Surviving an Abusive Relationship

outer shell of heart exploding, revealing sunshine beneath

August 14, 2025

Hazelle Gramalis, Author & Mum, Writer, Therapist

Tom O'Connor, Publisher

Author Hazelle Gramalis is a writer, therapist, and mother to three sons. She is based in Falkirk, Scotland, UK, and holds a degree in psychology from the University of Stirling. 

People in an abusive relationship are at risk of developing mental health disorders such as depression, post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD), deliberate self-harm, even suicidal thoughts or behavior. 

As a writer, Hazelle is known for sharing personal reflections in real-time as she recovers from leaving a relationship that almost ended her life. She focuses on relationships, healing, and navigating complex dynamics, especially within family structures. She often discusses themes of narcissistic abuse, betrayal, gaslighting, and the process of reclaiming authenticity and boundaries. Her posts frequently emphasize the importance of self-trust, healing, and recognizing manipulative patterns.

Hazelle's writings on emotional manipulation cover several key aspects:

Gaslighting: She explains gaslighting as a subtle form of emotional manipulation that makes someone doubt their memory, perception, and even their sanity. She provides examples of phrases commonly used in gaslighting and outlines the most common signs of being gaslit.

Narcissistic Manipulation: Gramalis highlights how narcissists manipulate by using conditional love, expecting conformity, and invalidating emotions. She stresses that in a narcissistic family, healing is often forbidden because it threatens the established power dynamics and the narcissist's self-image.

Love-Bombing: She describes love-bombing as a tactic used in emotional manipulation, especially in the early stages of a relationship, where excessive flattery and promises are employed to build loyalty before revealing the true nature of the relationship.

Recognizing and Responding to Manipulation: Gramalis encourages people to identify manipulation by understanding that it is a deliberate pattern meant to destabilize and disempower, not just a communication issue. She emphasizes the importance of setting boundaries, trusting one's instinct, and seeking support when needed. Perception, and seeking clarity. She highlights the need for survivors to reclaim their peace and reminds them that they are not crazy and don't owe anyone continued confusion.

According to Hazelle Gramalis:

I gave everything to someone who said they loved me, and then he tried to erase me.

He thought he couldn't handle me. But what he really couldn't handle was the light he couldn't control. And he realized he couldn't dim it, so he twisted his story.

Made me the villain. Painted himself as a victim. But here's what he couldn't rewrite: My conscience is clean. I stayed kind. And I rose anyway.

Being in an Abusive Relationship 

I was in an abusive relationship. Being in an abusive relationship is one of the loneliest, most isolating places you can be. You feel like you're going crazy. You are in a war you did not sign up for or see coming. No one else sees it, no one gets it. You have to explain the unexplainable; the words always fall short. The confusion. The hope. The fear. The anger.

The way you question your reality.

Betrayal Doesn't Just Break Your Heart - It Breaks Your Mind

Betrayal doesn't just break your heart. It breaks your mind. It breaks your sense of safety. It breaks everything you thought was real.

When someone you loved, trusted, and invested your heart and hope in lies, cheats, manipulates, and gaslights, it leaves scars that go deeper than anyone can see. It leaves trauma that most don't talk about.

 PTSD - your body remembers the danger, even when you're safe. Your mind replays the moments, trying to make sense of the senseless. You flinch at shadows. You brace for blows that aren't coming.

 Intrusive thoughts - graphic images of the betrayal that hijack your mind.

Memories that ambush you at the quietest times. The "what ifs," the "was it my fault," the "how did I not see it."

 Depression - a grief so deep it swallows color, laughter, joy. The weight of all that was lost. The silence where love should have been. Your ability to care for your most basic needs leaves as your resources work to repair the damage in your brain.

 Suicidal ideation - not because you want to die, but because the pain feels unbearable. Because the betrayal shattered your ability to hope. Because nothing feels solid anymore. You feel desperate to escape.

Life Beyond Your Painful Wounds

The pain is real. The wounds are real. But they are not the end of your story. There is life beyond this. There is peace beyond this. There is joy beyond this. And you are stronger than you know. You can heal. You can rise. You can build again. And you don't have to do it alone.

