8 Early Signs Of An Abusive Relationship (That Most
People Miss!)

Unless you know what you are looking for, the early signs of an abusive relationship are pretty much hidden. This is why so many people get caught in controlling relationships.

If you are just wondering if you might be getting into a bad situation, or you suspect abuse and need validation, then the following information should help you to recognize what is going on.

There are a few things that I want to be clear about first.

An abusive relationship is one in which there is a power imbalance that is taken advantage of by the manipulator to control the thinking, decision making, emotions and behavior of the victim. This imbalance is often not obvious to the victim for quite some time.

Manipulators know that if they showed their true nature from the start that the victims would run a mile. Therefore they put on an act, a performance, to entice their targets into believing that it makes sense to commit to a relationship. They can be very good actors!

I don't believe that anyone willingly steps into an abusive situation. Rather, they are tricked into it. It is not the victim's fault that they are in an abusive relationship.

So let's have a close look at how abusive and toxic relationships start so that you can begin to understand the early signs of an abusive relationship. We will examine in detail:

1. Initial moments
2. Love bombing
3. Flattery
4. Warnings from family and friends
5. Withholding information
6. Excuse machines
7. Their friends and acquaintances
8. Evasive, indirect

Very early signs of an abusive relationship

Imagine that you have been looking for a relationship for a while. You have dated a few people but there has been nothing that generated any enthusiasm in you. You feel a bit lonely, you wonder if it will ever happen. You imagine growing old on your own. Sometimes you may feel a bit desperate. Other times you decide that you don't need anyone, that you can be on your own, you will manage.

Then, just when you have finally decided that you are giving up for good, someone appears in your life. For some reason that you can't quite put your finger on, this person really catches your attention. They seem confident, self assured, full of life. They talk to others easily.

Your first impression, the first couple of seconds with them, felt off. Something was not right. But it was your friend who introduced you so you ignored the initial thing, whatever that was, and gave them the benefit of the doubt (more about this later).

When they got talking, that initial feeling disappeared. They seemed knowledgeable. They had opinions about lots of things.

But more importantly, they were interested in you! Lonely old you!

They gave you attention. Looking intently at you. Holding your gaze.

They asked lots of questions about you. They listened intently to the answers. They seemed genuinely interested. They didn't talk over you. They wanted to know about you.

You asked them questions about themselves and they spoke a bit, but quickly brought the conversation back to you. More questions about you.

 

They offer you exactly what you want!

They quickly figure out what you want, whether that is an intimate relationship, a job, company, someone to help move house, a relationship with God, health related matters and so on. And then they offer you exactly that!

You exchange phone numbers and email. They start messaging you. They say nice things about you. They are not shy with the compliments and even flattery.

(Flattery: excessive or insincere praise

When they compliment or flatter you, think. Is what they say true? Do they know you well enough to know if it's true or not? Do you know that what they are saying is not quite right but you allow yourself to feel good and be swept up in the emotion of it? This is obviously not a good thing to do with strangers, especially manipulators.)

They make you feel special. They make you feel unique. They make you feel safe.

You feel you can trust them. You may even have the sense that you have finally met someone who actually 'gets' you, who understands you in a way that no one ever has.

Sounds great, right? What's not to like? Why would you not go ahead in such a situation? It all seems perfect. Sounds too good to be true? Well, situations like this are usually too good to be true. Let's examine some of the details we have covered so far.

 

First signs of an abusive relationship - disgust??

Many people talk about the love bombing as the first sign of an abusive situation but my experience with my clients is that very often there is an earlier sign.

Many victims report that their very first few seconds with the manipulator was unpleasant to one degree or other. Some people feel that something is off in initial few moments. Others report stronger sensations of disgust, revulsion, nausea and so on. Sometimes people say that at the start they didn't like the attitude, or the loudness, but often they may not be able to put their finger on why they experienced such unpleasantness.

But then the manipulator starts talking and things change. He or she turns on the charm, they get involved in a conversation with their target and they begin to manipulate the impressions of the target. They present themselves as friendly, kind, helpful and caring. After a while the initial impression fades into oblivion.

If the target does happen to remember the unpleasantness of the first few seconds, they quickly dismiss it. "My sister likes this guy a lot, he must be ok and that awkwardness at the start must have been just me." "These two people are saying they are making money with her so she must be doing something right." "My good friend really wanted me to meet this guy so it should be ok to give him the benefit of the doubt. I will trust my friend on this one." In this way, the signal is ignored or minimized.

It is often only years later, sometimes only when asked directly about it, do the victims remember the first impression and how off it was.

 

Early signs of an abusive relationship - love bombing

Manipulators, psychopaths, sociopaths and narcissists, can be brilliant at 'reading' people. They will quickly size up your weaknesses, wants, fears and desires. They will also work out your strengths and your needs, along with some of your beliefs and your ideas, too.

