HRI Blog

When helping someone you care about who’s in an abusive relationship, it’s important to know, honor, and protect your own limits–including your emotions, knowledge, and physical safety. In today’s post, we will explore each of these and suggest strategies for times when you reach your limits.

Taking Care of Your Emotions

Abusive relationships can be emotionally exhausting for everyone involved, including friends and family members who offer their help and support. First and foremost, knowing that someone you care about is being hurt can be very sad. You care for them, and so of course you want to see them happy and being treated with love. In addition to sadness, you may be scared for their safety. Maybe you’ve seen what their abusive partner has done to them in the past, and you’re afraid that it could be that bad–or worse–again.

Confusion can be another powerful emotion when you’re trying to help someone involved in an abusive relationship. Your confusion may stem from difficulty understanding how the abusive partner can be so hurtful, why your friend is staying in the relationship, or what your role in the situation should be.

In light of all the emotions that can arise when helping a loved one who is being abused, you should think not only about their emotional needs, but your needs as well. Don’t hesitate to reach out for help to manage your own emotions related to the situation. You can benefit from talking with a friend, family member, or even a professional counselor. It is also important to engage in self-care as another way to help you manage the stress and emotions you may be experiencing. For example, you may benefit from getting physical exercise, practicing yoga or meditation, journaling, or drawing upon your religious or spiritual beliefs to help you cope.

Many people who want to help a friend who’s being abused face a risk of burnout, as the process of ending an abusive relationship and getting safe can be long and tumultuous. Therefore, in order to best support your friend in the long-term, it’s important to make sure you’re also taking good care of yourself in the process.

Recognizing the Limits of Your Knowledge

Unless you’re professionally trained to help people who are being abused or you’ve had some other form of training or experiences to help you understand the dynamics of abuse, it’s likely that there are important pieces of information that you don’t yet know that would help you best to support your friend. And, honestly, you’re not alone! Even many professionals who work with victims every day encounter situations in which there are no clear answers as to what actions are best to take to help the person be safe. The truth is, when it comes to abusive relationships, there are very few easy decisions to make!

Rest assured–there is help available for you to know how to help your friend! You can call the National Domestic Violence Hotline (1-800-799-7233; TTY: 1-800-787-3224),  The Guilford County Family Justice Center (336-641-SAFE (7233)), or your local domestic violence program to ask for assistance in knowing what steps you can take to help your friend. Most likely, you’ll be able to receive confidential help and ask for advice without disclosing your friend’s name. You may or may not even tell your friend that you called, depending on the nature of the situation.

If you feel that your friend needs help beyond what you can offer, you can help them to locate services and resources in their local community. If you don’t already know which community resources are available, you can contact your state domestic violence coalition to ask for their assistance. If ever there is an immediate danger, call 9-1-1 or the local emergency hotline to connect with emergency responders.

In addition to all of the challenges that your friend is facing in the abusive relationship, navigating community service agencies can be overwhelming and frustrating. Therefore, one of the critical ways you can help them is by supporting them as they navigate these systems and learning about other resources available to promote their safety.

Maintaining Your Physical Safety

Violence in an abusive relationship can spill over to other people, so it’s important to take steps to promote your own safety if you’re helping a friend who’s involved in an abusive relationship. Ask your friend if they know if their abuser has ever made threats to hurt other people. In addition, ask if they know if their abuser has access to weapons, especially firearms. Be sure to consider your own safety when you consider ways to help your friend.

For example, your friend may need a place to stay after leaving the relationship. When deciding whether to do this, be sure to consider if this will be a safety risk for you and anyone else who lives in the house. Be especially cautious if the abuser has threatened to hurt you, if they’re stalking or following your friend, and/or if they have access to lethal weapons. If you think that housing your friend would pose too great a safety risk, then you can help them to locate other sources of safe shelter, such as a domestic violence shelter, a hotel room, or another friend or family member who lives somewhere unknown to the abuser. Use similar precautions for any other action that could potentially put you in harm’s way.

When safety threats are imminent, we urge you to report them to law enforcement, and please use extreme caution before involving yourself in any situation that may pose a risk to your own physical safety. Again, you can reach out for support to your local law enforcement agency and/or a local or national domestic violence hotline in order to think through how best to protect your own safety while helping your friend.

When helping a friend who is being abused, it’s important to know your limits and protect your own emotional and physical safety. When you reach your own limits, know where you can turn for additional help, information, and support. Remember the old adage: “You can’t help others until you help yourself.” You’ll be in the best position to help your friend if you come to the process from a calm, strong place. Self-care is an essential component of being able to help others.

This information has been adapted from materials in the How to Help a Friend Collection from See the Triumph. Visit See the Triumph at www.seethetriumph.org for more information.

Although it may sound simple, if you’re trying to figure out how to help someone in an abusive relationship, just ask them what they need. By asking them what types of help and support they can use from you, you are empowering them to make their own decisions and take control of this one aspect of their life. However, once you decide to reach out and ask them what they need, it is important to be prepared: their answer may surprise you, and it may not be the kind of help that you think they need.

For example, you may think they need help leaving the relationship, whereas the help they ask for is for you to babysit their child while they go to a job interview. We encourage you to trust their judgment to know what kind of help they need in any given moment. You may not understand how the job interview is connected to their safety, but perhaps they’re seeking that job so that they’ll be better able to survive financially if they ever decide to leave.

