Today, I would like to talk about how a formerly strong woman gets trapped in a domestic violence relationship. Many of us have heard the analogy of a frog in a pot of boiling water. If you put a frog in a pot of boiling water, it would jump out immediately. In the...
I have recently become aware of a “new” term used to describe psychological abuse – “gaslighting”. I put “new” in quotes because the term was actually first used in a 1938 play called Gas Light. The play was made into the movie Gaslight in 1940 and 1944. In the play...
How should a woman who has left an abusive relationship begin to heal from it? This is a question that many women I speak to struggle with. I believe the first thing she must do is set boundaries around any continued relationship she has with their former abuser. As...
Domestic violence has some of the most alarming statistics of any social problem facing the world today. 1 in 4 women will experience it in their lifetime. Think of how staggering that statistic is. If you are in a room of 100 women, twenty-five of them have been or...
The most dangerous time for an abused woman* is when she is trying to leave her abuser or shortly after she has. Why is this? It is because an abuser doesn’t want to lose his control over her. An abusive man has a lot of perks in the relationship. Basically, he is...
Once you are free from your abuser, you might find that you are not truly emotionally free. Now you must deal with fierce ANGER toward your abuser. How can you get free from that? First of all, anger is understandable, and normal. A person who has been abused...
Does an abuser realize he* is being abusive? Does he know what he is doing? Author Lundy Bancroft says “Yes”. The following is taken from my book A Journey Through Emotional Abuse: from Bondage to Freedom. Why would a husband, especially one who claims to be a...
My friend “Stacy” is a licensed professional counselor. She is also a Christian who was abused. She says, “if the higher divorce rate today means that many of us abused women* are getting out, when our mothers and grandmothers stayed in abusive marriages, this is...
October is National Domestic Violence Awareness Month. Beverly Diehl is highlighting one story per day this month from a victim of DV on her Writing in the Flow website. I am honored that she chose my story to present today. You can also read my story below: I was...
In his blog from March 31, 2012 entitled “Does ‘Turn the Other Cheek’ Mean We Must Submit to Abuse?” Pastor Jeff Crippen talks about what Jesus said in Matthew 5:38-39, “You have heard that it was said, ‘An eye for an eye and a tooth for a tooth.’ But I say to you, Do...
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