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 from Mama's Kitchen” $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 from Mama's Kitchen” $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.
Yes I’ve experienced most of the above. Pretty scary when I read these words.
I have been in my relationship for nearly 4yrs. At first, I thought I was being overly sensitive (or at least that what he said I was) but it’s getting worse. He calls me slut, whore, lazy.. basically every name in the book. He tries to get me to react by getting in my face about how to do things correctly around the house because he says I’m like a child that needs to be taught. When he’s mad at anything or someone, his anger is always towards me and somehow everything becomes my fault. One minute he’s being funny the next minute, he wants to choke me. Then tells me he is just joking and that I am being a baby. He’s thrown me a couple of times, and has bruised me because he held me so tight, but never punched when mad only when he wants to rough house and he uses me as his punching bag. He then tells me that I bruise easily and that the markings are my fault and because I am a baby. I don’t know what else to do. I cook, clean, i have to give him a manicure and pedicure, massage his feet, rub his back, wash his clothes exactly how he wants and yet, he finds it funny when he pushes me because he says it’s too easy. I feel like I am stuck and he knows it. I cant get my own place because of my credit (lets just say i was in another relationship just like this and it took years to get out as well as ruining my credit). No one will rent to me, so I need him and he knows it. I make well over six figures and yet I cant afford anything because he tells me I have to buy everything or he will kick me out of the house.
Never, in a million years I thought I’d end up in these kind of relationship. I thought I escaped from my abuser BUT only to enter another abusive relationship. How is it that a smart girl like myself who is professionally successful cant seem to find a successful relationship. I am embarrassed, ashamed and depressed. I just don’t know what else to do.
I can’t really believe I’m about to post on here. I don’t think I can bring myself to admit I am in a verbal/emotionally abusive relationship. I feel silly.
There are so many things on te list above that I’ve said E&D to things that have made me start crying. I know that this may seem weak but I still love my partner and I think I still think maybe he can be different, maybe I’ve made him this way or maybe I’m the one that’s in the wrong.
It started with shouting and the only way to make the constant arguing stop was to just agree. To tell him I was wrong, I was a bad person and I knew I had to change. This continued. He denied watching porn, I never minded this I have no issue with it but I couldn’t understand why he would deny it. He would write to other women and I was just a jealous insecure girlfriend. Yes I was jealous and I was insecure and I wanted him to help me not to be but he would tell me my feelings didn’t matter when they weren’t real. He tells me anything that I say is not real and not based on reality.
Apparently I don’t go through a process or make the process matter and until I do we will always have a problem.
I’ve tried, I’ve tried to be who he wants me to be. Then I’ll feel frustrated and try and stick up for my beliefs and quickly wish I hadn’t. He calls me names and he has referred to me as two people. He will use my name Rose (not real name) and refer to that as the nice one and Cunt as the person that has over taken Rose.
He has spat at me, broken my things, sat on me until I go through the process, blocked my exit from the room I’m in.
He buys himself things when shopping to eat or drink and doesn’t consider me, he cooks for himself and not me.
However, he does cook for me too. He does buy me little gifts and he does look after me. This is where I get confused and think maybe I’m just the one being problematic?
He used to withhold sex for a few days after a fight. He knows that hurts me. Yet recently I left him after being scared by his behaviour (not preciously witnessed) and my safety and when we met up in public he fought with me, blamed me and got me to the point of crying and feeling totally lost to then being nice. Hugging me and telling me he misses me and regardless of the problem he loves me more than anything and wants me home. I stupidly went home with him and we had sex. I know that was stupid.I know that makes me a bad person because it’s not fair on him.
I’m giving out confusing information.
I’ve told him how he hurts me. It usually turns to how I’ve done wrong and he will ask me to repeat conversations and he knows I can’t.I then get accused of not listening or wanting to be better and solve problems.
I feel so confused. I don’t really know what to do. I have a wonderful family and I could just go straight to them. Why am
I still here. I may not be physically living with him but I’m still within his grasp.
I just keep thinking maybe he isn’t the person I think he is, maybe I’m the crazy one?
My boyfriend started off by swearing and telling me to fuck off, slowly it progressed and got worse and worse and worse. He now tells me he’s wishes that I would die and that he hates me. He has spat at me, he has physically crushed me when I was playing with him to a point where I took hold of his hair to pull him off me and I was close to passing out when he finally let go. It hurt so much it set my shoulder out of place. I thought my head would explode. He calls me a ‘fucking cunt’ to my face at a dinner party. He has told me to shut up more times than I could possibly remember. He calls me stupid and financially unstable. He calls me a psycho. He has strangled me so hard during sex that I bruised and couldn’t speak the next day. I am so brainwashed into thinking he gives me a wonderful life. I am so confused. I absolutely hate him but I love my life with him. I feel I am stuck in limbo and can’t leave because he has locked me into his life with him. I don’t know what to do. He uses cocaine all the time and drinks at least one bottle of wine by himself every single night. Sometimes he is so gentle but 80 % of the time he is just something that plummeted out of my worst nightmare. Help me
Telling his teenage and early adult aged children I am a psycho bitch. Cheated on me with his ex during their separation, while living with me and says he never cheated on me because we weren’t married yet. Tells his kids lies about me or VERY exaggerated truths to make them feel sorry for him and hate me. Physically abuses me in front of my children. Now, my 16 year old daughter will come “check” on me if he hears him yelling and screaming at me (daily), then verbally abuses her by mocking her and putting her down for checking on me. Later, he “punishes” her by shaming and humiliating her to others or in public and will pour his love and affection out on his biological daughter, in front of my daughter, (who has only known my husband as her only father since she was 6), to make her feel worthless and unworthy of his love or affection. He kicked us out last summer, called my daughter a worthless porker, challenged my son to fight him and when I moved, he told everyone I left him and we were separated so he could justify his going out to bars, etc. I could write a book with the life I’ve lived since being married to him. The crazy part is, I sincerely love him and continue to pray for healing. In the meantime, I’ve subjected my poor children to horrible abuse. ????