Emotional Abuse

            Train a child in the way he should go, .
             And when he is old he will not turn from it.
            
             When you think of emotional abuse most people think of parents that make fun or call their children names, but that's not all of it. Emotional abuse can be anything that hinders a child's growth, such as a parent that fails to show love or affection towards his or her child on a regular basis; and I feel that, that is a sin in God's eyes.
             In comparison to other forms of abuse, the effects of Emotional Abuse have only recently been recognized. Emotional abuse is a pattern of behavior that attacks a child's emotional development and sense of self-worth. Emotional abuse includes excessive, aggressive or unreasonable demands that place expectations on a child, adolescent, or adult beyond his or her capacity. Constant criticizing, belittling, insulting, rejecting, and teasing are some of the forms these verbal attacks can take. Emotional abuse also includes failure to provide the psychological nurturing necessary for a child's psychological growth and development-providing no love, support or guidance. (National Committee for the Prevention of Child Abuse, 1987) Some reasons why emotional abuse has been difficult to research in the past is there are no consistent definitions and it's hard to define. Also it is difficult to detect, assess and substantiate and many cases of emotional abuse go unreported. Of the cases that have been reported, tests have .
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             found that of one thousand women, fifteen years of age and over: Thirty-six percent had experienced emotional abuse while growing up; Forty-three percent had experienced some form of abuse as children or teenagers; and thirty-nine percent reported experiencing verbal/emotional abuse in a relationship within the last five years. (Source number one).
             At the present time they have reported five different types of emotional abuse. The first is Rejecting, where parents give their children the feeling that they are un-wanted, that they are to always be the scapegoat, and no relationship or affection is shown towards the child.