What Abuse Really Looks Like (Part 1): It Didn’t Feel Like Love. It Felt Like Control.

In this first episode of a four-part series, I walk listeners through subtle, often overlooked forms of abuse - specifically psychological abuse, emotional abuse, and coercive control.

Through real-life stories and gentle reflection, I name the quiet, soul-erasing patterns many survivors were taught to normalize.

This episode is for the woman still trying to figure out if it “counts.” And for the friend, mother, or pastor watching someone slowly disappear - and wondering why.

Episode Transcript

(00:01):
Hey friends, Christy here. Welcome back to I Choose the
Bear podcast. I decided that I wanted to do a
four part series called What Abuse Really Looks Like to offer
knowledge on signs of abuse. But before we begin, I want to
offer a trigger warning. We'll be talking about
emotional, psychological and controlling forms of abuse, what

(00:24):
they sound like, feel like, and how they often go unnoticed.
Some stories may be activating. Please listen with care.
Pause if you need to. Your well-being matters here.
This episode is for two kinds oflisteners.
One, those who are in it questioning if what they are

(00:45):
experiencing is OK, or perhaps you're out of it and looking
back, wondering. And two, those who are watching
someone they love slip into silence, confusion or control,
and wondering if it might be abuse, because abuse doesn't
always look like bruises. Sometimes it looks like a slow,

(01:08):
invisible shrinking. And it starts in ways that are
easy to excuse until the excusesrun out.
Let's begin. She brings up something that
hurt her. Calm, careful, like she's afraid
of setting him off. He crosses his arms and says
that never happened, you're remembering it wrong, you're

(01:31):
crazy, you always twist things. This is also called gaslighting.
She walks away, questioning her own reality.
Was she wrong? Did she make it up?
As time goes by, she doesn't even bring things up anymore, or
she brings something up that hurts her.

(01:54):
He gets defensive and now it's afight.
Somehow she always ends up beingthe one to apologize.
He raises his voice, accuses, deflects, and by the end of the
argument she's comforting him for how upset she made him.

(02:14):
These two examples are forms of psychological abuse.
It's not about anger, it's aboutpower.
It's about making sure you neverfeel sure of anything, not even
yourself. Sometimes abuse doesn't show up
in what they do to you, but in what they won't do.

(02:35):
She breaks down crying after a long day, dishes in the sink,
kids fighting. She's exhausted.
I just need help, I feel like I'm drowning, she says.
He doesn't say a word, doesn't move.
He just stares at her like she'sbeing ridiculous, maybe scoffs,
then scrolls his phone and walksaway.

(02:58):
That's emotional abandonment. That's emotional abuse.
Another version looks like she opens up about her fears, her
anxiety, her exhaustion. He rolls his eyes and says,
you're always like this, honestly, it's exhausting to be
around you. That's not honesty, that's

(03:20):
cruelty. And it teaches her little by
little to hide her feelings, to keep the peace.
That's emotional abuse. Or she starts crying during an
argument, not screaming, not dramatic, just honest tears.
And he says, my dad says it's not fair when women cry.

(03:41):
That's just manipulation. So she stops, not because she
isn't hurting, but because she knows he'll use her pain against
her. She learns that tears are
dangerous, that emotion is weakness, that she can only be
heard if she stays cold. That's emotional abuse.

(04:02):
That's silencing. That was my story.
I remember being told that crying was manipulation, that if
I teared up in an argument, I was being unfair.
And so eventually, with all I could muster, I tried to never
cry. I held it in.
I numbed out. I convinced myself that staying

(04:23):
composed made me safer. But it didn't.
It just made me smaller, quieter, less human.
If you've ever been told that your tears were a tactic, that
your sadness made you the problem, please hear this.
That wasn't love. That was control.

(04:45):
You are allowed to cry. You are allowed to feel.
You are allowed to be human in arelationship without being
punished for it. And there's more.
She's not yelling, not accusing,just upset.
Her voice wavers as she tries toexplain what's bothering her.

(05:07):
And he says, I don't like the sound of your voice when you're
upset. Not because she was cruel, not
because she was out of line, butbecause her tone, her truth,
made him uncomfortable. So she learns.
If you want to be heard, stay calm, stay quiet, stay neutral.

(05:31):
Don't let your voice carry pain in it, or he'll shut down.
Or worse, he'll shut you out. That's emotional abuse.
That's silencing too. It may not sound loud, but it's
devastating if someone taught you that your voice was too much
when you were hurt, that your emotion was a threat to their

(05:52):
comfort, that the only version of you they could love was the
version that stayed small. That's not safety.
That's not love. And you were never the problem
for needing to be heard. And finally, for today, this is
one of the hardest forms of abuse to spot, because it's not
always about violence. It's about power and fear and

(06:17):
shrinking somebody down so smallthat they forget they ever had
choices. Her phone buzzes again.
Where are you? Why haven't you answered?
Send me a picture. She wasn't doing anything wrong,
but now she feels like she was. So next time she doesn't go out
at all, that's coercive control.Or this.

(06:42):
He makes all the decisions, whatshe wears, who she talks to,
when she can go out, if she pushes back.
He says, you're ungrateful, I'm just trying to take care of you.
You're being difficult. So she shrinks, stops asking.
It's safer that way. That's not love.

(07:05):
That's not protection. That's coercive control for
those watching from the outside.Maybe this isn't your story.
Maybe you're here because someone you care about seems
different. She used to laugh more, speak
more freely, be more herself, and now she flinches when he

(07:27):
enters the room. She cancels plans more often.
She second guesses herself in every sentence.
She checks her phone like she's walking on egg shells.
You've wondered, is this just stress, a rough patch, or is
something else going on? And here's the truth, you don't

(07:48):
have to be sure to care. You can say you don't seem like
yourself lately. Are you OK?
I've noticed you seem more anxious when he's around.
You don't owe me details, but I want you to know I'm here
because the signs aren't always loud.

(08:08):
Sometimes abuse doesn't scream, sometimes it whispers.
Don't cause trouble, don't speaktoo loudly, don't make him
angry. And sometimes it just looks like
silence. Next week we'll talk about
verbal abuse, spiritual abuse, and neglect, 3 forms of abuse

(08:30):
that are often dismissed, spiritualized, or brushed off as
just personality differences. But until then, whether you're
surviving this or witnessing it,you are brave for noticing, you
are wise for asking, and you areworthy of truth.
This is I choose the bear because for some of us, the bear

(08:54):
really is safer than the man. Not just metaphorically, not
just emotionally, statistically,viscerally, spiritually.
And when we choose to see the truth, when we stop explaining
it away, we begin to survive.