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“He Withheld Sex and Made Me Feel Disgusting for Wanting It”

By
Samara Knight
-
withholding sex

Many survivors of domestic abuse describe a form of harm that does not match what people expect in relation to physical intimacy. There was no sexual coercion or aggression. Instead, their partner withdrew all physical intimacy and then turned their desire for closeness into something shameful.

Withholding sex as a tool of control receives little attention, and abusers depend on that lack of recognition. When it is used repeatedly to punish, shame, degrade, or control it is not a relationship problem. It is abuse.

A Form of Sexual Abuse That Often Goes Unseen

Sexual coercion and assault within relationships are widely recognised as serious and deeply harmful, and they occur far more often than many people realise. When the focus stays only on sexual aggression, it leaves space for other forms of harm to go unrecognised. Abusers take advantage of that gap. Some force sex to assert control. Others use sexual withholding while actively shaping how their partner sees themselves, so they feel unattractive, defective, and ashamed of their own needs.

Coercive control, as described by sociologist Evan Stark (2007), involves a pattern of behaviour through which an abuser strips away their partner’s autonomy, identity, and sense of reality. Within that pattern, the abuser uses intimacy as a lever. When they recognise that physical closeness matters to their partner, they identify a point of emotional significance and then remove it in a way that creates distress and dependence.

“He Called Me a Nympho”

One survivor described how the abuser gradually removed physical affection from her marriage:

“In the last few years of our union, he stopped touching me. No cuddles, no hugs, no kisses, no sex. He went to bed every night and turned his back on me. He called me a ‘nympho,’ whereas I was just a healthy woman in her 20s and early 30s. I was basically left in every way but name, and his assorted demands on my attention. The marriage was finally where he wanted it: me as his mommy and provider. Any argument resulted in bitter quarrelling, during which he compounded how ‘repulsive’ I was. Yet he continued to boast about me/us, and to accuse me of infidelity.”

In this account, the abuser removes warmth and connection while turning her need for intimacy into something to ridicule. He maintains an image of devotion in public while carrying out a sustained pattern of degradation in private. He defines her as excessive in one moment and inadequate in the next. That contradiction creates confusion and keeps her focused on trying to understand how she is being seen.

Another survivor described a similar pattern:

“He hadn’t touched me in over a year, but if I ever brought it up, he told me I was ‘obsessed with sex’ and ’embarrassing.’ He’d look at me like I was disgusting for even wanting to be close to him. I started to believe there was something wrong with me.”

The abuser shapes that belief directly. He applies pressure until his partner begins to see herself through his framing.

Shame as a Method of Control

When an abuser calls their partner a “slut,” “nympho,” or “whore” for wanting intimacy within their own relationship, they redefine a normal human need as a flaw. This reframing serves a clear purpose.

The abuser creates isolation by attaching shame to desire. When a partner feels embarrassed by their own needs, they are far less likely to speak openly to friends or family. The abuser’s words stay contained within the relationship, where they continue to shape how the partner thinks and feels.

The abuser also destabilises their partner’s sense of reality. Wanting closeness is part of human connection, and the abuser actively distorts that truth. He denies the legitimacy of her needs and replaces it with his own interpretation, which positions her as excessive or unreasonable. This process functions as gaslighting that operates through the body and through desire.

The abuser reinforces this pattern by reacting with hostility or humiliation whenever the subject of intimacy is raised. Over time, the partner learns that speaking about connection leads to harm, so she stops raising it. That silence strengthens the abuser’s control.

“Every time I tried to talk about how disconnected I felt, he’d throw it back at me, that I was needy, that I was suffocating him, that normal women didn’t carry on like this,” one survivor recalled. “I spent years apologising for wanting my own husband to hold my hand.”

Criticising Your Body and Sexual Performance

Some abusers move beyond withdrawal and provide explanations that are designed to wound. They target their partner’s body and appearance as the reason for rejecting intimacy. Survivors describe abusers making degrading comments about their genitals, their scent, or their shape. Others describe being told they were inadequate sexually, that they caused the lack of intimacy, and that no one else would want them.

“He told me early in our relationship that I smelled ‘off’ down there. I was mortified. I went to the doctor and there was nothing wrong with me. But I never forgot it. Years later, when he stopped wanting to be intimate, he brought it up again. It was like he’d been saving it,” one survivor said.

The abuser chooses an area where vulnerability already exists and applies pressure there. Sexual confidence can be easily affected, and repeated criticism of the body or sexual self creates a lasting impact that continues long after the relationship ends.

“He used to rank me. Literally tell me I was maybe a five out of ten on a good day, and that I should be grateful he’d been with me at all. He said I was ‘wooden’ in bed and that’s why he’d lost interest. I didn’t date anyone for four years after I left because I was so convinced no one would want me.”

Another survivor shared:

“He told me he was bored of having sex with me because it was like f**king a starfish. It’s the most humiliated and embarrassed I have ever felt. I was so ashamed and felt like I wasn’t measuring up to his expectations.”

The abuser uses these comments to damage self-worth at a deep level. When someone begins to see themselves as undesirable, they feel less able to leave, less able to seek connection elsewhere, and less able to trust their own understanding of what is happening.

Targeting What Matters Most to You

Research on coercive control shows that abusers tailor their behaviour to the individual. They observe what their partner values and then use that knowledge strategically. When a partner places importance on closeness and physical connection, the abuser uses withholding sex as a direct form of punishment.

“He knew I was a touchy-feely kind of person. I’d told him early on how important physical affection was to me, that it was how I felt loved,” said one survivor. “Years later, when he wanted to hurt me, that was exactly what he took away. And when I reacted, when I cried, or got angry, or begged him to just hold me, he used that reaction as proof that I was unstable.”

The abuser creates the distress and then uses that distress as evidence against their partner. He defines her response as the problem, which allows him to reinforce his control while maintaining his position.

Naming the Reality

Withholding sex alongside humiliation, shame, and attacks on the body is a form of abuse. It creates real psychological harm, including anxiety, depression, disrupted attachment, and a deep erosion of self-worth that can continue long after the relationship ends. Many survivors struggle to name this experience because it feels deeply personal and does not match the common narratives they have heard about abuse.

If your partner made you feel ashamed for wanting closeness, criticised your body, or defined your desire as inappropriate, the abuser used a deliberate strategy to control you. He shaped how you saw yourself and relied on that distortion to maintain his position.

You were never the problem. The responsibility sits with the abuser, and his behaviour depends on keeping that reality out of view.

When Abusers Use Humiliation as a Weapon

By
Samara Knight
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abuse and humiliation

Humiliation is woven through many abusive relationships, influencing both how you experience yourself and how you believe others see you. It chips away at dignity, unsettles your sense of what is real, and creates a power imbalance where your value starts to feel uncertain and dependent. It can unfold in private moments or out in the open, through words, behaviour, or situations carefully orchestrated to leave you feeling small, exposed, and diminished.

This piece is grounded in the voices of survivors who have spoken about what they endured. Their experiences are shared here because they matter, and because the patterns they reveal help bring this often hidden tactic into clearer view.

The Psychology Behind It: What Drives This Behaviour

To make sense of humiliation as a tactic, it helps to look at how an abuser positions their partner in their mind. There is often a strong sense of entitlement, alongside an expectation that their partner exists to meet their needs, enhance their image, and stay within the limits they set. A partner who feels secure, confident, or recognised by others disrupts that control.

