Am I Being Abused?

Aug 9

Am I being abused? Conscientious, agreeable people sometimes don’t recognise another person’s patterns of behaviour as abusive. Being kind-hearted, trusting, loyal, quick to forgive and willing to compromise are beautiful human traits. But for some other humans (for example, highly narcissistic people), those noble qualities just look like an invitation to be dominated.

It’s sad, but true.

So, how do we know if the weird, repeated behaviours we experience at the hands of someone we love, are close to, or work with add up to abuse? How do we recognise abuse?

Let’s start with contemplating what is happening emotionally and psychology for us. Things like:

Feeling afraid of the other person a lot of the time (dreading phone calls, visits, meetings or physical proximity)
Keeping secrets or telling lies to avoid the wrath/anger/punishment of the other person (especially when doing so is out of character for us)
Feeling like no matter how hard we try to please/pacify the other, nothing we do is ever enough/right
Continually feeling confused or questioning our own reality
Wondering if it’s all our fault and maybe we deserve the treatment we get
Avoiding being with this person in public to avoid others seeing us being treated that way, or conversely, wanting to be with others because this is the only time we get treated well by this person
Worrying about how this person will react before we make a decision (from the mundane, like grocery shopping, to the more important, like accepting a job offer). Putting the other’s needs, wants, likes, dislikes way before our own
Feeling helpless, hopeless, stuck or trapped
Feeling abused or bullied. Am I being abused?

Then, take an honest inventory of the way the other person regularly treats us. Things like:

Humiliating us, making us the subject of jokes, putting us down or blaming us for their own bad behaviours (see what you made me do?)
Frequent and regular criticism, micro-management or attempts to control what we do, who we see, what we talk about, our opinions and beliefs, how we spend our own money or what we choose to wear
Jealousy or possessiveness that is making us change our own behaviour (for example, not seeing friends, family or ex-partners who are friends)
Sabotage of occasions that are important to us, from small (medical appointments) to big (graduation ceremonies). For abusers, the best sabotage is plausibly deniable (for example, they get sick, have an emergency, or have something way more important show up for them at the exact same time as our occasion)
Forcing or coercing us to comply with their wishes/demands by using overt threats or emotional blackmail against us, children or pets
Treating us like a household servant, a sex slave or their personal property (using threats, bribes or coercion as in the above point)
Isolating us from our established support networks (for example, friends, family, spiritual community, or any other affiliations)

Being bullied at work or abused in the home can have serious long-term effects on a person’s self-esteem, ability to cope with stress, mood, memory, other interpersonal relationships and reputation. It’s not just ‘one of those things’ that are part of normal human life. It’s not just the result of being hyper-sensitive or a ‘snowflake’.

Clinical narcissism isn’t the cause of every controlling, abusive behaviour. But over-entitlement and lack of empathy are big red flags for the dynamic of abuse to develop in a relationship. The risk increases when this person has more social or positional power than us.

Taking back our own power so we can live our lives the way we want to instead of the way someone else tells us we should can be complicated. But ask any person who has escaped abusive relationships, and they’ll tell you they have no regrets once they get their lives back.

©Nicki Paull