How abuse starts

Chronic abuse usually starts slowly and over time.  Depending on someone’s age and relationship with the abuser, this process is sometimes referred to as “grooming.” 

Too Good to Be True

Abusive partnerships usually start out seeming like the complete opposite of abuse.  Often referred to as “love bombing,” abusive partners can initially seem like the perfect catch.  They will seem so interested in you, will get to know all of your favorite things, will go out of their way to make you happy, and will seem like the person of your dreams.  This is a very calculated and manipulative way of entering a relationship.  The intent is to make you feel so enamored by the person that you make excuses for them when the abuse begins to happen.  One of the first signs of an abusive relationship is that everything seems “too good to be true.” 

False sense of Intimacy

Another reason that abusers love-bomb, in the beginning, is because they don’t know how to have true emotional intimacy, so they force a sense of false intimacy by acting out or performing what they think love should look like. True emotional intimacy takes time to build and requires each partner to be vulnerable over time (and boundaries).  It wouldn’t make sense to tell a stranger all of the most intimate details of your life, yet with the beginning stages of a relationship, we are usually pretty anxious and want to know if something’s going to work out or not; and not “waste time.”  It’s imperative to pace things out at the beginning of a relationship, especially to ensure that someone shows up consistently over time and earns your trust.

A Pattern Emerges

Soon into the love-bombing phase, an abuser might start to let their guard down, and the abuse will begin.  It might start with what seems like a small criticism or moodiness that doesn’t seem to make sense.  If you notice you are consistently saying to yourself, “but when things are good, they are SO good” or “I just want to get back to what it was like in the beginning,” you might be in an abusive relationship.  Abusers often respond to their partners by telling them, “you’re too sensitive” or “that’s not what happened.”  Arguments don’t usually result in you feeling closer to one another after.  Partners of abusers will often begin to do things to avoid making their partner upset, and it will seem like almost anything could set off the abuser. By this point, it is often very painful and difficult to end things because of that initial stage of love-bombing.  But it is possible to set boundaries and expect to be treated with respect and care.