Learning About Emotional Abuse

Emotional abuse varies in its manifestations and is more consistent than just a bad mood, an outburst or a hurtful comment or action. Many people like myself have had some idea about what it means just by putting the meaning of 'abuse' and 'emotion' together, but do not really know what it looks like and just how harmful it can be. It is more common for women to be emotionally abused. I believe this is because of the emotional vulnerability and sensitivity of women, alongside their greater need to maintain relationships and family which creates the perfect conditions for an abuser. Nevertheless, a number of victims are male as well.

At the end of this post you will find a few site links which will provide a starting point if you'd like to know more about this type of abuse. I hope that this will help you or someone you know to identify any relationship that is emotionally abusive and to take the steps to avoid being scarred by it. There is also healing for abusers who want to end the cycle that destroys their relationships or traps others with them in unhealthy patterns. For other interested readers, this may also be eye-opening.

There is no globally accepted definition for emotional abuse but there is a comprehensive list of traits which are components of this type of abuse. Emotional abuse is psychological and may or may not always require the use of words. It is habitual and cyclical. It can include degrading comments, insults, angry outburts, shame tactics and various forms of manipulation and control. But other manifestation of this abuse comes in the form of cool indifference, sarcasm, witholding affection, approval or companionship. It is just as damaging to the victim, especially over time. For example, the victim may be subjected to harsh comments/sarcasm, followed immediately and sharply by indifference and prolonged withdrawal. Meanwhile, the abuser never accepts responsibility and awaits the victim's 'apology'. The rare but closest half-admission would be framed by the emotional abuser as 'I apologize for...but.'

Emotional abuse breaks the victim down from the level of the soul and spirit, insidiously. Many victims of emotional abuse will tell you that they would prefer to be physically hit if they had to choose one over the other. However, emotional abuse tends to co-exist or progress into sexual and physical abuse. This is particularly a stronghold in marriages where it is less easy to delineate the normal sexual obligation of partners in the marriage covenant from sexually abusive demands and practices. Furthermore, in families where children are involved, childhood emotional abuse may develop by the abusive partner and will affect children who live in the unhealthy environment and view its effect on one parent.

The abuser may not appear to the outside world of family and friends as the other partner knows them to be. This can trap the victim in fear of being blamed or of bearing the embarrassment of this secret reality. I have read desperate stories and letters from women in different online forums and I am amazed at how it nearly seems they are all married to the same man. For the Christian wife it is particularly difficult as she is torn by the doctrine of submission, sexually belonging to her husband, protecting the children, decisions for separation or grounds for divorce. Read one example here. Many more exist if you browse.

The emotional abuser is in his/her own way, a victim as well. He/she is usually so emotionally/psychologically broken somewhere that they do not recognize their abusive behavior which is almost ingrained in their own psyche. They are enabled by responses from the other person which provide a sense of affirmation, power and even love to attempt to remedy their own brokenness. This may be the reason that they rarely accept blame or see their problem.

There have been emotional abusers who were able to admit their problem, find healing and follow through to become emotionally healthy in stable relationships such as Paul Hegstrom, a christian author and teacher on many such life issues. He wrote from experience in Angry Men and the Women Who Love Them: Breaking the Cycle of Physical and Emotional Abuse. And is also the author of Broken Children, Grown-up Pain: Understanding the Effects of Your Wounded Past.The reviews are good although I've not been able to get my hands on either. I suggest you look him up for more resources.

I studied psychology and still enjoy reading up on psychological research and theories. I find it does accurately identify and even predict many human thought processes and behaviors - some of it is absolute rubbish too - but I want to emphasize that psychological techniques cannot once and for all change a human being from the inside out and achieve wholeness. Behavioral modification comes with no lasting guarantee either. Without the word and power of God as the source and foundation of our healing process we would not even know what wholeness is or what a healthy soul and spirit looks and thinks like.

Because there is so much information available quite easily, I decided to pull out a few that were also from a Christian perspective. Other more general sites will also be useful too.

Links to Info with a Christian Perspective:-

http://www.leaderu.com/orgs/probe/docs/verbalabuse.html

http://www.focusonthefamily.com/search.aspx/search?q=emotional%20abuse

http://silverreflection.tripod.com/speakoutagainstverbalabusecopy/id5.html

http://www.abigails.org/a-studypage.htm

"O God Of Our Many Understandings" - READ AS - "O Man-Made God"

In case you haven't read it already, you can read this ludicrous and disturbing inaugural prayer below, from a purported representative of the christian church (it is also available on YouTube which the simplest search will turn up if you're interested).

