Signs Of Domestic Violence
Signs of Danger by Dr. Irene
Does your partner:
Ignore your feelings?
Disrespect you?
Ridicule or insult you then tell you its a joke, or that you have no sense of humor?
Ridicule your beliefs, religion, race, heritage or class?
Withhold approval, appreciation or affection?
Give you the silent treatment?
Walk away without answering you?
Criticize you, call you names, yell at you?
Humiliate you privately or in public?
Roll his or her eyes when you talk?
Give you a hard time about socializing with your friends or family?
Make you socialize (and keep up appearances) even when you don't feel well?
Seem to make sure that what you really want is exactly what you won't get?
Tell you you are too sensitive?
Hurt you especially when you are down?
Seem energized by fighting, while fighting exhausts you?
Have unpredictable mood swings, alternating from good to bad for no apparent reason?
Present a wonderful face to the world and is well liked by outsiders?
"Twist" your words, somehow turning what you said against you?
Try to control decisions, money, even the way you style your hair or wear your clothes?
Complain about how badly you treat him or her?
Threaten to leave, or threaten to throw you out?
Say things that make you feel good, but do things that make you feel bad? ever left you stranded?
Ever threaten to hurt you or your family?
Ever hit or pushed you, even "accidentally"?
Seem to stir up trouble just when you seem to be getting closer to each other?
Abuse something you love: a pet, a child, an object?
Compliment you enough to keep you happy, yet criticize you enough to keep you insecure?
Promise to never do something hurtful again?
Harass you about imagined affairs?
Manipulate you with lies and contradictions?
Destroy furniture, punch holes in walls, break appliances?
Drive like a road-rage junkie?
Act immature and selfish, yet accuse you of those behaviors?
Question your every move and motive, somehow questioning your competence? interrupt you; hear but not really listen?
Make you feel like you can't win?
Damned if you do, damned if you don't?
Use drugs and/or alcohol involved? Are things worse then?
Incite you to rage, which is "proof" that you are to blame?
Try to convince you he or she is "right," while you are "wrong?"
Frequently say things that are later denied or accuse you of misunderstanding?
Treat you like a sex object, or as though sex should be provided on demand regardless of how you feel?
Your situation is critical if the following applies to you:
You express your opinions less and less freely.
You find yourself walking on eggshells, careful of when and how to say something.
You long for that softer, more vulnerable part of your partner to emerge.
You find yourself making excuses for your partner's behavior?
You feel emotionally unsafe.
You feel its somehow not OK to talk with others about your relationship.
You hope things will change...especially through your love and understanding. You find yourself doubting your memory or sense of reality.
You doubt your own judgment.
You doubt your abilities.
You feel vulnerable and insecure.
You are becoming increasingly depressed.
You feel increasingly trapped and powerless.
You have been or are afraid of your partner.
Your partner has physically hurt you, even once.
Ignore your feelings?
Disrespect you?
Ridicule or insult you then tell you its a joke, or that you have no sense of humor?
Ridicule your beliefs, religion, race, heritage or class?
Withhold approval, appreciation or affection?
Give you the silent treatment?
Walk away without answering you?
Criticize you, call you names, yell at you?
Humiliate you privately or in public?
Roll his or her eyes when you talk?
Give you a hard time about socializing with your friends or family?
Make you socialize (and keep up appearances) even when you don't feel well?
Seem to make sure that what you really want is exactly what you won't get?
Tell you you are too sensitive?
Hurt you especially when you are down?
Seem energized by fighting, while fighting exhausts you?
Have unpredictable mood swings, alternating from good to bad for no apparent reason?
Present a wonderful face to the world and is well liked by outsiders?
"Twist" your words, somehow turning what you said against you?
Try to control decisions, money, even the way you style your hair or wear your clothes?
Complain about how badly you treat him or her?
Threaten to leave, or threaten to throw you out?
Say things that make you feel good, but do things that make you feel bad? ever left you stranded?
Ever threaten to hurt you or your family?
Ever hit or pushed you, even "accidentally"?
Seem to stir up trouble just when you seem to be getting closer to each other?
Abuse something you love: a pet, a child, an object?
Compliment you enough to keep you happy, yet criticize you enough to keep you insecure?
Promise to never do something hurtful again?
Harass you about imagined affairs?
Manipulate you with lies and contradictions?
Destroy furniture, punch holes in walls, break appliances?
Drive like a road-rage junkie?
Act immature and selfish, yet accuse you of those behaviors?
Question your every move and motive, somehow questioning your competence? interrupt you; hear but not really listen?
Make you feel like you can't win?
Damned if you do, damned if you don't?
Use drugs and/or alcohol involved? Are things worse then?
Incite you to rage, which is "proof" that you are to blame?
Try to convince you he or she is "right," while you are "wrong?"
Frequently say things that are later denied or accuse you of misunderstanding?
Treat you like a sex object, or as though sex should be provided on demand regardless of how you feel?
Your situation is critical if the following applies to you:
You express your opinions less and less freely.
You find yourself walking on eggshells, careful of when and how to say something.
You long for that softer, more vulnerable part of your partner to emerge.
You find yourself making excuses for your partner's behavior?
You feel emotionally unsafe.
You feel its somehow not OK to talk with others about your relationship.
You hope things will change...especially through your love and understanding. You find yourself doubting your memory or sense of reality.
You doubt your own judgment.
You doubt your abilities.
You feel vulnerable and insecure.
You are becoming increasingly depressed.
You feel increasingly trapped and powerless.
You have been or are afraid of your partner.
Your partner has physically hurt you, even once.
What You Need To Know by Mary M. Alward
Abusers
Use warped logic to brainwash their victims. They use methods very similar to those of prison guards, who know that to control prisoners they have to have full co-operation. Subversive manipulation of the mind and destruction of the
victim are perfect tools to enable abusers to succeed.
The Logic of Brainwashing
Abusers use warped logic to brainwash their victims. Subversive manipulation of the mind and destruction of the victim are the perfect tools to enable abusers to succeed.
