You may know someone who lives with an abusive partner. You may have wondered why these two people stay with each other if their bond brings pain and misery.

Here are the most common reasons:

Too much has been invested in the relationship
The longer you stay in an abusive relationship, the more attached you become to your abuser. The problem with most of such unhappy couples is that the person who is being abused tends to think he or she is the one to be blamed for everything. Then they start trying to improve the situation in a whole variety of different ways. They invest their time, emotions, feelings and even finance to correct it all. When you have invested a lot, then you are not willing to give it all up or admit that your sacrifice was useless. You invest even more which leads to stronger attachment and leaving the abuser seems to be too difficult.

You’re stuck
You may feel stuck if you live with an abuser. The situation is even more serious if you are a family with children whom you love and take care of. You cannot leave each other since, which is very likely, the abusive partner will try to blackmail you trying to keep the kids and not let you take them from him or meet with them. Another issue may be your family budget and the money you live on. If you depend on your partner’s income, then you may have nowhere to go and nowhere to stay.