The things abusers say and do put you on the defensive, make you feel crazy, and to wonder if you are the abuser in the relationship. Your best ammunition against the things abusers say and do is knowing the answer to What Is Verbal Abuse? If you can say to yourself, “Hey! That’s abuse!” then you’ll more easily detach from the abuse emotionally and find a psychologically or physically safe place. Safety planning can help protect you against things abusers say and do (Hurtful Words Don’t Define You).
The things abusers say and do are designed to control you. Whether abusers say and do these things knowingly or unconsciously, the result is the same: you feel lower than dirt, afraid, and intimidated. In your weakened state, your abuser finds it much easier to gain power over you.
The following statements and actions are common things abusers say and do. Contribute your comments and take a look at everyone else’s comments too.
Name Calling
- Idiot, Stupid Cunt, Go sit in the corner where you belong (dunce)
- Crazy Bitch, Psycho
- Whore, Slut
- Heartless Ho
- Stupid
- Worthless
- Lazy
- Says “woman” or “man” in a sarcastic tone or demeaning tone.
- On the flip side, they may refuse to say your name at all to deny your existence
Intimacy Breakers
- “It is none of your fucking business.”
- “Why don’t you fucking leave?” or “Get the fuck out of my house.”
- “Shut up”
- Says “I don’t care about your feelings.”
- Often leaves you hanging when they promised to do something with you.
- Consistently puts their desires and schedule above yours.
- Breaks up often then comes running back, begging for forgiveness.
- Interrupts you when you’re talking.
Tells You What You’re Doing
- “Yes, why don’t you stuff your feelings inside.”
- “You’ve got your priorities screwed up.”
- “Stop being a drama queen!”
- “Stop crying – we both know you’re faking it to get your way!”
- Tells you what your intentions are, what you intend to do, and what you really meant when you said/did something.
Plays Word Games
- Interrupts you when you’re talking.
- Repeats “your exact words” but takes them out of context or makes up something that you did not say or mean.
- Challenges you to remember “exact words” but you can’t (or tells you you’re wrong) because the conversation is so confusing you don’t know exactly what they’re talking about anymore.
- Changes the subject to divert your attention.
- Tells you what you really mean to say.
- Drones on for hours, repeating the same points, getting nowhere, until you’re so exhausted you want to agree just to get them to be quiet (brainwashing).
- Re-defines words to mean what they want them to mean.
- Denies saying what they said (even if you’re playing it back to them from a digital recorder, they may deny meaning what they obviously meant).
- Uses tricks like abusive anger to get you to be quiet or listen.
Tries to Appear Better Than You
- “You have no money; without me, you’d be lost.”
- “At least I have a job.”
- “You know nothing about the real world!”
- “At least I know how to make friends that matter.”
Insults People And Pets You Love
- “Why don’t you leave, and take your geriatric dog too? I hope he falls dead.”
- “I hope your dog gets killed in the road right in front of you!”
- Uses threatening gestures toward your pets.
- “Your kid is such a sissy!”
- “Your mother left your dad to chase cock and you’re going to do the same to me!”
- “I’m really concerned that your sister will influence you to be a bitch like she is.”
Sexual Insults And Injuries
- Rapes you (it is possible to rape you even if you are married to the abuser).
- Makes you wear clothing that makes you feel uncomfortable.
- “You were just a good fuck.”
- Turns their back to you while laying in bed to show a withdrawal of affection.
- Lies incessantly about porn or cheating, even when faced with proof.
- Makes you feel “dirty” during or after sex with comments they know you don’t like.
- Uses sexual or racial slurs because they know you don’t like them.
- Tells you to go to a party alone and then insults you, withdraws, or sexually assaults you when you come home.
- Knows the meaning and value that you tie with having sex, but breaks up with you right after sex saying they lied about their feelings to get you into bed.
- Uses crude names for your body parts and knows you do not like them.
Insults Your Ideas and Dreams
- The churches, restaurants, movies, etc. that you choose are not good enough.
- Your career interests are “fluffy” or not real jobs.
- Insults the gifts you give or acts disinterested.
- “That is never going to work.”
- Mocks and makes fun of you.
A private place to write it down
If you already know why you’re here, there’s a private log built for exactly this: the Verbal Abuse Incident and Pattern Log. Write things down before you second-guess them, in a document made to stay yours.
Purchase “Recipes Digital Download” $8.99There is also a bundle offer at the end of this article.
They Do Not Care About Your Medical Issues
- You’re hurt after a fight with them and say you should go to the emergency room…the abuser’s response is “Quit your whining and crying and leave”.
- Major medical issue comes up and the abuser unavailable to comfort you or just disappears.
- Acts like a $10 co-pay for your doctor visit is going to break the bank.
- Makes fun of your medications (happy pills, crazy pills, etc.)
- Tells you that depression is in your head and if you appreciated them like you should you wouldn’t be such a sad sack.
