Signs that Emotional Abuse is Happening

Written by R. A. Stewart

Emotional abuse may not leave any physical scars, but unlike physical scars which heal over time, emotional scars can last a lifetime. Those closest to people who are being emotionally abused or have been emotionally abused in the past are usually oblivious to this issue.

Emotional Abuse comes in many different forms.

Here are several examples to check whether someone’s behaviour fits the definition of emotional abuse towards another individual.

1 You are called names which are not complimentary

2. Your achievements are downplayed and your mistakes are magnified.

3. You just cannot complete any task to the required standard no matter how hard you try.

4. You are treated as having no value as a human being.

5. Your movements are monitored and controlled.

6. You cannot do anything without the approval of whoever is controlling you.

7 Demeaning, shaming, or humiliating behaviour

8. Threatening and intimidating behaviour

9. Constant criticism.

10. Regular teasing.

The perpetrators of emotional abuse are insecure people who like to gain power over others by making them feel badly about themselves. It is their way of building up their own self-esteem. People like this are cowards and low life’s.

They may try to control you by:

Monitoring your whereabouts. They always want to know where you have been and what you have been doing and when you come home late they want to interrogate you.

Take away your choices. They may make all your choices for you as to what you should do with your money. What you should wear and what you should eat.

They explode for no reason: They may lose their temper and raise their voice at the drop of a hat.

Intimidation: They use intimidation to get their own way. According to them it is my way or the highway.

Another way they will do this is to turn others against you by spreading lies about you on social media or in person. I have seen this happen several times. People will choose what they believe and who they believe. On social media you can report this to the website whether it is facebook or instagram. Some countries have introduced laws against using social media to destroy someone else’s reputation.

What to do about emotional abuse.

There are two things you can do.

1. Spend more time with kind people

2. Spend less time with nasty people.

If this abuse takes place at work then there are protocols in place which you can follow, but this all depends on the attitude of the employer. Some simply ignore laws which are designed to make the workplace a safer environment. Technically, emotional abuse is a health and safety issue.

The Labour Department has clear guidelines on what steps you can take if this abuse is happening at work. The protocols will be different from one country to another.

There is no excuse for any kind of harassment at work and any suggestion of it being work related is insulting to those who are affected by it.

At school an option is to speak to a teacher about it but this can be likened to throwing petrol on a fire because this is likely to attract the hostility which is feared.

There are other ways of dealing with the problem without making it worse. One is to bring attention to it by writing an essay about it or writing to the editor of your local newspaper. Choose your words very carefully when you try this.

About this article

You may use this article as content for your blog/website or ebook.