Recent reports show significant increases in domestic violence and drug and alcohol use. In addition, the stress and anxiety created by the Pandemic are taking a heavy toll on mental health. This article describes the types of abuse. Further reports will explain abuse’s impact on people, including trauma and its consequences for mental and medical health. Finally, there will be an article reporting the therapies that help best for survivors of abuse.
What is Abuse?
Abuse occurs when people mistreat or misuse other people, showing no concern for their integrity or innate worth as individuals, and in a manner that degrades their well-being. Abusers frequently are interested in controlling their victims. They use abusive behaviors to manipulate their victims into submission or compliance with their will.
Physical and sexual abuse greatly exacerbate the risk of substance use disorders. Abuse has particularly far-reaching effects when it occurs during childhood.
Types of Abuse
- Verbal: They may verbally abuse them by calling them names, telling them they are stupid, have no worth, or will not amount to anything on their own.
- Physical: They may become physically violent, inflicting pain, bruises, broken bones, and other physical wounds (visible and hidden both).
- Sexual: They may rape or sexually assault their victims.
- Negligence: Alternatively, they may neglect dependent victims, disavowing any responsibilities they may have towards those victims and causing damage through lack of action rather than through a harmful, manipulative action itself.
Abuse is a commonplace event in modern times, taking on many different forms, including physical, sexual, emotional, and verbal abuse, occurring in many different contexts, including the home (domestic violence, spouse rape, incest), the workplace (sexual harassment), and in institutional (elder abuse, bullying) and religious and community (hate crime) settings. It touches victims across the lifespan, from children through elders. Abuse is a severe social and cultural problem affecting everyone, whether as a victim of abuse, a perpetrator, a friend or confidant of an abused person looking for ways to be helpful, or simply as someone who is angry about injustice and wants to work for positive change.
If you are currently being abused or abused in the past, you should know that you do not suffer alone. Right now, millions of people worldwide struggle to maintain dignity, safety, and self-worth in the face of ongoing abuse. In addition, millions more people work to recover from wounds they have sustained during past abuse.
You should also know that help is available for abuse victims, although it is not always easy to access. Community abuse resources (such as domestic violence shelters), mental health professionals, law enforcement, various other organizations, websites, and printed resources can provide instruction and assistance for people who need help removing themselves from abusive situations.
Victims of abuse often deal with severe psychological and physical consequences of being abused. There are various forms of counseling, psychotherapy, medical, and self-help resources available for people who have been used and want assistance and support for managing problems and issues they have developed due to being abused.
Such post-abuse issues are sometimes called ‘abuse sequela’ by health professionals. While no therapy is capable of erasing the effects of abuse, such resources can provide meaningful assistance in helping to minimize the adverse effects of abuse.