DateableHow to get help if an arrangement turns abusive
Abuse includes controlling your money and monitoring you, not only violence. A 24-hour service can help you plan a safe way out.
Abuse is not always violence. It includes controlling your money, monitoring where you go and who you see, and cutting you off from people who care about you. A 24-hour service can help you plan how to leave safely.
What counts as abuse
Domestic and family violence is any violent, threatening or controlling behaviour meant to make you feel scared and unsafe 1. It includes a partner or ex-partner, and it can happen in any arrangement, whichever side you are on.
Healthdirect lists coercive control, emotional blackmail, monitoring, isolating you from family and friends, and financial abuse such as controlling your access to money 1. In an arrangement, they can look like this:
- Coercive control: your date decides what you wear, where you go or who you see, and says you need their permission.
- Emotional blackmail: threats to end the arrangement, or to tell your family about it, unless you do what they want.
- Monitoring: demanding your passwords, checking your phone, or tracking your location.
- Financial abuse: using the allowance as a leash, making you account for every dollar, or pressuring you to give up work so you depend on them.
- Isolation: discouraging you from seeing friends and family, and calling it protection or proof of love.
Physical violence is abuse, and so is threatening it. The other forms are abuse too, even with no bruise to show.
Why it starts and why it continues
Controlling behaviour often starts small. Your date might ask why you are late, or suggest what you should wear. That is not abuse. But if they insist, or say you are being unreasonable to refuse, or punish you for saying no, it is abuse.
It continues because the person who is controlling you wants to keep you off balance. They might apologise after an outburst, say it will never happen again, or blame you for making them act that way. Each time you consider leaving, something changes: they cry, they promise to change, or they threaten to hurt themselves. That pattern keeps you hoping it will get better.
Call even if you are not sure
You do not have to be certain it is abuse to call. If you are worried you might be in a controlling relationship, call a service. They will listen without judgement and help you figure out what is happening.
In Australia, call 1800RESPECT:
1800RESPECT: 1800 737 732, 24 hours a day, 7 days a week. Text 0458 737 732. Chat online or video call. It helps with sexual assault, sexual harassment, stalking, monitoring, and financial and image-based abuse 2.
In the United States, call the National Domestic Violence Hotline:
The Hotline: 1-800-799-SAFE (7233), 24/7. Text START to 88788, or chat online. It offers crisis support, safety planning and referrals to local shelters, legal help and counselling 3.
What a safety plan is
A safety plan is a way of leaving that keeps you safe. It is not an escape you improvise in an hour. It is a series of practical steps: a place to go, money you can reach, documents you have copied, a person who knows where you are, and when and how you will leave.
The Hotline offers safety planning 3, and 1800RESPECT counsellors can talk you through yours. They know what to ask and what to arrange so leaving is possible.
A safety plan might mean staying longer than you want to, so you can get money together or line up a place to stay. Or it might mean leaving today. They will help you decide what is safe for you.
If you want to leave and keep it private
Read how to end an arrangement and what to do if something goes wrong, then plan the ending with the service you called. If the person checks your phone or computer, use a private browsing window, or a device they cannot reach, for these pages and those calls.
On Dateable, block them from their profile or your messages so they can no longer contact you there, and report them so a person reviews it. Tell someone you trust where you are going, and keep a charged phone and your own way home.
After you leave
Shock, sadness, anger and relief can all come at once, and that is normal. Even an arrangement that hurt you can leave a loss to grieve; more on this is in ending things.
Talk to someone: a friend, a counsellor, or the service you called. Tell them how you feel. Do not blame yourself. You did not cause someone to abuse you, and it is not your job to fix them.
Sources
- Healthdirect Australia (2024). Domestic violence and abusive relationships.
- 1800RESPECT (2026). 1800RESPECT.
- National Domestic Violence Hotline (2026). The Hotline.
