Hey!” The male voice sliced through the noise. Terri ignored him, determined to get back to the bar for her next order. A harsh hand gripped her arm, jerking her back into a firm chest. “I asked your name.” Hot breath reeking of stale beer permeated her sinuses, making her stomach turn, as the tenor of his voice burrowed into her ear. Fear gripped her. Memories of the way Randy would grab her, and where it always ended, slammed into her, making her head spin. Shaking it off, Terri narrowed her eyes and whirled around, jabbing a red lacquered nail into his powder blue polo. “Back off,” she warned, snatching her arm back. He advanced on her, his large frame towering over her. “Just want to know your name, sweetheart,” he said with a sleazy smile. “No need to get testy.”“You haven’t seen me testy.” As she turned her back on him and continued on her way, he called out to her. “Yet.” Terri--from Spring Cleaning--Coming Summer 2012

— Brandi Salazar

I am done looking for love where it doesn’t exist. I am done coughing up dust in attempts to drink from dry wells.

— Maggie Georgiana Young

I am often asked whether physical aggression by women toward men, such as a slap in the face, is abuse. The answer is: “It depends.” Men typically experience women’s shoves or slaps as annoying and infuriating rather than intimidating, so the long-term emotional effects are less damaging. It is rare to find a man who has gradually lost his freedom or self-esteem because of a woman’s aggressiveness.

— Lundy Bancroft

I'd lost myself in the abyss of someone else's tyranny...again.

— Cassandra Giovanni

I dreamt I crawled on top of you and kissed your hips, one at a time, my lips a smolder. I straddled your waist and pressed both shaking hands against your torso. Spongy, like an old tree on the forest floor. I push and your flesh sinks inwardly, collapsing with decay, a soft shushing sound. A yawning hole where your organs should be. Maggots used to live here until your own poison killed them off. I laid my cheek into the loam and three little mushrooms brushed over my eyelid. Peat, decomposing matter, all of it, whatever you wish to call it, rested in the cavity of your chest. And there I planted seeds in the hopes something good would come out of you.

— Taylor Rhodes

If you walked away from atomic, negative, abusive, one-sided, dead-end low vibrational relationship or friendship — you won.

— Lalah Delia

I have sometimes said to a client: “If you are so in touch with your feelings from your abusive childhood, then you should know what abuse feels like. You should be able to remember how miserable it was to be cut down to nothing, to be put in fear, to be told that the abuse is your own fault. You should be less likely to abuse a woman, not more so, from having been through it.” Once I make this point, he generally stops mentioning his terrible childhood; he only wants to draw attention to it if it’s an excuse to stay the same, not if it’s a reason to change.

— Lundy Bancroft

I'm Used To, Being Used, Not Abused.

— Syed Sharukh

In a healthy relationship, vulnerability is wonderful. It leads to increased intimacy and closer bonds. When a healthy person realizes that he or she hurt you, they feel remorse and they make amends. It’s safe to be honest. In an abusive system, vulnerability is dangerous. It’s considered a weakness, which acts as an invitation for more mistreatment. Abusive people feel a surge of power when they discover a weakness. They exploit it, using it to gain more power. Crying or complaining confirms that they’ve poked you in the right spot.

— Christina Enevoldsen

IN ONE IMPORTANT WAY, an abusive man works like a magician: His tricks largely rely on getting you to look off in the wrong direction, distracting your attention so that you won’t notice where the real action is. He draws you into focusing on the turbulent world of his feelings to keep your eyes turned away from the true cause of his abusiveness, which lies in how he thinks. He leads you into a convoluted maze, making your relationship with him a labyrinth of twists and turns. Furthermore, he wants you to puzzle over him, to try to figure him out, as though he were a wonderful but broken machine for which you need only to find and fix the malfunctioning parts to bring it roaring to its full potential. His desire, though he may not admit it even to himself, is that you rack your brain in this way so that you won’t notice the patterns and logic of his behavior, the consciousness behind the craziness.

— Lundy Bancroft