The Process of Brainwashing
The abuser uses several methods of coercion to brainwash his victim. They are as follows:
Isolation
Abusers deprive their victims of social interaction with family members and friends. This is necessary to gain control over the victim.
Resistance
The abuser manipulates his victim to become mentally and physically dependent upon him, which reduces the ability of the victim to resist his abuse.
Threats
Abusers use threats to cultivate anxiety, despair and the ability to resist. Most often they threaten children, family members or friends with harm if the victim doesn’t comply with his demands.
Indulgences
Occasionally the abuser will comply with the wishes of the victim in order to provide motivation to comply with his every demand.
Omnipotence
The abuser suggests to the victim that it is futile to resist his demands.
Trivial Demands
Abusers strictly enforce trivial demands in order to create a habit of compliance in his victim.
Degradation
Abusers degrade their victims in order to damage their self esteem and make them think they are unable to face
life on their own. Self esteem can be damaged beyond repair and the victim is often reduced to animal level concerns.
About the Abuser
The methods that abusers, both male and female, use to manipulate their victims are a natural part of their personalities. Abusers all share behaviors and thinking patterns. This labels them as dysfunctional, insecure and unable to have a relationship unless they are in complete control.
Abusers keep their victims in the dark about events that are taking place. They are most always in control of the finances, talk about the victim behind their back in order to cause them to become isolated and make plans that include the victim without consulting them. The abuser’s goal is to monopolize the victim’s time and physical environment and suppress their behavior. An abusive partner tells you what social events you can attend and who you can go with. He may insist you quit work and remain at home where he can keep an eye on you, or he may tell you
that you can no longer participate in hobbies. Abusers often insist you move to a location away from family members, friends and other contacts that will give you support.
Abusers do their best to instill feelings of fear, powerlessness and dependency in their victim. Both verbal and emotional abuse heightens these feelings and they grow more pronounced as time passes.
The abuser’s system of logic is closed. She doesn’t allow her partner to voice opinions or criticize her in any way. She lets you know, without a doubt, that her word is law.
Abuser’s Tactics
There’s a wide range of tactics that the abuser uses to debilitate the victim. If you recognize any of these tactics, a red flag has been raised.
Domination
Abusers are extremely dominating to the point that they want to control everything that the victim does. If they don’t get their way, they act like spoiled children. On top of that, they use threats to get what they want. If you allow your abuser to dominate you, you will lose your self respect.
Verbal Assault
The abuser tends to verbally assault their victim by calling names, degrading, screaming, threatening, criticizing, berating and humiliating. They will center their victim out in front of family and friends by taking small personality flaws and embellishing them to the extreme. They make snide remarks and use sarcasm to erode the victim’s sense of self-worth and self confidence. Making the victim look bad in front of others is an attempt to isolate the victim and
keep them at their mercy. Then, the abuse worsens.
Gaslighting
Gaslighting is a slang term from the 1950’s but is the perfect word to describe one tactic of the abuser. The dictionary definition of gaslighting is to drive someone crazy. This is used to keep the abuser’s victim under control. The abuser will swear that events never occurred and that certain things were never said. The victim knows better, but over time will begin to question their sanity. Be alert to gaslighting tactics that can beat you down and make you think you are going insane.
Blackmail
The abuser uses emotional blackmail to get what they want by pushing your buttons. He plays on his victim’s sense of compassion, fears, sense of guilt and values in order to get his own way. He may refuse to talk to his victim or threaten to end the relationship or withdraw financial support if the victim is dependent on him for basic living necessities. Emotional blackmail is the act of working on the victim’s emotions so the abuser can get what he wants.
Constant Chaos
An abuser will keep the household and his victim’s emotions in total chaos by starting arguments and constantly being in conflict with other family members.
Abusive Expectations
This happens when the abuser makes unreasonable demands on their victim. They may expect their partner to reject everything in their life to tend to the abuser’s needs. Included can be frequent sex {rape}, forcing the victim to perform sexual acts that are against their will, demanding all of the victim’s attention or demanding that the victim spend all free time with the abuser. No matter how hard the victim tries to please the abuser, she will always demand more. The
victim, whether male or female, will be constantly criticized and berated because they are unable to fulfill the abuser’s demands.
Unpredictable Responses
This includes emotional outbursts and extreme mood swings on the part of the abuser. If you partner likes something you do today and hates it tomorrow, or reacts to the extreme at an identical behavior by the victim, this is an unpredictable response. This behavior damages the victim’s self esteem, self confidence and mental well-being because they are constantly on edge, wondering how their partner is going to respond to their every move. Living with a person who has unpredictable response is difficult, stressful, nerve wracking and it causes a great deal of anxiety that can lead to health problems. The victim lives with fear and security and has no sense of balance in their life. Abusers who drink excessively are alcoholics or drug abusers often have unpredictable responses to trivial events.
Inside the Abuser’s Mind
Abusers have a tendency to feel they are unique individuals (narcissistic) and shouldn’t have to live under the same rules as everyone else. However, the opposite is true. Abusers share many of the same thinking patterns and behaviors and use the same tactics to keep their victims under their control.
Blaming
Abusers tend to shift responsibility for their actions to their victims and become angry because the person caused them to behave inappropriately. The abuser might say, “If you hadn’t talked back to me, I wouldn't have had to hit you.” Don’t fall for it. The abuser did the hitting and no matter what you did, you are not to blame. He is blaming you for his shortcomings and do not believe that you are the one to blame for even one second.
Making Excuses
Abusers seldom take responsibility for their actions, but try to justify their behavior by making excuses. They may blame the abuse on a difficult childhood or a hard day at the office. Their mind-set tells them that they are never to blame for any negative behavior.
Fantasies of Success
Abusers believe that they would be famous and rich if the victim and other people weren’t holding them back. Because he believes his failure in life is due to others, he feels he is justified in retaliating in any way he can, including
physical and emotional abuse. He belittles, berates and puts others down, including the victim, to make himself feel more powerful.
Manipulation
Abusers combine manipulative tactics, such as upsetting people to watch their reaction, lying and provoking arguments and fights among family members and his peers. He charms his victims and other people who he wishes to manipulate by professing that he cares and is interested in their well-being, when all he is doing is opening the door for a deeper level of abuse.
