Coercive Control

For many of us, the subject of family is a loaded one. I’m sure I’m not the only one whose blood family is large and diverse, and not everyone in a large family gets along. It’s fine not to get along with everyone, but it is dangerous to think you still have to associate with everyone regardless of how they treat you or what it costs to be “loyal.”

The difficulty of setting boundaries goes beyond the need to please others. It affects people from all walks of life, including those in addiction recovery, those re-entering society after incarceration, and survivors of toxic relationships.

My fight for mental health awareness is strongly tied to my fight against domestic violence because we do not wake up one morning and have an anxiety disorder, or a mood disorder that developed completely on its’ own without any help from our living situation. That, to me, is truly crazy.

The truth is that the people who are doing bad things are very good at it. We can’t be too hard on ourselves for “falling for it” because, frankly, they lied to us, and we didn’t find out until we were trapped. We get trapped emotionally, financially, and sometimes even physically. Statistics show that most victims of domestic violence end up going back to their abuser.