Humiliation becomes a direct way to manage that disruption. By making their partner feel foolish, inferior, or ashamed, the abuser achieves multiple outcomes at once. They wear down the partner’s sense of worth until it begins to feel unstable. They communicate that stepping outside expectations will come with consequences. And they shift the focus of the relationship, so the partner becomes preoccupied with avoiding conflict rather than living freely.

There is also a more immediate reinforcement. For some abusers, their partner’s distress brings a sense of relief or satisfaction. One survivor described it simply: “He provokes for no reason, and when I respond emotionally, that’s when he feels most at ease.” The reaction becomes proof of control, and maintaining that proof is what sustains the pattern.

Beliefs rooted in ownership, superiority, and entitlement allow the abuser to justify their actions. Humiliation is reframed as something deserved or necessary, and any response from the partner is then used to reinforce the idea that the partner is at fault.

What Happens Behind Closed Doors

Some of the most severe humiliation happens out of sight, where there are no witnesses and no external limits on behaviour. In these private spaces, the cruelty can be intense while leaving no physical trace.

One survivor shared: “He poured water in my bed and told me I deserved to sleep in piss.” Another described how her abuser chipped away at her sense of desirability, listing reasons he would not be intimate with her, blaming her for each rejection, and then accusing her of infidelity. She wrote: “My anxiety and confusion in those days was off the charts.”

Humiliation can also be highly targeted and subtle. One survivor spoke about how her abuser fixated on her resemblance to her father, a man he claimed to dislike: “He’d keep calling me ‘Andrew’ every time he thought I sounded like him. He’d repeat what I said, mimicking me in a dull voice meant to sound like my Dad. This became more and more frequent.” The intention was precise. Even her voice and way of speaking were turned into something to be criticised.

Another survivor shared some of the statements directed at her: “You can’t educate pork,” “You are untrainable,” “You don’t have enough money to buy paper to wipe your backside.” These were said by someone who claimed to care about her. Words like these are not accidental. They are selected to hurt, and the person using them understands their impact.

When It Happens in Front of Others

When humiliation is brought into public spaces, the impact deepens. The presence of others becomes part of the dynamic. The partner is left managing their reactions while feeling exposed, often unable to respond without escalating the situation or drawing more attention.

One survivor described how this was done deliberately: “He would try to embarrass me while I was out in public, especially in Walmart. He would push all of my buttons in the hopes that I would freak out.” The aim was to create a scene where she would be judged by others.

Another survivor described a recurring pattern in social situations: “When we were in a group setting, he would cut me off mid-sentence and say to everyone that I didn’t know what I was talking about, and then proceed to talk about what he wanted.” Each interruption reinforced her diminishing presence while elevating his own.

One account highlights how threatening an abuser finds their partner being valued by others. After receiving a simple compliment from another man, the aftermath was immediate: “You ever meet him for lunch and I’ll kill you.” Nothing had happened beyond a passing interaction, yet it triggered a threat. The message was clear. Her value in the eyes of others was something he intended to control.

Using Technology to Amplify Humiliation

While humiliation has always been part of abusive dynamics, technology has extended how and where it can happen. Some abusers use online platforms to expose private moments or to shape a narrative where they appear wronged. Others use recordings or images as tools of control.

One survivor described how her abuser documented her distress: “He would walk around, phone in hand, ridiculing me and telling me I was worthless, a horrible mother, a crazy person. When I broke down, he’d film me and use those videos to threaten me, saying he’d get custody of our children. He’d even show them to friends to make them feel sorry for him.” He created the reaction and then used it to support his version of events.

Another survivor shared a different form of violation: “He got hold of my journal where I wrote about some of my most embarrassing moments and things that traumatised me that I was trying to heal from, and copied some entries and filed it with the court when I tried to leave him.” What had been a private process of healing was turned into a weapon.

One survivor described a moment that captured the same pattern: “He took pictures of me semi-naked in the pool and told me his mate would enjoy these.” A private moment was taken and shared as though her autonomy did not exist.

The Lasting Impact on Your Sense of Self

Repeated humiliation reshapes how you see yourself. When you are consistently told, in different ways, that you are inadequate or unworthy, it can begin to feel believable. One survivor described how her abuser “mocked my standards constantly, telling me they were too high and that I was stuck up and so far from reality. It was very destabilising.” That sense of instability is intentional. It disrupts your trust in your own thinking and perception.

Another survivor shared a statement that captures this clearly: “Whose body is it anyway?” said when she pushed him away. The aim was to make her question her right to boundaries, to create shame around something that should have been entirely hers.

When this pattern continues over time, it begins to influence how a person shows up in every area of life. Even after leaving, many survivors describe second-guessing themselves, holding back in conversations, or feeling uncertain in situations where confidence is needed.

The effect becomes internal. The voice of the abuser no longer needs to be present because it has already been absorbed. Rebuilding a sense of self separate from those messages takes intention, awareness, and time.

Recovering from Humiliation

Recovering from humiliation is a gradual process, and it involves recognising that the shame never truly belonged to you. It was introduced, repeated, and reinforced by someone else. They chose the words, created the situations, and targeted what mattered to you. That speaks to their need for control, not your worth.

A starting point for many survivors is naming what happened. Several of the people who contributed to this piece have done exactly that. They wrote down what was said, shared it openly, and chose not to carry it in silence. One survivor said: “I wrote a list of the things he said and published them in my book.” In doing so, she shifted those words from something that diminished her into something that documented the truth.

Naming these experiences matters because humiliation relies on silence to maintain its hold. It depends on the belief that it is too personal, too uncomfortable, or too insignificant to speak about. When you name it, you move outside that structure. You are no longer the person defined by what was said. You become the person who can recognise it, place it where it belongs, and decide what holds truth for you.

* Quotes are drawn from survivor experiences shared publicly on the Shadows of Control Facebook and Twitter pages and have been lightly edited for spelling, grammar, or clarity.

The Lasting Voice of the Abuser: Why It Doesn’t End When You Leave

By
Samara Knight
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voice of the abuser

Abuse extends far beyond what someone says to you or how they behave toward you. It embeds itself in what you eventually begin to say to yourself, and it often remains long after the relationship has ended. Throughout the relationship, the abuser works to replace your own thinking with theirs, until their judgements and your self-perception become difficult to distinguish. Many survivors only recognise this once they have left, when the criticism continues but there is no longer anyone there to deliver it except themselves.

It starts during the relationship, at a time when you are still trying to understand what is happening around you, and it develops in a way that is gradual enough to be difficult to identify. By the time many survivors leave, the abuser has already laid the groundwork. The internal framework they created does not disappear when the relationship ends.

How the abuser works their way into your thinking

At the start of the relationship, you rely on your own perspective. When something feels off, you speak up, expecting that your view will matter. The abuser does not respond in the same way. They push against your interpretation, introduce their own version of events, and continue presenting it as the more reasonable account until your sense of certainty begins to shift.

They pay close attention when you explain your thoughts and emotions, then use that insight to interfere with how you process things. They question your reactions and suggest that you misunderstood, and they repeat this dynamic until your trust in your own judgement begins to erode.

This process is described in depth by Don Hennessey, an Irish counsellor and researcher who has spent more than 40 years working in the area of domestic abuse. As Director of the Ireland National Domestic Violence Intervention Agency, he has worked directly with hundreds of women and more than 1,000 male abusers. In his book How He Gets in Her Head: The Mind of the Male Intimate Abuser, Hennessey outlines how the abuser gradually replaces the person’s understanding of events with their own interpretation.

He writes that the abuser “gets inside her thought process and replaces it with his worldview,” altering how she interprets what is happening and how she understands her own responses.

