Online Therapy for Emotional Abuse: Is It Effective?
Emotional abuse in romantic relationships is more much more prevalent than most people would think. In a recent study it was found that there was some form of emotional abuse taking place in approximately 80% of all intimate relationships. It was found that there was a high amount of both overt aggressive behavior, as well as subtle coercion taking place in these relationships. (Source)
What is Emotional Abuse?
Emotional abuse can take many forms, from manipulation and control, threats and intimidation, to verbal aggression and humiliation. A person who uses emotional abuse will often attempt to control the other person by belittling, embarrassing or criticizing them. They may also use guilt, fear, blame, shame or other emotions to manipulate or coerce the other person. While this typically takes place in romantic relationships, emotional abuse can take place in any type of relationship. Not only romantic partners, but parents, family, friends or really any type of interpersonal relationship may have emotional abuse taking place.
Often times the abuser will try to lower the victim’s self-esteem in an attempt to bully the other person and ultimately to control the other person. The abuser will typically try to lessen the other person sense of identity, self thinking and / or self worth.
How Does Emotional Abuse Begin?
In the early days of the relationship, most abusers will begin by acting normal and rational, and then slowly start using emotional abuse tactics little by little. In some cases, the abuser will try to quickly develop a bond with the victim as if it is just the two of them in an important relationship — as if the rest of the world is against them.
After a while, the abuser May then start to manipulate and / or control various aspects of the victim’s life. They will typically demean, belittle, and insult the victim — sometimes going so far as to threaten their victim as well.
Once this change in the relationship finally occurs, it often times leaves the victim feeling confused and unbalanced. They may feel like they were fooled or tricked into getting into a relationship with the abuser. However, it’s important to keep in mind that whether you suspect that you are in a relationship with emotional abuse or have been in the past, it’s not your fault.
Are You in an Emotionally Abusive Relationship?
Whether you feel like you may be presently involved in a relationship where emotional abuse is currently taking place, or are thinking that you may have been at some point in the past, it’s important that you no the learn the warning signs of emotional abuse — as they are the first step to recovery. Just a few signs that you may be in / have been in an emotionally abusive relationship are:
The abuser I’ll try to break the other person down so that they’re easier to control, and lower their self image.
The abuser will insult or criticize you your intellect, looks, weight and or how well you do things on a frequent basis. They may do this subtly by merely suggesting such things, or they may be very obvious and overt about it.
Emotional abusers will normally try to both isolate and control their victims. Just a few examples of this include:
Controlling: The abuser will often attempt to control your time, control who you are able to see or be around, as well as just generally controlling your life overall. Typically, the abuser wants all of the victims time for themself.
Eavesdropping: Often times in cases of emotional abuse the abuser well eavesdrop on your phone calls, spy on your email and text messages and be generally distrusting.
Possessiveness: An abuser will typically treat the victim as if they are a possession, and become very threatened of anyone or anything that could attempt to take that possession away.
Jealousy: Abusers tend to be very jealous and always suspicious of the victim cheating.
Verbally Abusive: Often abusers will be very insulting to the victim and put down the victims friends and family as well.
Threatening: To go along with the attempts to control and manipulate the other person, many times abusers will threaten to leave the victim if they don’t go along with what the abuser wants.
Emotional abusers will often have extremely demanding expectations.
Many emotional abusers will have unreasonable expectations of their victims. It’s as if nothing is ever good enough for the abuser, or no matter what you do it’ll never be right. A few examples of this are:
Expecting that the victim should drop everything in order to do what they want.
Always being unsatisfied, no matter what the victim did or how hard they tried.
Constantly criticizing the victim for not doing things on time or up to there unrealistic standards.
Expecting the victim to always agree with them, think like them and share their beliefs and opinions
Emotional abusers will often use what is known as emotional blackmail. This will typically include humiliating the victim, which may go on behind closed doors in some relationships, or right in front of friends and family in others. In some relationships it may even be both of these.
The abuser may blow things out of proportion when criticizing the victim’s shortcomings and / or bringing them up in the attempt to deflect the conversation or admit any fault of their own.
