26 Things You Do As An Adult When You’ve Experienced Childhood Emotional Abuse - Page 2 of 3

When growing up, the raising that we receive has much to do with our coping skills as an adult. And I have noticed that I, and other victims of emotional abuse, have certain behaviors that separate us from the rest. If you, or someone you know was a victim of abuse, then you may want to read through these. Just being able to understand where another person is coming from, or understanding yourself better, can make all the difference. 1. Asking Questions Even When You Know the Answer If you have ever been berated, you may doubt yourself, even when you know you are right. Due to this, you may find that you ask a million questions. 2. Constantly Saying “Sorry” Children of abuse may feel as though they were never able to do anything right. In turn, they always apologize, even when they didn’t do any wrong. 3. Second Guessing Everything When you have lived in the chaotic world of emotional abuse, you never truly believe in anything. Instead, you may always be in fear of something bad happening. 4. You Are Tough, But Also Very Sensitive During a hard childhood, you learn to be tough, because you have to be. However, you also experience a number of emotions at a young age, causing you to be especially sensitive to your own emotions as well as others. 5. You Are Indecisive It’s harder to make decisions if you spent your childhood hearing that you weren’t good enough. 6. You Are Self-Disciplined In order to combat a parent or caregiver that constantly was searching for what you hadn’t done, or had done wrong, you may become a perfectionist. You are timely, clean, and organized. Many victims of abuse learn to over-do because they want to people please. 7. You May Be Sensitive to Loud Noises If you have been raised in fear, you may be used to being yelled at, and associate loud noises with abuse. 8. Victims of Emotional Abuse Can Be Introverted So many victims of abuse may be afraid of contact with people, and can sometimes try to distance themselves as much as possible. 9. You Have a Defensive Nature You may perceive people as negative or offensive because of your previous abuse. 10. Having Attachment Issues You may find that when you fear others leaving you, or abandoning you. 11. Issues With Eye Contact When speaking, you may become anxious to the point that you can’t even make eye contact with the person you are speaking with. 12. Running Away From Conflict Rather than face conflict, which gives you immense anxiety, it feels easier to just leave the situation entirely. 13. Constantly Beating Yourself Up After being abused, you may be used to some sort of repercussion for wrong doings. In turn, you may constantly bash yourself. 14. Having Issues Getting Close to Others If you have been abused, you may not especially like people. Due to this, getting close to others isn’t something you take lightly. 15. You Are Quiet You may not feel as though you have a voice after you have been made to feel so small and errant your whole life. 16. You Can’t Take a Compliment When someone tells you how wonderful you are, you may doubt their words, because you can’t see yourself as good. 17. You Have Low Self-Esteem 18. You Don’t Feel Valid No matter what you do, you doubt that you are capable of doing it. 19. You Are Always Nervous Everything worries you and makes you nervous. Even the slightest sign of trouble, you may even feel overwhelmed. 20. You Are Angry Underneath it all, you are angry. Your whole life you sat back and watched an angry person treat you terribly, and in turn, you may have outbursts of anger. 21. Self-Harming Behaviors Many abused children will abuse themselves. They feel as though they deserve it, and oftentimes these behaviors follow you into adulthood. 22. Constant Mood Swings Living with a toxic abuser can cause you to have a plethora of emotions come at you at random times. This could be due to the abused person being so used to a number of emotions and hardships. It is just how some people cope. 23. Living In Auto-Pilot You may notice that you sometimes blank out entire conversations or events, because you simply weren’t present. And its not because you didn’t want to be present, you just disassociated from the situation. 24. Commitment Issues Committing to people is harder when you have been hurt. You may not be able to trust others enough to settle with them. 25. You Have Addiction Issues According to scientists and psychologists, victims of emotional abuse often cope through addictions. These can include hard drugs, alcohol, stealing, gambling, eating, etc. 26. You Are Humble Despite it all, when you do have something good in your life, you appreciate it. And you are humbled by your past to some extent. Not that it was a good thing, but it didn’t change you into a bad person. Instead, you are stronger, grateful and a survivor.

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