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[quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous]Thanks to the victims who took the time explaining the dynamic of abuse. It must be hard to be a victim and have most people around you question the fact that you were abused.

I have a friend that I am particularly worried about, but I am worried about her husband as well.

She thinks that he is abusive, and he thinks that she is the abusive one. They have some mutual friends who think that she is the abusive one and others who think that he is, depending on whose side of the story they hear

She wanted to go to therapy, and he doesn't, and I encouraged her to keep asking him to go with her. I told her to go by herself if he did not want to, but she refused.

Now she does not even want to see a therapist with him anymore. She claims that she is done with the marriage, but they still live in the same house and sleep on the same bed. They fight less often, but they still fight and make all kinds of horrible threats to each other.

I am very hesitant to ask her to leave because they have children who are very well taken care of emotionally and in every other way by both parents. I am concerned that if they divorced, the dynamics with the kids will change.

What would you tell her besides encouraging her to go see a therapist?[/quote]

You are part of the problem if you are encouraging them to stay together for the sake of the kids.  Witnessing verbal or emotional abuse is as damaging as witnessing physical abuse.  kids are internalizing everything they see and hear parents do as a kind of model for their own behaviour, which then messes up the kids' social relationships.  You are naive if you think this kind of abuse isn'also directed at the kids sometimes - it just probably doesn't come out when you are around.  That is part of the nature of abuse; the abuser wants to be seen as a good guy to others.

My mom was verbally abusive to my Dad.  It resulted in me being in several emotionally abusive relationships in my 20s and 30s.  The second one, I had kids.  I finally woke up and smelled the coffee, but not until after a lot of damage had been done to me and my life.  I am still forced to interact w/ my kids' father, and it has taken over a decade for me to identify the abuse and understand it.  I have consciously had to build better boundaries and be less accommodating and stop walking on eggshells.  I live as a single Mom with full custody of two kids. This situation has wrecked my finances and my kids do not have fancy clothes and vacations or a big fancy house.  And yet, they are far happier and healthier than if I had stayed.  I am determined not to let them grow up with the burden of emotional abuse. [/quote]

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