Signs of an abusive relationship (mental, physical, and financial)

Written by Dakotta Hargrave

The signs aren't always noticeable in abusive relationships. They can begin out of the random or be slowly put into the relationship by the abuser. The abuser will act like the perfect partner in the beginning then knowing you’re with them good the abuse can start. Not every good partner is abusive, these are signs to look out for though and are many different types of abuse, but they’re put into three main topics like physical sexual psychological/emotional financial/material discriminatory organizational/institutional domestic, modern slavery, neglected/act of omission and self neglect.

Physical Abuse

The first topic that will be covered is physical abuse. Types of physical abuse are domestic, sexual, modern slave, physical, neglect, and self neglect. Domestic abuse can be characterized as psychological, physical, sexual, financial, and emotional. However, the definition is “an incident or pattern of incidents of controlling, cohesive, threatening, degrading, and violent behavior, including sexual violence, and the majority of cases by the partner or ex partner, but also by a family member or carrier.“ sexual abuse is rape, attempted rape/sexual assault, inappropriate touch, non-consensual masturbation, non-consensual sexual penetration, or attempted, any sexual activity that person lacks capacity to consent to, inappropriate, looking sexual teasing, sexual harassment, sexual photography, forced to use pornography, witnessing of sexual acts, and indecent exposure. 

Modern slavery is human trafficking, force, labor, domestic servitude, sexual exploitation (escort work, prostitution, pornography), and debit bondage (being forced to work to pay off debts that realistically will never be able to be paid off). Physical abuse can be assault, hitting, slapping, punching, kicking, hair, pulling, fighting, pushing, rough handling, scouting, or burning, physical punishments, inappropriate or unlawful use of restraints, making someone purposely uncomfortable (opening a window and removing blankets off of a person), involuntary isolation or confinement, misuse of medication (over-sedation), forceful, feeding for withholding food, unauthorized restraint/ restricting movement (tying someone to a chair). \

Neglect and or acts of a mission can be failure to provide for allow access to food/shelter/clothing/heating/simulate and activity/personal or medical care, providing care in a way that the person dislikes, failure to administer medication as prescribed, refusal to access to visitor, not taking account of individuals cultural/original religious/ethnic needs, not taking account for educational/social/recreational needs, ignoring or isolating, the person, preventing the person for making their own decisions, preventing access to classes/hearing aid/dentures/etc., failure to ensure privacy and dignity. In the physical category, self neglect. Self neglect can be lack of self-care to an extent that it threatens personal health and safety, neglecting the care for one’s person’s hygiene/health or surroundings, inability to avoid self harm, failure to seek help or access services to meet health and social care needs, and inability or unwillingness to manage one’s personal affairs.

Emotional Abuse

The second topic is emotional abuse. Emotional abuse can be phycological, discriminatory, and verbally abusive. Psychological abuse is enforcing social isolation, removing mobility/ communication aids, preventing expression of choice/opinion, failure to respect privacy, preventing stimulation/meaningful occupation or activities, intimidation/coercion/harassment/threats/humiliation/bullying/verbal abuse/swearing, addressing someone in a patronizing manner or infantilizing way, threats of harm/abandonment, and cyber bullying. Discriminatory abuse is unequal treatment based on age/disability/gender reassignment/marriage/civil partnership/pregnancy or maternity/race/religion/sexual orientation, verbal abuse, derogatory remarks, inappropriate use of language related to a protected characteristic, denying access to communication aids or not allowing access to an interpreter or signer, harassment or deliberate exclusion on the grounds of a protected characteristic, denying basic rights to healthcare/education/employment or criminal justice relating to a protected characteristic, and substandard service provision relating to a protected characteristic. Lastly in the emotional abuse category there is verbal abuse. Verbal abuse is name calling, bullying, demean, frightening, intimidating, or controlling someone. Verbal abuse can include screaming, yelling, swearing, harassment, insulting, and criticizing someone.

Financial Abuse

The third and last category is financial abuse. Financial abuse consists of financial/ material abuse and organizational/ institutional abuse. Financial/material abuse is theft of money or possessions/fraud/scamming/preventing someone access to their money/benefits/assets, employees taking a loan from a person using the service, undue pressure/influence put on a person in connection with loans/money/etc, arranging less care then is needed to save money to maximise inheritance, denying assistance to manage financial affairs, denying assistance to access benefits, misuse of personal allowance in a care home, misuse of benefits or direct payments in a family home, someone moving into a person's home and living rent free without arrangement, false representation/using another persons bank account/cards/documents, exploitation of a person's money or assets, misuse of power of attorney/deputy/appointee-ship, and rogue trading. 

Organizational/institutional abuse is discouraging visits or the involvement of relatives or friends, run-down or overcrowded establishment, authorization management or rigid regimes, lack of leadership and supervision, insufficient staff or high turnover resulting in poor quality care, abusive and disrespectful attitudes towards people using the service, inappropriate use of restraints, lack of respect for dignity and privacy, failure to manage residents with abusive behavior, not providing adequate food and drinks/assistance with eating, not offering choice or promoting independence, misuse of medication, failure to provide care with dentures/spectacles/hearing aids, not taking account of individuals cultural/religious/ethnic needs, failure to respond to abuse appropriately, interface with personal correspondence or communication, and failure to respond to complaints.

Stages & Why

Abusive relationships can lead and cause many things to happen in a person's life. It's not always understandable for others to wonder why someone would stay with an abusive person either. We start a relationship with our best foot forward and our best thoughts. Abusers often work to slowly disconnect you from your friends and family. Abusers do this so they can mold you into what they want you to be and there to meet every little need. Abusive relationships are a cycle that can be broken. The cycle consists of 4 stages, the 1st stage, Honeymoon Phase, the 2nd stage, Calm, the 3rd stage, Tension Builds, the 4th stage, Abusive Incident. People often stay in abusive relationships from fear or hope/love. The fear behind it is often that the abuser will hurt their children/loved ones if they leave, what others may think of them (weak, stupid, foolish), and that no one may ever love them again since they are “too damaged” and or “not good enough”. The hope and or love behind it is that the abuse will go away with time, the person may change for the better, and that they may be able to change their abuser. However we can’t change people's behavior, once we leave an abusive relationship it takes a while to get back on our feet as an actual human being. The abuser may be able to see their mistakes they’ve made in that relationship and change for the better, not everyone can see their mistakes they’ve made though. “In order to escape accountability for his crimes, the perpetrator does everything in his power to promote forgetting. If secrecy fails, the perpetrator attacks the credibility of his victim. If he cannot silence her absolutely, he tries to make sure no one listens.” ― Judith Lewis Herman, Trauma and Recovery: The Aftermath of Violence - From Domestic Abuse to Political Terror

 Abuse hotlines available to contact at any time of day or night

Extra Hotlines: 

• National Domestic Abuse Hotline - 800-799-7233

• Emotional Abuse Hotline - Text CONNECT to 741741

• Text START to 88788

• Chat on thehotline.org