Thoughtless of Your Needs
- Makes lunch for themselves without asking if you want any (on purpose).
- Doesn’t help with the kids or household chores.
- Does not ask you about your day.
- Does not start and/or engage in thoughtful communication.
- Keeps you up all night “talking” or raging. Interrupts your sleep for tiny things they could handle alone.
Gifts Are Not From the Heart or Used As Tools
- Gives gifts that did NOT come from the heart, isn’t wrapped, has a price tag on it, tossed at you with no emotion but scorn, etc.
- Gifts given after fights to gain your forgiveness.
- Ignores (“forgets”) your birthday or holidays that are special to you.
Disrespects Your Belongings
- Destroys things that are important to you.
- Destroys or makes you destroy pictures, diaries, letters, or anything else of sentimental value from before the relationship with you.
- Throws away your clothes that either you love or the abuser hates.
- Gaslighting (purposely moves your things or changes your environment and then denies doing it).
- Hides your personal belongings and denies knowing where they are.
- Steals your jewelry, pawns it, then brings another piece home to place in your jewelry box and pretends it is the missing piece.
- Insists you promised to do something that you know you didn’t promise.
- Engages in crazy making behaviors at your expense.
Withholds Financial Information or Money
- Demands that you shop for the household but doesn’t give you enough money to cover necessities.
- Makes you give them your paycheck.
- Doesn’t give you access to the bank accounts.
- Makes you believe that you cannot budget or save, that you waste money, or generally cannot figure out how to handle your financial matters.
- Gives you complete access to the bank accounts and allows you to make financial decisions, but uses your decisions as a tool to verbally and mentally abuse you.
- Closes joint bank accounts with no notice.
- Finds a way to close your bank accounts using your passwords and security information.
Threatens Or Intimidates You
- “Maybe I should just do pot, porn and date other women so you will leave me.”
- “I should run you through the wood chipper out there!”
- “If you don’t shut your ever-runnin’ mouth,…”
- Says “This is YOU!” and hits something or says nothing but you know they’re hitting things to scare you.
- Jerks the steering wheel from you when you’re driving or drives like a crazy person with you in the car.
- Spits on you.
- Threatens to take you to court over issues they know they will lose, but be able to waste your time anyway.
- Seeks attention by threatening suicide. Intimidates you into doing things by threatening suicide.
Abandons and/or Threatens to Abandon You Physically
- Pushes you out of the car and leaves you in a strange place without your personal effects (i.e. cell phone, purse, wallet).
- Takes you to their family’s home far away and then leaves you at their mother’s house for two days while partying with cousins.
- “Maybe I just won’t come home tonight!”
- “I’ll take our kids and leave you on the street!”
Physically Insults or Assaults You
- Spits on you.
- Blocks your exit.
- Drags you.
- Grabs you and makes you stay in one place.
- Hits, punches, or slaps you.
- Kicks you.
- Makes you hold pillows so they can “practice” fighting/self-defense.
- Pinches you
- Squeezes you too tightly.
- Chokes you or puts you in a position where they could easily choke you.
You just read what’s been happening to you.
Here’s somewhere to put it.
Reading a list like this is one thing. Writing down what’s actually happening in your own relationship, in your own words, is another.
That’s what the Verbal Abuse Incident and Pattern Log is for: a private, structured place to record what’s said and done to you, so there’s a record you can trust, even when your memory feels less certain.
What’s inside:
- Quick Capture pages for when you only have thirty seconds and need to get it down before you forget, or before someone’s back in the room.
- Detailed Record pages for later, when you have more time to write.
- Pattern Review pages that help you see what’s repeating, not just what happened once.
- A Summary page, built to hand to an advocate, counselor, doctor, or attorney, without having to explain everything from scratch every time.
It’s not a diagnosis, and it’s not a legal document. It’s a way to keep your own record straight, whether you’re still deciding what this is, still living with it, or getting ready to talk to someone about it.
Privacy. Not everyone needs to hide that they bought this, but every download works the same way regardless. Needing that privacy, or not needing it, has nothing to do with how much what’s happening to you matters.
The download opens with a couple of pages made to look like a recipe file before the real Log begins. PayPal will send you a purchase confirmation email, but even that uses a discreet product name, not the title of what you bought.
Getting it. After you pay through PayPal, you’re brought right back here to a download page where your file is ready and waiting.
Price. $8.99 on its own.
Purchase “Recipes Digital Download” $8.99If you also want the Domestic Violence Safety Plan Workbook, the two together are $18.99, or $3 less than buying them separately. The Safety Plan Workbook covers what to do before, during, and after leaving; the Log covers what to write down along the way. Get one or both, whichever is useful to you right now.
Purchase “Recipes from Mama's Kitchen Bundle” $18.99The file name for the Verbal Abuse Incident and Pattern Log is recipes-mamas-kitchen.pdf and the cover of your downloaded document will say “Recipes from Mama’s Kitchen”. It’s the same for the Domestic Violence Safety Plan Workbook, except the file name is more-recipes-from-mamas-kitchen.pdf and the title showing is “More Recipes from Mama’s Kitchen”.