His work centres on male abusers and female victims, but the psychological mechanism he describes applies across different dynamics. Abusers establish control by reshaping how the other person thinks, not only by directing what they do.

When their voice begins to take over

Challenging your perception is only the starting point. What the abuser is ultimately aiming for is to get you to carry out that process yourself, so that you begin questioning your own thinking before you even speak.

This is how the shift unfolds. You start anticipating their reaction to what you are about to say, and you adjust your words accordingly. Then you begin adjusting your thoughts before they even become words. The abuser pays attention to this change. When you begin to use their explanations and their language, they recognise that their influence has taken hold.

Hennessey describes this stage clearly. He explains that the abuser “gets his voice into her head and monitors it when she begins to speak with it,” illustrating how control moves from something imposed externally to something that operates within your own mind.

When their criticism becomes your self-view

Once that voice is established internally, the next stage is what it does to your sense of self. The abuser has spent the relationship positioning you as the problem, framing your reactions as unreasonable and their behaviour as justified, and repeating that narrative often enough that you begin to accept it. You stop waiting for them to criticise you. You begin doing it yourself.

At this point, the abuser no longer needs to defend their behaviour, because you have taken on that role. You look for explanations that place responsibility on yourself, and those explanations start to feel more accurate than any other way of understanding the situation.

One survivor described how this process took hold:

“I used to think it was my fault. That maybe when he told me I was grandiose that he was right. That I needed to communicate better.”

Hennessey explains that the abuser recognises this as progress, when the person begins “using his explanations and his language to minimise or ignore the effects of his behaviour.” At that stage, their perspective has been fully internalised.

Another survivor described how complete that internalisation can become:

“Often, she was merely echoing the worst things I used to say to myself. I could not usually offer any counter-argument because I already believed these things, that I was a failure, that being with me was a burden, that she could easily find someone better.”

One survivor explained how this internal voice continues long after leaving:

“We completely rely on them too. Put all our trust in them assuming they know best, while we make ourselves smaller, constantly wondering what is wrong with us. I became a mess because the real me kept fighting from deep within. At least now he’s just a ‘weaker’ voice in my head.”

Another described the same experience years later:

“The constant, low-level criticism is still a voice in my head, six years later. It sticks because he continued where my mother left off.”

This is how internalisation settles in. The criticism continues without the abuser needing to say anything.

How you begin to regulate yourself

Once the abuser’s voice is operating internally, it starts to shape your behaviour. You run decisions through what they would think before you have even made them. You anticipate their reaction and adjust accordingly, not because they are present, but because the pattern has become so established that your mind continues to follow it automatically.

Hennessey describes how each thought begins to pass through this internal check, with the person asking themselves what the abuser would think before acting. What began as a way of managing the relationship becomes a default way of functioning that continues long after it has ended.

Survivors often recognise this most clearly in everyday moments. One survivor described how these rules remained in place even when there was no one left to enforce them:

“I only knew who I was with him. I could do whatever I wanted, but still abided by his rules even when I didn’t have to. I still revert to this whenever I am emotionally vulnerable.”

Another described how this appears in ordinary behaviours, even decades later:

“It’s been 20 years since I got out, and I still find myself folding the chip bags his way, and driving his way.”

These details highlight something important. The behaviours that once reduced conflict became so ingrained that they no longer felt like adaptations. They started to feel like the natural way of doing things. This shows how deeply the abuser’s expectations can take hold.

Why it carries on after the relationship ends

Many survivors describe a specific kind of disorientation. The relationship is over, the person is gone, and yet the internal experience continues as though nothing has changed. The doubt remains. The hesitation before decisions remains. The sense that criticism is coming, even when it is not, remains.

This is confusing because there is nothing external to point to. The abuser altered how you think, replacing your internal reference point with theirs, and that structure does not dissolve simply because they are no longer present.

Hennessey describes this as a form of psychological invasion, where the person loses the ability to trust their own thoughts and begins relying on the abuser’s perspective instead, a perspective that continues operating long after the relationship has ended.

Reclaiming your own voice

Recovery begins with recognising that this internal voice was learned. You start to notice the patterns, the doubt that appears when you begin to trust yourself, the criticism that follows a decision that felt right to you. These thoughts follow the same logic the abuser used, and recognising that is what begins to weaken their hold.

That awareness creates distance. You begin to see that these thoughts were shaped by someone else’s influence, even though they now feel like your own. You start to examine them against your own understanding of what is true, your own values, your own experience, instead of filtering them through the abuser’s perspective. Their voice may still appear, but you begin to recognise it rather than accept it, and as that recognition grows, your own voice becomes clearer.

Hennessey describes what becomes possible when this process begins. “She can gradually restore her ability to examine these thoughts and ideas against her own criteria and value system. She can allow the voice of her instincts, quietened for so long by her abuser, to be heard again inside her head.”

For many survivors, that is exactly how it feels, a gradual return to yourself, one small moment at a time.

How Abusers Use Your Empathy to Keep You Silent: 8 Common Tactics

By
Samara Knight
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abusers exploit empathy

Empathy is a beautiful quality and is always seen as a strength in relationships. The ability to understand another person’s feelings, to care about their struggles, and to respond with compassion is what allows trust and closeness to grow between people. Healthy relationships rely on this capacity. Yet in abusive relationships, the same quality can be used against you and turned into something that keeps you trapped.

Many survivors are thoughtful and reflective people who genuinely want to understand what their partner is experiencing and why they behave in harmful ways. You may care deeply about fairness and about how your partner feels. You may worry about how they seemed to have changed since when you first met and hope that if you understand them better the relationship can improve. These instincts normally reflect emotional maturity and care for others. In abusive dynamics, however, empathy is often manipulated. Instead of being met with shared care, it becomes something the abusive partner learns to use as a form of influence and control.

Your compassion can slowly become the reason you stay silent, explain away behaviour that harms you, and continue protecting someone who is hurting you. Learning how this process unfolds can help bring clarity to experiences that once felt confusing.

1. Presenting Abuse as the Result of Their Suffering

A common tactic involves presenting abusive behaviour as the result of personal suffering. The abusive partner may speak at length about childhood trauma, painful past relationships, work pressure, or emotional hardship. They may describe themselves as someone who has been deeply wounded by life.

Experiences of pain do not automatically lead someone to harm others, and most people who have endured hardship do not go on to abuse their partners. Yet when this narrative is repeatedly introduced, attention shifts away from the behaviour that caused harm and toward the suffering they claim to carry.

If you are an empathetic person, you may begin to feel that challenging their behaviour would be insensitive or unfair. Your focus moves toward protecting their feelings. You hold back your own reactions because you do not want to add to the distress they say they are experiencing. In this way empathy becomes something that restrains your voice.

2. Treating Your Concerns as Personal Attacks

When you try to talk about a way in which they hurt you, the abusive partner may react as though your words are deeply wounding. They might say you are attacking them, that you are being unfair, or that you have no understanding of what they are going through. At times they appear devastated, overwhelmed, or emotionally fragile in response to even mild concerns.

This response makes it difficult to continue the conversation. Instead of feeling entitled to speak about the behaviour that affected you, you begin to feel uneasy about raising the issue at all.

The original problem fades into the background. The focus turns to whether you have been too harsh or too demanding. Your empathy encourages you to soften what you say, apologise, or withdraw the concern completely.

3. Playing the Victim

Another pattern involves reversing the roles and playing the victim. After behaviour that harms you, the abusive partner may reshape the situation so that they appear to be the one who has been mistreated. Attention moves toward your tone, your reaction, or the fact that you raised the issue in the first place. The conversation soon centres on how unfairly they feel they have been treated.

