Types of Abuse

Posted by StevenHWicker on January 12th, 2019

What types of abuse are there?

There are many types of abuse that are defined throughout the web. Some of the most common are: Physical, Sexual, Verbal, Emotional (Mental/Psychological), and Financial abuse. Victims of these types of abuse may not entirely understand or even realize that they are going through it. There is that gut feeling that something is not right but that feeling is usually brushed aside or overtaken by the thought of “I must be exaggerating this”.

There are also silent signs of abuse that victims go through. Signs that outsiders would recognize, especially if they know the victim well. Leaving an abusive relationship

Silent Signs of Abuse:

Fear

Social Isolation or Withdrawal

Excessive absences from school or work

Anxiety

Eating Disorders

Depression

Guilt

Self-blame

Abuse of drugs or alcohol

Physical Abuse

Physical Abuse is probably the most common known type of any abuse. It is defined as a way of a person receiving intentional trauma or injury by bodily contact from another person. Normally when someone first thinks of this word ‘Abuse’ they picture a woman with a black eye and a bloody lip. Sadly that is exactly what it is.

Signs of Physical Abuse:

Swollen Areas of the body (eyes, lip, nose, cheeks, etc)

Fractures/Sprains

Cuts

Bruises

Bite Marks

Burns

Scratches

Remember, when a victim is being abused a majority of the time the abuser does his best to hide the physical abuse in certain areas so that other people cannot see it. For example, an abuser may punch the victims side repeatedly, bruising it but not breaking it. The abuser will then tell the victim to keep it hidden and threaten her so that she does not tell anyone about what happened. The abuser may also have the victim cover the markings with something like a band-aid , gauze, or even concealer. Then have her make up some false story of why it is there.

Sexual Abuse

Sexual abuse is “also referred to as molestation, is usually undesired sexual behavior by one person upon another” as defined in Wikipedia. The sexual abuse discussed here is to do with intimate relationships with two partners. Nothing that includes sexual abuse with children, strangers, family members, or friends.

Signs that you are being Sexually Abused by a Partner:

Demanding sex when victim is unwilling

Using weapons/threats to force the victim into sexual intercourse

Intentional harm on sexual parts of the body

Forced sexual participation with others or in the presence of others

Use of drugs or alcohol to manipulate the unwilling victim into sexual intercourse

Forced prostitution

Making the victim do sexual things they do not want to do (includes participation in bondage/sadomasochistic activities)

Just because you may be his girlfriend/wife/partner (or vice versa) it does not mean you do not have a mind or choice of your own. If someone genuinely loves you they would not force any type of sexual wants onto you, especially when you are openly unwilling to do so.

Verbal Abuse

Verbal abuse is pretty self-explanatory, it is verbal. Anything someone says to intentionally hurt the victim, demean the victim, or insult/criticize the victim. A lot of people do not realize that they are being verbally abused. I myself, did not realize it for a period of time until I did my research.

Signs of Verbal Abuse:

Name-Calling

Threatening

Yelling

Gaslighting

Humiliates you in public on purpose

Criticizes your friends, family, co-workers

Insults you repeatedly (your attire, morals, beliefs, wants, dreams, etc)

Insults you bluntly (ex: your stupid, you’ll never make it, no wonder you can’t do this/that)

Constantly correcting the victim

Constantly interrupting the victim

Verbal abuse is not to be taken lightly. This form of abuse can have extremely severe effects on someones self-esteem. These effects can interrupt their academic, professional, and home life. Many people take this form of abuse as bullying and we can see why.

Emotional (Mental/Psychological) Abuse

Emotional and verbal abuse usually mix together. In order for a victim to be emotionally traumatized verbal abuse would have to be present. This is another one that can have extremely severe effects on the victim leaving them feeling alone and hopeless.

Signs of Emotional/Mental Abuse:

All symptoms of verbal abuse

Manipulation to get the victim to do what the abuser wants, this type of manipulation is mostly subtle

Blame – Convincing the victim that everything is their fault even when it is not

Isolation – Leaving/ignoring on purpose to punish the victim

Financial Abuse

Financial abuse is known to be one of the most powerful forms of abuse. Victims become dependant on the abusers financially and usually do not have the financial security to be on their own. For this reason alone, a majority of the time victims will stay or return to the abuser.

In other situations like mine, I was forced to give him what he wanted and required to take care of him. Normally, if I would refuse he would intimidate, manipulate, or threaten me into giving him what he wanted.

Signs of Financial Abuse:

Control over financial resources: telling the victim when, where, how much they can spend

Criticizes the victim if they buy something nice for themselves

Threatening, manipulating, or intimidating the victim to get what they want

Forcing the victim to provide in anything regardless if they want to or not

Forging documents under the victims name (mortgage, credit cards, etc)

Making them quit their job or purposely ruining the career (ex: harassing them at work so they get fired)

There are so many different scenarios that can be placed on financial abuse. Like the other forms, most victims brush aside their gut feelings. Do NOT do this anymore. If something does not feel right or seems weird but your not sure, 99% of the time it’s wrong! Toxic relationship