Written by Kellie Jo Holly Close, who has worked in domestic violence advocacy since founding VerbalAbuseJournals.com in 2008.
thank you for the site and other peoples stories. Have tried to shut out the knowledge that I am in a long term relationship with a man who is abusive emotionally and has been physically abusive in the past. We have been together some years now as roomates, without intimacy, or affection on his part. Tells me that he can not love me, but yet talks as if we will always be together, expects to be catered to, and cared for.. with me hoping he will decide he loves me and become affectionate and stable. . if I can just do things right. Have gone into major debt buying things for him, because “we are going to build a life together”. It’s never enough though, never any contentment, I can’t do anything right. He’s never happy. Somehow, for me there is a feeling of companionship and warmth when he talks and laughs with me, but that can quickly change, he has real mood swings, can go from friendly and warm to rage, with any failure on my part; whether it’s not completing his errands, or not doing everything his way, or he doesn’t like my “attitude” or look.. Tells me to “shut up”, that my feelings don’t matter at all. When he’s angry, calls me really horrible names and threatens to throw me out, or tells me to get out.. tells me he doesn’t care what happens to me. Yet the next day expects warmth and everything to be fine, just wait on him as if nothing happened. Lately has begun to threaten physical violence with the nasty name calling, threatening to gouge out my eyes, or burn me with his cigarettes. He can turn around and be so nice, talk to me, talk about the future, lulls me into thinking he really does care, but never says so…feel trapped.
Tonight during a discussion my husband was being sarcastic and closed off to what I felt was my own valid point. I told him I was not going to continue the discussion (after he said “you’re losing the battle, not winning this, etc), I told him I was done because he was being sarcastic and he told me to go f*ck myself. I told him not to talk to me that way, I was his wife, and he said, I’ll say whatever I want to, it’s my house. I said don’t you have any respect for me, to talk to me that way? And he said not when it comes to this (the discussion, which we were clearly divided on). I went to bed (we already sleep in seperate rooms) after putting our child to bed and locked my door.
Thanks for this list. I was surprised by how many things I could “check off.” Whenever I talk to him though, I am often convinced that I am the crazy one…and that I am “just playing the victim” as he would say. In the past he’s even broken into my internet accounts and emailed my schools that I would not be attending the grad program to “get revenge” on me. My friends have made me go to the police for various things in the past but I never filled out a report because the police actually decide if they will press charges, not me. I don’t want to ruin his career. I guess it was also fear that he would then retaliate or hate me.
Besides all the physical and emotional abuse, he left me recently…but wouldn’t mind keeping me around for ***. I find that repulsive but I don’t know if I would refuse…or if I have the self respect to do so…do abusers always come back?
I am in a relationship that is slowly killing me, we have been together 14 years. Drugs are a problem, he has had two relapses during our relationship. the first one was 7 years ago and lasted a little over a year. The current relapse has been going on for almost 3 years. During both he abused me. He cheats and does everything described in this article. He has also been physically abusive at times. We had to move out of our home because we couldn’t keep up with the bills (he lost his job due to drug usage) and now we live with his mother. I am trapped, I have no family, no friends, I do not have a vehicle and i’m not working because I have a back injury. My license is also suspended because of a unpaid traffic ticket. We live in a area that is not near public transport. He also has no license but still drives, he has two vehicles and also access to his moms car if needed. However he won’t take me anywhere or allow me to use any of the 3 vehicles here because of my license. But it’s okay that he drives? If I ask him to take me to the doctor, he flakes on me. If I ask him to take me to the store he gets angry and 90% of the time won’t take me. I don’t know what to do, I feel helpless. I know I need to leave but where do I go and how will I get there? I am severly depressed and often think of suicide. I just feel so alone and don’t know what to do. Please help me.
I am shocked at all the different stories. My spouse would verbally put me down, call me names if I did things wrong, call my family to tell them how bad I am everything I did wrong. he resented that I helped reverse our autistic son didn’t want me to help him leave him to be severe. He wants to be the one to fix him. he lied about income to me, micromanaged me like a child. put me down verbally till I would get angry till I would react in physical way against him so he would call police on me 12 hrs after the fact put me in jail. leave me homeless, take kids away from me making false allegations, telling judge to give me 0 support after 2yrs, paying 100,000 to fight me in court always lied to me saying we had no money when he lied about income making really 30,000 a month. put down people he worked with
saying secretaries are nothing and all people with low income paying jobs are nothing. he is a jekyl and hyde personality. he puts our older son down like this also but he stands there taking it all he even threw him out of the house.
he is teaching our autistic son to be like this.so worried for him age 9 our older son 19 which his father still wont let him learn how to drive and our son upset his father controlling him on this and everything and everyone else around him.