A reader reached out to me that my writing on toxic relationships was not comprehensive enough. She asked me to do a detailed article on how to avoid abusive relationships. Though single, she is getting scared of the rising tide of abuses in marriages. She did not want to be a victim and wanted to know how to avoid toxic people in her relationship.
I cannot but agree with her as to be forewarned is to be forearmed. Before getting into a relationship, it is wise to know how to tell if one is getting involved with someone who will abuse one.
Abuses in relationships come in many ways, either physical, emotional, verbal, sexual, economic or psychological. Why are some people facing abuses in their relationships? The answer is power and control, also dominance and submission.
One partner wants to influence or control the other partner and when they don’t toe their stipulated lines they get angry or resentful, and being abusive is the only way to unleash these emotions. They use coercion, manipulation or force to get what they want. Though it is more common for women to be the victims of relationship abuses, men also experience abuses in relationships too.
Below are hints on how to dictate and avoid abusive people.
Take your time:
If you meet someone you are interested in, take your time. Allow yourself to get to know the person before you make decisions about where the relationship is headed. Before you jump in, figure out if this is what you want and figure out if this is leading where you think it is leading. If it is, then take time out to study and understand the person. Is he/she what you want in a partner?
Don’t allow yourself to be pushed too fast or coerced into a hasty decision. Take things slowly, take time to think and assess the person. You don’t want to be in a relationship with someone who is going to be pushy, jealous or possessive. You want someone who will respect your boundaries, value you the way you are and love you for real.
Most women when they fall in love become blind and will put up with anything, especially those that need to get married desperately for one reason or the other. They succumb to a whirlwind romance, become engaged or start to live together with the man and then end up in regret afterwards. If you walk carefully and take your time to get to know the person and be honest with yourself, you will not fall into the hand of an abuser.
Avoid quick physical involvement:
Don’t sleep together, don’t move in and start being a couple. Don’t get emotionally attached before you have time to figure out the person.
I ran into an old friend recently, we got talking, she just fled from her marriage due to domestic abuse from her husband. I asked if she didn’t see the red flag while courting the man? She did but pregnancy happened and she married him with the hope that marriage would change him, but he got worse after they are married. After five years of insult, embarrassment and brutality, she left with three kids. The trauma left her emotionally and mentally damaged, she is in therapy now.
That is the danger of getting physical so early in a relationship. Only get physical when you’re sure the man is the real deal. Getting physical at the beginning of a relationship muddles a woman’s thinking. When you fall in love ensure you land into the relationship with both feet, don’t tumble into it heart first.
Listen to Your Intuition:
Listen to your intuition, not to your friends or relations but to the message that comes from within you. Neither your parents nor your friends or relatives know the person better than you do. You are in a better position to decide what is best for you more than those around you. What does your intuition tell you about the person you are dating or living with? If your gut feeling is telling you something is not right about the man or the relationship. Have a rethink.
Let your intuition be your guide. If you have nagging feelings about any aspects of the person or the relationship, get to the bottom of your hunches or get out. Listen to that still, small voice inside you, when you put that voice first, above any voice in your head, you can’t go wrong. If you have doubts, anxiety, persistent nagging thoughts, suspicion, apprehension or hesitation about going into the relationship or continuing with the person, listen to your intuition and act on lt.
Pay attention to his/her words or remarks:
Don’t play blind and deaf. Observe the person’s actions and words. Pay attention to remarks and comments and how the person speaks to you. If their words are subtly insulting, belittling, humiliating, disrespectful or intimidating, then beware, that’s verbal abuse. When your partner makes insulting remarks about you in public and embarrasses you in front of your family or friends that is verbal abuse.
Verbal abuse is any kind of demeaning, degrading, insulting comments or remarks from your partner that hurts you. If your partner calls you lazy, stupid or senseless, probably under the guise of a joke and laugh it off and you feel hurt about it, that is abuse.
If the person can accept the same comments from you without getting offended, then fine. But if the person cannot accept the same joke from you then it’s a red flag, beware!
Mr Nice and Charming are not always Mr Good:
Meeting a charming and handsome man doesn’t mean you have met a good man. The man may be sweet, gentle, kind, and probably attentive but behind all these good attributes, may lie a baser side hard to detect in the beginning. You have to be cautious and observant, do not allow his sweet and gentle attitude to disarm you. Often we meet a guy or a gal and got carried away with their external fineness, surface appeal and forget to take cognizant of other aspects of them. This mentality makes us ignore all the warnings and glaring signs that will help us avoid a toxic relationship.
Do not jump to conclusions about whether he is the one or not. But take one step at a time. This way, you will be far less likely to get into an abusive relationship. Though the man is kind and gentle towards you in the beginning, don’t let down your guard. Watch how he interacts with those around him, that will give you an inkling of the kind of person he is. Watch how the person treats others. Abusive people are often very self-absorbed, unkind or disrespectful of others, especially those they consider to be beneath them. How they treat others is a warning sign that they will eventually treat you the same.
Jealousy:
Jealousy can be flattering at the beginning of a relationship because it will appear like the other person cares so much about you and can’t bear to let anyone else be interested in you. However, jealousy, when in excess, is different from caring and has nothing to do with love. It is a sign of insecurity, possessiveness and a lack of trust. Excessive jealousy is a common character trait of an abusive person. If you’re in a relationship and your partner is jealous, it is a warning sign he/she is possessive, which is not healthy in the long run. If you are serious about an excessively jealous person, you better set boundaries from the beginning of the relationship.
