Signs of an Abusive Relationship

 

Over the years, I’ve encountered various situations with women who are experiencing domestic abuse and violence. These situations are often extremely difficult to deal with, because abusers are so good at controlling and manipulating their victims. An abuser in a church environment will often use Scripture as a weapon. He’ll insist that his abusive behavior is due to your lack of submission, or claim that because he is the head of the household, he has the God-given right to control and dominate you. This is a distortion of what the Word of God teaches. (Read what complementarian pastors have to say about this.)

If you’re in an abusive relationship, chances are you feel drained, depressed, frightened, ashamed, and confused. You’re probably reluctant to let your family, friends and church community know about the abuse. You might make excuses for your husband, blame yourself, minimize or overlook the abuse, or hope that he really has changed this time around.

Perhaps the abuse isn’t physical. You might think that physical abuse is far worse than emotional abuse, since physical violence can send you to the hospital and leave you with scars. But the scars of emotional abuse are very real, and they run deep. Emotional abuse can be just as damaging as physical abuse–sometimes even more so.

The trouble is, without  intervention, abuse usually gets worse. Verbal, emotional and psychological abuse can progress to physical abuse. Infrequent episodes will progress to more frequent ones. Less severe episodes will progress to more severe ones. Please believe me when I tell you that it’s easier to deal with the symptoms of abuse early on than to wait until it has deteriorated into an ingrained cycle of control, destruction and violence, and the chance of saving the marriage has dimmed.   Continue at Mary Kassian