Redefining
The abuser will often redefine situations to blame others for his troubles. Abusers will seldom admit that they are wrong, or for that matter, less than perfect. It’s always someone else’s fault when they act inappropriately.
Assuming
An abuser’s thought patterns lead them to believe that they know what others, including their victim, is feeling and thinking. They use this warped logic to blame these people for their behavior. For instance, an abuser might say, “I
knew you’d be angry about that, so I went for a few drinks after work to enjoy myself. Why should I come home to listen to you nag?”
Dependence
Believe it or not, abusers are emotionally dependent on their victim. This causes an inner rage that encourages the abuser to lash out. Because he is so dependent, he takes control of his victim’s life. This is the way they deny their weaknesses and make themselves feel powerful.
Symptoms of Emotional Dependency
Symptoms of emotional dependency include, but are not limited to, excessive jealousy, jealous rages and possessive actions that are usually sexual in nature. Abusers spend an excessive amount of time monitoring the action and movements of their victims. Often, abusers have no support network and lack those supportive roles
that others depend upon. Another sign of emotional dependency is the extreme affect the abuser suffers if his victim leaves. He will go to any lengths to get the victim to return.
Rigid Gender Attitudes
Abusers in a domestic atmosphere tend to have extremely rigid attitudes about the role that their spouse should play in a marriage or common law situation. Wives may expect their husbands to fulfill all of the family’s chores, such as repairs and hold up his role as a father. Husbands may expect their wives to hold down a full time job, keep the house spotless, the laundry caught up, meals made on time and also tend to the kids’ every need. All of these examples are things that should be shared in a normal relationship.
Lying
Most abusers are liars. They lie to manipulate their victim by controlling information. They also lie to keep their victim, and others, off balance psychologically. This enables the abuser to gain control of every situation.
Withdrawal
Abusers have a tendency to put up emotional walls and never give out personal information freely. He keeps his real feelings to himself and is not interested in what others think of him. Abusers like secrets and are righteous and
close-minded. An abuser always feels she is right in every situation.
Drama
Abusers, either male or female, can’t seem to develop close, satisfying relationships, or even bad relationships that last. They replace closeness with drama in order to make their life more exciting. They love watching others argue and fight and often do things to keep those around them in a state of constant chaos and upheaval.
Minimizing Actions
Abusers always minimize their actions and refuse to accept their mistakes. An abuser might tell his spouse who has a black eye, “I didn’t hit you hard enough to give you a black eye.”
Ownership and Possession
Abusers are extremely possessive and believe that they should get everything they want. They also feel they can do whatever they wish with their possession and abusers see their partner or spouse as something they own. They feel they are justified in hurting their victim by taking their possessions, attacking them mentally and physically and controlling all aspects of their life.
Anger Management
Most abusers have had a violent and abusive childhood in a dysfunctional family setting. These children are very likely to grow up into spousal abusers. They are taught from the time they are babies that violence is a way to settle
disputes and get their own way. It’s a way to settle differences of opinion and they see abuse as normal. As adults, they won’t be able to find alternate ways of showing or channeling their anger. People who do not have a method of outlet for anger on a daily basis allow it to build to a point where it explodes. When this happens, the people closest to them become their sounding board emotionally, mentally and physically.
Rules
Abusers feel they are superior to others and don’t have to follow the rules of society. This is also the attitude of hundreds of criminals in prisons world wide. Inmates often believe that while other inmates are guilty of their crimes that they aren’t. Abusers feel it is always their partners who need counseling and that they can take care of their life without help or support from others.
Fragmentation
The abuser, whether male or female, does their best to keep their abusive behavior separate from the rest of their life. For example: abusers will beat their spouse and kids on a regular basis, but seldom physically attack anyone outside
of their home. They also separate their lives psychologically. They may attend church on Sunday morning and play the role of a loving spouse and parent and then go home and beat their spouse and kids on Sunday afternoon. Abusers see this as acceptable and normal behavior and feel it is justified. Yet if they hear a report that someone else has abused their loved ones, they are the first to condemn them.
Verbal Communication
Abusers are seldom capable of a relationship that includes real intimacy. It is believed that they feel vulnerable when they are open and truthful with others. Abusers feel that it is up to their partners to turn feelings of anger and frustration into gratification and to fulfill their every need. Partners of abusers are essentially expected to be mind readers and know in advance the needs of the abusive spouse. When this doesn’t happen, the abuser feels insecure, unloved and rejected and rejection is grounds for emotional, mental and physical abuse.
Glorification
Abusers, both men and women, think of themselves as independent, self-sufficient, superior and strong. If someone criticizes them or says something that causes them to feel insulted, the feeling will cause them to react violently toward their victim. This is the only outlet that they know to use to quell feelings of inadequacy.
Being Vague
Abusers think and speak vaguely to avoid their responsibilities. When asked why they are late or where they’ve been, answers will be vague. If their partners pursue the reason, the abuser becomes defensive and strikes out in order to remain in control of the situation.
Things You Need to Know
Red Flag Signals
Many people of both genders interpret early warning signs of abuse as attentive, caring and romantic.
Here is a list of early warning signs of future domestic abuse.
If you see any of these warning signs in your partner, be ever vigilant. For your own safety, it’s best to end the relationship immediately. It’s better to be alone than to be in a relationship where you are constantly abused in any way. Get help now!
Use warped logic to brainwash their victims. They use methods very similar to those of prison guards, who know that to control prisoners they have to have full co-operation. Subversive manipulation of the mind and destruction of the
victim are perfect tools to enable abusers to succeed.
The Logic of Brainwashing
Abusers use warped logic to brainwash their victims. Subversive manipulation of the mind and destruction of the victim are the perfect tools to enable abusers to succeed.
The Process of Brainwashing
The abuser uses several methods of coercion to brainwash his victim. They are as follows:
Isolation
Abusers deprive their victims of social interaction with family members and friends. This is necessary to gain control over the victim.
