"You're attractive, intelligent, and kind--why did he abuse you?" a fellow writer once asked me. He was not the first person to wonder if I had somehow provoked the abuser. He wasn't trying to be mean, he was just trying to understand what had happened. It just didn't make any sense to him.
The human mind wants everything to be logical. And most people are comfortable with the idea that if your life is horrible, you must have done something bad to cause it...and if your life is great, you must have done something good.
If you are living in abuse or used to live under an abuser's oppression, I hope you've figured out that you were not the cause or the reason for the abuse. Whether you are gorgeous, ugly, kind, impatient, faithful, or flirty--it didn't bring on mistreatment. No matter what the abuser said. The experts say that abuse victims are found in every demographic: every financial status, both genders, every sexual orientation, every nation, every age, and every religion. Anyone can be abused.
The abuse happens because the abuser is unwilling to repent of his/her controlling and abusive behavior, period.
Have you been blaming yourself? Most victims do. Part of healing involves putting the blame where it rightfully belongs--on the person who abuses, taking what is not theirs to take and dishing out punishments that are undeserved.
"Deliver me, O Lord, from evil men;
Preserve me from violent men,
Who plan evil things in their hearts;
They continually gather for war.
They sharpen their tongues like a serpent;
The poison of asps is under their lips."
Psalm 140: 1-3
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Recommended Books
- 10 Lifesaving Principles for Women in Difficult Marriages by Karla Downing
- A Way of Hope by Leslie J. Barner
- Angry Men and the Women Who Love Them by Paul Hegstrom
- Battered But Not Broken by Patricia Riddle Gaddis
- Boundaries by Dr. Henry Cloud and Dr. John Townsend
- Bradshaw on the Family by John Bradshaw
- Caring Enough to Forgive/Not Forgive by David Augsburger
- Codependent No More by Melody Beattie
- Healing the Wounded Heart by Dr. Dan B. Allendar
- Keeping the Faith: Questions and Answers for the Abused Woman by Marie M. Fortune
- Perfect Daughters by Robert J. Ackerman, Ph.D.
- Recovery: A Guide for Adult Children of Alcoholics by Herbert L. Gravitz and Julie D. Bowden
- Safe People by Dr Henry Cloud and Dr. John Townsend
- Slay Your Own Dragons by Nancy Good
- The Cinderella Syndrome by Lee Ezell
- The Dance of Anger by Harriet Goldhor Lerner, Ph.D.
- The Search for Significance by Robert S. McGee
- Turning Fear to Hope by Holly Wagner Green
- When Violence Comes Home: Help for Victims of Spouse Abuse by Tim Jackson and Jeff Olson
- Why Does He Do That? by Lundy Bancroft
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