Love and Abuse

Every relationship should have stopping points when you feel yourself slipping away. Emotional abuse operates as a slow drip-feeding of toxic behaviors that gradually erode boundaries.

The endless monologue of some emotionally abusive people is a tactic that keeps you silent and submissive. It's designed to wear you down until you finally give in. 

Some emotionally abusive people do heal. And once they do, they might feel the relationship will be great from that point on. What they don't consider is that the victim of their abusive behavior is only starting their healing process. 

If you've ever questioned how to forgive yourself for choosing your own well-being over an abusive partner, you're not alone. If you're feeling guilt or shame for leaving an abusive person, this is an important episode to listen to. 

If you find yourself obsessively attached to someone who hurts you, is it a sign of a trauma bond? I'll tackle this challenging subject, shedding light on why you might stay in a relationship despite enduring hurtful behavior and what this could mean for your sense of self-worth and emotional well-being.

Some people will deflect blame and make you feel like the problem. In this episode, I dive into this subject by examining a heart-wrenching story from a listener whose partner's jealousy turned violent, leaving her questioning the future of their relationship and her path to healing.

The emotionally abusive relationship can sometimes be hard to define. How long must abusive behavior go on before actually admit that what's really happening is abuse? 

How do you know when it's time to instigate a split? If your partner's behavior leaves you feeling oppressed and defeated, and they refuse to change, and they also don't want to end the relationship, then what? 

Breadcrumbing can be a manipulative way to keep someone in your mind so that you can't fully move forward, keeping you as a pawn in another person's game. In this episode, a person wrote to me talking about their ex, a 13-year breadcrumber!

The way someone talks about their relationship reveals a lot. Abuse victims and perpetrators each have their own language patterns. Knowing these language patterns will help you understand on which side of the fence you're on.

In abusive relationships it might be difficult or even impossible to discern which parts of yourself are truly you and which are shaped by the abuse. Let's talk about what it takes to start building or rebuilding your identity.

You walk into an emotionally abusive relationship as one person, but where do you go after you're in one for a while? Is the person you're with trying to change you into someone you're not? 

Love can feel like a double-edged sword, cutting deep despite the tender moments. Or is that really love? Caring and kindness mixed with toxic, controlling behaviors create a dangerous emotional cocktail of bonding and trauma. 

They did the worst thing imaginable and now want you to stay in their life. Is it possible they can change? Should you give them a chance?

What does it take for an abusive person to change? A whole lot (if they even want to change), but this one component of healing is often one of the hardest for them to stop. Their consistent focus on you can make their healing and change much more difficult, let alone having no time and space to heal yourself. 

The one-off difficulties in relationships are perfectly normal for everyone. They're not welcome, necessarily, but normal. But what happens when the "one-offs" become systemic? What happens when they are non-stop? That's when changes are inevitable.  

When they threaten to leave or take something away from you, but they never follow through, expect them to repeat that behavior indefinitely. Empty threats are effective on those who fear them coming true. There is a way to stop the empty threats (but you probably won't like it).

You'd think it'd be easy to figure out: The hurtful one is the abusive one. But what happens when the victim gets convinced they are the abuser? Determining that while in the abuse cycle can sometimes be very difficult. However, I make it very clear in this episode.