myself safe but that's not entirely true. I believe we are all at risk of abuse, and that the need to feel loved and cared for is so great that we can often overlook the abuse to get the good bits. This makes me so sad.

I hope we can all manage to make more loving and caring relationships than this.

Rxx

[Gemme]

Originally Posted by Kobi

Snow, I agree that most females have experienced abuse by the traditional definition of the concept at the hands of other people at some point in their lives.

What I was referring to was this:


About 17-45% of lesbians report having been the victim of a least one act of physical violence perpetrated by a lesbian partner (1,5,6,13). Types of physical abuse named by more than 10% of participants in one study included:

Disrupting other’s eating or sleeping habits

Pushing or shoving, driving recklessly to punish, and slapping, kicking, hitting, or biting (11).

Sexual abuse by a woman partner has been reported by up to 50% of lesbians (12).

Psychological abuse has been reported as occurring at least one time by 24% to 90% of lesbians (1,5,6,11,14).


These are stats for lesbian-lesbian relationships. Not for women in general. At least one incident of psychological abuse in a relationship by 24-90% of lesbians? Sexual abuse 50% of the time?

This is when I feel like I am living in a parallel universe.

It doesn't read like sexual abuse occurs up to 50% of the time to me. It reads that sexual abuse occurred in UP TO 50% of the cases that sexual abuse from a woman partner was documented. We all know that of the cases that are documented, there are far more that are not. Of the documented cases, there could easily be documented incidents up to half of the reported cases. That doesn't mean that it happened 50% of the time. It would only have to happen at least once in up to 50% of the cases documented.

I haven't gone back so forgive me if I didn't see this but was there a clear and definitive definition of sexual abuse for these stats? Was it including only times when a physical assault actually occurred or does it include times that threats of assault were made but perhaps no definitive, physical assault occurred? Did it include sexual harrassment as sexual abuse? Does it include the fucked up mind games that people often play with one another?

I had a friend in high school who was physically assaulted in a very specific and graphic way. After that happened once, just the threat of that happening again created the same reaction as did the initial assault, so even though.....say the tenth time it happened (the threat), she was not physically touched but the threat of it happening again was very much a possibility.....does that still count as sexual abuse? Is it strictly psychological abuse at that point? For me, I see the various forms of abuse like links on a chain. They are connected and it's difficult to suffer one without another.

As for the psychological abuse stat, I fully believe it. Again, it's all about the definition for me. What you may consider fine or just rude behavior, I might consider abusive behavior. We all view from our individual perspectives and unless there's a straightforward definition of what is being measured, then we're going to have that gray area.

[Kobi]

Originally Posted by Gemme

It doesn't read like sexual abuse occurs up to 50% of the time to me. It reads that sexual abuse occurred in UP TO 50% of the cases that sexual abuse from a woman partner was documented. We all know that of the cases that are documented, there are far more that are not. Of the documented cases, there could easily be documented incidents up to half of the reported cases. That doesn't mean that it happened 50% of the time. It would only have to happen at least once in up to 50% of the cases documented.

I haven't gone back so forgive me if I didn't see this but was there a clear and definitive definition of sexual abuse for these stats? Was it including only times when a physical assault actually occurred or does it include times that threats of assault were made but perhaps no definitive, physical assault occurred? Did it include sexual harrassment as sexual abuse? Does it include the fucked up mind games that people often play with one another?

Gemme, you ask some very pertinent questions and show some excellent critical thinking skills.

Perhaps if you actually read it, some of those would have been answered and even more generated.

Same goes for the math. Read it. Then venture an opinion based on fact, not arbitrary conjecture.

Would love to discuss it further, once we are working with the same data.

Have a nice day

[Teddybear]

Originally Posted by Girl_On_Fire

Some people just do this for fun. Some because they honestly don't know any better and it's simply a pattern from their childhood. Since that movie, a psychological term came about called 'gaslighting' in which one partner slowly and methodically picks apart at the sanity of another by implanting false information and misdirecting to make the other person questions themselves so much, they doubt their own sanity. This makes one of the partner even more vulnerable and easy to control. When they finally blow up or have a breakdown, the abuser can say, "See, I told you she was nuts." It's the most isolating, horrible, mentally-torturing feeling on earth. I've been through it.

