Saturday, May 22, 2010

Abuse: Physical, Emotional and Spiritual abuse

We live in a society where we encounter Abuse around every corner. We read about it in the newspapers, see it on the news and find it in homes in our areas. Abuse is visible across all levels of society, some levels of society are just better in covering up. In some circumstances it is done with intend and in others the abuser is not even aware that he/se is abusing the other person.
Physical abuse is much easier to recognise than emotional or spiritual abuse. This kind of abuse leaves marks on the outer as well as on the inner person.
Emotional and Spiritual abuse are much harder to recognise because it only leaves scars on the inner person.
People who are emotionally or spiritually abusing other, are usually not even aware that they are doing it. In many cases they grew up in households where there were bad relational skills, resulting in shouting, name-calling and ridiculing. This usually goes hand in hand with poor listening skills, low self-image and the belief that you know what the other person thinks and what his/her motives are. Then any normal conversation has the ability to explode at any moment. When these people get angry they would usually dominate the other person or waiting till they are in a vulnerable state or position before starting a conversation. If this happen, emotional abuse has already been happening, before the conversation started. If compared to physical abuse, it is at this stage where the one spouse is starting to manhandle the other spouse. In both cases the abused person has now already started to panic, fearing what is to come. In the case of the physical abuse, if the abused do not agree with the other person they would get a beating, or what ever form of violence the abuser decides on. In the case of emotional abuse, it would usually start with actions like not giving the other person chance to talk, not willing to listen to the other person. When the other person make reasonable points, to ignore them and to jump to incidents that are not applicable. To make use of any and all possible unrelated scenarios, shouting, making all kinds of assumptions and getting very emotional. Then starts the name-calling, saying the things that you know would really hurt the other person and justifying it to self and the other person. In the worst cases using God, their believe/love for God or the Bible to grind them into the ground. The sad thing is that these people do not realize what they are doing.
In Physical, Emotional and Spiritual abuse the person who is doing the abuse would usually apologise for what they have done. But they would almost always immediately give you the reasons why they had the right to do so. This is the worst part of the abuse. Saying sorry clears them form the responsibility but by giving the reasons why they had the right to do this, they are putting all the blame as well as the blame of the abuse on the person that was abused. This empower them to go on as if nothing has happened. Everything is cleared after saying sorry.
Thus they end up further apart and the abuser can not understand why. The person abused either start to except that they are responsible for the whole thing and accept the blame, or they tend to pull away from the person. In extreme cases this can lead to a permanent split.
Remember NO person has the right to abuse another person! The most important thing for the abused person is to speak to somebody. To have somebody they can talk to openly.
In the case of physical abuse make sure you talk openly to your doctor, take photos and get help immediately.
In the case of emotional and Spiritual abuse the first step is for the other person to realise what they are doing and why? If this happens there is a lot of hope. If necessary show the person articles like these. If they are not willing to listen then you must get help.
Remember that underneath every abuser there is a broken person, but that does not give them the right to take it out on you.



4 comments:

  1. Die feit dat jy daaroor moet skryf maak mens klaar hartseer. Daar is baie pyn op die aarde op die oomblik...

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  2. Ek het so 2 jaar terug oor hierdie selfde onderwerp 'n praatjie gelewer by 'n laerskool, Vader het dit op my hart gedruk, ja dit is so waar, en tog so ongelooflik jammer...maar dan vra ek net Here begin by my, iewers moet ons begin om hierdie bose kringloop te stop, of te probeer stop!

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  3. Ek sien Baie spiritual abuse om my. Ek dit skeur my hart. Laat my wonder of hulle regtig 'n verhouding met Jesus het. Maar soms is hulle besig met dit, en besef dit nie. Mes moet praat oor sulke goed, en nie bang wees om mense te konfronteer, op 'n mooi manier, as hulle abusive raak nie.

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  4. Onthou ALMAL moet verantwoording doen.

    ReplyDelete