The abuser may punish the victim by withholding affection, one example of this is commonly known as “the silent treatment”.
The Signs of a Healthy Relationship
Maybe you’re still not 100% certain if you are in or have been in an emotionally abusive relationship in the past. This is not uncommon, as many people find it much easier to see the emotional abuse going on in other people’s relationships, but not in their own.
Sometimes emotional abuse can be so subtle that you don’t notice it happening until you’ve been in a relationship a long time. Many times the emotional abuse can go on for years as long as the relationship lasts, this is especially true in cases where the emotional abuse is more subtle and covert.
One method that helps people to better see the signs of emotional abuse in their own relationship is to use the characteristics of a healthy relationship as a guideline when looking at their current relationship.
The Cycle of Emotional Abuse
In almost all cases of emotional abuse there are four main stages of the abuse which cycle over and over again. These stages are tension, incident, making up and calm. The relationship typically cycles through these four stages in order — and then the pattern of abuse resets, just to begin again.
Let’s take a closer look at the four stages of the emotional abuse cycle:
Tension: In this stage there may be a disagreement or argument, and the relationship is under stress. This will often times lead to unhappiness, trouble communicating and in worst cases even fear.
Incident: In the incident stage, all the tensions that have built up will be released in the into the primary incident of the cycle. This may include attempts to control, threats, fighting and arguing, blaming one another, and so on.
Making Up: After the primary argument or incident, the abuser will often say that they’re sorry, but could still resent the victim and / or make light of the entire incident itself — as if it was no big deal.
Calm: The last stage in the cycle is sometimes called calm, in which the victim will typically forgive the abuser for the problem, and the incident will be put behind them.
This cycle will normally repeat over and over again for months or even years, as long as emotional abuse is still going on in the relationship.
Whether you believe that you are currently in an emotionally abusive relationship or have been in the past, it’s important to understand the emotional abuse cycle, as well as how emotional abuse functions in a relationship.
Simply understanding and acknowledging that a relationship is / was emotionally abusive is a big step forward to healing. For both anyone who is or has been in an emotionally abusive relationship, therapy has shown to be possibly the most effective treatment of all.
Emotional Abuse Therapy
When you first start therapy for emotional abuse, one of the primary goals his to uncover the root causes of the abuse. Your therapist may discuss many different things with you, the goal of which may be to answer some of the following questions:
Who is the abusive one in the relationship?
How did the instances of emotional abuse cause you to feel?
How long has emotional abuse been active in the relationship?
When did the instances of emotional abuse first begin?
What situations / circumstances typically take place just before the abusive incidents?
Have you ever tried to confront the abuser directly?
Have you ever reported the abuse to anyone outside of the relationship?
Did the relationship ever become physically violent?
While you may think that you directly know the answer to some of these questions, after you’ve been in therapy a little while you may find out that things are slightly different then you first perceived them. After long periods of time, in cases of emotional abuse it’s not uncommon for the victims memory to become cloudy.
When you’re first starting therapy for emotional abuse, you should look for a therapist who specifically has experience with emotional abuse and relationships. Getting the help you need from an experienced licensed professional is the first step towards stopping emotional abuse in its tracks.
An experienced therapist can also help you with many of the side effects caused by emotional abuse, like low self-esteem / self image, nervousness and anxiety disorders, recurring traumatic thoughts of the abuse, and depression, among others.
The process of recovery and moving on from an emotionally abusive relationship can be a lengthy one, and although it may be difficult at times, the reward is well worth it. Working with a therapist will be helpful in countless ways, but just a few key benefits starting a program of therapy are:
You may feel strange or uncomfortable discussing the details of your emotional abuse with family or friends, while online therapy provides a safe and judgment free place to heal.
Often times people who have dealt with emotional abuse for a lengthy period of time will find it hard to trust others afterwards. Therapy can help you to feel safe to trust again, as well as have healthy relationships in the future.
The confidential and beneficial relationship with your therapist can act as a role model for all of your everyday relationships outside of treatment.
