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" 1. Domestic violence mainly affects underprivileged poor people and minorities.  Melanie Dickerson, a crisis counselor and social worker at the South Suburban Family Shelter in Homewood, Illinois, says, &amp;quot;That is untrue. Domestic violence occurs across ALL races and socio-economic levels. It is underreported with the wealthier demographic, mainly because they don&amp;#039;t need the resources that underprivileged people do \u2014 like housing, clothing and shelters.&amp;quot; 2. Domestic violence only occurs in heterosexual relationships. &amp;quot;When abuse goes on in a same-sex partnership, it can be very violent,&amp;quot; says Dickerson. 3. The victim is doing something to provoke the abuse \u2014 and it&amp;#039;s not a black and white situation, it&amp;#039;s gray. &amp;quot;Domestic violence is never justified,&amp;quot; says Cynthia Baron, a Prevention Specialist at the South Suburban Family Shelter who often speaks at high schools on the subject of teen dating violence and provided all of the following information below. 4. It&amp;#039;s the victim&amp;#039;s fault for not leaving. There are often still strong emotional ties to the abuser despite the violence. In addition, many DV victims stay in the relationship because they&amp;#039;re afraid it will get worse if they leave.  5. If the partners engaged in domestic violence have kids, the victim doesn&amp;#039;t care enough about the kids to leave. S/he is doing the best they can, and doesn&amp;#039;t realize the effects it has on the kids. S/he may think that having both parents is more important. 6. The abuser must be depressed, bipolar or suffering from some other mental illness. Domestic violence is a learned behavior, not a mental illness. It was often learned in the abuser&amp;#039;s own childhood. 7. Drugs and alcohol are usually to blame for teenage abuse. Teen abusers often claim they &amp;quot;lost control&amp;quot; while under the influence, but the fact is that while drugs and alcohol may intensify existing behavior, they do not cause it. 8. It&amp;#039;s not an abusive relationship unless you&amp;#039;re being hit. During Baron&amp;#039;s last talk at a high school, she asked teens if anyone thought anything non-physical counted as abuse. Only one or two students raised their hands. Emotional and/or verbal abuse is just as damaging and real as physical abuse. It involves slowly chipping away at the victim&amp;#039;s self-esteem with name-calling, threats, insults, and general humiliation in front of other people. Isolation from friends and family, mind games, excessive calls and texts, and demanding things in order to prove that the abused really loves them. They make the victim feel like they&amp;#039;re the crazy one. Social media also plays a big part in emotional abuse: The abuser often wants all of the victim&amp;#039;s passwords in order to control them completely. 9. In teen dating violence, boys are more frequently the perpetrators. While 90 to 95 percent of the time the abuser is a man, this statistic is likely incorrect because men are less likely to report abuse from their female significant others \u2014 they&amp;#039;re often too embarrassed. But among high school students, female-on-male abuse is common in the form of emotional abuse: High school relationships can be very intense, and often girls think that they can control their boyfriends by calling and texting obsessively, getting their Facebook and Twitter passwords and manipulating them into ending their friendships with other people. 10. The best way to help a friend who&amp;#039;s being abused is to forcefully tell them to leave the abuser. Baron says that the best way to intervene if you suspect that someone close to you is being abused is to offer your support \u2014 plus outside DV resources in the area \u2014 and listen, don&amp;#039;t judge or yell at her. Teens can suggest that their friend go to trusted adults, like a favorite teacher or mentor. Follow Anna on Twitter.   Photo Credit: Getty "^^<http://www.w3.org/2001/XMLSchema#string>
<http://www.cosmopolitan.com/sex-love/advice/a5645/domestic-abuse-myths/>