While many of the components seem noble, this prayer is foolishness because it went wrong from its first line "O God of our many understandings." This 'god' just simply does not exist.

In addition, I shudder to think of what this type of prayer means in the spiritual realm, and how far America has fallen. Can you imagine King David's inaugural ceremony including a prayer by a high priest of baal? Ok, ok, so that did not and could not have happened, but please ponder that as the reason I call all of this ludicrous.

Gene Robinson may truly be part of 'a church', but he's definitely not a member of the Blood-bought Body of Jesus Christ. This prayer is not going any further than the ceiling, so-to-speak...unless, of course, it's captured by some demons and carried off as a keepsake for the kingdom of darkness.

By The Rt. Rev. V. Gene Robinson, Episcopal Bishop of New Hampshire

Opening Inaugural Event
Lincoln Memorial, Washington, DC
January 18, 2009

Welcome to Washington! The fun is about to begin, but first, please join me in pausing for a moment, to ask God’s blessing upon our nation and our next president.

O God of our many understandings, we pray that you will…

Bless us with tears – for a world in which over a billion people exist on less than a dollar a day, where young women from many lands are beaten and raped for wanting an education, and thousands die daily from malnutrition, malaria, and AIDS.

Bless us with anger – at discrimination, at home and abroad, against refugees and immigrants, women, people of color, gay, lesbian, bisexual and transgender people.

Bless us with discomfort – at the easy, simplistic “answers” we’ve preferred to hear from our politicians, instead of the truth, about ourselves and the world, which we need to face if we are going to rise to the challenges of the future.

Bless us with patience – and the knowledge that none of what ails us will be “fixed” anytime soon, and the understanding that our new president is a human being, not a messiah.

Bless us with humility – open to understanding that our own needs must always be balanced with those of the world.

Bless us with freedom from mere tolerance – replacing it with a genuine respect and warm embrace of our differences, and an understanding that in our diversity, we are stronger.

Bless us with compassion and generosity – remembering that every religion’s God judges us by the way we care for the most vulnerable in the human community, whether across town or across the world.

And God, we give you thanks for your child Barack, as he assumes the office of President of the United States.

Give him wisdom beyond his years, and inspire him with Lincoln’s reconciling leadership style, President Kennedy’s ability to enlist our best efforts, and Dr. King’s dream of a nation for ALL the people.

Give him a quiet heart, for our Ship of State needs a steady, calm captain in these times.

Give him stirring words, for we will need to be inspired and motivated to make the personal and common sacrifices necessary to facing the challenges ahead.

Make him color-blind, reminding him of his own words that under his leadership, there will be neither red nor blue states, but the United States.

Help him remember his own oppression as a minority, drawing on that experience of discrimination, that he might seek to change the lives of those who are still its victims.

Give him the strength to find family time and privacy, and help him remember that even though he is president, a father only gets one shot at his daughters’ childhoods.

And please, God, keep him safe. We know we ask too much of our presidents, and we’re asking FAR too much of this one. We know the risk he and his wife are taking for all of us, and we implore you, O good and great God, to keep him safe. Hold him in the palm of your hand – that he might do the work we have called him to do, that he might find joy in this impossible calling, and that in the end, he might lead us as a nation to a place of integrity, prosperity and peace.

AMEN.

P.S. Yes I do realize that Barack Obama is no King David either...

More on: deception at TWILIGHT

For at one time you were darkness, but now you are light in the Lord. Walk as children of light (for the fruit of light is found in all that is good and right and true), and try to discern what is pleasing to the Lord. Take no part in the unfruitful works of darkness, but instead expose them.
(Ephesians 5:8-11)

If you've just started reading, you can get the first installment on this topic here. I will share even more informative links with you in this post. But first, a little preamble.

In taking the scripture I started with seriously, it is my hope to expose what I can about this demonically-inspired saga that has baited and caught many Christian women and girls. I wonder how many of you already knew that the author had this saga start unfolding to her in the form of a dream she had one night. In that dream she just 'knew' that Edward was a vampire and she described how beautiful he was...and from there it continued to unfold as she put it to paper. No, this was no writer having a moment of artistic inspiration. In fact, she was no writer and this series made her into one. She was a prepared and open vessel for this satanic deception that would be unleashed to have just this effect on women and girls who just long for this supposed undying love and romance and cherish these types of sensual longings.

