Healthy vs. Abusive Relationships

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Here’s What Healthy and Abusive Relationships Look Like

Sometimes abusive relationships are easy to identify; other times the abuse may take subtle forms. The examples shown here can help you identify traits of abusive and healthy relationships. In general, abusive relationships have a serious power imbalance, with the abuser controlling or attempting to control most aspects of life. Healthy relationships share responsibility and decision-making tasks and reflect respect for all the people in the relationship, including children.

Healthy Relationships:

Non-Threatening Behavior

• Talking and acting so that your partner feels safe and comfortable doing and saying things.

Respect

• Listening to your partner non-judgmentally.

• Being emotionally affirming and understanding.

• Valuing opinions.

Trust and Support

• Supporting your partner’s goals in life.

• Respecting your partner’s right to his or her own feelings, friends, activities and opinions.

Honesty and Accountability

• Accepting responsibility for self.

• Acknowledging past use of violence and / or emotionally abusive behavior, changing the behavior.

• Acknowledging infidelity, changing the behavior.

• Admitting being wrong when it is appropriate.

• Communicating openly and truthfully, acknowledging past abuse, seeking help for abusive relationship patterns.

Responsible Parenting

• Sharing parental responsibilities.

• Being a positive, non-violent role model for children.

Shared Responsibility

• Mutually agreeing on a fair distribution of work.

• Making family decisions together.

Abusive Relationships:

Using Intimidation

• Making your partner afraid by using looks, actions, gestures.

• Smashing or destroying things.

• Destroying or confiscating your partner's property.

• Abusing pets as a display of power and control.

• Silent or overt raging.

• Displaying weapons or threatening their use.

• Making physical threats.

Using Emotional Abuse

• Putting your partner down.

• Making your partner feel bad about himself or herself.

• Calling your partner names.

• Playing mind games.

• Interrogating your partner.

• Harassing or intimidating your partner.

• "Checking up on" your partner's activities or whereabouts.

• Humiliating your partner, weather through direct attacks or "jokes".

• Making your partner feel guilty.

• Shaming your partner.

Using Isolation

• Controlling what your partner does, who he or she sees and talks to, what he or she reads, where he or she goes.

• Limiting your partner’s outside involvement.

• Demanding your partner remain home when you are not with them.

• Cutting your partner off from prior friends, activities, and social interaction.

• Using jealousy to justify your actions.

(Jealousy is the primary symptom of abusive relationships; it is also a core component of  Love Addiction.)

Minimizing, Denying and Blame Shifting

• Making light of the abuse and not taking your partner’s concerns about it seriously.

• Saying the abuse did not happen, or wasn't that bad.

• Shifting responsibility for your abusive behavior to your partner. (i.e: I did it because you ______.)

• Saying your partner caused it.

Using Children

• Making your partner feel guilty about the children.

• Using the children to relay messages.

• Using visitation to harass your partner.

• Threatening to take the children away.

Using Male Privilege

• Treating your partner like a servant.

• Making all the big decisions.

• Acting like the "master of the castle."

• Being the one to define men’s and women’s or the relationship's roles.

Using Economic Abuse

• Preventing your partner from getting or keeping a job.

• Making your partner ask for money.

• Giving your partner an allowance.

• Taking your partner’s money.

• Not letting your partner know about or have access to family income.  

What to do if you are in an abusive relationship. 

| Abusive Relationships | Warning Signs | Healthy vs Abusive | Effects of Abuse |
| Personality Types |  Anger and Rage | Links | What to Do |
| About BPD | Abusive Relationships and BPD |
|Abusive Relationship Readings |
|BPD Site|BPD Sanctuary |

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Note on Authorship: this website was created by a recovering addict and survivor; I am not a chemical dependency therapist or mental health professional. Except as otherwise cited, opinions offered here are the result of my own life experience and a great deal of reading in the Recovery and Mental Health fields.  You may cite this site for academic reference, however in keeping with twelve step traditions regarding anonymity I request you identify the author as "Will H. - RecoveryMan.com Webmaster" 

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Updated: 11/15/2007