Resistance
The abuser manipulates his victim to become mentally and physically dependent upon him, which reduces the ability of the victim to resist his abuse.
Threats
Abusers use threats to cultivate anxiety, despair and the ability to resist. Most often they threaten children, family members or friends with harm if the victim doesn’t comply with his demands.
Indulgences
Occasionally the abuser will comply with the wishes of the victim in order to provide motivation to comply with his every demand.
Omnipotence
The abuser suggests to the victim that it is futile to resist his demands.
Trivial Demands
Abusers strictly enforce trivial demands in order to create a habit of compliance in his victim.
Degradation
Abusers degrade their victims in order to damage their self esteem and make them think they are unable to face
life on their own. Self esteem can be damaged beyond repair and the victim is often reduced to animal level concerns.
About the Abuser
The methods that abusers, both male and female, use to manipulate their victims are a natural part of their personalities. Abusers all share behaviors and thinking patterns. This labels them as dysfunctional, insecure and unable to have a relationship unless they are in complete control.
Abusers keep their victims in the dark about events that are taking place. They are most always in control of the finances, talk about the victim behind their back in order to cause them to become isolated and make plans that include the victim without consulting them. The abuser’s goal is to monopolize the victim’s time and physical environment and suppress their behavior. An abusive partner tells you what social events you can attend and who you can go with. He may insist you quit work and remain at home where he can keep an eye on you, or he may tell you
that you can no longer participate in hobbies. Abusers often insist you move to a location away from family members, friends and other contacts that will give you support.
Abusers do their best to instill feelings of fear, powerlessness and dependency in their victim. Both verbal and emotional abuse heightens these feelings and they grow more pronounced as time passes.
The abuser’s system of logic is closed. She doesn’t allow her partner to voice opinions or criticize her in any way. She lets you know, without a doubt, that her word is law.
Abuser’s Tactics
There’s a wide range of tactics that the abuser uses to debilitate the victim. If you recognize any of these tactics, a red flag has been raised.
Domination
Abusers are extremely dominating to the point that they want to control everything that the victim does. If they don’t get their way, they act like spoiled children. On top of that, they use threats to get what they want. If you allow your abuser to dominate you, you will lose your self respect.
Verbal Assault
The abuser tends to verbally assault their victim by calling names, degrading, screaming, threatening, criticizing, berating and humiliating. They will center their victim out in front of family and friends by taking small personality flaws and embellishing them to the extreme. They make snide remarks and use sarcasm to erode the victim’s sense of self-worth and self confidence. Making the victim look bad in front of others is an attempt to isolate the victim and
keep them at their mercy. Then, the abuse worsens.
Gaslighting
Gaslighting is a slang term from the 1950’s but is the perfect word to describe one tactic of the abuser. The dictionary definition of gaslighting is to drive someone crazy. This is used to keep the abuser’s victim under control. The abuser will swear that events never occurred and that certain things were never said. The victim knows better, but over time will begin to question their sanity. Be alert to gaslighting tactics that can beat you down and make you think you are going insane.
Blackmail
The abuser uses emotional blackmail to get what they want by pushing your buttons. He plays on his victim’s sense of compassion, fears, sense of guilt and values in order to get his own way. He may refuse to talk to his victim or threaten to end the relationship or withdraw financial support if the victim is dependent on him for basic living necessities. Emotional blackmail is the act of working on the victim’s emotions so the abuser can get what he wants.
Constant Chaos
An abuser will keep the household and his victim’s emotions in total chaos by starting arguments and constantly being in conflict with other family members.
Abusive Expectations
This happens when the abuser makes unreasonable demands on their victim. They may expect their partner to reject everything in their life to tend to the abuser’s needs. Included can be frequent sex {rape}, forcing the victim to perform sexual acts that are against their will, demanding all of the victim’s attention or demanding that the victim spend all free time with the abuser. No matter how hard the victim tries to please the abuser, she will always demand more. The
victim, whether male or female, will be constantly criticized and berated because they are unable to fulfill the abuser’s demands.
Unpredictable Responses
This includes emotional outbursts and extreme mood swings on the part of the abuser. If you partner likes something you do today and hates it tomorrow, or reacts to the extreme at an identical behavior by the victim, this is an unpredictable response. This behavior damages the victim’s self esteem, self confidence and mental well-being because they are constantly on edge, wondering how their partner is going to respond to their every move. Living with a person who has unpredictable response is difficult, stressful, nerve wracking and it causes a great deal of anxiety that can lead to health problems. The victim lives with fear and security and has no sense of balance in their life. Abusers who drink excessively are alcoholics or drug abusers often have unpredictable responses to trivial events.
Inside the Abuser’s Mind
Abusers have a tendency to feel they are unique individuals (narcissistic) and shouldn’t have to live under the same rules as everyone else. However, the opposite is true. Abusers share many of the same thinking patterns and behaviors and use the same tactics to keep their victims under their control.
Blaming
Abusers tend to shift responsibility for their actions to their victims and become angry because the person caused them to behave inappropriately. The abuser might say, “If you hadn’t talked back to me, I wouldn't have had to hit you.” Don’t fall for it. The abuser did the hitting and no matter what you did, you are not to blame. He is blaming you for his shortcomings and do not believe that you are the one to blame for even one second.
Making Excuses
Abusers seldom take responsibility for their actions, but try to justify their behavior by making excuses. They may blame the abuse on a difficult childhood or a hard day at the office. Their mind-set tells them that they are never to blame for any negative behavior.
Fantasies of Success
Abusers believe that they would be famous and rich if the victim and other people weren’t holding them back. Because he believes his failure in life is due to others, he feels he is justified in retaliating in any way he can, including
physical and emotional abuse. He belittles, berates and puts others down, including the victim, to make himself feel more powerful.
Manipulation
Abusers combine manipulative tactics, such as upsetting people to watch their reaction, lying and provoking arguments and fights among family members and his peers. He charms his victims and other people who he wishes to manipulate by professing that he cares and is interested in their well-being, when all he is doing is opening the door for a deeper level of abuse.
