Improved
6112 HealthChanged
3786 LivesSaved
3568 Lives0 lives impacted in the last 24 hrs Learn More
Photo: Photospin - Auremar
Physical and verbal abuse are forms of “visible” abuse. Scars and bruises, raised voices and demeaning and hurtful words are signals to others that something is not quite right in the relationship. It’s also easier for a wife to see and recognize that’s she’s being abused.
Emotional abuse, however, is much more insidious and not quite as visible. Certainly, a wife’s self-esteem and spirit are battered along with her body in the case of physical and verbal abuse, but a husband can kill his wife’s spirit without even raising a hand or voice against her. For this reason, many women don’t even know they’re being abused, or if they do it’s a long and difficult battle not only to work to repair the damage done themselves, but to get the abuser to recognize the harm that he’s done.
What are the signs of mental abuse?
“Emotional abuse is any nonphysical behavior or attitude that controls, intimidates, subjugates, demeans, punishes or isolates another person by using degradation, humiliation or fear” (www.focusonthefamily.com).
“Nonphysical behavior or attitude” can safely be interpreted to mean neglect, invalidating another’s thoughts and feelings, and refusing to acknowledge the needs of the other (whether intentionally or not). Over a period of time, this kind of emotional climate in a marriage can squeeze the life out of a marriage and out of a wife.
There is a difference between experiencing or inflicting emotional hurt and being emotionally abusive—it is important to make this distinction. Abuse is a cycle. It is not a once-in-a-while event that happens and hurts someone else. In many “ordinary” hurtful cases, apologies can be offered if truly sincere and heal the rift that the hurt has caused. Many hurts are unintentional, and if they were, there is (hopefully) remorse on the part of the person who inflicted that hurt, once the anger, frustration, etc., calms down and cooler heads prevail. With emotional abuse there is none of this. Like other forms of abuse, there can be apologies and promises to never do it again, and there is hope in the beginning that behaviors and attitudes will change—often referred to as the “honeymoon phase”—but somewhere in the back of many a wife’s mind, she knows that it’s only a matter of time before the abuser settles back into old routines.
The Profile of an Emotional Abuser
At the heart of an emotionally abusive husband is his need to ultimately be in control. He feels inadequate and harbors distorted beliefs about women and marriage, usually learned from an abusive father or other dominant male influence, or sometime due to lack of decent male role modeling in how to treat women. In many cases, but not all, an emotionally abusive husband can be manipulative and heavy-handed in keeping his wife “under his thumb”. The abusive husband is “self-referenced”, which means he only sees and considers things from his point of view; he deliberately refuses to or is incapable of looking at things from another’s perspective. “Selfish” and “self-referenced” are two different words and can be described this way: the “self-referenced person would give you the shirt off his back, but he doesn’t know you need it. The self-referenced person frequently violates the marriage partnership by acting without thoughtfully considering his partner’s point of view and needs” (Amy Wildman White). The abusive husband is also emotionally dependent on his wife; that is, his feeling of self-worth comes from being married. Most emotionally abusive husbands are unable to look at and examine themselves and why they engage in such spirit-killing behavior against a person they have avowed to love and cherish.
The Profile of an Emotionally Abused Wife
Women who find themselves in an emotionally abusive situation often have low self-esteems even though they may appear confident and in control of everything. An emotionally abused wife “looks to her husband’s acceptance of her as the measure of her worth” (White).
Unlike a man, who typically finds his identity through work, and academic or athletic achievement, “[a] woman’s identity is often based on her relationships” (White) this makes her vulnerable to abusive relationships.
One of the most common characteristics of an emotionally abused woman is that she is unable to enjoy sexual experiences with her husband. This is due to the deterioration of the trust and the lack of friendship and intimacy over the time of the relationship. Add on top of this societies’, her husbands’ and the church’s views that she’s not a good wife if she doesn’t meet her husband’s sexual needs and she may feel perpetually trapped in her marriage. What many people (including counselors and pastors) fail to realize is that “[t]he wife in these situations experiences intercourse as an indignity, almost as rape, because the physical and the deeply personal, loving aspects of sex…[i]ntimacy and trust, which lay the necessary foundation for a woman to respond sexually, have been removed from the relationship” (White) and she is left to emotionally detach herself from the situation just to survive—at the cost of her soul and spirit.
Call to Action
It’s time to lift the veil from these situations and recognize how much a person’s soul and spirit can be damaged without physical and verbal abuse. Abuse doesn’t have to come in the form of acting out a form of punishment, or lashing out with temper and words. Abuse can also be withholding affection, or never saying a kind word. It takes a strong woman to stand up against what everyone is telling her is her duty and recognize that this kind of situation is not okay, and to talk about it until somebody listens.
If you believe you are in an emotionally abusive marriage—which can take many forms to keep a wife dependant on a husband (a virtual prisoner in her own house)—or you’re not even sure if what you’re experiencing is emotional abuse, please join us in the Marital Discovery and Recovery group and share your story.
Sources: www.focusonthefamily.com; “The Silent Killer of Christian Marriages” by Amy Wildman White (http://www.safeplaceministries.com/pdf/The Silent Killer of Christian Marriages.pdf)
Add a Comment380 Comments
I relate to your story. After 31 years of marriage, I finally filed for a legal separation. I had no proof of sexual infidelity, although my husband continuously used porn, skyped women and flirted inappropriately, so I felt I had no biblical grounds for divorce. Things will not change, so it is better to get out now!
January 20, 2015 - 3:37pmThis Comment
I feel for you so much.....
