I have a PSA for everyone:
Verbal abuse is abuse.
I am tired of people not understanding that. Just because you don't get beat doesn't mean you can't have scars that will stick with you for the rest of your fucking life. As someone who has has been verbally abused my entire life, I can tell you exactly what it has done to me. I have a terrible self-esteem. You may say, "Well, so does everyone else. You're a teenager. Get over it." And to that I say, "Fuck off." If you don't know what it's like, then I can't explain it to you. You'll never understand. Granted, no matter how much of an asshole you are about it, I'll be glad if you never have to go through it. I wouldn't wish this upon anyone, regardless of how much I hated them.
It gets inside your head, makes you think that you are the problem. You always see the cases where an abuse victim tries to protect their abuser. It's not because of loyalty of because they're are weak, or any of the other bullshit they pass it off as. It's because we actually see ourselves as the problem. If we didn't do x, then we wouldn't be yelled at, threatened, insulted, controlled, blamed, etc.
I understand that this reaction is not logical, but feelings are not always logical.
But the most illogical thing of all is the fact that people think verbal abuse is okay and not harmful. It's not okay, and it's incredibly harmful.
