INTO THE DEEP

Are you a victim of abuse?

Are You a Victim of Abuse?

Do you think you're being abused? Are you being mistreated physically, emotionally, financially, or do you suspect that someone you know is being abused?

Before a person will try to leave an abusive

situation or ask God to deliver them, they

must first realize that they are indeed being

abused.

To someone raised in an abusive home,

many forms of abuse seem "normal."

Most victims are confused to some degree about what constitutes abusive behavior. If a victim does recognize the mistreatment, most bullies will quickly distort the truth, refusing to accept responsibility. Many victims believe the lies and simply try to "do better," but their efforts are never quite good enough, and the mistreatment continues.

Bullies rely on the victim's ignorance and

confusion, knowing that the victim may seek

help if she/he gains a true perspective of

the situation.

The abuser is usually a spouse but can also be a parent, a child, a sibling or another relative, a supervisor (the work-place bully), a business associate, a caretaker or a neighbor.

The following list will help victims understand exactly what abuse is. Keep in mind that the list is not complete.

Examples of Abusive Behavior:

PHYSICAL ABUSE

- Pushing, shoving, throwing the victim down, pinning the victim against a wall, physically preventing a person from leaving

- Slapping, biting, kicking, choking, pinching, burning, hitting or punching

- Tying down, sitting upon, or physically restraining the victim

- Throwing objects

- Abandonment in dangerous places

- Threats with or injury with weapons

- Intentionally disrupting sleep

- Withholding food or medication

- Withholding medical appliances (walker, crutches, dentures)

- Preventing the victim from leaving the house

- Throwing the victim down stairs or against a wall, striking the victim with a motor vehicle, setting the victim on fire, holding the victim under water

EMOTIONAL & VERBAL ABUSE

- Isolating the victim from family or friends

- Ignoring feelings, subjecting the partner to unpredictable outbursts of anger, withdrawal of contact or affection

- Persistent name-calling, degrading remarks, humiliation of the victim in public or private

- Ridiculing the partner's performance: sexual, housecleaning, work, etc.

- Displaying obsessive jealousy

- Insulting family or friends of the victim

- Insulting beliefs, religion, race, heritage, or sex

- Controlling the victim's clothing, hairstyle, entertainment, religious affiliation, and work choices

- Abusing pets to punish or frighten the victim

- Lying

- Passive-aggressive behavior. These are acts that aren't wrong in themselves, but cause emotional pain because of the context in which they're done. Example: Husband raises newspaper in front of his face whenever wife speaks.

SEXUAL ABUSE

- Obtaining sex by force, assaulting the victim during sexual acts, rape

- Forced unsafe sex

- Forced oral, anal, or genital contact

- Criticizing sexual performance

- Using sexually degrading language

- Forcing the victim to perform sadistic or unpleasant sexual acts

- Denying sex to the victim

- Controlling reproductive choice (i.e., prohibition of contraception)

- Forcing the victim to have sex with others

- Forcing the victim to engage in prostitution

- Intentional exposure to sexually transmitted diseases including HIV

- Unwanted sexual bondage

- Threatening the victim with a weapon to obtain sex

DESTRUCTIVE ACTS

- Throwing, breaking or burning of household items

- Cutting up clothing, furniture, credit cards

- Throwing away medications and destroying medical appliances (dentures, crutches, prosthetic devices)

- Damaging or stealing the victim's car

- Intentional damage to personal items such as photographs, jewelry, clothing

- Stealing, hiding, or selling of the victim's property

ECONOMIC ABUSE

- Seizing control of the partner's assets, registering all assets in the name of the abuser

- Misuse of the partner's credit cards

- Interference with the partner's work or education

- Refusal to work, forcing the partner to work to support the abuser

- Interference with the partner's spending

- Stealing the partner's disability or social security checks, food, stamps, etc.

THREATENING BEHAVIORS

- Brandishing weapons

- Threatening physical or sexual assault

- Threatening to expose the partner to HIV

- Threatening to destroy or misappropriate property

- Threats to kill the partner, self, others

- Threats against third parties

- Reminders of prior assaults against third parties

- Displays of anger: pounding fists in anger

- Telephone harassment

- Stalking

- Threats to kidnap or sue for sole custody of the couple's children

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After reading the list, if you realize that you or someone you know is being abused, please consider the following:

Abusive behavior isn't always illegal, but it's always wrong. It always hurts the victim.

If you're being abused, it's not your fault. You don't "deserve" it.

Abuse doesn't just disappear.

Your life may be in danger (or your child's life may be in danger).

If it's not you, but someone else who's being abused, then please get this information to them

now. Tomorrow could be too late.

If it's you who is being abused - please get help. You deserve to be treated with respect. You

deserve to be safe. The Police Department or the Department of Family and Children's Services

are both good places to start. HELP IS AS NEAR AS A PHONE.

But maybe there's no immediate danger. Maybe the victim will live to be 70 and die quietly, when their heart is finally crushed by the weight of a lifetime of meanness.

Or maybe the female victim believes that "a good Christian woman will submit to her husband, no matter what." What a lie from the pits of hell! This is not how a life should be spent. God is not glorified when a woman enables the brutality of her husband.

Jesus died to set His people free from abuse. God's written word, the Bible, will renew your mind and teach you how to walk in the wonderful plan He has for your life.

The thief (Satan) does not come except to steal, and to kill, and to destroy. I (Jesus) have come that they may have life, and that they may have it more abundantly. - John 10:10

He has sent Me (Jesus) to heal the brokenhearted, to proclaim liberty to the captives and recovery of sight to the blind, to set at liberty those who are oppressed... - Luke 4:18

Do you need prayer, for ANY REASON?

Do you need prayer, for any reason?

Please email me, Susan Rose

All prayer requests will be kept completely

confidential.