All this information is then used against you. They make you feel great, as I mentioned above. But there is something more sinister going on at the same time.

What specifically, you may ask. Well, they present themselves to you as being your ideal partner.

They make you feel that they like you the way you are. They make you believe that they are interested in all the same things that you are. We like people who have things in common with us. So very quickly they are making friends with you.

They make you feel that your secrets are safe with them. They create a sense in you that they are trustworthy.

They offer you exactly what you are looking for, whether that is companionship, love, money, help setting up a business, whatever...

They basically make you feel that they are the perfect partner for you.

The rule here is... If something seems too good to be true, it probably is.

The difficulty in this phase is that once your emotions are running high, you have no sense of problems or difficulties. Because you feel enamored, besotted, euphoric or even in love with this person, you are unable to think rationally. They say that 'love is blind' for a reason.

Your decisions become totally emotional, and all you want is for the euphoria to continue. It seems that nothing can stop these good times and you end up ignoring the other early signs of an abusive relationship.

So what are they?

 

People try to warn you

Your friends or family members may tell you that they don't like this new person in your life. They tell you that this person is not good for you.

Your first response may have been, "You don't know them like I do. Wait until you get to know them, then you'll understand!"

If they persist in complaining to you about this supposedly wonderful person in your life, you start to get angry, questioning them about why they can't just be happy for you. You tell your friend or family member that you can make your own decisions, thank you very much. You get huffy and tell them to "...just stay away then!"

If this has happened to you, don't be too hard on yourself. You are not the first and you won't be the last. You have, even at this early stage, been programmed to not listen to criticism of the manipulator and to even defend them. This is the nature of mind control.

If more people paid attention at this stage to what friends and family members told them about their 'new friends', it would save such a lot of suffering and heartache. Friends and family members care for you, they love you (unless of course, they are manipulators themselves!), they have your best interests at heart. But, as I said, it's not that easy to listen to those around you when the emotions are running high.

If you have been caught in a bad relationship, it's a good idea to make the decision, before getting into another relationship in the future, that you are going to listen to trusted friends and family about new potential partners. That way, if you get caught up in the emotions in a new relationship, and your family says it's not good, it's much easier to get out because the decision is already made. You don't have to make the decision in the moment.

 

Withholding and deception

Withholding information is another of the early signs of an abusive relationship that is often overlooked.

Obviously a victim may not figure this one out for a long time.

However, if you do recognize that this wonderful new person in your life has been holding back important information, it's useful to act on it straight away. Do not ignore things like this! Withholding information can be considered as lying by omission.

If you find out that your new potential business partner has been bankrupt several times in the past, and he or she never mentioned it, beware. If your new intimate partner turns out to have been married 4 times and not the once that your were told about, this is a major warning sign. If a dating site contacts you to warn you about the person you just met on line, under no circumstances should you ignore this piece of information.

And yet many people do... Why?

 

Excuses and justifications

Because another skill of the manipulators is to have instant justifications for things that they may have said or done or for things that have happened around them. Some of them may even be able to rattle off 3 or 4 different justifications in seconds!

These justifications may seem acceptable in the moment. Sometimes they are just about plausible for the victim to accept them. After all, at the start of the relationship things feel so good. There are plenty of very pleasant times and it's easy to let something slide because it seems so out of character for this wonderful new person who has arrived on the scene and is fitting so well into your life.

The important thing here is to look at the behavior and keep it separate from the justifications and excuses.

 

Examples of early signs of an abusive relationship

For example, the manipulator says something hurtful and when the victim complains, the manipulator says that sayings like this are common in their own family, or that it was a joke, or suggests that the victim not be so sensitive. In a normal, healthy relationship, you would expect that the speaker aplogize and at least attempt not to repeat the upsetting behavior

When the manipulator repeats the hurtful thing, and the victim objects again, and the manipulator trots out the justifications, now there is a problem. The manipulator is saying hurtful things. This is a fact. This is what you have to deal with, not the justifications.

Dealing with the justifications can often cause confusion and doubt in the victim. The abuser can speak with such conviction that the victim begins to wonder whether they themselves are the problem. Gaslighting, of course, is a particular form of this pattern.

 

Beware of blaming the past

Another classic is where the abuser does something nasty and then claims that their past, either an abusive childhood, or having been cheated on by an ex, is the reason for their current behavior.

First of all, past experiences should never be accepted as a justification for present abusive and controlling behavior. As an adult, a person can get help to overcome past traumas. If someone recognizes that they are treating others badly, and have no interest in changing their behaviors, let this be a major warning sign of an abusive relationship. Keep in mind, too, that there is a major difference between talking about changing and actually doing something to bring about change.