January 19, 2015 - 1:24pmThis Comment
Hi, i would like to thank you for this article. I've been married to my husband for 17years. and discovered that he had several relations while being married, and to my knowlege is still emotionally attached to a woman, he supports her financially. this is not something that he's told me, but i have my way of finding out. I feel that i have been both physically and spirtually raped by his actions. i've gone thru many counseling sessions and marriage counselling with an associated minister from the church i belong too. I figure that my husband has totally checked out of this marriage, I'm only needed when he needs initmacy. i dont trust, he's a pathological liar. i have left on 2 occassion, but i feel that God is telling me to stay in this marriage. i pray that God would capture his heart and change this situation, because i'm not sure if i can continue like this.
January 10, 2015 - 5:51pmThis Comment
Is it God that is telling you to stay? Or is it fear? Gods greatest gift to man is his wife. That is, besides our LORD that is. Is he treating you like you are his greatest gift? You mentioned that you feel that he has checked out. That he only uses you. God tells as to pray for those who hurt us. He also tells us to guard our hearts. God is love. Perfect love. Why do you think God is telling you to stay with a man who does not treat you the way God commanded us to treat each other? "Do unto others as I have done for you". Someone once told me that I have the love of God because I was, and unfortunately am, in love with my beloved despite the awful things he's done to me. You have unconditionally loved this man. You have given him your most precious possession. Now instead of taking care of you, and being a Godly husband as you deserve he is destroying your spirit. Why would God want that for his daughter? You can not make your husband choose God. God gave us free will to test us. Will we love God or the world? Your husband knows he is hurting you, no doubt. He is unfaithful and has taken away love from you to give to another? I'm not perfect but I would not continue to hurt anyone , let alone my beloved. I don't know why God wants You to be unhappy because of your husband? You can pray for him, you can plant seeds, only God will make those grow. If your husband isn't accepting Gods love, you are "casting your pearls before swine". I know what it is like to love him and do anything to make him happy, only to Be ignored, cheated on countless times, lied to, used, lied about, treated like trash....exc. It left me empty, and feeling worthless. The pain goes deep into Your soul. If your light isn't already out, continuing as is will put It out. I thought it was my duty to save my beloved soul. I thought If I loved him enough He would stop and return the love to me. I loved him with everything I had. The only thing that changed was me. I did things with him that I didn't want to do just to show him that I loved him more then anything. All of my love and everything I had done because of him only made me a stop loving myself. I suggest you pray for yourself more and ask God what he wants you to do. Then read Your bible. Because you are lost. Your husband left you but God will look for you. He tells us that he wrote us everything we need. Its his letter to you. You will find answers there and with him. Fear is not from God. He gave us HIS spirit. He gave us HIS power over evil. Evil comes in many forms. It comes to steal our JOY! One more thing, Our FATHER did not raise us to be abused. I pray your life soon is filled with Joy and love from above!
January 10, 2015 - 10:44pmThis Comment
I'm glad I found this page. I need someone to talk to.. I'll write more later. Thank you.
January 8, 2015 - 1:47pmThis Comment
I'd like to read some advice on repairing relationships that include these kinds of actions, particularly how the abusive partner can work on altering his behaviour.
The article reads as if the abuser is damaged due to things such as no male role model, does that mean they're forever damaged never to be fixed?
January 8, 2015 - 9:23amThis Comment
I always hold out hope that some men can change if they're behavior is the result of a not-so-great childhood. Every person has to make choices in their lives about how they treat someone else. Someone, however, who is totally self-referenced (I would consider this something along the lines of bipolar or some other mental illness) is incapable of understanding what their behavior is doing to someone else because they can only see things from their own point of view -- for these people, I hold out very little hope that they can change and the relationship repaired. Child experiences can be learned from and different choices made if a person is willing to make the change. If it is the result of a mental illness, there's a lot more to deal with and, while I haven't done any research to verify, I'm fairly certain this kind of personality can't be helped by medication or counselling -- and the person would probably never really believe he/she needed it anyway.
March 13, 2015 - 10:43amThis Comment
I have been married to my husband for ten years. He had been emotionallly and mentally hurting me. He doesn't mean too. He just wants me to hurt because he's hurting. He has a lot of problems due to his childhood tobhia adult years. I just don't know what to do anymore.
January 6, 2015 - 8:49pmThis Comment
Thank you for the article and all the comments... I learned a lots and much were confirmed. I see my situation in so much of what was writen, but I'm only married since July and have a gorgeous little 7months old. I left a few days before Christmas and am considering returning as he promised not to hurt me again, to go to counciling and seek ways to control his temper. he does not understand the emotional emptiness I feel, but is willing to work on our marraige. I'm in turmoil for I so want this love I waited so long for to be true, but will not be able to forgive myself if my son gets hurt. am I yet again being the fool to believe in love, change and miracles?
January 1, 2015 - 1:26pmThis Comment
You are not a fool to believe in change, miracles and love, but you are wise to educate yourself on the necessary process of healing. The average victim of abuse will go back 7 or 8 times before she has the courage to stay away for good or is dead. It sounds like you may be dealing with more than emotional abuse. Couples therapy is not appropriate until both of you get help individually. The cycle of abuse must be broken. I stayed 17 years in my marriage because he never hit me. I also didn't understand the cycle of abuse so every time we went back into the honeymoon stage, I thought things were really getting better. I am so proud of you for recognizing the danger and getting out so soon. My children are 9 and 12 and have been through so much. They are depressed, confused and angry but we are healing. I too hope for my husband to change. My pastor has told me that my husband must demonstrate change over a period of five to seven years before I should attempt to go back. Words mean nothing from an abuser. You must see him getting therapy, being financially responsible in providing for you and truly owning his issues. I hope this helps. Stay strong. I can relate to your pain.
January 1, 2015 - 2:00pmThis Comment