Sometimes, you may ask how you can help, and the other person will say that they don’t need or want any help from you right now. This can be very frustrating to you, especially if your perspective is that they need a lot of help. If you find yourself wanting to force your help or advice on the person, resist this urge! A much more helpful approach is to let them know that you’ll be there for them if and when they ever do need your help. This leaves the door open for the person to seek your help at another time, and it also avoids disempowering the person by telling them what to do.

There are some situations where you may need to take some action to address an abusive relationship situation, even if the person you’re helping doesn’t want you to intervene. These may include the following:

• If it is a highly dangerous situation for anyone involved, and lives are at stake.
• If your own safety is at risk, such as if the abuser has threatened to harm you as well.
• If there are children, elderly adults, and/or adults with disabilities who are involved, and you are required to report the situation to Child or Adult Protective Services.

In these cases, you may need to report the abuse or take other protective actions to promote the safety of those involved. If you find yourself in a situation like one of these, we recommend that you consult with professionals (e.g., domestic violence service providers, law enforcement, social service professionals, and/or an attorney) in your local community – such as The Family Justice Center who can help guide you through the steps you need to take. These cases can be especially difficult to navigate, so draw upon your own support network to help you think through your decisions and actions.

Ultimately, the power of asking what kind of help the person needs lies in trusting their judgment, as well as honoring their choices and expertise to make choices for their own life. This empowerment approach is fundamental to the way that many domestic violence service agencies operate, and it’s useful to adopt in helping a friend as well. Asking how you can help may seem like a simple task, but it requires courage, patience, and compassion. By offering to help in a way that is most meaningful to them, you send a powerful message that their needs and decisions are important, and that help is available if and when they need it.

This information has been adapted from materials in the How to Help a Friend Collection from See the Triumph. Visit See the Triumph at www.seethetriumph.org for more information.

Just how different is the view from the outside, compared to the inside, of an abusive relationship?

From the outside looking into an abusive relationship, it can be tempting to judge a person who is staying with someone who is hurting them. However, from the outside, it’s nearly impossible to know the full story of how that person thinks and feels about their relationship, as well as their reasons for staying with their partner.

For this reason, our first suggested step to helping someone who is involved in an abusive relationship is to try your hardest to avoid judging that person and their decisions. We know that this can be extremely difficult, especially if you’re emotionally invested in the person who is being hurt. Not only can it make you feel confused because you don’t understand their reasons for staying, but also you may feel sad and scared, as you want that person to be safe and respected.

Someone who is being abused does not want the abuse to happen and did not do anything to “deserve” being treated that way.

Although some people who are being abused may not want their relationship to end, they always want the abuse to end. Always. People have diverse reasons for wanting to stay in a relationship, even when enduring relationship abuse, and we cannot fully understand or judge their decision. They may have children together, own a house together, and share a social circle. They may have good memories of happy times in their relationship, and find it hard to imagine their life without their partner. When we begin to fully appreciate the complexity of people’s lives, we can see that very rarely are there clear-cut, easy answers as to whether a significant intimate relationship should end or continue. Even when the answer seems simple, the steps required to end that relationship can be very, very difficult. In some cases, those steps are life-threatening.

Therefore, we suggest that the first step to helping a person who you know or suspect is being abused is to approach the situation and the person with a non-judgmental, supportive perspective and an open mind. Any judgment that the person perceives from you could lead them to turn away from you and view you as unhelpful, regardless of how positive and supportive your intentions may be.

Here are three statements you can make to remind yourself to remain non-judgmental:

* “I don’t know the whole story.”

* “I have no idea how I would respond if I was in this person’s exact same situation.”

* “I can best help this person by supporting them, not judging them.”

Although this is the first step we suggest, we know it may be one of the most difficult. However, it is also perhaps the most important step in being able to help and support someone who is being abused. By providing a supportive, nonjudgmental presence for that person, you can provide a powerful statement about how important it is to understand and honor their value as a person, as well as their unique perspective on their situation and relationship.

This information has been adapted from materials in the How to Help a Friend Collection from See the Triumph. Visit See the Triumph at www.seethetriumph.org for more information.

HRI views safety as the core foundation of happy and healthy relationships. Safe relationships are free from all forms of abuse, neglect, and any other threats to a person’s physical and emotional safety, well-being, and development. Sadly, many families in our communities are affected by domestic violence.

If you know someone in an unsafe, abusive relationship, you may be struggling with how to help and support them. It’s not easy to know what to do or how to best help a friend or family member who is facing domestic violence, but thankfully, there are many resources to help you reach out and start a conversation. Showing someone that you deeply care for them and are concerned for their happiness and well-being can go a long way in supporting them through a difficult situation. Some important things to consider are being open to what your friend or family member may need and becoming familiar with the local resources for individuals facing domestic violence in your community.

A couple of resources in Guilford County are:

1. The Guilford County Family Justice Center
2. Family Service of the Piedmont

In support of Domestic Violence Awareness Month, throughout the coming week, HRI will be providing five steps you can take to support and promote the safety of a friend or family member who is experiencing domestic violence.

We encourage you to review and save the “I’ll Be Ready” checklist from the See the Triumph below, so you have it in case you ever need it.