If this is where you are, this space is for you—no explanations needed—just truth, solidarity, and light.

Missing what never really was. It's a strange, frustrating thing - missing the one who broke you. Not because you want the pain back. Not because you've forgotten what happened. But because your brain is wired for the familiar. Because your heart remembers the moments when it felt safe, even if that safety net was only temporary.

Grief is messy like that. Healing doesn't always look like clean lines and a lack of longing.

Sometimes it seems like missing what was meant to be, even if it never really was. And that's okay. It doesn't mean you're weak. It doesn't mean you're going backwards. It means you're human and that you loved.

The real work is in seeing the truth, feeling the ache, and choosing, again and again, not to go back to what broke you. Your heart will become familiar with something new. Your spirit will find home in peace, not in patterns. And one day soon, what you miss now will feel like a distant echo, and what you have will be worth every hard step forward. Keep walking. You're doing beautifully.

Shut the Harassment Door and Found Freedom

During May, I finally shut the door on the harassment—the emotional manipulation.

The threats. The stalking. The quiet torment behind the scenes. 

For a long time, I felt trapped in a cycle I didn't willingly choose-goaded, gaslit, and blamed. Every time I thought it was over, there'd be a new message. A new angle. A fresh attempt to twist the story, provoke me, or pull me back in. I didn't just block a number. I broke a pattern. 

I shut a door on fear. And it cost me more than I can say. Because the truth is, I loved him. I prayed for him. I saw the goodness I hoped was in there. But you can't build love on lies. You can't walk forward with someone who refuses to face the truth.

So I stopped waiting. Stopped defending. Stopped explaining myself to someone committed to misunderstanding me. And something miraculous happened. Peace. Not instant. Not easy. But real. In the place where pain used to sit like a stone in my chest,

I now feel breath. Joy. Even laughter. There's grief, of course. There's still healing ahead. But I'm no longer scared to be seen. No longer apologising for my boundaries and no longer absorbing his confusion or rage. I'm rising now. I'm building. And I'm free.

I'm not dating. And some days, I honestly wonder if I ever will.

When you've loved with your whole being-when you've believed the promises, carried the hope, and stayed far longer than you should have, the damage doesn't just dissolve when you walk away. It clings, echoes, and alters the way you look at love.

He told me I was the one. And then he lied. Not once. Not in a moment of weakness. But it was repeatedly, deliberately second nature. He gaslit, minimized, and flipped the script.

And I kept trying to forgive, to understand, to be enough.

I kept reaching back into the fire, thinking maybe this time it wouldn't burn. That perhaps love was supposed to hurt before it healed. But now I know better. Now I sit in the stillness of truth. I feel the ache of betrayal in my body. I catch myself flinching at kindness, doubting sincerity, and wondering if every compliment has a hook behind it.

I'm not bitter. Just clear. Recently, the same man who lied, cheated, and twisted my mind found a way into my inbox. Despite being blocked. Despite everything. When his fake kindness didn't elicit the response he wanted, he accused me of flaunting myself on social media, of using it like a dating site — as if my healing and confidence were about him. As if I owed him silence, invisibility, shame. As if my life is any of his business.

Let's not mention the fact that he was on actual dating sites throughout our relationship and within hours of me leaving. That I've heard from women about how he was chasing them before my side of the bed was cold. That he was grabbing at the married woman he'd betrayed me with, within days.

Let me be clear: I am not flaunting. I am surviving. Not-thriving. I'm showing others and myself what it looks like to rise, to rebuild, to find joy again. And none of it is for him.

I don't want a man to fix me. I want to trust someone and not be taken advantage of for doing so. And I haven't found that yet. I might never. And if that's the cost of living in truth, of staying free from manipulation and illusion, I'll pay it every time.

Because I'd rather walk alone with peace than lie beside someone and feel more alone than ever, so no, no-I'm not dating. Not because I'm broken. I'm finally whole enough to wait for the kind of love that doesn't need rescuing, explaining, or surviving.

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Hazelle Gramalis can be contacted via email at hgramalis@gmail.com

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