For your general information if you find me.
My passion is prevention, from experiences drawn from life - my life, your life, her life and what his life had the potential to be:
Domestic Violence
Auditing your Relationship
The best time to prevent an abusive relationship is before it starts.
It is known that abusive relationships get worse as time goes on. What could be seen as a show of devotion early in the relationship can become a tactic to keep control of a partner as it develops. Years down the track it could characterise serious abuse and violence.
Women escaping from abusive relationships often say that the warning signs were there early on but they chose to ignore them, or to believe that they would be able to change their partner over time. Sadly, it's unusal for commitments to change without first reaching a crisis point. By then there is likely to have been deep unhappiness for everyone involved.
Check if any of these statements apply to your current partner, male companion or boyfriend.
Warning signs
He is jealous and doesn't like you talking to other men (boys)
He criticises your women (girl) friends and wants you to stop seeing them
He wants to know where you are and who you are with all the time
He tries to control your contacts with members of your family
He often criticises what you wear or how you look
He often criticises what you say and do
He questions what you've spent money on
He expects sex on demand when he wants it
If they apply, he is attempting to control your activities and who you see and talk to. If he can do this you will be much more dependent on him.
Hazard lights
He tells people about things you did or said that are embarrassing and makes you feel stupid
He blames you for things that go wrong for him
He makes jokes which put you and other women down
He calls you fat, lazy, stupid, ugly, a slut, or other things to make you feel bad
He ignores your opinions or objections and does only what he wants
If any of these statements apply to him, he is putting you down and making you feel less confident and less in control of yourself.
Danger zone
He drives too fast or does other dangerous things which scare you
He goes too far when you are playing around and hurts you or holds you down to make you feel helpless
He gets angry or violent when he drinks or uses drugs
He threatens to break your belongings or destroy your property
He threatens to hit you, hurt you or your friends, your pets or family
He threatens to leave you or to kill himself if you don't do what he wants
He forces you into sexual acts you don't want - by threats, coercion, or physical force
He gets very angry about small unimportant things
He won't express his thoughts or feelings and then he blows up
He hits or physically assaults you in some way - he may be sorry afterwards but he does it
If he does any of these things, he is threatening you, is abusive, and in some cases physically violent.
No one deserves to be treated this way!
For all you Simpsons fans ... "will someone please think of the children. THE CHILDREN!!!!!!"
The Effects of Domestic Violence on Children
A child’s intellectual, emotional and psychological ability is shaped by what it sees, hears, and how they make sense of it. Experiencing and witnessing abuse prevents children from reaching their potential as adults.
Children and babies are often invisible to adults in violent situations, and to the adults who come to help. Every year, thousands of NZ children are seriously traumatised by family violence.
Children who are frightened and traumatised suffer from health, development, and emotional problems.
Children’s brain development is affected greatly by trauma. Chronic anxiety creates chemicals in their brains which interrupt learning abilities.
Boys who witness their mother being beaten frequently go on to abuse their women partners; some girls assume that male violence is a normal part of a relationship.
Children of battered women are fifteen times more likely to be abused as children than other children.
The primary cause of youth delinquency is witnessing domestic violence as a child.
Some experts say that children will move into one of four coping styles. These are easily recognised:
1) Living in secret, withdrawing into a fantasy world, apparently unaware of what’s going on around them. Maybe overly compliant, quiet, or high achieving at school.
2) Conflict of loyalties - feel they have to choose which parent to support or they can only love one parent.
3) Living in terror and fear with no stability or certainty - chronic long-term anxiety, depression, bed-wetting, regressing to younger behaviour.
4) Aggressive and bullying, behaviour problems and failure at school, sometimes diagnosed with attention deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD).
