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[quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous]I have to be honest that I may be guilty of this.

In my very limited and shallow experience, the people whom I know who have complained about emotional abuse usually say and do similar things to their spouses. And when you get down to it(in the cases that I know of) it is difficult to determine who is the victim and who is the abuser. Both spouses seem like victims and abusers to me, and I would usually suggest counselling.

Personally, I would leave an emotional abusive relationship fast, but I am not one to advise others to leave because in the cases that I know of, both spouses were emotionally abusive. So I figure maybe there is a way to teach them how to treat each other through therapy.

Physical abuse seems more dangerous, and usually it is clear that one spouse is doing most or all of the physical abuse and the other is taking the heat..[/quote]

I'm a survivor of abuse, emotional abuse included.

I would vacillate between always agreeing with my abuser, apologizing, not standing up for myself, doing whatever I could do to "keep the peace." Other times, I would respond in kind - respond viciously, scream, rage etc. So yes, from time to time I also did what the abuser did, but I did not have the underlying pathology that drove me to see myself as "superior" to my partner, nor any desire to control his actions.

I can see what you're saying but I don't think it's common to have a situation in which both people are equally perpetuating abuse. [/quote]

+1.

There is a cycle to abuse. But victims responding to that cycle don't make them abusers. This requires the detailed involvement of an expert in the field. It is very complicated. It's like punishing a child that is a 7 year old bully, who is being molested at home. Certainly, bullying is not okay. But certainly, punishing is not addressing the true problem here. The problem is the abuse. When that stops, the corresponding and problematic behavior usually follows soon after, with new learned principles and therapy.[/quote]

There is another aspect of the cycle that far too many people aren't aware of where the victim may subconsciously use provocation as a way of getting the abusive episode over with. In physically abusive relationships, there is often a cycle where there's an episode of violence, then remorse on the part of the abuser where they try to make it up to the victim. After that honeymoon period, there usually come a phase of build-up to the next incident of violence, where the abuser isn't physically hurting their victim but is become kind of restless in their non-violence, they get meaner, short-tempered, threatening, etc., until it peaks with violence. That build-up phase can in some ways be worse for the victim because they know the punch is coming but then don't know when, and it's torturous. The victim in those cases will often do something during that build-up phase to make the violence come faster, such as yelling at their abuser, insulting him, maybe even shoving him (not in a way that will cause injury, just make him mad) so they can get the violence over with and get back to the peaceful, harmonious phase.

This same phenomenon happens in emotionally abusive relationships too but it's even harder to recognize when it happens. The emotional abuse victim who gets into an argument with their abuser and can tell it's not going anywhere constructive but won't end until their abuser has let loose (at which point they can have their make-up sex and he'll tell her how much he loves her) might make the subconscious decision to throw a gratuitous insult at their abuser so their abuser will let loose their verbal tirade and the fight will end. The victim knows there's no other way out of the fight except to let the tirade happen, because even if she were to walk away from the fight before it happens, the tirade will still be waiting for an excuse to come out.

This phenomenon is insidious in all abusive relationships because it gives opening for people to blame the victim for their role in the abuse. In physically abusive relationships, though, it's easier for the victim who has done this to recognize that they are still a victim and their abuser is still an abuser because calling someone an asshole doesn't warrant getting pushed down a flight of stairs.[b] It's much worse for emotional abuse victims because an outsider (and even the victim herself) often can't distinguish between insults hurled for the purpose of harming the other person and the insults hurled only to get the abuse over with[/b].[/quote]

What if both partners are hurling the insults to get the abuse they perceive over with?

I am not blaming the victim here, but if anyone said some pretty abusive things to me, there is no way that I will retaliate to end the abuse. I do not get the logic.

For example, I have a friend who claims that her husband is emotionally abusive. I also know that she has told him on several occasions, during heated arguments, that she could have done much better than him and that she settled for him.

I think that you cannot make such statements to your spouse and then claim that your spouse is abusive and you are not. How am I even sure who started it? I don't have his side of the story.

[/quote]

When you are dealing with abuse, there is at least 1 person in the party who is unhealthy, unwell, and not using rationalization in the way that you are. You cannot understand this dynamic by simply putting yourself in an abusers shoes. You are not operating with the intent to control, suppress, demean, and lower someone to feel empowered. So first, consider looking through the lens of a dysfunctional person unconsciously programmed and/or motivated to do this. I would imagine it is very difficult to do with just an example of other "facts" around the story.

The PP describing elements of a classic cycle hit the nail on the head. Dead on.

Again, focusing on victim's singular act, removing it from the abuse cycle, asking for personal accountability individually, is unfair in this case. There is nothing that would change the cycle, and honestly it doesn't carry as much weight as it would in a normal interaction because it is occurring in a very different environment.

You can't take one thread out of a tire and ask why it wore down and caused a flat tire. You have to look at the entire picture of everything, all of the elements, to truly dissect areas of accountably for each person involved. Victims are victims, they are harmed and made to suffer by the conditions of abuse, and many victims respond in different ways.

Victims who employ tactics that work to help lessen their pain or risk of exposure in ways that "make rational sense in an irrational situation" are doing what they best know how to do.

Often the more powerful abuser is the one who began with the behaviors; the victim learned them as a response and sometimes uses them to defend themselves, and this is why the cycle gets worse and worse.

An abuser takes the golden rule (treat others how you want to be treated) and tarnishes it with their own dysfunction, because they never learned how to treat others without harm, for whatever deep seated reason. Most abusers don't go around wearing big red marks on their forehead. So at best, you look for flags.

If you haven't been trained to look for red flags to abuse, it is easy to get in the cycle of a relationship, allow small concessions with your "rational" thinking, not realizing that there is an irrational core that will rear its ugly head in time. No one gets punched in the face on the first date, or called a slut or horrible mother in a moment of anger or jealousy one week in. Part of the struggle is that when you are in love with an abuser, there is so much respect and love you have originally, and gradual changes from how the abuser treats you begins the process of deflecting. It creeps in subtly, then  grows, and you don't even realize how behaviors become modified over time until you are stuck, crying, trapped, and the fear of harm is greater than the confidence and safety you used to feel.

People who say, I would never take it, have never been manipulated by it. They were either wise and empowered enough to leave before it truly started, or able to get the wisdom and empowerment to leave once it did start. But that process looks different for everyone.

Even this response takes so much energy to articulate without defensiveness as a former victim - it is tough to do. Sometimes, it is easier to just wait for the next wave of pain. Humans are dynamic, we learn to adjust and adapt in ways that prioritize whatever our most immediate needs are at that moment, sometimes it isn't rational and not the best choice immediate, short or mid term, but it is the choice we had the capability of making at that time with the tools and information that we had at hand.  [/quote]

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