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WEDNESDAY, Sept. 1 (HealthDay News) -- Even after escaping a violent or controlling relationship, a mother's mental health may continue to decline, a new study finds.
Ohio State University researchers analyzed data from 2,400 women who were married to, or living with, the father of their child at the end of the first year of a three-year period. The women were divided into three groups: those who experienced no abuse, those in physically violent relationships, and those in controlling relationships where their partners were extremely critical and insulting and tried to control the woman's actions.
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The study found that all the women, even those who were not in an abusive relationship, reported more depression and anxiety at the end of the three years -- a finding the researchers attributed to the nature of the sample. The women participating were nearly all low-income, minority first-time moms, so it was likely they were under considerable stress, they noted.
However, women who stayed or left a physically or emotionally abusive relationship showed significantly higher levels. The study found that women who left an abusive relationship after the first year became more depressed and still had high levels of anxiety over the next two years. In terms of mental health, these women were no better off than women who stayed in abusive relationships, according to the researchers.
But they did find that abused mothers who had more social support did better after the end of their relationship than those with less help from family and friends.
"Our findings really help us understand how unstable those first few years are for mothers who leave violent or controlling relationships," lead author Kate Adkins, who conducted the study as a doctoral student at OSU, said in a university news release.
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-- Robert Preidt
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