Abuse

We often use the word bully for people who uses force or coercion to abuse or intimidate others. The behavior can be habitual and involve an imbalance of social or physical power. Bullying is repeated acts over time that involves a real or perceived imbalance of power with the more powerful individual or group attacking those who are less powerful. Bullying may consist of three basic types of abuse – verbal, physical and emotional. 

Verbal abuse is described as a negative defining statement told to a person or about a person or by withholding any response thus defining the target as non-existent.

Physical abuse is an act of another party involving contact intended to cause feelings of physical pain, injury, or other physical suffering or bodily harm.   In most cases, children are the victims of physical abuse, but adults can be the sufferers too. Physically abused children are at risk for later interpersonal problems involving aggressive behavior, and adolescents are at a much greater risk for substance abuse. In addition, symptoms of depression, emotional distress, and suicide are also common features of people who have been physically abused.

Psychological abuse, also referred to as emotional abuse or mental abuse is a form of abuse characterized by a person subjecting or exposing another to behavior that may result in psychological trauma, including anxiety, chronic depression, or post-traumatic stress disorder.  Such abuse is often associated with situations of power imbalance, such as abusive relationships, bullying, and abuse in the workplace

Emotional abuse can be hard to know. Most women think that their husbands are allowed to make them have sex. That's not true. Forced sex is rape, no matter who does it just as cruel or threatening words.  And sometimes emotional abuse is a sign that a person will become physically violent.

The ff are list of possible signs of abuse. Some of these are illegal. All of them are wrong. You may be abused if your partner:

• Monitors what you're doing all the time
• Unfairly accuses you of being unfaithful all the time
• Prevents or discourages you from seeing friends or family
• Prevents or discourages you from going to work or school
• Gets very angry during and after drinking alcohol or using drugs
• Controls how you spend your money
• Controls your use of needed medicines
• Decides things for you that you should be allowed to decide (like what to wear or eat)
• Humiliates you in front of others
• Destroys your property or things that you care about
• Threatens to hurt you and the children
• Hurts you (by hitting, beating, pushing, shoving, punching, slapping, kicking, or biting)
• Uses (or threatens to use) a weapon against you
• Forces you to have sex against your will
• Blames you for his or her violent outbursts
• Threatens to harm himself or herself when upset with you
• Says things like, "If I can't have you then no one can."

If you are going through such treatment, get help. Abuse can have serious physical and emotional effects. No one has the right to hurt you. Report to the police before you are killed.