For someone who cares deeply about fairness and emotional impact, this experience can feel disorienting. You begin to question whether you have been unreasonable. Instead of asking why the behaviour occurred, you may find yourself trying to repair the emotional injury they claim to have experienced.

4. Using Vulnerability to Avoid Accountability

At times the abusive partner may share moments of vulnerability that feel sincere and personal. They may talk about fears, insecurities, or feelings of worthlessness. These conversations can feel intimate and meaningful, and they may strengthen your belief that beneath the harmful behaviour there is a fragile person who needs support and understanding.

Vulnerability can also be used strategically. When every attempt to discuss the abuse turns into a conversation about their struggles, their fears, or their emotional wounds, accountability gradually disappears from the relationship. Your role begins to shift. Instead of standing as an equal partner, you become the person responsible for stabilising their emotions and protecting their sense of security.

5. Appealing to Loyalty and Commitment

Abusive partners often emphasise loyalty within the relationship. Disagreements may be framed as betrayal or abandonment. If you consider speaking to someone else about what is happening, they may accuse you of being disloyal or unforgiving. Attempts to leave the relationship may be presented as proof that you lack commitment.

If you are a person who values loyalty and responsibility within relationships, this creates powerful pressure. You may begin to believe that remaining silent is part of being supportive. You may fear that speaking openly about the abuse would make you appear disloyal or unfair.

Your empathy for their difficulties becomes connected to the belief that you should endure whatever happens in order to prove your commitment.

6. Focusing on Their Intentions Instead of the Harm

Another way empathy is manipulated involves shifting attention toward intention instead of impact. The abusive partner may acknowledge that something they did upset you, yet quickly explain that they did not mean it that way. They might insist that their intentions were positive or that the situation was misunderstood.

If you care deeply about understanding people’s motivations, this explanation can carry considerable influence. Your attention begins to move toward what they intended or what they say they meant rather than the behaviour that occurred.

Gradually the harm becomes easier to overlook. You reassure yourself that they did not intend to hurt you, even when the same behaviour continues.

7. Suggesting That Others Would Judge Them Harshly

When victims consider reaching out for help, abusive partners may appeal to empathy by emphasising the consequences they might face. They may warn that outsiders would misunderstand the situation or judge them unfairly. They might say that revealing the problems in the relationship would damage their reputation, their career, or their mental health.

For empathetic individuals this creates a heavy emotional burden. You may feel responsible for protecting them from the consequences of their own behaviour. You may still care deeply about them and feel distressed at the thought of them experiencing serious repercussions.

As a result, you keep the situation private. You avoid seeking support because you do not want to be the person who causes harm to their life. Their potential suffering becomes the centre of attention while your own distress receives less space.

8. Reinforcing Silence With Moments of Warmth

One of the most powerful reinforcements occurs when silence is followed by warmth or connection. After you decide not to challenge them, the relationship may suddenly feel calm again. Tension lifts and the abusive partner may become affectionate, attentive, or appreciative of your understanding.

These moments create relief. Your mind begins to associate silence with peace and emotional safety. Speaking up becomes linked with conflict, guilt, and distress.

Gradually this pattern trains you to believe that protecting their feelings is the safest course of action.

When Empathy Becomes a Trap

Empathy itself is not a weakness. It allows people to build meaningful connections and respond to others with care and humanity. Yet empathy also requires balance within a relationship.

In abusive dynamics that balance disappears. One person’s empathy becomes the mechanism that allows the other to avoid responsibility while harmful behaviour continues.

Many survivors later recognise that the compassion they consistently extended to their partner was seldom offered back to them in the same way.

Seeing this pattern can bring clarity. It allows you to recognise that your empathy was never the problem. The difficulty arose because it existed within a relationship where accountability and mutual care were absent.

Compassion should never require you to accept harm or silence your own experience. A relationship that depends on your silence in order to continue is sustained by control rather than by genuine empathy.

How Abusers Use Loyalty Tests to Make You Prove Your Devotion

By
Samara Knight
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loyalty tests

Loyalty tests are a common feature of coercive and controlling relationships. They often appear as real or hypothetical questions that place you in a position where you feel you have to choose between your partner and someone or something else that matters to you.

At the time, the situation may feel uncomfortable or confusing, and it can seem as though your partner is simply looking for reassurance, connection, or emotional closeness. In an abusive relationship, however, the purpose is different. These moments are used to measure how much control they have over you and how willing you are to place them above everything else in your life. Each test carries the same underlying question:

Will you choose me, even when it costs you something important?

“Who Would You Save – Me or the Baby?”

Award winning novelist and Substack writer Ros Barber has spoken openly and candidly about her experience of domestic abuse. In one of her notes, she shares an experience that captures the true nature of an abuser’s loyalty test. While she was breastfeeding their newborn baby, her partner asked who she would save if there were a fire and she could only choose one of them. She answered instinctively that she would save their baby, who was tiny and completely dependent on her.

The result was weeks of his silence and withdrawal, a form of punishment driven by the expectation that he should hold the central place in her world.

Loyalty tests are not only driven by insecurity or jealousy, although those feelings are often present. They reflect a particular way of thinking about relationships, organised around control, entitlement, and the expectation of emotional priority, rather than mutual care.

How Loyalty Is Defined in the Abusive Mindset

In a healthy relationship, loyalty is built through trust, reliability, and emotional safety. Both partners understand that each person has their own life, their own responsibilities, and their own relationships outside the partnership. Choosing your child, your work, your family, or your wellbeing is seen as normal and reasonable. It does not threaten the relationship because the connection is not based on ownership.

In the abusive mindset, loyalty is defined very differently. Loyalty means priority, and priority means being placed above everyone and everything else. The abusive partner expects to be the central focus of your emotional world, and any shift in attention or energy can feel threatening to them. They don’t view your independence as healthy autonomy but as growing distance. They perceive outside relationships as competition rather than support and community. Your separate needs, preferences, or commitments are interpreted as signs that their control is weakening.

This way of thinking is often rigid and black and white. Situations are framed as a choice between loyalty to them and loyalty to someone or something else, rather than recognising that multiple relationships and responsibilities can coexist. Choosing your child is seen as choosing against them. Spending time with family is interpreted as caring more about them. Pursuing your work, your friendships, or your own interests becomes evidence that they are no longer your priority.

This is why situations that would seem ordinary in most relationships can trigger strong reactions in controlling ones. When you make a decision that does not centre them, they do not simply see a practical choice. They see a message about where they stand. Loyalty tests are a way of forcing that message into the open so they can assess whether you still belong within their sphere of control.

Within this mindset, each test becomes a checkpoint in the relationship, and a way of confirming that your priorities continue to revolve around them. If your response reinforces their sense of control, the relationship temporarily settles. If your response suggests independence, the abuser works to pull you back into line through anger, withdrawal, guilt, or intimidation.

These reactions teach you that choosing yourself, or choosing anything outside the relationship, comes at a cost. Eventually, you begin to anticipate the consequences and adjust your behaviour in order to keep the peace and avoid the emotional fallout.  

When a Question Isn’t Just a Question

Loyalty tests often appear as emotional questions, hypothetical scenarios, or difficult dilemmas where you are asked to demonstrate your commitment. They may sound casual, joking, or just theoretical at first, but the situation quietly places you in a position where your priorities are being measured.

The surface issue might involve family, friends, work, opportunities, or even your children. But the deeper question is always about how far you will you go to put them first and how much of your own life you are willing to give up for them.

