Hello my friends,

As Many of you Know I have created a Kathy Hamilton Foundation for at Risk Youths.

Kids who suffer or has suffered Domestic Violence.

It is in a Pilot Program right now at the High school.its so far been great.

Any way September is "Domestic Violence" Month

DM comes in all forms, Try to do something great for some one today.

Hello my friends,

This is an article for all of my parents. It is for the Domestic Violence. In an attempt to bring more attention to Domestic Violence Awareness Month going on for the month of October coming up. This has honestly been the most gut wrenching article I have ever read, If you are being emotionally, verbally or psychologically abused I hope that you will find help. If you know someone who is being abused and are looking for help for them I am sure you will find wonderful resources through this event.

Emotional abuse is one type of abuse that can truly scar your mind and soul forever if you allow it too. It is the one abuse that leaves all of its scars on the inside where they are not visible to the people around you. If you are physically abused or sexually abused the physical hurts heal. The emotional abuse that you endure from these abuses are what is left behind to deal with. I hope that you will find helpful resources from the links that I am including for this article.

Emotional abuse comes in many different forms. It can be subtle and hard for others to see. It is a systematic way for an abuser to control their victim. Verbal/Emotional abuse can be both passive and active. Passive abuse would be along the lines of neglect or intentionally withholding love and affection or praise for things that are well done. Active abuse is deliberate humiliation and belittling to hurt feelings and destroy self-worth and self-respect . Either form is just as horrendous. It can also be constant or occasional. It doesn't matter if it is occasional it is still abuse.

If you are being emotionally abused but think you are doing a good job of hiding it from your kids, think again. If your children are very young they may not understand what is actually going on, but as they grow they will eventually know what emotional abuse is. They will live it too. They will eventually suffer from this abuse even if they are not direct recipients of it. It appears that emotional abusers will often begin to abuse their own children at some point. The scars of a child who has been emotionally abused are long suffering and can lead to permanant imparement. If you are living with a spouse or intimate partner who is systematically breaking you down by emotional abuse, your children will be affected. The potential for scars on your children's lives is incredibly high. Emotional abuse prepares and conditions a child to expect abuse in their adult lives. This can lead to physical abuse, sexual abuse, emotional and verbal abuse for your child as an adult and has just as much potential to lead to the same for their children. Emotional abuse if often a repeated behavior.
Please, if you feel that you or someone you care about might be a victim of emotional abuse but you are not sure, check this list. At this site you will also find other information that is helpful.

If you assume that you are not being abused because your partner has never actually hit you then you are wrong. If you are being constantly belittled, called bad names, if you cannot express your feelings or things that are bothering you, if you feel obligated to have sex, and your relationship swings wildly between euphoric and hellish, and most importantly if you are afraid of your partner, then you ARE being abused. Are you made to feel that everything that goes wrong in your partner's life is your fault and your responsibility to fix? This a co-dependant lifestyle indicative of emotional abuse. Emotional abuse is designed to make the victim feel tremendous guilt, feelings of powerlessness, fear and dependancy. It is a repetitive behavior that uses those feelings to destroy any self-worth and self-respect. These are the very feelings that will lead a victim into believing that there is no way out or no way to make their life better. It is also an easy abuse to imitate which leads me back to the point of our children. They will be affected one way or another.

If you feel you must stay in this relationship and survive with your mind, heart and soul intact you will need to learn how to cope. This is not an easy task. You will need to create a web of support. Most likely that web will have to remain somewhat of a secret. If you tell your partner that you have a support system they may go to great lengths to dissolve that support system. They will most likely belittle you for needing the system in the first place. They may begin to control your finances with a tight reign in order to control where you go and when. They may even try to alienate you from any friend or family member they perceive as a threat to their control over you. A support system will be viewed as a threat, thus the reason for keeping it secretive. I am not saying that you should not tell your partner where your going or who you are talking to, just be prepared for an interogation. Have your answers ready and do not allow yourself to be involved in a railroaded conversation where your words will be turned on you. Keep your explanations simple and do not lie. For example, if you are talking with your friend Jane on the phone and you talk about the weather somewhere in the conversation you can tell your partner you were talking about the weather. I know it may not seem like it is right but you must have some support somewhere. If you do not have some place that you can lay out your feelings and discuss them they will eventually lead to physical symptoms.

Kathy Hamilton/simikathy.com

lazzeosangel@yahoo.com

253 277 1238

Kathy,

Thanks for all your good efforts.  There is definitely a need for promoting DV.  Even here in our little town the paper is full of reports of domestic 'disturbance', sometimes it is wife abuse, more often than not, child abuse and very disturbing.  A grandmother was keeping her 5 year old granddaughter but the courts awarded custody back to her parents who were abusing her.  They allegedly have sex parties with drugs and the 5 yr. old is exposed to all of it and made to participate.  Very sad and she was crying when they made her go back.  We have been praying and hope for help for her soon.

Hello Kathy

   I truly admire your effort to bring more attention to the tragedy of domestic violence. There needs to be much more awareness brought to this terrible tragedy in American Life and around the world.

  Several years ago I chaired a mental health discussion group under the auspices of a wonderful Dr named Allan Sommers. The way we had it set up was for him to refer his patients that were being discharged from the local psychiatric center, to me. I would invite them into our group and try to help them continue the healing process that Dr Smmers had begun in the hospital. 95% of our members  wwere women and 99% of them had been seriously abused. Physical, mental and emotional abuse became very hard to differentiate between. The results were devasting no matter the type of abuse.

   There were women who had lived in abusive relationships for years and years and never dreamed that there actually was a way out of it all. I watched as women came through our doors with broken bones, cuts, bruises, scars and even a missing eye, with tears still in their eyes and fear in their hearts. On the outside I smiled but on the inside it felt as if my heart were being ripped right out of my body. Every time I thought I had seen the very worst, another woman would pass through those doors and reaasure me that I had seen nothing yet and, these were the survivors. I could not bare  to think of those who never made it to our meetings or even to the hospital.

  So Kathy, I commend you on this work you are doing and I hope that this forum will get the attention of every member of this entire community. I will be an active member of this project here and I am very happy to find others who are as concerned about these matters as I am. As you know from having been to my mental health forums, I believe that our message should be one of HOPE. To those who are now suffering at the hands of an abuser, my message is this. You are not alone anymore and there is hope. There is a way out and there are many people who care enough about you to want to help you find your way.

Thank you sara,

Your a very amazing woman.

Kathy