If your partner resents the time you spend with your family or friends or questions you about the people you talk with or accuse you of flirting when he sees you with other men, watch out because that is a sign of possessiveness. If your partner frequently calls to check on you, to find out where you are, who is with you and what you are doing? Don’t see this as a sign of love or care, but a sign of jealousy.
Low self-esteem:
People with low self-esteem are always hypersensitive. They are quick to lose their tempers and react aggressively to normal criticism or commentary. A lot of abusers have low self-esteem and see any kind of critique as a threat. But they are quick to criticise and insult others. If you feel sad, hurt, humiliated, or frustrated with your partner’s words or actions, this is a sign you are not in a healthy relationship. Also, if your partner uses outdated gender roles to keep you subservient, he or she may be an abusive person.
When a man uses an implied gender role to make you obey his orders, or subjugate you to a certain treatment, he is an abuser. Many male abusers see women as being inferior to men and use this philosophy as a form of excuse to batter or abuse them. Some, because of their low self-esteem, try to keep their partners under them because they feel threatened by the lifestyles of their partners. A person with low self-esteem has feelings of inadequacy about him/herself and feelings of insecurity about their partners.
Authoritative behaviour:
Authoritativeness and controlling character traits are other signs of an abusive person. If your partner becomes angry when you do not take his or her advice, attempts to control your movement, your life or your finances or make personal decisions for you, you may be in an abusive relationship. A controlling partner undermines your integrity and demonstrates a lack of respect for you. Men who are controlling are more likely to become physically abusive.
In one of the groups I belonged to on social media, a lady wrote that her sister died giving birth without revealing the father of the child. The responsibility of taking care of the child, a baby girl, fell on her. For eight years she took care of the girl as a daughter, sent her to the best private school in her area and made sure she dresses well and nicely. Then a man came into her life and proposed to marry her but with conditions. He complained she buys expensive clothes for the girl. To please him, she went for cheaper clothes for the girl. Next, he asked her to withdraw the girl from the private school she attends and put her in a public school. She did. Lastly, the guy said he would not allow the girl into his home when he marries her. He told the lady to give up the girl for adoption or send her to someone who would take her in as a housemaid. She is frantically looking for who will take the girl off her hand.
At the end of her post, she said no one should blame her or advise her otherwise. She is 37 years old and desperately needs to get married and the guy is the only one who is serious about marrying her.
This has the stamp of a toxic relationship but she is too blind to see it. Probably, she is seeing the man’s behaviour as an act of concern for her. He has not yet married her but has started controlling her life and she is allowing it. It will get to a point where the man controls what she wears, where she goes, and who she spends time with.
Isolating Behaviour:
If your partner isolates you from your friends and family, forbids you to see other people or expresses anger when you spend time with friends on your own, it’s a sure sign of an abusive partner. Isolation is often the first step an abusive person uses to segregate their partners from social interaction with others.
A jealous and controlling person may often try to undermine family or friends with veiled concern for you. An abuser sees a close-knit family or friends as potential enemies and threats to his or her way of life. Some abusers even stop their partners from attending school or work, isolating them further from others and increasing their dependence on them for companionship and social acceptance.
Mood Swing:
Explosive angry and constant irritability are both warning signs of an emotionally unhealthy person. Mood swing is a form of emotional instability often caused by mental or behavioural disorders that trigger abusive tendencies in a person. Most abusers experience frequent mood changes, that’s why they have multiple personalities. Abusers are prone to explosions of rage when least expected, some days they will react differently to the same situation, it all depends on their mood at the time. Someone with such frequent mood changes and explosive character traits is unpredictable and so very hard to trust.
If you walk on eggshells around your partner, or constantly watch your words or actions around the person to avoid mood triggers, then you are in an unhealthy relationship.
Shifting Blame:
Abusive people don’t accept responsibility for their actions. They rather blame others for their feelings and actions they commit. They shift the blame of the consequences of their action to others. “You made me angry, that’s why I beat you.” Some will say “You refuse to take my instruction, that’s why I’m mad at you.” It becomes the fault of the person they have abused. They make the person feel guilty and responsible for their words or actions.
If your partner refuses to accept responsibility for the mistakes they make in their lives and constantly blames others for his or her problems, the person has an abusive trait.
Abusers typically blame others, especially their partners, for almost anything that goes wrong in their lives. Someone is always doing them wrong or out to get them, his/her wicked uncle, his/her village people, not the bad choices or mistakes they made. They will never accept it was their fault and will always insist they were right.
Unhealthy Perfectionism:
People with unrealistic expectations from others who want things to be done in a certain way or their partners to conform to their particular standards, such people are toxic and you will never please them. They are always unreasonably angry over minor difficulties or challenges in their life and are not open to changes.
They are not flexible and when their partners do not meet their unrealistic expectations, they may become explosive, resentful, angry and abusive. Though not everyone with perfectionist tendencies is an abuser, however when it becomes extreme, it becomes toxic.
A friend of mine on his Facebook wall posted this advice for ladies. I find it very succinct :
“Single girls read these statements very carefully and very well.
“Change your number after marriage.
“Quit your job after marriage to take care of the kids.
“Stop keeping friends, no visitors including family members after marriage.
“You see these three statements, once you hear any of them, or what loosely sounds like any of them from a man you are dating, no matter what stage the relationship is, even if you are getting married tomorrow, END IT!!!”
These are the biggest red flags you can ever get in a relationship in Nigeria today. And it will not end well. They are the typical example of what you expect from a textbook narcissist. Like I said before, it will end in tears.
I’m just revealing this secret to you. 80 per cent of single ladies that will read this will still go ahead to make the same mistake thinking, “he loves me,” while forgetting that the person telling you this also know how men reason more than you know.
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