Redefining
The abuser will often redefine situations to blame others for his troubles. Abusers will seldom admit that they are wrong, or for that matter, less than perfect. It’s always someone else’s fault when they act inappropriately.
Assuming
An abuser’s thought patterns lead them to believe that they know what others, including their victim, is feeling and thinking. They use this warped logic to blame these people for their behavior. For instance, an abuser might say, “I
knew you’d be angry about that, so I went for a few drinks after work to enjoy myself. Why should I come home to listen to you nag?”
Dependence
Believe it or not, abusers are emotionally dependent on their victim. This causes an inner rage that encourages the abuser to lash out. Because he is so dependent, he takes control of his victim’s life. This is the way they deny their weaknesses and make themselves feel powerful.
Symptoms of Emotional Dependency
Symptoms of emotional dependency include, but are not limited to, excessive jealousy, jealous rages and possessive actions that are usually sexual in nature. Abusers spend an excessive amount of time monitoring the action and movements of their victims. Often, abusers have no support network and lack those supportive roles
that others depend upon. Another sign of emotional dependency is the extreme affect the abuser suffers if his victim leaves. He will go to any lengths to get the victim to return.
Rigid Gender Attitudes
Abusers in a domestic atmosphere tend to have extremely rigid attitudes about the role that their spouse should play in a marriage or common law situation. Wives may expect their husbands to fulfill all of the family’s chores, such as repairs and hold up his role as a father. Husbands may expect their wives to hold down a full time job, keep the house spotless, the laundry caught up, meals made on time and also tend to the kids’ every need. All of these examples are things that should be shared in a normal relationship.
Lying
Most abusers are liars. They lie to manipulate their victim by controlling information. They also lie to keep their victim, and others, off balance psychologically. This enables the abuser to gain control of every situation.
Withdrawal
Abusers have a tendency to put up emotional walls and never give out personal information freely. He keeps his real feelings to himself and is not interested in what others think of him. Abusers like secrets and are righteous and
close-minded. An abuser always feels she is right in every situation.
Drama
Abusers, either male or female, can’t seem to develop close, satisfying relationships, or even bad relationships that last. They replace closeness with drama in order to make their life more exciting. They love watching others argue and fight and often do things to keep those around them in a state of constant chaos and upheaval.
Minimizing Actions
Abusers always minimize their actions and refuse to accept their mistakes. An abuser might tell his spouse who has a black eye, “I didn’t hit you hard enough to give you a black eye.”
Ownership and Possession
Abusers are extremely possessive and believe that they should get everything they want. They also feel they can do whatever they wish with their possession and abusers see their partner or spouse as something they own. They feel they are justified in hurting their victim by taking their possessions, attacking them mentally and physically and controlling all aspects of their life.
Anger Management
Most abusers have had a violent and abusive childhood in a dysfunctional family setting. These children are very likely to grow up into spousal abusers. They are taught from the time they are babies that violence is a way to settle
disputes and get their own way. It’s a way to settle differences of opinion and they see abuse as normal. As adults, they won’t be able to find alternate ways of showing or channeling their anger. People who do not have a method of outlet for anger on a daily basis allow it to build to a point where it explodes. When this happens, the people closest to them become their sounding board emotionally, mentally and physically.
Rules
Abusers feel they are superior to others and don’t have to follow the rules of society. This is also the attitude of hundreds of criminals in prisons world wide. Inmates often believe that while other inmates are guilty of their crimes that they aren’t. Abusers feel it is always their partners who need counseling and that they can take care of their life without help or support from others.
Fragmentation
The abuser, whether male or female, does their best to keep their abusive behavior separate from the rest of their life. For example: abusers will beat their spouse and kids on a regular basis, but seldom physically attack anyone outside
of their home. They also separate their lives psychologically. They may attend church on Sunday morning and play the role of a loving spouse and parent and then go home and beat their spouse and kids on Sunday afternoon. Abusers see this as acceptable and normal behavior and feel it is justified. Yet if they hear a report that someone else has abused their loved ones, they are the first to condemn them.
Verbal Communication
Abusers are seldom capable of a relationship that includes real intimacy. It is believed that they feel vulnerable when they are open and truthful with others. Abusers feel that it is up to their partners to turn feelings of anger and frustration into gratification and to fulfill their every need. Partners of abusers are essentially expected to be mind readers and know in advance the needs of the abusive spouse. When this doesn’t happen, the abuser feels insecure, unloved and rejected and rejection is grounds for emotional, mental and physical abuse.
Glorification
Abusers, both men and women, think of themselves as independent, self-sufficient, superior and strong. If someone criticizes them or says something that causes them to feel insulted, the feeling will cause them to react violently toward their victim. This is the only outlet that they know to use to quell feelings of inadequacy.
Being Vague
Abusers think and speak vaguely to avoid their responsibilities. When asked why they are late or where they’ve been, answers will be vague. If their partners pursue the reason, the abuser becomes defensive and strikes out in order to remain in control of the situation.
Things You Need to Know
- A batterer’s level of hostility is extremely higher than that of non-batterers. Emotions easily turn to rage (control), which in turn is acted out in violent behavior. Abusers suppress anxiety, tension and stress until they eventually explode in a fit of violent behavior. They are not able to express emotions in a healthy manner.
- They use power to control their victims.
- Abusers suffer from low self esteem. They become dependent on their partners emotionally and feel threatened if they thing that they are going to be left on their own. However, many do not suffer low self esteem, many enjoy the privileges of their power.
- Abusers often show emotions of excessive jealousy and are extremely possessive.
- Many abusers are alcoholics or use drugs frequently. If they discontinue alcohol and drug abuse, they tend to be violent through the process of withdrawal.
- Many people who are abusers have experienced or witnessed violence during their childhood. This leaves them with a feeling of worthlessness and low self esteem, which in turn traumatizes them and leaves life-long emotional scars. Most abusers however were not abused as children, they tend to have such entitlement that any form of denying them or saying no is seen as abuse towards them. About 40% of male abusers were abused themselves.
Red Flag Signals
Many people of both genders interpret early warning signs of abuse as attentive, caring and romantic.
Here is a list of early warning signs of future domestic abuse.
