Physical abuse is emotional abuse. The only time I have been hit and I liked it is when I was training for martial arts.

by Anonymous 1 year ago

Emotional abuse is emotional abuse Physical abuse is physical and emotional, and often comes with a ton of emotional abuse What do you think is happening when people are physically abused? They are having a grand old time between beatings?

by Anonymous 1 year ago

This. in fact what op said isn't an unpopular opinion , I've seen a lot of people saying hurting feelings is worse than physically hurting someone , while you can't even hurt someone physically without hurting their feelings.

by Anonymous 1 year ago

They completely dismiss the suffering of chronologically ill people

by Anonymous 1 year ago

Do you mean chronically?

by Anonymous 1 year ago

Yes sorry I'm not a native speaker

by Anonymous 1 year ago

No worries!

by Anonymous 1 year ago

Well the difference is that it's easier for the victim to acknowledge that he/she is abused when it's physical. Also it's the same thing for others to understand. It's just much easier for other people to understand/prove physical abuse and be supportive. With emotional abuse chances are higher that you are without support or that you live with its consequences without even knowing where it's from. People have the misconception that physical abuse is about physical damage. But if you trip and fall down stairs you can get just as hurt. The main difference is what the physical damage represents. It represents a situation where another person violates your boundaries and treats you less then human. It can represent that there is no safe environment for you even in your family and that you always need to be expecting danger. So it is in the way what it represents very similar to emotional abuse.

by Anonymous 1 year ago

>Well the difference is that it's easier for the victim to acknowledge that he/she is abused when it's physical. Source?

by Anonymous 1 year ago

What's easier to notice? To get smacked/beat/kicked for no good reason? Or to notice someone gaslighting you? I can't imagine you would ask for a source for something that clear.

by Anonymous 1 year ago

abuse is abuse. there is no kind of abuse that is easy to recover from.

by Anonymous 1 year ago

Physical abuse involves emotional abuse too. No one just hurts you and says nothing at all.

by Anonymous 1 year ago

Physical abuse and emotional abuse often go hand in hand. It's easier to recognise that you're being abused when it's physical, but emotional abuse is harder to recognise and that's what makes it harder to heal. You don't even realise you were emotionally abused, and yet you have all these problems and trauma responses.

by Anonymous 1 year ago

Only those of us that have been through it truly understand! I have ptsd bc of this

by Anonymous 1 year ago

I was in a much, much darker place when I was being physically abused vs. emotionally abused. I think I deal with more issues from that then from the emotional abuse. That being said, I'm not going to say one is worse than the other. It's personal for everyone who experiences it.

by Anonymous 1 year ago

I was physically and emotionally abused. Spent many years flinching if people even raised their hands, and likewise their voices. I think for me, the emotional (or more specifically, verbal, as physical abuse does cause emotional trauma as well) abuse was worse, because the physical abuse was awful but never severe enough to leave marks or cause lasting physical damage. In many ways, the physical abuse was easier to endure and overcome. But I think it largely depends on the individual person, the situation, how strong or fragile they might be, how hard it is for them to overcome the form of abuse they faced, etc... I think there's just far too many factors that it can't boil down to just one vs the other.

by Anonymous 1 year ago

On what basis have you come to this conclusion? No one has an emotionally healthy relationship with a person who physically abuses them. Physical abuse includes emotional abuse. One is not worse than the other. What determines long term consequences on the victim is their mental constitution and protective factors such as support network and relief they're able to seek in-between the abuse.

