You have likely kept on trying and trying your best to resolve issues and doing everything in your power to try to stop your partner's abusive behavior... and nothing has worked. Nothing has worked because she doesn't want to stop controlling you and abuse is her method of doing it. One more time just for GPs:

Nothing has worked because she doesn't want to stop controlling you and abuse is her method of doing it. It really is that plain and simple.

Take a look what has happened to you over the course of days, weeks, months and years. Your "failure" to stop the abuse and "failure" to resolve issues, has very likely set up feelings of helplessness within you because you can't seem to make anything better no matter how hard you try. As you keep trying, and "failing", you feelings of helplessness and frustration grow. Your once healthy ego and sense of pride begin to slip away and your sense of self-worth is shattered. You lose confidence in yourself and your abilities.

The combination of abuse and your "failed" efforts to stop it: erode your self-confidence, devastate your self-esteem and destroy your sense of self-worth. You become fearful, insecure and dependent. Everything in your life eventually revolves around her, her moods and her needs. You become a non-person, and as such, you are reduced to existing as her "possession" or "provider."

You can't change her no matter how hard you try. You can't love her enough to make her stop abusing you. Only she can change herself or make the decision to stop being abusive.

The Cycle of Abuse keeps you fearful and off balance both emotionally and psychologically. Look at the diagram of the cycle shown below... you will most certainly recognize this vicious and devastating wheel spinning within your abusive relationship.

In the 1970s, Lenore Walker developed the theory that all forms of abuse occur within a distinct cycle. Once the relationship is established, the same pattern emerges time after time and is constantly repeated, often becoming more intense. Human beings are creatures of habit and routine - we seek out patterns to settle into.

Within an abusive relationship, this pattern of degenerative, progressive behaviour eventually forms a "living, fluid dynamic" between two the people - the abuser and the victim. Through repetition, it becomes a familiar, well-choreographed "dance" in which each person knows their role intimately and behaves accordingly.

Although these repeating cycles of abusive incidents throw you into emotional chaos and send you reeling on an unpredictable emotional rollercoaster ride - they strangely become entirely predictable. Why? Because it's the same pattern time and time again with only the 'reasons' for it changing. You learn what you have to do to make it through yet one more time - then all will be well again.

Episodes Passed Through Generations

Abuse is identifiable as being cyclical in two ways: it is both generational and episodic. Generational cycles of abuse are passed down, by example and exposure, from parents to children. Episodic abuse occurs in a repeating pattern within the context of at least two individuals within a family system. It may involve spousal abuse, child abuse or even elder abuse.

Emotional abuse is:

• A form of addiction - control and power are self-perpetuating and form a "hunger" needing to be satisfied
• A habit and routine - a cyclical pattern of behaviour that is repeated until it is unlearned
• A highly dysfunctional way of relating - it carries on as the default "language" of communication

Not all relationships follow the precise sequence of events within the cycle and individual experiences vary. Some stages, especially the honeymoon or calm periods, may shorten or be left out completely. This becomes obvious as the abuse intensifies over a period of time. For example, she may not even bother to offer you a flat-line "Sorry." or be apologetic in any way after an abusive attack. Also note that each stage of the cycle can last from only a few minutes to a number of months and even years.

Understand how this cycle efficiently destroys you

This insidious, repetitious wheel will break you so smoothly, there's an excellent chance you won't realize you've lost yourself. For some people it may take years... but it will break you.

Each time you take a spin on the Cycle of Abuse you lose a little piece of yourself. You never quite make it back up to your top again. Oh I know, you may think and believe you have... but you haven't. Every cycle of abuse takes you lower and lower and lower until one day, there is nothing left of you. You just don't recover. Look closely at yourself and your life:

Are you really the same person you were before you began riding The Cycle of Abuse?

The heavy weight of abuse crushes you a little bit more each time you travel around the cycle. Down, down, down you go... until you are physically, mentally, emotionally and spiritually annihilated.

You begin whole and completeYou finish depressed and broken

Rider Beware

• She rages at you - you become emotionally distant from her
• Your distance is "emotionally safe" for her but she doesn't want to lose you
• She works hard to win you back - the harder she has to work - the more she appreciates you
• She showers you with attention, love, sex, smiles, dinners and whatever else she knows will work
• She wears you down - you begin to warm up to her - she keeps up her efforts
• She wins - you're hoovered back in
• You try to close the emotional gap between the two of you - to restore an "emotionally normal" relationship
• She feels you closing in on her emotionally - her innate sense of mistrust rises up
• She becomes fearful and pushes you away - destroying all the "tender feelings" she was showing you to win you back
• You wonder WTF?
• And the whole cycle begins again

So, now you see the truth behind all her raging and blaming - it has nothing to do with you. You are simply a convenience for her. A scapegoat » door-mat » stomping-ground » sparring partner for her to work out her own childhood issues.

Destructive Effects of The Cycle of Abuse

Isolation from others, withdrawal from family and friends, avoid the public

• Spending more and more time at work, not wanting to come home
• Low self-esteem, feelings of worthlessness
• Depression, thoughts of suicide
• Emotional problems, shame, emotional highs and lows, emotional numbness
• Illness - physically, mentally, emotionally, spiritually
• Increased alcohol or drug use, addictions
• Withdrawal from real life into an alternative reality - perhaps the Internet

Co-dependency & abuse are bed-mates

Some types of men are attracted to women who are emotionally abusive. They complain, blame and try to control, yet they continue to allow others to hurt them. Why do they do this?

Co-dependents push their thoughts and feelings out of awareness by focusing all their energy on other people. They stay busy so they won't have to think about things and face reality. They ignore problems and pretend they aren't happening. They pretend that things aren't as bad as they really are. Read more about abusive relationships and co-dependency

See also:

• The Terminator - inside the cycle of abuse

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