Relationships: Relationship Building & Management

Psychological Abuse - 3 Secrets to Saving Your Sanity in Domestic Abuse Divorce

A common threat to battered women in divorce proceedings is their perpetrator's use of psychology to officially, yet improperly, establish that they are mentally ill. And all too often, these domestic violence survivors sit back and do nothing to prevent this from happening.

They are flooded with the mental/emotional assault and, like a deer caught in headlights, show startle...sever startle that is in many cases paralyzing and debilitating.

If you are a domestic abuse survivor and you suspect that you are being set up to be backed into wearing a psychiatric label that is being established to discredit, silence, contain or punish you, what would you do?

Read Dr. King's entire article Psychological Abuse - 3 Secrets to Saving Your Sanity in Domestic Abuse Divorce

Dr. Jeanne King, Ph.D., our official Abusive Relationships Expert

Skills of Listening: Are You a Compassionate Listener?

It is difficult to become a good listener who both validates the pain of the other, while maintaining the ability to look at themselves. Each person must listen compassionately to themselves and each other. Within many relationships, rather than engaging in compassionate listening, many couples polarize. One partner is the voice of reason, the head, while the other partner is the voice of emotion, the heart. These patterns often create communication problems, which hardly begins to touch on the angst that can be felt between couples.

While, listening with both our hearts and our heads is valuable, neither is complete by itself, because listening with both makes one complete person. Someone who uses just their head while listening is using their intellect and knowledge, and when used individually, without the hearts part, it can be cold and indifferent. When listening with just the heart compassion turns into confused feelings.

Read Dr. Miles' entire article Skills of Listening: Are You a Compassionate Listener?

Dr. Linda Miles, our official Marriage & Family Therapist Expert

Spousal Emotional Abuse - How to Break the Cycle of Emotional Psychological Abuse

Emotional psychological abuse from your intimate partner is as clear as the day is long when on the receiving end. But for the bystanders, it's ambiguous.

Some people will even tell you that when you are the abused, on some level, you become a bystander. It is as though you take yourself out of the line of fire simply to survive the blows of spousal emotional abuse . . . and ultimately exist.

You hate being hated. Your tire of being told how inadequate you are, how you are lacking...deficient...defective. You grow to expect darts in your own home and recoil in anticipation.

Read Dr. King's entire article Spousal Emotional Abuse - How to Break the Cycle of Emotional Psychological Abuse

Dr. Jeanne King, Ph.D., our official Abusive Relationships Expert

Three Things Parents Should Tell Children Every Day

Do you remember holding your first baby for the first time? Were you struck, almost immediately, with an acute awareness of your infant's helplessness? I remember feeling incredibly humbled, and a little overwhelmed, by my new responsibility for the life of another human being. Although normal, for some of us those feelings don't diminish with time and experience.

I have seven children, living now in six states. My oldest son is serving as a Special Forces Medic in Afghanistan. These grown children are all successful, and living joyfully. They know how to love, laugh, and live well, in spite of the fact that each one has faced incredible obstacles in their lives.

Read Paula's entire article Three Things Parents Should Tell Children Every Day

Paula Fellingham, our official Strengthening Women and Families Expert

Healing from Psychological Abuse: The Truth about Your Thoughts and Finding Your Peace

The mental and emotional baggage we bring with us following an abusive relationship can be as disturbing as the relationship itself. What can you do to relieve yourself of the consequence of destructive mental chatter, or a relentless thought that colors your day and brings you down or spirals you into states of anguish?

Mental-Emotional-Physical States

We know from psycho-physiology that a thought in the cortex triggers a limbic (emotional brain) hypothalamic-pituitary response, which merely causes specific glandular reactions and subsequent body system effects to occur.

Read Dr. King's entire article Healing from Psychological Abuse: The Truth about Your Thoughts and Finding Your Peace

Dr. Jeanne King, Ph.D., our official Abusive Relationships Expert