Secondly, the fact is that this person has done something nasty. That's what you are dealing with. This person is not only capable of treating others badly, they are actually doing it. Repeated bad behavior, again, is another major warning, another of the significant early signs of an abusive relationship.

I know, I know, victims end up accepting years of bad behavior. This is the nature of coercive control. You can read more here about how abusers trap their victims in these articles about narcissistic boyfriends and narcissistic husbands

What I am pointing out here are the early signs of an abusive relationship so that people who are doubting their new, or newish, relationship have some ideas about what to look out for. The reason people get caught is that they don't know what the traits of an abusive relationship are and they trust their 'instincts'. In this way, they end up making decisions emotionally and this actually plays into the hands of the abusers.

 

Friends and acquaintances

I believe it was Robert Hare who said that psychopaths do not have friends, they have acquaintances and victims, and the acquaintances eventually become victims, too.

It may seem at first glance that they know a lot of people. They talk to those around them, they mention lots of people they have spoken to, they have all sorts of stories.

However, when you look closely, all these so called friendships are relatively superficial.

Is he insecure or manipulative?

One of the clues to this idea is when this new person in your life is all of a sudden spending huge amounts of time with you. If they are not physically present, they are texting, calling, emailing. They spend hours a day communicating with you.

What happened to the full life they were living up to the day they met you? Have they just abandoned their friends? Have they suddenly just lost interest in everything that was going on for them? Or are you the next new shiny thing that has caught their attention? Are you their next project to see what they can extract from you?

Another clue is where they very quickly start making your friends their friends. They insert themselves not only into your life but into the lives of those around you.

Do they invite themselves along when they know you are going to spend time with one of your friends? Do they invite your friends places without inviting you? Do they offer to do favors for your friends whether you are going to be present or not?

These situations often do not end well, with the manipulator taking advantage of your friends as well as of you, dating them (as well as, or instead of!) you, and stealing them away from you when they eventually get rid of you.

Are you never invited to their place? Do you not get to meet his or her friends? Or family? These are not normal situations in healthy relationships. Treat these things as red flags.

 

Evasive, slippery, vague and indirect

Remember that when they meet you first, they ask lots of questions and want to know all about you? What happens when you ask similar questions of them?

They may talk a lot but they actually give you very little concrete information about themselves. Many of my clients realize that even after years of marriage they know little to nothing about the past history of their spouse and they even know very little about the person they are actually married to.

Initially, the manipulators may seem to be revealing personal details about themselves but careful attention to their answers reveals that they are often just 'saying the right things'. They seem to be revealing private details about themselves but really they are just making it seem that you have a lot in common.

These types are renowned for not answering the question that is being asked of them. They can start talking, linking one thing to another but when they stop speaking, they may not have answered the question at all!

It even can be so bad that if asked to give a yes or no answer, they will still refuse. "I want a yes or no answer. Were you working late last night?" and they still will not say yes or no. This, obviously, can be incredibly frustrating for the victims.

 

Specifically vague

They can also be 'specifically vague'.

Psychopathic husband: "If you don't change your attitude, I am not sure how much I can put up with."
Wife: "Are you saying you want a divorce if I complain about you shouting at me?"
Psychopathic husband: "I didn't say that!"

Technically, he is right, he did not say the word divorce, but the message to the victim is actually very clear. The victim hears the phrase, 'not sure how much I can put up with' and understands it to mean divorce. In this particular example, the ideas are vocalized. In many situations the victim does not get to speak up but the effects of the vague language of the psychopath or narcissist has every bit the same effect, if not even stronger.

These patterns are visible from the very start of the relationship, if you know what you are looking for!

 

Conclusion

There are very early signs of an abusive relationship that are obvious to the trained eye and ear. In order not to get caught in an abusive relationship, it's vital to be able to spot these as they are coming at you, in real time.

Being able to label the techniques goes a long way to not only spotting them but also to prevent being caught up in the emotions that they are designed to generate in you.

In the early stages of an abusive relationship, the signs are not that knot in your stomach when you read a text or that sinking feeling when you hear them coming in the front door. Apart from the first few seconds that I mentioned, the signs are often the opposite! The euphoria, the great feeling that you have found a soulmate within 2 hours of meeting someone, the family and friends who seem not to want you to be so happy. These are not the usual suspects on a list of early red flags in dating and for that reason, unless you understand these ideas, it makes you vulnerable to being caught.

Do you recognize these psychological abuse signs in your relationship? Are you ready to take the next steps in getting out, protecting yourself and making sure you don't get caught again? You can contact me for (non-judgmental!) professional help and advice.

 

Early signs of an abusive relationship - more reading

Learn more about:

• what an abusive relationship actually is
• what makes someone a psychopath
• what does manipulation look like
• the stages of an abusive relationship
• why it's so difficult to leave a controlling partner
• how to leave an abusive relationship and
• what's involved in a good recovery from narcissistic abuse

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