One example of this dynamic appeared in my own marriage during what initially felt like a light, almost playful conversation. My husband had been reading an article about Elon Musk’s plans to build a self-sustaining city on Mars. Smiling, he asked me whether I would go with him if he were selected, or whether I would stay on Earth. The way he asked it made the situation feel like a joke about a distant and unlikely future, so I laughed and said, “Earth of course. I’m quite happy here, thank you.”

The smile disappeared from his face almost immediately. What had felt like a casual moment shifted into something tense and serious. His mood changed abruptly, and he began insulting me, telling me how “forward thinking” he was and how “behind” and boring I was, that I never wanted to try new things and that I didn’t care about him. He then said that if I wouldn’t go with him, he would simply take our child and go without me.

The conversation was no longer about a far-off planet or an imaginary scenario. It had become a test of whether I would abandon everything familiar, stable, and meaningful in my life in order to follow him.

There was a clear contradiction in this expectation. The future he was describing involved him leaving his life, his family, and our relationship in pursuit of his own ambitions, yet my reluctance to abandon my world in order to follow him was treated as selfishness and disloyalty.

This is typical of the double standards in abusive relationships. They see their freedom to pursue their own desires as natural and justified, while your independence is framed as being selfish, uncaring, and evidence that you don’t prioritise the relationship.

When the Threat is Your Child

Ros Barber’s example highlights another pattern that many survivors recognise, which is the way an abusive partner may experience a child as a threat. The arrival of a baby fundamentally changes the emotional landscape of a relationship. Time, attention, and emotional energy are now directed toward a vulnerable human being whose needs are immediate, constant, and cannot be postponed or negotiated.

For a partner who expects to remain the central focus at all times, this shift can feel like they are losing their place. The child is not simply seen as a new family member, but as a rival for attention, care, and emotional priority. This helps to explain why abuse often escalates during pregnancy and in the early months after a baby is born. The increased demands on the mother, combined with her reduced availability to meet the partner’s emotional needs, can intensify their sense that control is slipping.

Loyalty tests that involve choosing between a partner and a child are an extreme expression of this dynamic. They go beyond jealousy or insecurity. They reflect an underlying expectation that they should come first, even over the safety, vulnerability, and basic needs of a dependent child. In this mindset, any shift in attention away from them is experienced as rejection, and the purpose of the test is to reassert their position at the centre, even when the alternative is unreasonable, unsafe, or harmful.

How Loyalty Tests Narrow Your World

What makes loyalty tests so effective within abusive dynamics is that they are framed in emotional terms that make resistance feel unkind or disloyal. They may say that they simply want to feel important to you, that they are afraid of losing you, or that your choices make them feel pushed aside. When your decisions are described as hurtful, selfish, or evidence that you do not care enough, the focus shifts away from whether the situation is reasonable and onto your responsibility to protect their feelings.

You begin to feel that maintaining peace in the relationship requires you to limit your independence, your relationships, or your opportunities. Decisions that would once have felt normal begin to feel risky. Seeing friends, spending time with family, or pursuing your own interests can start to feel like something that needs to be explained, negotiated, or justified in advance.

This is how loyalty tests gradually reshape the boundaries of your life. Each incident reinforces the idea that stability depends on minimising anything that exists outside the relationship. Slowly, without any explicit rule being stated, your world becomes smaller. External connections, interests, and sources of support begin to fall away, leaving the relationship at the centre of your emotional and practical decision making.

Small Tests That Become a System of Control

Loyalty tests often appear early in coercive dynamics and tend to continue throughout the relationship in different forms. Each one marks a point where your autonomy is challenged and where the boundaries of control are quietly pushed further. These moments accumulate, expanding the expectation that your choices, priorities, and emotional energy should increasingly revolve around your partner.

When someone repeatedly places you in situations where you are expected to choose between them and your child, your family, your friends, your work, or your own wellbeing, the issue is not insecurity or a simple need for reassurance. It reflects a mindset in which your independence is experienced as a threat, and your loyalty is judged by how much of yourself you are willing to give up in order to maintain the relationship.

Healthy relationships allow space for multiple sources of meaning, connection, and responsibility. Abusive relationships move in the opposite direction. They depend on your world becoming smaller, quieter, and increasingly centred around your partner’s needs, emotions, and expectations.

When loyalty is demanded through tests, emotional pressure, or punishment, what is being measured is not love, but compliance. When someone repeatedly asks you to choose them over your wellbeing, your support system, or your reality, the question is no longer about loyalty. It is about control.

Special thanks to Ros Barbar for allowing me to share her experience as part of this article. You can find her Substack page here.

Emotional Withholding: When Affection Becomes a Tool of Control

By
Samara Knight
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emotional withholding

Abusive partners rely on many strategies to maintain power, and emotional withholding is one of the most harmful. It involves deliberately pulling back warmth, closeness, and emotional connection so that the other person becomes unsettled, compliant, and focused on repairing the relationship. The abuser controls when connection is offered and when it is removed, and access to that connection depends on whether their partner is meeting their expectations.

Emotional withholding usually follows a specific trigger, such as a boundary you set, a disagreement, or a moment when you did not go along with what they wanted. Their response is usually immediate, and they give no explanation for the sudden emotional shift. That silence is intentional. The distance leaves you trying to make sense of what happened, and most people fill that gap by assuming they must have done something wrong.

How Emotional Withholding Operates

Warmth and connection are basic emotional needs, and emotional withholding works because it targets something fundamental. Most people want to feel loved, secure, and emotionally close to their partner, and the sudden removal of that connection creates a powerful sense of loss.

The impact is even stronger when you already carry a fear of abandonment. When the possibility of someone pulling away feels threatening, repeated withdrawal of affection can feel overwhelming, and you may find yourself doing whatever you can to bring the closeness back.

Some of the ways emotional withholding shows up in everyday life include:

  • Physical affection stops after you question something, hold a boundary, or do not comply with a demand
  • Attempts to ask what is wrong or to seek reassurance are ignored or dismissed, leaving your emotional needs feeling unreasonable
  • Your partner appears warm, friendly, and engaged with other people while remaining distant and cold with you, making you doubt your own perception
  • Warmth returns once you apologise, back down, or give in, reinforcing the idea that connection depends on your behaviour
  • Emotional or physical intimacy becomes conditional, something that is offered as approval and removed as a consequence

The unpredictability is part of how emotional withholding works. When warmth returns without warning, it creates a strong pull back toward the person who caused the distress. Small moments of connection feel intensely meaningful after periods of distance, and this cycle gradually creates an emotional dependency that can be very difficult to break.

Why Emotional Withholding Creates Control

One of the immediate effects of emotional withholding is that you begin trying harder. You replay conversations, search for mistakes, and look for ways to fix the situation, even when there is nothing to fix. Because no explanation is offered, you are left adjusting yourself around a problem that was never clearly defined and was never yours to solve.

This response serves the abuser’s needs. When your energy is focused on restoring closeness and managing their mood, you are less likely to step back and question what is happening in the relationship. Gradually, your sense of what is normal begins to shift. You may start shaping your behaviour around avoiding tension, preventing conflict, and holding back your own needs, because losing warmth feels too costly.

The longer this continues, the more it affects your sense of self. When warmth appears only when you comply rather than as a genuine expression of care, the message about your value becomes difficult to ignore. Emotional withholding is used deliberately to weaken confidence and replace it with anxiety and self-doubt. As your confidence reduces, your dependence on the relationship increases, and that dependence strengthens the control the abuser is trying to establish.

