Immediate steps:

1. Trust your intuition: If you feel unsafe, treat it as real, even if they deny it.
2. Create distance: Physically, emotionally, and digitally. Boundaries are essential.
3. Document behaviour: Texts, emails, logs of incidents — factual, unemotional records.
4. Safety plan: Identify escape routes, safe spaces, and emergency contacts.
5. Limit confrontation: Avoid arguments that escalate into testing or retaliation.
6. Support network: Friends, family, therapists, or support groups who validate your reality.
7. Legal safeguards: Orders of protection, restraining orders, or consultation with law enforcement if danger escalates.
8. Self-care & grounding techniques: Deep breathing, mindfulness, safe spaces, journaling, and limiting rumination on the abuser’s behaviour.

Grounding helps your nervous system return to safety, even in the face of emotional and psychological manipulation.