ABUSIVE RELATIONSHIPS
Jan 6, from “Strengthening My Recovery” daily reader
“We stay in abusive relationships because they resemble how we were raised.” BRRp.197
“We’re going along and things seem to be working smoothly, and suddenly, “Bam!” The rug gets pulled out. We feel betrayed by the ones who supposedly love us the most. And we feel stupid for trusting again that things will be better.
This can describe what happened in our childhood and also what happens in our adult relationships. We can experience abuse as an adult, whether it’s with our family of origin or another relationship.
We may get knocked down emotionally or physically, but with the help of the program, we can learn to separate ourselves from the abuser. We are not trapped like we were as children.
In ACA we learn to trust and to feel at a level we never experienced before. We have choices – to continue to hope the others will change as we continue to be abused, or remove ourselves and find a safe haven. There are many levels of safe haven, from a shelter to simply being in a meeting with our ACA friends. They are available if we are ready to stand free.
On this day I will choose the best path for my emotional health. I prepare myself to make life-changing decisions to remove myself from my abusive relationships.”
My Experience:
I had taken abuse for so long I didn’t even recognize it. I am a pretty good-sized man so I am not talking about physical abuse, I am talking about emotional abuse. You know the subtle digs your significant other takes at you in an attempt to “keep you grounded” or to “keep you humble.” They are just trying to help, they say. What you don’t get is, that these “digs” are awakening something deep inside you that you don’t even know about. It awakens this anger and you explode. It seems unreasonable, because after all, they were only trying to help. Once you get into the program, you realize a couple of things. Your behavior and reactions were reasonable reactions that you developed to an unreasonable childhood. However, today, those same reactions are very much unreasonable. Secondly, you recognize that you do not like the behavior displayed towards you and you start to formulate a more reasonable response to the behavior, including removing yourself. What a pleasure it is to know that I no longer have to rely on the learned behavior but instead act lovingly and purposefully for myself and towards others. You can enjoy this pleasure too! I so hope you do.