When Emotional Withholding Extends Further

For some abusers, emotional withholding also includes sexual withdrawal. Refusing physical intimacy becomes another way to express disapproval and to signal that a partner has fallen short. This can be deeply damaging because it affects how wanted and desirable you feel, and it often creates a level of rejection that people find difficult to talk about, even with those they trust.

Emotional withholding is often part of a wider pattern of control that may include financial restriction, isolation from friends and family, criticism, or humiliation. The emotional dependency created by the withdrawal of warmth becomes one element in a broader system that limits independence and strengthens the abuser’s influence. In some relationships it is used alongside many other tactics, while in others emotional withholding becomes the primary way control is maintained, and its impact can be just as severe.

Emotional Shutdown in Survivors Is Different

It is important to understand that emotional withholding as a tactic is very different from the emotional shutdown many victims experience while living in an abusive environment. Emotional withholding is used intentionally to influence and control another person. Emotional shutdown, by contrast, is a protective response.

When you have been living with ongoing tension, criticism, fear, or emotional harm, your nervous system may begin to protect you by numbing your emotional responses. You might feel detached, flat, or unable to access warmth in the way you once did. This is not a personality flaw and it is not something you are doing to punish your partner. It is your mind and body adapting to a situation that has become too painful to fully experience. Many survivors carry guilt about becoming distant or emotionally closed, without recognising that this response developed as a way of coping with prolonged stress.

Emotional withholding and emotional shutdown come from very different places. One is a deliberate strategy used to maintain power. The other is a survival response that develops under sustained pressure.

Recognising Emotional Withholding

One of the reasons emotional withholding can be difficult to identify is that it leaves no visible marks and does not match common images of abuse. The absence of warmth can be explained away as stress, tiredness, or mood. Even so, the impact is real, and the intention behind the pattern matters. When affection is used to influence your behaviour and closeness is given or removed to keep you emotionally dependent, emotional withholding is functioning as abuse.

Many survivors describe a turning point when they began to recognise the pattern clearly. The distance was not caused by their shortcomings and it was not a reflection of their worth. Emotional withholding followed a purpose, and once that became visible, it became possible to step back from the story the relationship had created about who they were. That understanding, difficult as it is to reach, often marks the beginning of recovery.

The Art of Boundaries: Building the Structure You Need to Thrive

By
Rayann Gordon
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boundaries after abuse

I’m delighted to share this guest piece by Rayann Gordon on the art of rebuilding boundaries after abuse. Rayann is currently completing an MSc in Psychology of Coercive Control at the University of Salford and researches the mental health needs of cult survivors at the University of Victoria. Alongside her academic work, she supports people recovering from spiritual abuse and coercive dynamics. You can find her writing on Substack at Chest Full of Stars.

Boundaries are part of the soil that you grow within. A person who is trying to subjugate you will systematically undermine most or all of your boundaries in an attempt to change who you are entirely. People experiencing coercive control find it difficult or unsafe to articulate boundaries out loud or even to themselves, which is a completely natural response to the mistreatment they are experiencing. 

The good news though, is that boundaries can come back online, and rather than being exhausting defenses that you have to hold up, become the very organic structures that guide and shape your new life. 

I consider boundaries to be a living art form.If you imagine them visually as protective structures around you, what would they look like? They could be made of clay, ice, or water; they can shift in texture and quality depending on what you need. A metal wall of a boundary might serve you powerfully in one situation, while a cobweb (delicate, visible, and purposeful) may be all that’s required in another. 

You are the artist here, and boundaries are the structures you choose for your life and spirit to thrive. You get to create them and update them as your life unfolds, honoring the situations that arise in your life as well as the needs you have now. After abuse, boundaries are essential for healing. In an ongoing way, they are essential for healthy, reciprocal relationships.

Below is a practice for creating a new boundary system. For those living in abusive relationships, this practice is intended for people who are not in immediate danger. You may need to leave before you can do this practice fully and safely. 

Part 1: Identifying the NOs

Make sure you are in a safe space. 

While journaling or on a contemplative walk, ask yourself: what are truly NOs for me now? 

Write down the answers and be specific. Make a list. 

Don’t worry if it is clunky at first, it’s like picking up a pen to draw when you haven’t had the opportunity to draw for years. Perhaps you only get one or two that come to mind. That is no problem. There is no magic number of boundaries and even articulating one clearly is life changing. Also, once you open the door, more will come and they will be specific to you.

For example, when I left my abusive guru, one of my NOs was “I won’t let any man teach me spiritual embodiment practices” To this day, male spiritual teachers teaching women how to be in their bodies is simply a NO for me. 

Once you have your list of boundaries, put it somewhere visible where you are going to see it several times a day, like your fridge or near your computer. Just as you were constantly reminded of the old boundary system in the abusive relationship you were in (who is allowed to have boundaries and who is not), you may need to actively remind yourself of this new one for a while. See how it feels to rest your eyes on these boundaries and read them. 

After a week or two, check in: do any need adjusting, refining, or releasing? Is each one something that excites you, calms you, or fortifies you? Are they things that feel far away, but pique your curiosity? 

These boundaries are YOURS. Craft them with care as they become part of the template for the new life you are building. 

Part 2: Embodying the NOs Ritual 

There is a magic to speaking things aloud that I can’t quite explain, except that it changes things, especially when speaking with intention and in connection to your body or your heart. 

When you look at the boundary list and it feels right to you, not imposed on you, but really right for you at this moment in time, it’s a good time to ritually embody it. 

If you have a spiritual practice you can call upon the benevolent beings who you consider supportive to be witnesses here – perhaps a deity, loving ancestors, the tree in your garden that you visited through hard times. You can create a sacred space with a candle or any other set up that feels right to you to acknowledge that you are marking an occasion and inner and outer change is happening now. 

If none of that appeals to you, you can also just practice speaking them aloud. Make sure you have a good 20+ minutes undisturbed though so you can take the time to feel your boundaries being brought further to life. 

As you read the list aloud, listen to the power of your own voice. Shaky or not, giving your boundaries voice is powerful. 

You can sense or imagine the words moving through your body then rippling outward into the space around you like sound waves or light. 

Repeat as many times as you need to and stop when you feel something has changed. 

If you are working with a tree, ancestor, deity, or guide, thank them for witnessing you. 

Then see how it goes over the next few weeks in your life. Do any of them need tweaking? Both parts of this practice can be repeated any time you feel you need an upgrade. 

Once your NOs are established and embodied to protect your space, you can make clearer choices about the seeds that you want to grow in that space. 

The same ritual you did for NOs can be repeated to identify and embody your YESes.

I personally spent months with my NOs before I felt ready for the YESes, it may have even been years! You might be ready sooner or you might need more time. 

Part 3: Identify true YESes

While journalling or on a contemplative walk, ask yourself: What kinds of relationships do I want in my life now? What are my YESes? 

See what comes and notice how each word feels. Write them down. Don’t worry if they sound simple or very specific to you or if you only have two or 122. 

An example of one of mine that emerged was a big huge YES to reciprocal relationships. That doesn’t mean that to be my friend you have to send me 3 emails if I send you 3 emails. But it means that there is a sense of balance that I now hold as sacred in all my relationships. This couldn’t exist when I was working for an abusive spiritual teacher.

Again, keep this list of YES somewhere visible and tweak the language until when you read it yourself you feel really good about each and every YES on the list.