- Your partner insists you spend all of your free time with them in order to isolate
you from family and friends. - You always have to tell your partner where you are going, who you are going with, what your
plans are and when you will be home. - Your partner is extremely agitated or angry when they don’t get their own
way. - Your partner tells you what you can and can’t wear and insists on going shopping with
you when you shop for clothes. - You are accused time and time again of cheating, flirting or having an
affair. - Your partner refers to women in derogatory slang, or is secretive about previous
relationships. - The person was abused mentally, physically, emotionally or verbally as a child.
- Your partner grew up in an environment where one parent abused the other emotionally,
He is a charmer or a smooth talker. - He is abusive to his mother or sister and refers to them in derogatory slang.
- The person has expectations that are not realistic.
- The person has a tendency to be cruel to animals or pets.
- The person has hurt a child in some way. (emotional or physical)
- Your partner has abused spouses in a previous relationship. If so, it will happen to
you too. - The person displays a tendency to have extreme mood swings for little or no reason.
- Male abusers often feel women are inferior and were born to indulge their every
whim. - Female abusers feel men are inferior and expect their partner to give them their full
attention at all times. - Abusers like to intimidate and use threatening body language. They may throw things,
punch walls or destroy their victim’s possessions. - Abusers stop their victims from leaving the room during an argument or dispute.
If you see any of these warning signs in your partner, be ever vigilant. For your own safety, it’s best to end the relationship immediately. It’s better to be alone than to be in a relationship where you are constantly abused in any way. Get help now!
10 Signs by Kiri Blakely
Written by Kiri Blakeley on CafeMom’s blog, The Stir .
Are you in a relationship with a psychopath? You might think that's something you'd know right away by the red tint of evil in the person's eyes, the swastika tat on the forehead, or the insistence on discussing serial killers over dinner. But nope! Psychopaths can be extremely charming and come across like Prince Charming at first. So unless you know the signs, you'd probably get sucked into the life of a psychopath and not know who he or she really was until you are completely sucker punched. Here are 10 signs you should look out for to quickly identify a psychopath.
1. Flattery like you've never heard before. Psychopaths move extremely quickly. On the first date, he'll probably tell you that you are stunningly beautiful, unbelievably intelligent, and uproariously witty. He will play into every fantasy and insecurity you have. If you think you're fat, he will tell you how much he loves your body. If you think you're shy, he will laugh at every lame attempt at a joke and tell you you should have been a comedian. This is called "love bombing." It's the idealization phase he gets you hooked on, and it's the phase you will spend the next however-many months or years trying to get back once he abruptly shuts it off.
2. He is just like you. Psychopaths will try to convince you that you are soul mates, just alike. He loves all the things you love and you have all of the same interests. If you had a tough childhood, he will say something like, "We both had it rough. That's why we understand each other." If there's an obscure book you love, he will make sure he loves it too. What he's doing is called "mirroring." He has no real identity, so he sucks yours up and mirrors it back to you.
3. Pity plays. Pay careful attention to what a psychopath says on the first few dates about his exes and other people in his life. Is his ex girlfriend crazy and stalking him? Did another girlfriend rob him blind? Is his mother controlling and horrible? Does he seem like he's had a tough time with people, who always use and abandon him? Whatever he says about the other people in his life is pretty much exactly what he'll be saying about you at some point, so listen carefully.
4. Illnesses and injuries. Psychopaths absolutely love pity, so pay attention to how many illnesses and injuries he's had. Did he miraculously beat cancer but it could come back at any minute? Does he break his foot on your second date and has to cancel? (But strangely is okay for the third date?) Did he lose his first wife in a car accident that left him with brain trauma (yet he talks fine and seems fine)? Try to check out his stories -- call hospitals if you need to -- but don't be surprised if he has an excuse for why you can't find any record of any of his traumas.
5. Great sex. Everyone wants great sex, but those who have been with a psychopath often say it's the best thing they've ever experienced. A psychopath goes out of his way to please you. It's just another way of getting you hooked. Once he has you hooked, you'll find yourself begging for sex because he suddenly won't want it anymore.
6. Cracks in the mask. A psychopath will sometimes blurt out something odd about himself, apropos of nothing. Like you might be cooking dinner and suddenly he blurts, "I'm crazy you know." Or "I'm cheating on you." He will then either deny he said it or play it off as a joke. A form of keeping you off balance -- but also possibly an unconscious slip of the mask of his persona.
7. Silent treatment. Once psychopaths have you hooked after the "love bombing" and "idealization" phase, they then begin to devalue you. The first step in that is usually to give you the silent treatment over something. Psychopaths are also known to disappear for days at a time. Be sure, the silent treatment and disappearing act will be laid squarely at your feet. In reality, he is off sizing up his next target somewhere.
8. Triangulation. Psychopaths love to work you up into a state of obsessive frenzy, so to do that, they idealize you, give you fabulous sex, and then begin pulling away and "triangulating." This is when they introduce other people into the mix to make you jealous. It could be an ex-wife or ex-girlfriend, a friend of the same sex, or even a celebrity. In the psychopaths mind, everyone else wants him, so you better be on your best behavior, or he will move on to one of his adoring fans.
9. Discard. The final phase of the psychopath is the "discard" phase. After he sucks you in with idealization, then begins to devalue you, he will suddenly discard you as if you never had a relationship. You are suddenly completely worthless to him. He will usually move on to another target at this point.
10. "Hoovering." Although a psychopath will discard you, he doesn't quite want you moving on either. If he senses you are done with him, he will suddenly do an about-face, and begin bombarding you with pleas to stay together. He will try to "Hoover" (named after the vacuum cleaning company) you back in by saying everything you've ever wanted to hear, making a million promises, and suddenly being on his absolute best behavior. It's all an act so he can get you back into the fold.
The only way to get rid of a psychopath is to completely go no contact. It's the only thing that doesn't fuel his games and ego. He will make that difficult for you -- some psychopaths will stalk you, most will Hoover. But to engage him in any way, even just to tell him off, only leaves you open to more mind games, which he will win, because he has no feelings. (Those who have children with psychopaths must develop low contact, and keep in touch only as much as absolutely needed as regards the children.)
