When emotional battering is covert, each moment looks harmless on its own. A comment, joke, or a nice” surprise might seem harmless. But when you step back and look at the pattern, a very different story emerges, one where boundaries are crossed, and her reactions are used as evidence against her. SEVEN SIGNS OF EMOTIONAL BATTERING Here are seven signs of emotional battering that often go unnoticed, especially when the husband looks like a great guy to everyone else. Her reactions don’t match his gestures. He is doing something that seems nice, but she seems genuinely distressed. It usually means she senses something that other people can’t. If she seems on edge around his kindness. She flinches at affection or looks uneasy when he is charming, it’s usually because she knows that kindness is hiding something that isn’t so kind. If she watches him carefully, she’s probably gauging risk. Hyperawareness is an emotional survival skill. So if she’s being emotionally battered, it’s totally normal that she’s gonna be on high alert for emotional manipulation. Feeling relief when you are away from him is a powerful indicator that something’s really wrong in your marriage. She apologizes for things that don’t require an apology. If she’s apologizing for just stating her opinion, or talking about how she feels, it’s highly likely that she’s experiencing emotional battering. She adjusts herself to constantly keep the peace. His lies that she’s doing something wrong are part of the emotional battering. Her friends notice that she’s not quite herself around him. A woman who’s trying to make herself smaller is not loved in marriage. If she seems quieter or less alive in his presence, that’s a sign that her husband is emotionally battering her. To learn if you are a victim of emotional battering, take this free emotional abuse quiz. WHAT IS EMOTIONAL BATTERING? Emotional battering is a consistent pattern of words, actions, or behaviors intended to manipulate, or control a person. Unlike physical abuse, emotional battering is more subtle and insidious, making it difficult to identify and even harder to explain to others. Worse, an abuser may manipulate others, so you experience emotional battering from people in your church congregation or even neighbors. If you’re experiencing emotional battering from by-standers regarding your husband’s behavior, you need support. Attend a Betrayal Trauma Recovery Group Session TODAY. COMMON EMOTIONAL BATTERING TACTICS Being married and experiencing emotional battering by your husband means navigating daily complexities that are draining and painful. Some common tactics include: Gaslighting: Making you question your memory, reality, or perceptions. For example, he may say, “I never said that,” even when you vividly remember he did. Constant Criticism: Regularly pointing out flaws, whether it’s your cooking, appearance, or parenting, to damage your confidence. Blame Shifting: Over time, you may find yourself thinking, my husband says I’m the problem, because he consistently redirects accountability onto you instead of addressing his own actions. Stonewalling or Silent Treatment: Refusing to engage in meaningful conversations, leaving you feeling invalidated and powerless. Public Embarrassment: Mocking or undermining you in front of friends or family to isolate you and damage your self-esteem. Emotional Withholding: Withholding affection, love, or support to punish or control you. TRANSCRIPT: EMOTIONAL BATTERING – THE INVISIBLE ABUSE NO ONE CAN SEE Anne: I have a member of our community on today’s episode. We’re gonna call her Kiki. Welcome, Kiki. Kiki: Thank you very much. I’m excited to be here. First of all, I wanna thank BTR, because when I was in the middle of a complete breakdown, not understanding what was happening to me, it was only through finding your organization and the help of your team that made me realize that I wasn’t safe. The abuse was so covert that most people couldn’t have recognized it, myself included. I had therapists that didn’t recognize it as emotional battering. And that started a journey into figuring out exactly what had happened to me. And what had happened to my friend. I came home from work one night, and there were police vehicles all over the place. We were told she had shot herself in her husband’s car. And she would tell us a lot of times these stories, and we would look at her like. She’s crazy or she’s making things up because her husband was such a great guy. As I started going through my own stories and learning things after her death, but I was thinking about it the other day, like, you look at the Diddy trial or you look at women who come in and they’re battered. And they still have a hard time being believed. And then you take somebody who has been covertly abused or live in a society where, if your wife isn’t pretty enough or what have