Part 4: Embodying the YESes ritual 

Again, If you have a spiritual practice you can call upon the benevolent beings who you consider supportive to be witnesses here – perhaps a deity, loving ancestors, a favorite tree. You can create a sacred space with a candle or any other set up that feels right to you to acknowledge that you are marking an occasion and inner and outer change is happening now. 

You can also just speak them aloud. Listen to the power of your own voice. 

Sense or imagine the words moving through your body then rippling outward into the space around you like sound waves or light. This is the new life you are creating. You are laying the ground for it right now. 

Repeat as many times as you need to and stop when you feel something has changed. 

Find a way to close by offering thanks, blowing out your candle, or maybe have a little dance party for yourself. You have just planted the seeds of the life you are willing to grow into good, healthy soil. 

An example of these practices in action

A friend of a friend contacted me to ask if I could hook her up with a place to stay in another country so she could go to see the spiritual teacher who she is obviously starry eyed over. While I’m not opposed to spiritual practice or teachers, I declined, because it didn’t feel right, and I didn’t know her well enough to have her stay with my friends. 

She pushed harder, increasing the intensity of the ask, including my partner on the emails, and leaving long voice messages repeating her ask. 

She had stepped over my initial NO. 

I decided I had enough flexibility in my system to make my NO clearer for her. I explained that my friends in that country had experienced spiritual abuse, and sending someone I didn’t know well to their doorstep to support her relationship with her new (and controversial) guru, wasn’t kind or appropriate and I wasn’t going to do it. 

She ignored the second NO and explanation, and asked again, also sending a separate additional email to my husband as though he might cave.

At that point, I decided not to respond, and that if she and I ever say more than hello to each other at a party, I will need to name the impact of her behavior, which was feeling disrespected. I left it there for now, and thanked my system for bringing the boundary to my attention clearly without any guilt or obligation.

The boundary rose when it was needed, as though popping out of the ocean like a whale, then it receded. Boundaries are magic this way, with practice they become more immediate, coming up to do the work of protecting our spaces and making our values clear just when they are required. 

What came forward for me was rooted in this practice. The clear NO to manipulation that I discovered and embodied, which was eventually followed by a year of contemplating and seeding my full body YES to reciprocal relationships. 

Both came online easily with this acquaintance, for a relatively painless response to what years ago would have been a very confusing and sticky situation. 

I hope that this practice is beneficial for you and would love to hear how it goes.

False Accusations and Control: How Abuse Turns Innocence Into Guilt

By
Kimberley P
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false accusations

Accusations, especially those that are false or unfounded, are a hallmark of an abusive relationship. That’s mostly because hurling accusations at a partner allows an abusive person to easily shift blame or insecurity from themselves onto their partner. What’s more, it keeps the abuser in a position of power and control. Being accused of something you didn’t do can be confusing and destabilizing, and it’s this confusion that can make it so difficult to get free from an abusive relationship. 

Abusers will accuse their partners of just about anything, like accusing you of being the abusive one, accusing you of mistreating them, or even accusing you of doing exactly what it is they’re doing (a tactic called projection). But one of the most insidious and enduring types of accusation in abusive relationships occurs when an intimate partner accuses you of supposed infidelity. Here’s what that looked like in my own marriage. 

When Innocence Becomes Suspicion

The first time my ex-husband accused me of flirting with another guy, I was blindsided. We were visiting my parents, and my younger brother dropped by with his friend. I hadn’t been back to my hometown in years, and I enjoyed catching up with the guys, asking about old friends, finding out who was still in town and who had moved away, etc. I engaged in a light-hearted and animated conversation with my brother’s friend, and that was the end of it. 

Later, when we were alone, my husband exploded with rage, screaming at me and accusing me of flirting with my brother’s friend. I begged, pleaded, and placated, insisting I was innocent and that I didn’t see him that way at all, I had just been excited to catch up with old friends. But my husband was adamant, absolutely convinced he was right and I was denying it. 

After the fight died down, I did a ton of self-reflection. Was I a flirt? Did I have bad intentions? Had I done something wrong? I didn’t realize it at the time, but this would be the first of many, many times I asked myself those questions. 

When Accusations Escalate

Over the years, the accusations got worse. Way worse. And oftentimes, they were about things that were sexual in nature. Some were subtle, others not so much. I quickly became a shell of my former self, always wondering when he’d perceived I’d stepped out of line. He’d accuse me of standing too close to his brother, checking out guys everywhere (places like church or restaurants were prime targets for these types of accusations), wearing particular clothes so guys would check me out, buying matching underwear because I had “intentions,” and even standing in our master bathroom with my pants down waiting for a friend of his whom he had invited over for dinner.

When we started having children, he questioned whether they were his or not, and casually mentioned paternity testing for each. I’m often asked why I continued having kids with him, when this intensely abusive dynamic was occurring. I’m not sure I have a clear answer, except that this is exactly what makes abuse so insidious. It happens slowly and grows over time, like a cancer you don’t realize you have. 

Yes, I knew my friends’ relationships didn’t look quite like mine, but I still told myself that it was something I was doing wrong that was causing this. Inside, I felt dirty and worthless, and figured I must have a lust for infidelity that only my husband was detecting. 

Yes, I truly thought this. That’s how powerful gaslighting can be. 

The Long-Term Impact of False Accusations

I started changing myself to avoid these situations. I would steer clear of men in social situations, like my brother-in-law or my friends’ husbands. I would examine the menu or the tabletop in restaurants, fearful that my husband would otherwise detect my “wandering eyes.” I would avoid wearing clothing he might not approve of, particularly things that bordered on “too revealing,” despite being a very modest dresser overall. 

In an article titled, “The Psychological Effects of False Accusations in a Relationship,” Douglas Thiel lists the following long-term impacts of being falsely accused of wrongdoing by an intimate partner. These mirror the behaviors I noticed in myself as I stopped trying to defend and started trying to disappear in order to avoid conflict.

People in these situations often start to:

  • Feel anxious just existing in public
  • Second-guess normal behavior
  • Feel shame about their body or sexuality
  • Lose confidence and independence
  • Feel isolated or “crazy”

If you’re reading this and recognizing yourself in it, I want you to know something I didn’t know then: being repeatedly accused of wrongdoing by your partner does not mean you’re doing something wrong. It means someone is trying to control you through confusion and shame, especially when the accusations are sexual in nature. Healthy relationships are not built on constant suspicion or fear. You deserve trust, autonomy, and the freedom to exist without feeling like your very presence is an offense.

10 Things Abusers Do When They Feel They Are Losing Control

By
Samara Knight
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how abusers maintain control

Abusive behaviour grows out of a mindset that treats another person as territory rather than as an equal. Control becomes the organising principle, and the abuser shapes their actions around keeping that control intact.

Abusers use kindness, anger, silence, promises, and threats as tools to keep you compliant, available, and easier to manage. The methods may change from day to day, but the goal underneath remains steady and deliberate.

When you begin to question the relationship, set boundaries, or build a stronger life of your own, the abuser usually intensifies their drive to control you. They shift their behaviour quickly, as though an internal alarm has sounded that you are becoming harder to direct. They work to pull you back into the old position where your choices revolve around them.

What follows are ten common patterns that emerge when an abuser senses they are losing their grip.

1. Sudden bursts of affection

When an abuser starts feeling insecure, their behaviour can change quickly and predictably. They become more attentive, more interested in your day, and more present in ways you have not seen for a long time. They may buy gifts, offer compliments, and talk about how special your bond is or how, together, you have something no one else does.

It is common for them to suggest ways to solidify the relationship, such as having a child, renewing vows, moving house together, or making another big commitment that ties your lives more tightly.

