PSA: Mutual abuse is a myth made to keep survivors from leaving.
I was lied to, intimidated, yelled at, my life got put in danger, my safety and well-being got compromised. I got yelled at, dismissed, walked out on, and gaslit when I addressed any of it. https://www.thehotline.org/2016/01/25/myth-of-mutual-abuse/

I got tired. I snapped. I yelled back. I started grasping at straws to keep myself a bit safer--to make my perpetrator be less abusive to me if only he stopped exposing himself to triggering people and substances. These last resort attempts got painted as 'controlling'.

I got physically aggressive in response after being intimidated physically myself. I got grabbed and then violently hit out of the door + with large objects over and over--my fist swung instinctively from being hit; I pulled back last minute. He gaslit me, "I never hit you".

I hated myself and these responses coming out of me. I questioned everything for a while, especially from the gaslighting.
I know better now.
Intimate partner abuse is not an incident--it's an established dynamic.

The myth of mutual battering is particularly stereotyped and damaging to queer relationships.
Just because you fought back, acted out, screamed and yelled to finally be heard without being gaslit--doesn't make you the abuser. It makes you a self-respecting human.

What I know is I, or nobody else, should have to be these people who have to turn to our survival instincts with our 'loved ones'. We deserve to never have to be abused in the first place. We deserve so, so much better.
#EndDomesticViolence #EndIPV #FuckAbuse