Do you feel like you have to “walk on eggshells” around your partner?  Are you afraid a lot of the time in your relationship?  Is your self esteem being slowly eroded?  It’s possible you’re in an emotionally abusive relationship.

Emotional abuse can sometimes be a tricky thing to identify for those in the situation because often the abuser employs tactics that make the other person feel like they’re going crazy.  Abusive people will dominate conversations so that the other has little time to decide if the behavior is harmful. 

There’s often a pervasive sense of being off balance for the person being emotionally abused.  They start to question their own thinking and eventually believe that they must have it wrong and in fact, they’re the bad ones for daring to believe such a thing about the abuser!  We call this “crazy-making” because that’s precisely the impact it has on the receiver.

In my own practice I’ve seen couples come in where it’s pretty obvious this is going on.  I’ve seen men and women in emotionally abusive dynamics with their partners.  I’ve witnessed people literally verbally “shut down” their partner – and the other one shrink away right before my eyes. 

Part of the problem for people who are being emotionally abused is they often don’t realize it.  Their self-confidence has been whittled down to a nub. 

Could you be in an emotionally abusive relationship? 

Ask yourself the following five questions – which are also signs you might be in an emotionally abusive relationship:

1)  Does your partner frequently criticize or humiliate you?

2)  Does your partner isolate you from your family and friends?

3)  Has your partner ever limited or controlled your access to money?

4)  Do you feel trapped in your relationship?

5)  Are you afraid of your partner?

The Cycle of Abuse

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1. Why So Many Men Are Emotionally Unavailable – The Astrology of Feeling
2. How Power and Risk Affect Your Relationship
3. Relationship Problem – Fighting Like Wild Animals?
4. What Are You Really Fighting About? It May Not Be What You Think…
5. She’s Crying On My Shoulder While Living With HIM (Video)

A couple has been married for 5 years or more, they have 2.5 kids, and live in a suburban wonderland.

All of a sudden, they realize they’re not "a couple" anymore, just roommates. The spark has vanished without a trace. Gone are the days or love, romance, excitement, happiness. It’s just dreary, boring, playing house with a roommate you can no longer stand.

Remember those days you couldn’t let each other go to sleep at night, and couldn’t wait to wake up and be together? Yeah, they’re gone. You don’t know why, but they’re long gone.

And suddenly, you meet someone new, fun, and exciting. Maybe even an ex-boyfriend or ex-girlfriend from college. And suddenly you feel alive again, like you’ve been woken from a bad dream.

With one minor detail of course… your spouse and the 2.5 kids.

So what do you do? Stay with your spouse and continue the unhappy marriage, seek counseling, or divorce? 

You decide. Be sure to read the question, then watch the video and leave your thoughts below. 

Here’s the full story…  

Dear Dan and Jennifer,

Hi, I’ve been married to my husband for 5 years and with him for a total of 9 years. We have three kids together. For a long time now we have not gotten along, there have been fights, some physical, he was arrested for trying to push me out of a car, there is emotional abuse, and I am just not happy. I told him I want a divorce.

Well, we are in financial ruin with debt a lot of debt and cannot afford a separate residence – which is a criterion for divorce in our state. You must live in separate places for a year.

In addition the financial aspect of it scares me, but I honestly don’t think I’m in love with him anymore, and I am quite certain that if we didn’t have children together I would leave and probably wouldn’t have married him in the first place. He is on the other hand a wonderful dad, and we have a great "community image" with lots of friends, etc. and he’s a teacher.

To complicate things I began speaking to a male friend of mine from college again and it began as friends, and has escalated into an affair. He lives 600 miles away but has come up to visit me and I am planning on visiting him as well. He is divorced and has a son and on the bad side he is a drunk.

But, when I speak to him, I am just completely and totally in love. I have known him for about 13 years and we were even roommates at one time, but involved with other people.

I just feel like for the first time in my life I have found true love and happiness, except for the fact that I am married to someone else. I don’t know what to do, I feel that by staying in my current marriage (I have told my husband of my feelings for this other person, but he still wants to try to make things work) it is unfair to me, and to my husband who should have someone who is in love with him.

I also think of my children and that I may possibly screw up their lives with my own selfishness….any advice is greatly appreciated.  

- Tanya

Watch this short video for the answer…

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Then, be sure to chime in and tell us your thoughts - leave a comment below.

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1. Should You Stay Married Just For The Kids? (Video)
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3. Fight or Flight – How Men React To Divorce
4. He’s Divorcing His Wife to be With Me – Or Is He? (Video)
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