To mark Pride, the latest episode of Too Into You, a podcast that helps people recognise intimate partner abuse, explored abuse in queer relationships. The podcast invited James O’Hagan from LGBT Ireland, who coordinates the LGBTQI+ Intimate Partner Violence Network, to discuss the barriers people may have to recognising abuse in queer relationships and what forms it can take.

Too Into You is a project launched by Women’s Aid to teach young people about intimate relationship abuse. They’ve recently launched a podcast that breaks down red flags, celebrates green flags, and helps listeners spot when someone is too into them.

Aired on June 2, the new episode is titled ‘Control isn’t Love: Abuse in LGBTQ+ relationships’. It explores what a healthy queer relationship should look like, what forms abuse can take, barriers in recognising it and finding support for abuse in queer relationships.

Among the topics of discussion, O’Hagan highlighted how the lack of representation of healthy queer relationships in media can impact how people experience them in real life.

“People are left a bit in the blind. They are learning from each other, they often are learning from doing,” he said. “But if you don’t know what a healthy relationship is meant to feel like then how are you meant to divine whether you’re in one?”

 

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One of the topics of discussion was “lovebombing”, a form of emotional abuse where a person is showered with romantic gestures, like moving quickly into a relationship, spending all the time together, and sharing feelings early on. While exciting at first, this sort of behaviour can become controlling and manipulative.

Lovebombing can be difficult to recognise even in queer relationships, but some red flags to watch out for are if your partner doesn’t respect your boundaries, if their gestures make you anxious instead of excited and if your independence isn’t prioritised.

Reflecting on how the lack of visibility can create misconceptions, O’Hagan said: “One of the things that we started understanding and learning as we started to do the work with the Intimate Partner Abuse Network is that there is a widely held belief that abuse doesn’t happen in queer relationships”

“People see our relationships and just don’t perceive that they can have an abusive element to them. And I think a lot of that comes from the fact that we have always perceived abuse as happening within a cisgender heterosexual domestic environment.

“You know, the very traditional view of what domestic violence is. So queer people are not seen as being in those relationships and thus they’re not accounted for within services.”

 

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You can listen to the full episode here.

The LGBTQI+ Community IPA (Intimate Partner Abuse) Network is a group of Irish community organisations working across LGBTQ+ issues and domestic, sex, gender and sexuality-based violence. The network aims to develop cross-training and pathways between the domestic violence and LGBTQ+ sectors to enable a more nuanced, informed, and inclusive response to intimate partner abuse.

Those experiencing intimate partner abuse can reach out to the following help organisations for support.

• Women’s Aid helpline for 24/7 support at 1800 341 900, available to assist anyone experiencing abuse, regardless of gender.
• Men’s Aid helpline – 01 554 3811
• The National Male Advice Line run by Men’s Development Network, 1800 816 588
• LGBT Helpline, 1800 929 539.
• Aoibhneas is a women and children’s refuge, 01 867 0701 or email [email protected]
• Immigrant Council of Ireland supports migrant women experiencing domestic violence, 01 674-0200
• HSE information line, 1800 700 700
• Safe Ireland provides a list of services across all Ireland
• Dublin Rape Crisis Centre, 1800 778 888