by Anonymous 1 year ago

Though I myself was fortunately never abused, I definitely think it can be. I think a part of why emotional abuse can be so insidiously damaging is because it's a lot harder for the victim (and outsiders as well) to fully understand and recount what's going on. If you tell someone else that your parent or partner continually punches you in the face, the other person (if they are a normal decent person) will most likely immediately understand that you're being abused. Having a parent or partner who constantly emotionally invalidates you is a lot harder to explain to yourself or others. It changes your self-perception. You question whether or not the abuse was real and worry that you're just being too sensitive/ overreacting/playing the victim, etc. I think emotional abuse is often the most common form of abuse as well, which can make it harder to recognize also due to prevalence. I'm glad that people are recognizing emotional abuse to a greater extent now. I do think, however, that different types of abuse victims require different types of support. My boyfriend is a survivor of very severe physical/emotional/sexual abuse, and he was put into support group therapy as a teenager for it among teenagers who'd suffered mainly emotional abuse and less severe physical abuse. He found he couldn't talk openly about his experiences because his peers would end up feeling invalidated/questioning whether they were actually abused after hearing his story. This was very harmful to him and hindered his ability to heal by making him feel he shouldn't open up at all. A lot of abuse victims, especially those who suffered mainly emotional abuse, will minimize their own experiences as "not that bad" in comparison. Many have also had the experience of their parent pointing to stories of extreme cases like my boyfriend's to deflect any questioning of their own abuse. I think a combination of all these dynamics working together can make it harder for victims of abuse of all types to heal.

by Anonymous 1 year ago

If you're being physically abused then you are 100 percent being emotionally abused unless you come out with amnesia and forgot the entire thing. Physical abuse can be a memory of what happened to you especially if it was really bad. Having the scars to remember your emotional abuse only makes it so much worse. Emotional abuse can be healed slowly. Physical wounds heal but they often never go away and will always be displayed for you.

by Anonymous 1 year ago

My dad beat my mom to death

by Anonymous 1 year ago

Bruises and cuts fade but words and put-downs ruin your self esteem and stick with you for life.

by Anonymous 1 year ago

This is true, mental tortue works more effectively than physical tortue.

by Anonymous 1 year ago

100%, at least in my case. It's like my mom said (who funny enough was the primary source of my abuse) "physical wounds may leave scars but they heal quick. Emotional wounds don't always heal".

by Anonymous 1 year ago

Maybe we shouldn't try to see wich type of abuse is worse? Abuse is abuse (Also physical abuse generally also comes with emotional abuse soooo)

by Anonymous 1 year ago

I disagree, because you can emotionally abuse someone without physically hurting them, but you can't physically abuse without also emotionally doing so.

by Anonymous 1 year ago

Have you been physically or emotionally abused

by Anonymous 1 year ago

Yes, but you don't want to start an either or.

by Anonymous 1 year ago

it's not a contest

by Anonymous 1 year ago

Is it a competition.

by Anonymous 1 year ago

stupid thing to argue. "my bad thing is worse than your bad thing"

by Anonymous 1 year ago

This is the weirdest opinion I've seen on here. Did you have a pissing contest with someone and came here to settle it?

by Anonymous 1 year ago

I'm going to assume you mean emotional trauma can be harder to recover from than physical trauma. There is some truth that. The body often does heal easier than the mind, if the injuries aren't too severe. But abuse is horrible. There is no worse form of abuse. That implies there is a better form of abuse, which is certainly not true. Abuse is bad because it's abuse, the healing required doesn't factor in.

by Anonymous 1 year ago

People should not dismiss emotional abuse of being any less impactful than the other types of abuse. But as everyone else has said, abuse varies and cannot be compared on the same level. They are different types, different levels, different scenarios and situations, different impacts, and different outcomes.

by Anonymous 1 year ago

I've survived emotional abuse. But to me any kind of abuse is just the same: abuse. Regardless whether that's physical, mental/emotional, etc. What's "survivable" to me might be so deeply traumatizing to others, so I can't just go comparing the depth of my trauma with that of others.

by Anonymous 1 year ago

Said the person who has never repeatedly had the piss beat out of them lol

by Anonymous 1 year ago

On the one hand side I'd agree with you, however, it is mostly impossible to abuse someone physically without abusing them emotionally as well. It is possible to abuse someone emotionally without physical abuse. Check up on studies of girls getting into a 'fight' with each other and boys with each other. Not long term bullying, since that is emotional abuse often culminating in physical abuse. But if girls get into a fight, they will talk trash behind your back for a very long time. Boys will start a physical fight and afterwards will either see the stupidity of it and play together again, or just go separate ways.

by Anonymous 1 year ago

i'd rather be physically abused than emotionally abused

by Anonymous 1 year ago