Of course, nobody is perfect, and some people are just immature and go through periods of giving the silent treatment, or "devaluing" you with critical comments. Other people may triangulate to create jealousy because they're insecure or bored or don't even quite realize they're doing it. There are also plenty of garden-variety jerks out there who will engage in a lot of "psychopathic" behavior without being clinical psychopaths. But if your lover engages in much or all of this behavior, then he or she is likely psychopathic, and you should run for the hills!
If you think you are in a relationship with a psychopath or are trying to recover from one, Psychopath Free offers information and support.
Are you in a relationship with a psychopath? You might think that's something you'd know right away by the red tint of evil in the person's eyes, the swastika tat on the forehead, or the insistence on discussing serial killers over dinner. But nope! Psychopaths can be extremely charming and come across like Prince Charming at first. So unless you know the signs, you'd probably get sucked into the life of a psychopath and not know who he or she really was until you are completely sucker punched. Here are 10 signs you should look out for to quickly identify a psychopath.
1. Flattery like you've never heard before. Psychopaths move extremely quickly. On the first date, he'll probably tell you that you are stunningly beautiful, unbelievably intelligent, and uproariously witty. He will play into every fantasy and insecurity you have. If you think you're fat, he will tell you how much he loves your body. If you think you're shy, he will laugh at every lame attempt at a joke and tell you you should have been a comedian. This is called "love bombing." It's the idealization phase he gets you hooked on, and it's the phase you will spend the next however-many months or years trying to get back once he abruptly shuts it off.
2. He is just like you. Psychopaths will try to convince you that you are soul mates, just alike. He loves all the things you love and you have all of the same interests. If you had a tough childhood, he will say something like, "We both had it rough. That's why we understand each other." If there's an obscure book you love, he will make sure he loves it too. What he's doing is called "mirroring." He has no real identity, so he sucks yours up and mirrors it back to you.
3. Pity plays. Pay careful attention to what a psychopath says on the first few dates about his exes and other people in his life. Is his ex girlfriend crazy and stalking him? Did another girlfriend rob him blind? Is his mother controlling and horrible? Does he seem like he's had a tough time with people, who always use and abandon him? Whatever he says about the other people in his life is pretty much exactly what he'll be saying about you at some point, so listen carefully.
4. Illnesses and injuries. Psychopaths absolutely love pity, so pay attention to how many illnesses and injuries he's had. Did he miraculously beat cancer but it could come back at any minute? Does he break his foot on your second date and has to cancel? (But strangely is okay for the third date?) Did he lose his first wife in a car accident that left him with brain trauma (yet he talks fine and seems fine)? Try to check out his stories -- call hospitals if you need to -- but don't be surprised if he has an excuse for why you can't find any record of any of his traumas.
5. Great sex. Everyone wants great sex, but those who have been with a psychopath often say it's the best thing they've ever experienced. A psychopath goes out of his way to please you. It's just another way of getting you hooked. Once he has you hooked, you'll find yourself begging for sex because he suddenly won't want it anymore.
6. Cracks in the mask. A psychopath will sometimes blurt out something odd about himself, apropos of nothing. Like you might be cooking dinner and suddenly he blurts, "I'm crazy you know." Or "I'm cheating on you." He will then either deny he said it or play it off as a joke. A form of keeping you off balance -- but also possibly an unconscious slip of the mask of his persona.
7. Silent treatment. Once psychopaths have you hooked after the "love bombing" and "idealization" phase, they then begin to devalue you. The first step in that is usually to give you the silent treatment over something. Psychopaths are also known to disappear for days at a time. Be sure, the silent treatment and disappearing act will be laid squarely at your feet. In reality, he is off sizing up his next target somewhere.
8. Triangulation. Psychopaths love to work you up into a state of obsessive frenzy, so to do that, they idealize you, give you fabulous sex, and then begin pulling away and "triangulating." This is when they introduce other people into the mix to make you jealous. It could be an ex-wife or ex-girlfriend, a friend of the same sex, or even a celebrity. In the psychopaths mind, everyone else wants him, so you better be on your best behavior, or he will move on to one of his adoring fans.
9. Discard. The final phase of the psychopath is the "discard" phase. After he sucks you in with idealization, then begins to devalue you, he will suddenly discard you as if you never had a relationship. You are suddenly completely worthless to him. He will usually move on to another target at this point.
10. "Hoovering." Although a psychopath will discard you, he doesn't quite want you moving on either. If he senses you are done with him, he will suddenly do an about-face, and begin bombarding you with pleas to stay together. He will try to "Hoover" (named after the vacuum cleaning company) you back in by saying everything you've ever wanted to hear, making a million promises, and suddenly being on his absolute best behavior. It's all an act so he can get you back into the fold.
The only way to get rid of a psychopath is to completely go no contact. It's the only thing that doesn't fuel his games and ego. He will make that difficult for you -- some psychopaths will stalk you, most will Hoover. But to engage him in any way, even just to tell him off, only leaves you open to more mind games, which he will win, because he has no feelings. (Those who have children with psychopaths must develop low contact, and keep in touch only as much as absolutely needed as regards the children.)
Of course, nobody is perfect, and some people are just immature and go through periods of giving the silent treatment, or "devaluing" you with critical comments. Other people may triangulate to create jealousy because they're insecure or bored or don't even quite realize they're doing it. There are also plenty of garden-variety jerks out there who will engage in a lot of "psychopathic" behavior without being clinical psychopaths. But if your lover engages in much or all of this behavior, then he or she is likely psychopathic, and you should run for the hills!
If you think you are in a relationship with a psychopath or are trying to recover from one, Psychopath Free offers information and support.
Types Of Abusers
Abuser Profiles -- from Why Does He Do That? by Lundy Bancroft
KEY POINTS TO REMEMBER
• Tremendous variation exists among abusive styles. Your abusive partner may be of a type I haven't encountered yet, but that doesn't make him any less real. Many men are mixtures of different aspects."
