Helping a Friend in an Abusive Relationship

Most of us at one time or another have a friend that we talk to just about every day. Men and women alike usually come across that one special friend that you like to keep in your life forever. Well, what do you do when one day your friend falls in love with someone who you consider to be a bad and/or harmful person? Do you keep your mouth shut or do you voice your opinion and risk losing your wonderful and special friendship forever?

First lets consider both of these options and throw out some examples. Your friend calls you one day and is full of excitement. You are dying to find out what is going on and he/she proceeds to tell you that they have met the most wonderful person! For most of us the reaction is complete happiness for our friend. So your friend proceeds to tell you all about the special person that (We will use the name Sharon in these examples) has met. First Sharon explains how they look and they tell you how special this person is making them feel. So everything is great.

Then one day Sharon calls you just like any other day and tells you that she has gotten into an argument with that special someone that they found. She proceeds to tell you that the argument was over the silliest thing, it was over something she said about that special persons family. Your friend accidentally stepped over a boundary that was not known to her. She has made the mistake of saying something negative about a close family member of the new person in her life. For you, hearing this would probably be a red flag. Especially if it was something minor. To your friend, who is actually in the relationship...she doesn't understand what she has done wrong and cannot just get over the feeling that she has just really messed up. So she tries to correct the wrong by basically bending over backwards for this person. Of course as she explains to you later, nothing is working and this person is still upset with her and punishing her in different ways.