you, then she’s replaceable and it’s okay. PEOPLE HAVE A HARD TIME BELIEVING THERE IS EMOTIONAL BATTERING Kiki: People have a hard time believing there was abuse involved, but I left a 35 year marriage with severe CPTSD. I had a psychotic break, and I had to put myself back together. And during all of it, my ex-husband is the hero. My kids aren’t talking to me because I had some big breakdowns and did some things I’m not proud of. And that was like my friend’s story, she would have these breakdowns. You could be just as abused with a fist as you can with a piece of birthday cake. And I know that sounds silly. But it’s so covert, that people can’t see it as emotional battering. And BTR and the women and the professionals that came on here really gave me that push to step into it. Anne: Talk to me about the things your friend did that were totally normal under the circumstances. Like now that you know what you were looking at. So that we can let women who are listening know they’re not alone. If they’ve done something like this, it’s because they were trying to protect themselves. It’s completely and totally normal, and even healthy, when you’re in the situation to try to get to safety in any way that you can. Kiki: Oh, absolutely. There are several things that come up right away. The first one was we always had holiday parties at their house. They had a beautiful pool and her husband said something that seemed very innocuous and she started yelling. You promised me you wouldn’t say that you wouldn’t do this. ABUSE BY THROWING A SURPRISE PARTY Kiki: And she kind of goes off the rails a little bit, and we’re all sitting there looking at her like, what is going on right now? And so I immediately go into my people pleasing it’s okay to… and she’s yelling at me, “No, you don’t understand. You don’t understand what he does. I told him not to do this. He told me he wouldn’t do it. To you it seems innocent, but it’s not innocent.” And everybody’s looking at her. I get her away, and then I get her calmed down. And I go back and her husband is playing the victim. “Oh, poor me, you see, she’s bipolar. She always does this. This is what I have to live with.” And I feel so bad, because at the time, I didn’t realize I was going through it myself. You don’t realize it until after you’re out of it. Another thing, he was just very manipulative. For her 40th birthday, he threw her this amazing party, and everybody was in awe and completely jealous. And she was not happy about it. She told me afterwards, “I told him, I don’t like things like this. And it was just too much. It was way over the top.” And of course, I’m looking at her like I would give my left arm if my husband would throw me a party like this. Of course, he wouldn’t, because he knew I wanted one. Yeah, so there’s the difference. If you want it, you don’t get it. If you don’t want it, you get it. Then every year after that, he would throw her a surprise party and he would go out of his way to get people there, and she would walk in the room. MAKING HER LOOK UNGRATEFUL, UNKIND AND UNCARING Kiki: And we would all yell, surprise, and she would be devastated. then she’d try to put a smile on her face, and she was dying inside. Because how do you walk into the public where your husband has done this beautiful thing for you, but it’s exactly what you’ve asked him not to do? By year seven, she just kind of walked in, and then just went off in the corner and drank too much. She didn’t want a dog, but her son wanted a dog. So on her birthday, he bought her a designer dog and invited several friends to see her get the dog. Now she loved the dog with all her heart, but it was that manipulation tactic to say. Look at what a great husband I am. Here’s this $1,500 dog and you don’t get to complain about it. Anne: Correct me if I’m wrong. But he had effectively made her look ungrateful, unkind, uncaring. Which is exactly what he wanted. Kiki: Exactly. He was a very charming, gracious host, and the door was always open. I lived next door to them. And she could be reactive at times. And I would hear him talking to his son on the side of the house, and he would be saying. Just be quiet. I’ll help you out. You know how your mother is, you know how your mother gets, so he’s completely not supporting her. The biggest thing: the woman who he had a long-term affair with, they ended up getting married and they had a destination wedding. Anne: Did you know about the affair before she died ? Kiki: I did know about it and she knew about it. She was always concerned about it because her husband had told her it was over. ALWAYS PITTING EVERYBODY AGAINST ONE ANOTHER Kiki: But she would get these, Facebook or emails from an email she had never heard of before or a fake name, nobody she knew. That would say, your husband doesn’t love you. At one point, her husband even admitted it was fro
