People who are like "why would you stay in an abusive relationship??" need to understand that the abusive person can often convince their victim that they, the victim, are actually the abusive one. I don't see that given as an explanation in those conversations very often

Like, "sticking up for yourself" becomes "you should have known that responding would have provoked me. If you cared about me you would put more effort into calming me down." etc, not like, things that would actually be considered abusive by reasonable people lmao

"You're controlling for not letting me stomp on your boundaries" "you're neglectful for needing space after a fight" all kinds of stuff to make someone feel like they're at least "as abusive" and unworthy of better. part of abuse is manipulation! "tHeN wHyD tHeY sTaY" smh lmao