I want to address the issues you brought up but I want to do it separately.

Gaslighting is something that is a slow and methodically way to abuse someone. It takes someone who is really dark to put another on this path. I have followed some down that rabbit hole. It HELL to crawl back out and if and when your able to your NOT the person you were before. Its easy to follow the person you love down this path. It isnt like so outrageous that you can spot it a mile away.

It starts off very slowly and deliberate. They test the waters. It could be something as little as moving your keys from where you usually put them at the end of the day to asking where something is that was never there to start with. By time your so deep into it you dont know if your living in reality or in a dream world.

I used to set up little test for myself and didnt tell anyone but I wrote them down so I could check to make sure or I would take pictures with my camera. It was a way for me to know where to find what I was looking for in the am. I found out in short order that I wasnt "losing" my thing they were being moved on purpose. Im surprised that it took me months to finally say enough is enough.

By time I had left these relationships I knew that I had been played but couldnt figure out WHY? Im still asking myself that and I think I may for a long time to come.

I know that some ppl love to do this to others I just cant figure out why and where they really get the "balls" to do it.

Im sure there are others that will comment on this also and I look forward to reading them

[Nic]

Damn. Used to love that movie. Can't really look at it the same way now. What a shitty thing to do to someone.

[Teddybear]

Originally Posted by Girl_On_Fire

I also want to address the "abuser versus victim" topic. I've only once considered myself a victim. I don't anymore. I'm somebody who unfortunately gets into a pattern of abusive relationships. I'm no innocent angel either.

I was a VICTIM to my father and to the others I was PREY.

The abusers HUNT us. They set their sights on us and trap us. I like others i think use the word victim cause it is acceptable and it is how people outside looking in see us.

I have or I am working on taking that target OFF of me. It isnt an easy road by no means but its one Im traveling.

[Teddybear]

Originally Posted by Girl_On_Fire

I'm no innocent angel either. However, I can say with complete honesty that I have never in my life gone out of my way to harm somebody in a premeditated fashion. Have I reacted out of anger, fear, frustration or confusion in the moment? Yes. Absolutely. Has my inability read and understand social cues hurt people indirectly without my being aware of it? Yes. Absolutely. And once I figured out what I had been doing, it hit me like a ton of bricks and I spent several months tracking people down to apologize to them. (Which, unfortunately, got me back together with my ex).

I think there is something to be said about intent. (Yes, it's my favorite word.) An abuser, in my opinion, is someone who clearly knows they are physically or psychologically harming another. Once they find out from their partner that they are being hurtful, they purposefully use that information to continue to hurt their partner. That, in my opinion, is the definition of an abuser.

Someone who has a mental/developmental disorder and has a temper that they have difficulty controlling or difficulty understanding social expectations may display abusive behavior but may not, in fact, be an abuser. Someone who comes from an abusive background and knows no other way to behave may exhibit abusive behavior but may not be an abuser if they had therapy and/or education about more appropriate behavior.

I agree that two people just may be a bad fit for each other. They bring out the worse in each other but when they are with other people, their behavior and conduct would be considered within the norm. Every case is different. There are always grey areas.

I too have NEVER set out to hurt anyone intently that doesnt mean that I havent or wont in the future. However I have to say that being human we all hurt each other in some way or another. But that doesnt meet the definition of abuse. We hurt others feelings when we may or may not be who or what they want us to be.

Being with someone with mental health issues is a horse of a different color. I for one understand that no matter what they try sometimes they just cant control it.

I was with someone who refused to get help for her mental illness. She is now and Im thankful for that. We have just recently reconnected and the change in her is amazing. I know we wont ever be a couple again cause she will stop getting the help she needs.

INTENT!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! AN abuser is FULL of intent. Now to hear them tell it they arent doing anything wrong nor have they.

Im not going to go down that road. To me they get their kicks by DESTROYING their prey