Death through words

This past month has been an eye opener with the realization that verbal and mental abuse is just as deadly as physical abuse. The sad part is that when this abuse ends usually someone is dead. They will either take their own lives or finally the messages sink so far inside them that they become walking dead. Please think before you speak... I've seen first hand how words can become a murder weapon.

It is amazing how conversations I have about abuse that some people still struggle with the idea of verbal abuse. I still think back to my last divorce and when I felt safe enough to start dating again that three different women shared with me that they would rather be physically abused then verbally abused.

The scars from the physical abuse would heal and the perpetrator would be in trouble with the law. But the verbal abuse never left scars and never meant time in jail. And those scars never heal. They just sink into the mind and stay there. The more the
verbal abuse takes place, the more the message is reinforced. You keep hearing over and over and over again the same message eventually you believe it.

It takes away your confidence, it keeps you quiet, and it keeps you in line. The abuser not only bullies you into submission but they end up controlling your every thought. Your opinion means nothing, you walk on eggshells in your own home for fear of what new abuse awaits you.

Your tormentor may make remakes that you have no idea what abuse is and you even begin to doubt your own sanity. Could it be true that you are not being abused? That you are just on your own “pity pot” which makes you feel even more guilty and filled with shame for thinking you were abused.

You don't have a black eye or bruises... how could you be abused? Maybe you are dumb, just like you have been told over and over and over again. Maybe you don't have a lover because you are not beautiful, which has been reinforced with those
messages over and over and over again.

It gets to the point that nothing is real because we have been told our version of reality is wrong. You never had a finger laid on you, yet life is dead and the unthinkable becomes the only choice. Suicide. It happens and people are in shock because no one knew. No one knew because no one saw the bruises, they may have saw the sad face, but never thought anything about it, they just thought the person was tired.

Suicide... an overdose... a bullet... whatever method was chosen... the voices are finally quieted. No longer is the person dumb or ugly or whatever. They are free.

What did you say today? Stop the abuse... listen to the words you speak before regret fills your every day.