In the bible, a search for the keywords 'Twilight', 'New Moon', 'Eclipse', 'Breaking Dawn' and 'Midnight Sun' (her books in/hinged on the Twilight Series) or even for the word 'vampire' will not turn up anything. What the bible does tell us is clear and sufficient. God reveals Himself and the awesome holiness of His ways, so that the person in a growing relationship with Him (reading His word, loving Him, talking to Him, worshiping Him and obeying Him diligently) gets to know that this God does and does not approve of certain things - some of those are things that were never even spelled out in black and white on those pages. In those situations what we gain through a growing relationship with Him, really KNOWING Him, is what turns out to be the ability to apply the truths He has revealed (about Himself and what He requires of us), to the things that face us in our everyday life. It is for this reason that the bible is relevant for every age, for every generation, every society, every person. It contains the indestructible word of God upon which His own eternal, unchanging character is based.

Most people who read this blog and who will in the future, will do so because they consider themselves to be Christians and already have some type of relationship with the bible. It is for this reason, that a post like this should not be necessary for everyone, because discernment is sharpened by regularly exercising our senses to view and judge everything through the Word of God.

The first book I'll always refer you to is the bible. Not in the sense that you go look it up like a text you would use to support an argument in some essay. Not a cold, religious, Pharisaical study. That's not what I mean. But if you love the truth, if you seek the truth, go to the word of God. Read it. Feed on it. Pray for more understanding on what you find there. Think about it. What does this tell me about God? Knowing this, how can I best please Him? What does God require from me?

In addition, resources such as articles and teachings by other Christians who already have some insight into the ways and works of God through their own relationship with Him and His word - though not necessarily inerrant - will often do much to open our eyes to the truth and to point us in the right direction in how to start exercising discernment.

I am about to post a few more links on these Meyer books. I have been doing some research and I am not surprised that the sequels to the first book are increasingly dark and demonic though attempting to intertwine themes of 'love' and self-sacrifice' e.g. Bella's pregnancy being a risk to her that she is unwilling to end, although her baby (she is now married to the vampire by this time) is eating her (Breaking Dawn).

Living Dead Christian Blood Suckers Come Out For Twilight

The Twilight Saga – Stephenie Meyer

The Twilight Saga – Research Resources

Vampires and Young Female Desires

As a side note, I found out that Meyer has another book called The Host. As I was reading about it from her own website I couldn't help but think that this was just like a demon's take on demonic possession (or whatever you want to call it).

Here is an excerpt from her site on this other book:

Our world has been invaded by an unseen enemy. Humans become hosts for these invaders, their minds taken over while their bodies remain intact and continue their lives apparently unchanged. Most of humanity has succumbed.

When Melanie, one of the few remaining "wild" humans is captured, she is certain it is her end. Wanderer, the invading "soul" who has been given Melanie's body, was warned about the challenges of living inside a human: the overwhelming emotions, the glut of senses, the too vivid memories. But there was one difficulty Wanderer didn't expect: the former tenant of her body refusing to relinquish possession of her mind.

Dark, with a very dramatic plot that is designed to pique your curiosity and stoke your imagination.

For we do not wrestle against flesh and blood, but against the rulers, against the authorities, against the cosmic powers over this present darkness, against the spiritual forces of evil in the heavenly places. Therefore take up the whole armor of God, that you may be able to withstand in the evil day, and having done all, to stand firm.
(Ephesians 6:12-13)

If you know the God of the Holy Bible. If you are walking with Him. If you are desiring Him above all else sincerely. If you have set your heart on Him. If you love Him. If you love His works and His ways. Then, you cannot read or continue to read these books without having to sit on your conscience and silence that still small voice inside that tells you that this is not like the "Holy One of Israel", the One who "clothes Himself with light as with a garment"...If after being warned, convicted, enlightened or presented with some clear standards to judge these books by, you find yourself able or willing to sit on your conscience or silence the conviction of the Spirit of God, it reveals something else, much worse, about what your heart is really set upon. And maybe, just maybe you may not be what you think you are either. But thank God, there is the Cross of Jesus.

He who has ears to hear, let him hear.

[On the top right side of this page I have posted the links included in this article, along will an additional link for more information about Vampirism. I will continually update this list.]