If you are currently in an emotionally abusive relationship, having a therapist that knows all the details can be one of the safest ways to ensure that the abuse does not progress from emotional to physical.
Working with your therapist will help you move forward and start a new life, a life that’s finally free from low self-esteem, guilt, threats and fear.
Online Therapy for Emotional Abuse Could Be More Effective than Face-to-Face Counseling.
Online therapy has been quickly growing and gaining more and more popularity over the past 5 to 10 years, and there are more and more online therapy platforms popping up every day. These days, online therapy is more available than ever before, and recent studies suggest that online therapy may actually be even more effective then traditional, face to face counseling. (Source)
In most cases, online therapy is by far less expensive then face-to-face counseling. Online therapy opens the doors for more people to be able to receive treatment — people who otherwise couldn’t afford it.
Most online therapy platforms allow one on one counseling as well as unlimited text, email or chat based communication with your therapist. All of that is for a fraction of what one session a week of in person therapy would cost.
Online therapy is also much more convenient then in person counseling, as you can receive treatments based around your schedule, at any time of day. There’s no need to shower, get made up and fight with traffic in order to make it to your appointment on time. With online therapy you receive treatment from a licensed professional, right from the comfort of your own home — whenever it’s most convenient for you.
Online therapy can be more private and confidential then in person treatment. As mentioned above, most online therapy platforms will allow you to communicate by one on one video chat, email, text and online chat rooms. Many of these platforms allow you to pick and choose which of these options are right for you and in most cases, your therapist doesn’t even need to see your face or know your real name. It’s up to you as to how much or how little of your personal information you would like to share with your therapist.
Online therapy platforms only deal with real, licensed professional therapists. Furthermore many of these platforms also require additional screening and real world experience from therapists looking to work with them. This often means that a therapist will have to have met additional requirements and have practiced for a minimum of so many years (depending on the platform).
While in traditional face to face counseling you are limited to just one therapy session per week, many online therapy platforms now offer offer unlimited chat and emails with your therapist. Often included is text-based messaging with your therapist and / or one on one video therapy sessions.
Your Best Options for Online Therapy for Emotional Abuse
As I previously mentioned, there are more and more online counseling platforms springing up every day. I wanted to review only the most well known platforms that are respected by professionals in the industry. Here are your best choices for starting a program of online therapy:
For anybody who’s thinking about giving online therapy a try, Calmerry would be a great place to start. They’re one of the leading online therapy platforms in the industry.
Calmerry offers live, on demand video counseling with your personal therapist, in addition to unlimited messaging — any time of the day or night.
Calmerry features an intuitive and simple to use platform that will match you up with a professional, licensed therapist who’s right for you and your individual needs. If for some reason you decide that you aren’t satisfied with your therapist, you can easily change to a different therapist at any time, and at no additional charge.
Calmerry only uses highly vetted, licensed therapists that have worked with many people dealing with emotional abuse, not to mention many other situations.
In a recent poll, 88% of Calmerry’s clients said that Calmerry was just as effective, if not more effective than in person therapy. And 95% of their clients said that Calmerry is much more convenient than traditional treatment.
They’ve generously offered to give all of my readers 30% off of your first month if you sign up through this link.
Another quickly growing online counseling platform, Online Therapy has hundreds of great reviews on the web. Their standard counseling plan offers a weekly, one on one session of 30 minutes and unlimited messaging with your therapist throughout the rest of the week.
Online Therapy is one of my favorite platforms, as I found their counselors to be both warm and professional and their user interface easy to use. After contacting them, they agreed to give my readers a 20% discount off your first month of therapy if you sign up through this link.
Another leader in online treatment, Talkspace boasts a simple user interface, lots of satisfied clients and competitive prices. Talkspace recently announced that they’ve treated over a million people worldwide. Anyone looking for professional treatment for their OCD should really consider giving them a try.
So regardless of if you decide to try Calmerry, Online Therapy or Talkspace — keep in mind that it still takes time. Just like face to face counseling, online therapy is not an overnight cure. Some people even find it useful to try out more than one platform and see which one best fits their individual needs.