The affection can feel like proof that things are finally changing. Yet nothing real has been repaired. The abuser is using romance and attentiveness to steady their fear of losing influence, and to pull you back emotionally so the relationship can return to its familiar shape.

2. Escalating jealousy

Abusers feel threatened when your world gets bigger than them. If you start socialising more, taking classes, or simply needing them less, they experience that independence as a loss of control. Jealousy is one of the first signs that they are afraid.

They may begin questioning you more about where you are and who you are with. A coffee with a colleague can turn into a long debrief. A missed call can lead them to demand an explanation. Ordinary parts of your day suddenly require permission or proof.

The tone is usually wrapped in concern with phrases like “I just worry about you,” or “I do not trust other people around you.” Yet the real purpose is to slow any movement away from them. Questions can quickly turn into monitoring your movements, checking your phone, or timing your journeys. The abuser redraws the boundaries of your life around their insecurity.

3. Rage that appears suddenly

Control can feel fragile to an abuser, and they respond with anger when that fragility shows. A small, ordinary moment, a comment about dinner, a change of plans, a question about money, can trigger shouting or intimidation that seems wildly out of proportion. You can be left confused and searching for what you did to cause it, even when nothing justifies the reaction.

They may shout, slam doors, or use their body to intimidate the space around you. The rage does not need to be physical to control you. Even a raised voice or a furious stare can freeze a room. You learn to measure every word, trying to avoid the next explosion.

4. Playing the victim

If you challenge an abuser’s behaviour, they may respond by flipping the narrative. They shift attention away from what they have done and begin talking about how hard life is for them and how unfairly they are treated. Your experience quietly disappears from the room because they redirect the spotlight onto their pain.

You may hear statements such as “after everything I do for you, this is how you treat me,” or “you are breaking my heart.” They use this vulnerability to pull on your compassion. Many people end up apologising for setting limits, as though the boundary itself was an act of cruelty.

5. Recruiting allies

When abusers feel their control slipping, they often solidify their position by pulling other people onto their side. They speak to friends, relatives, or professionals in a way that makes them look calm and reasonable while suggesting you are unstable, confused, or difficult. This is a strategy to rebuild authority through witnesses.

They recruit allies because outside voices can do what they can no longer manage alone. If others begin to doubt you, your confidence weakens and the abuser’s version of reality grows stronger. You can find yourself defending events you actually lived through, while the abuser stands beside a chorus of people who now see you through their narrative.

As people repeat the doubts the abuser planted, you may start to question your own memory and judgement. Isolation grows without anyone needing to announce it. By reshaping how others see you, the abuser restores control without ever having to confront you directly.

6. Intensifying criticism

When they sense you growing stronger, abusers increase the flow of negative comments. They target your body, your parenting, your intelligence, or your competence until the remarks become part of daily life. The aim is to knock you down a few rungs so you lose confidence in your own footing.

You might hear phrases like “nobody else would put up with you,” or “you are useless with money, leave it to me.” They use criticism to erode your confidence and narrow your sense of what you deserve. Gradually you begin to see yourself through their lens instead of your own.

7. Creating emergencies

Abusers often experience your growing independence as abandonment, rejection, or disloyalty. When you make plans for yourself, they read it as a sign you are pulling away rather than simply living your life. That feeling quickly turns into action.

They manufacture crises at the exact moment you move toward something for yourself. Sudden illness appears on the night you planned to meet a friend, or a dramatic problem is announced when you start a course or a job. Your needs are treated as optional while theirs become urgent. Cancelling your plans becomes the easiest way to avoid the storm they create.

8. Offering grand promises

If an abuser senses you are close to leaving, they often reach for sweeping declarations. Just when you are at your limit, they make the promise you always hoped to hear, such as “I will go to counselling,” “I will stop drinking,” or “I’ll get a better job with less pressure.” The words can sound sincere, and for a moment hope returns.

Yet they rarely follow those promises with steady behaviour. Once the immediate threat passes, the commitments fade quietly away. The promises function as a bridge back to the relationship, not as a plan for real change.

9. Using children or pets as leverage

Abusers know exactly where your heart lives and they will use that knowledge to reassert power and dominance. Threats about custody, access, or the wellbeing of a beloved animal are common.

You might hear, “the children will never forgive you if you leave,” or “I will make sure you never see the dog again.” They aim those threats at loyalty and love because they understand how deeply they land. People remain far longer than they planned because the abuser has made the cost of leaving feel impossible.

These threats strike at the most tender parts of your life. The message is that freedom will cost you what you love most. Many stay because the price feels unbearable.

10. Withholding affection

As their influence begins to weaken, many abusers turn to distance instead of confrontation. If they know you fear abandonment or being alone, withdrawing warmth becomes a powerful way to pull you back into line. Affection and intimacy are deliberately withdraw and you are left trying to work out what you did wrong. The message is not spoken, but it is clear that closeness is something you must earn.

They use this strategy because it restores leverage. Silence, coldness, or rejection can be enough to make you soften boundaries and chase connection again. By turning affection into a reward, the abuser regains influence at the very moment they feel it fading.

Seeing the pattern

These behaviours are connected and deliberate. None of them are accidents or misunderstandings. Each one is an attempt to restore a sense of control when the balance of power begins to shift. Affection, jealousy, rage, and promises may look very different on the surface, yet they all work toward the same goal of keeping you in place.

Escalation does not mean you have done something wrong. It happens because you are becoming harder to control. These tactics work not because you were foolish or weak, but because they target ordinary human needs for love and belonging. Many capable, thoughtful people have been caught in the same web.

Many survivors say the confusion weighed heavier than the fear. Once you can name the pattern, the behaviour loses some of its power to distort your reality.

When Abuse Rewrites Your Sense of Self: Marcella’s Story

By
Samara Knight
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Marcella's story of domestic violence

Marcella’s experience of abuse did not begin with violence. It started the way so many abusive relationships do, with small insults, a gradual erosion of her sense of self, and a slow recalibration of what feels normal. By the time physical violence entered the relationship, her confidence and self-worth had already been worn down to the point where resistance felt almost impossible.

What Marcella describes so clearly is how emotional abuse prepares the ground for physical harm, because when someone has been told often enough that they are worthless, broken, or unlovable, their ability to protect themselves is steadily dismantled. Hearing her speak about this progression makes visible a pattern many survivors recognise deeply, even if they have never had the words to describe it.

One of the most devastating parts of Marcella’s account is the isolation that slowly took hold of her life. Everything began to revolve around what her partner allowed, who he approved of, and where she could go, until her world shrank to the size of his permission.

When that level of dependency is created, leaving does not simply mean ending a relationship, it means losing your entire world in one moment. The interview captures how frightening that vulnerability feels and why so many people remain even when the abuse escalates and becomes extreme.

Why Abuse So Often Repeats Across Relationships

Marcella also speaks openly about something that is widely misunderstood, which is why abuse can repeat across relationships. After years of being told she was the problem, she began to believe it, and each new partner felt like confirmation of a story already written about her worth.

Neglect, violence, addiction, and cruelty all became framed as evidence that she was somehow attracting or deserving this treatment. This is the psychological impact of prolonged abuse reshaping a person’s sense of identity and their expectations of love.

What makes this interview so powerful is that it does not end with a neat or simplistic transformation. Marcella shows how awareness builds slowly, how self-worth has to be learned again from the ground up, and how boundaries often only form after deep and painful experience. Her voice carries both the cost of what she survived and the strength and clarity that came from finally seeing herself differently.

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