**Many women assume that if they’re not being physically abused by their partner, then they’re not being abused. If you are not being treated with respect, feeling unsafe, afraid of your partner, being isolated from your family, feeling drained from being in the relationship, these are all signs of some form of abuse.**

___________________________________________________________

The following questions ask you about your relationship. If you are not currently in a relationship, these are signs or "red flags" to assist people in identifying a potentially abusive person.

• Do you feel nervous around your partner?
• Do you have to be careful to control your behavior to avoid their anger?
• Do you feel pressured by your partner when it comes to sex?
• Are you scared of disagreeing with your partner?
• Does your partner criticize you, or humiliate you in front of other people?
• Are they always checking up or questioning you about what you do without your partner?
• Does your partner repeatedly and wrongly accuse you of seeing or flirting with other people?
• Does your partner tell you that if you changed they wouldn't abuse you?
• Does your partner's jealousy stop you from seeing friends or family?
• Does your partner make you feel like you are wrong, stupid, crazy or inadequate?
• Have they ever scared you with violence or threatening behavior?
• Does your partner prevent you from going out or doing things you want to do?
• Do you often do things to please your partner, rather than to please yourself?
• Do you feel that, with your partner, nothing you ever do is good enough?
• Does your partner say that they will kill or hurt you or themselves if you break up with them?
• Does your partner make excuses for behavior, for example, by saying it's because of alcohol or drugs, or because they can't control their temper, or that they were "just joking"?

Ladies and Gentlemen: Everyone has heard the songs about how much love can hurt. But that doesn’t mean physical harm: The person who loves you should never abuse you. Abuse can be emotional, physical, or sexual. Sometimes abusive relationships are easy to identify; other times the abuse may take subtle forms. The examples shown here can help you identify traits of abusive and healthy relationships. Abusive relationships have a serious power imbalance, with the abuser controlling or attempting to control most aspects of life. Healthy relationships share responsibility and decision-making tasks and respect for all parties in the relationship including the children.

Non-Threatening Behavior

• Talking and acting so that your partner feels safe and comfortable doing and saying things.

Respect

• Listening to your partner non-judgmentally.

• Being emotionally affirming and understanding.

• Valuing opinions.

Trust and Support

• Supporting your partner’s goals in life.

• Respecting your partner’s right to his or her own feelings, friends, activities and opinions.

Honesty and Accountability

• Accepting responsibility for self.

• Acknowledging past use of violence and / or emotionally abusive behavior, changing the behavior.

• Acknowledging infidelity, changing the behavior.

• Admitting being wrong when it is appropriate.

• Communicating openly and truthfully, acknowledging past abuse, and seeking help for abusive relationship patterns.

Responsible Parenting

• Sharing parental responsibilities.

• Being a positive, non-violent role model for children.

Shared Responsibility

• Mutually agreeing on a fair distribution of work.

• Making family decisions together.

Using Intimidation

• Making your partner afraid by using looks, actions, and gestures.

• Smashing or destroying things.

• Destroying or confiscating your partner's property.

• Abusing pets as a display of power and control.

• Silent or overt raging.

• Displaying weapons or threatening their use.

• Making physical threats.

Using Emotional Abuse

• Putting your partner down.

• Making your partner feel bad about himself or herself.

• Calling your partner names.

• Playing mind games.

• Interrogating your partner.

• Harassing or intimidating your partner.

• "Checking up on" your partner's activities or whereabouts.

• Humiliating your partner, weather through direct attacks or "jokes".

• Making your partner feel guilty.

• Shaming your partner.

Using Isolation

• Controlling what your partner does, who he or she sees and talks to, what he or she reads, where he or she goes.

• Limiting your partner’s outside involvement.

• Demanding your partner remains home when you are not with them.

• Cutting your partner off from prior friends, activities, and social interaction.

• Using jealousy to justify your actions.

(Jealousy is the primary symptom of abusive relationships; it is also a core component of Love Addiction.)

Minimizing, Denying and Blame Shifting

• Making light of the abuse and not taking your partner’s concerns about it seriously.

• Saying the abuse did not happen, or wasn't that bad.

• Shifting responsibility for your abusive behavior to your partner. (i.e.: I did it because you ______.)

• Saying your partner caused it.

Using Children

• Making your partner feel guilty about the children.

• Using the children to relay messages.

• Using visitation to harass your partner.

• Threatening to take the children away.

Using Male Privilege

• Treating your partner like a servant.

• Making all the big decisions.

• Acting like the "master of the castle."

• Being the one to define men’s and women’s or the relationship's roles.

Using Economic Abuse

• Preventing your partner from getting or keeping a job.

• Making your partner ask for money.

• Giving your partner an allowance.

• Taking your partner’s money.

• Not letting your partner know about or have access to family income.

Domestic violence is one of the most pervasive problems in America today. On most weekends more women are admitted to emergency rooms as a result of domestic violence than from automobile accidents.  Violence does not have to be physical, emotional abuse can be as destructive to the survivor's psyche as physical battery.

Domestic Violence Handbook   You are Not Alone!  
(www.domesticviolence.org)

State Coalitions and Information on Domestic Violence - numbers for domestic violence and rape crisis coalitions in each state in the U.S. - plus new links to other websites with state-specific information

The wheel of abuse documents the cycles and tactics of relationships based on power and control. 

Daniel Sonkin, Domestic Violence Professional - For mental health professionals, books, software and online articles on domestic violence theory, assessment and intervention.

Abuse - the Family Epidemic - a very informative page with discussion of precursors to abuse and the underlying dynamics of abuse within family systems. 

Diane's Domestic Violence Pages - includes support resources for men, women, teens, children, lesbians, and gays; memories; help for batterers; and more.

Survivors of Stalking - support organization for survivors of stalking.

Violence at Home - year-long series on domestic violence, from the Sacramento Bee.

No Safe Place: Violence Against Women - companion site to the PBS documentary film which tells the stories of women who have been battered, assaulted, and raped, as well as the stories of men who commit these crimes.

Read about the characteristics of people in abusive relationships.