• An abuser may change so much from day to day that he couldn't belong to any type. This style of abuser is so unpredictable that his partner can never make sense out of what she is living with."
• An abuser of any type can have days when he turns loving, attentive, and thoughtful. At these times, you may feel that his problem has finally gone away and that the relationship will return to its rosy beginning. However, abuse always comes back eventually unless the abuser has dealt with his abusiveness."
MR. RIGHT
Mr. Right considers himself the ultimate authority on every subject under the sun; you might call him Mr. Always Right. He speaks with absolute certainty, brushing your opinions aside like annoying gnats. He seems to see the world as a huge classroom, in which he is the teacher and you are his student. He finds little of value in your thoughts or insights, so he seeks to empty out your head and fill it up with his jewels of brilliance. When Mr. Right sits in one of my groups for abusive, men, he often speaks of his partner as if she were in danger from her own idiocy and he needs to save her from herself. Mr. Right has difficulty speaking to his partner—or about her—without a ring of condescension in his voice. And in a conflict his arrogance gets even worse.
Mr. Right's superiority is a convenient way for him to get what he wants. When he and his partner are arguing about their conflicting desires, he turns it into a clash between Right and Wrong or between Intelligence and Stupidity. He ridicules and discredits her perspective so that he can escape dealing with it. Here is a conversation I had with a Mr. Right whom I worked with in one of my abuser groups:
BANCROFT: Pat, do you have any abusive behaviors to report from this past week?
PAT: Well, I did yell at Gwen once and called her bitch. We were fighting about money, as usual.
BANCROFT: What was Gwen's perspective in the argument?
PAT: She thinks money grows on trees.
BANCROFT: Gwen said that money grows on trees?
PAT: Well no, not just like that. But that's how she acts.
BANCROFT: Let's try again. What was she saying in the argument?
PAT: She thinks we have enough money to get both of the children whole new sets of clothes. But we just bought all new stuff for them only a few weeks ago. And we just don't have it in the bank right now.
BANCROFT: Does Gwen agree that the last round of shopping was only a few weeks ago?
PAT: No, she says it was four months ago, at the beginning of the summer, which is a crock. I can remember that the summer was more than half over.
BANCROFT: So her memory is different from yours. Did she say why she thinks it was earlier?
PAT: Of course not, she's…Well, maybe she said something about how she remembers she paid the credit card bill for those clothes while the children were still in school. But she's wrong.
BANCROFT: Now, you said that the money simply isn't there. Gwen obviously thinks differently. Where does she think the money should come from?
PAT: I already told you, she wants me to be a magician who can just make it appear.
BANCROFT: But she must have been making points about it. What was she saying?
PAT: Oh, I don't know…She says we should sell our car and get a shit box, which would just end up costing us more in the long run, plus I don't want to deal with it.
BANCROFT: What do you drive now?
PAT: A Saab.
BANCROFT: Let me guess. She would like to trade the Saab in on a reliable car that has lower monthly payments, cheaper parts, and fewer repair bills.
PAT: Yeah, that's what I said, a shit box.
What Pat revealed in this exchange was that each time Gwen attempts to stand up for herself or put forth her views, he twists her statements to make them sound absurd. Notice how long it took me to drag out of him what Gwen's opinions actually were. Gwen naturally came out feeling stifled by Pat, as there was nothing she could do to get her views heard and taken seriously. Part of why Pat is convinced that Gwen is stupid is that he is so exaggeratedly certain of his own wisdom and clarity. Since she continues to disagree with him, he takes that as proof of her foolishness.
When Mr. Right decides to take control of a conversation, he switches into his Voice of Truth, giving the definitive pronouncement on what is the correct answer or the proper outlook. Abuse counselors call this tactic defining reality. Over time, his tone of authority can cause his partner to doubt her own judgment and come to see herself as not very bright. I notice how often I am speaking with the intelligent-sounding partner of one of my clients, only to have her say to me: I'm not that smart. The abuser wants her to doubt her mental abilities in this way, so that he can control her better.
Besides knowing all about the world, Mr. Right is also an expert on your life and how you should live it. He has the answers to your conflicts at work, how you should spend your time, and how you should raise your children. He is especially knowledgeable about your faults, and he likes to inventory what is wrong with you, as if tearing you down were the way to improve you. He may seem to enjoy periodically straightening you out in front of other people to humiliate you, thereby establishing his unquestionable intellectual superiority. When Mr. Right's partner refuses to defer to his sophisticated knowledge, he is likely to escalate to insulting her, calling her names, or mocking her with imitation. If he's still not satisfied that he has brought her down low enough, he may reach for bigger guns, such as ruining evening plans, leaving places without her, or saying bad things about her to other people. If he is physically assaultive, then this is the time he may throw things, raise fists, or attack violently. In short, Mr. Right finds some way to ensure that his partner regrets her insistence on having her own mind.
Mr. Right in some respects is a less violent and frightening version of the Drill Sergeant (see p. 86), but Mr. Right's control tends to be especially focused on telling his partner how to think. His partner feels suffocated by his control, as if he were watching her every move under a microscope.
Mr. Right tries to sanitize his bullying by telling me, I have strong opinions or I like debating ideas. This is like a bank robber saying, I'm interested in financial issues. Mr. Right isn't interested in debating ideas; he wants to impose his own.
The central attitudes driving Mr. Right are:
• You should be in awe of my intelligence and should look up to me intellectually. I know better than you do, even about what's good for you.
• Your opinions aren't worth listening to carefully or taking seriously.
• The fact that you sometimes disagree with me shows how sloppy your thinking is.
• If you would just accept that I know what's right, our relationship would go much better. Your own life would go better, too.
• When you disagree with me about something, no matter how respectfully or meekly, that's mistreatment of me.
• If I put you down for long enough, some day you'll see.
MR. SENSITIVE
Mr. Sensitive appears to be the diametric opposite of the Drill Sergeant. He is soft-spoken, gentle, and supportive—when he isn't being abusive. He loves the language of feelings, openly sharing his insecurities, his fears, and his emotional injuries. He hugs other men. He may speak out about the absurdity of war or the need for men to get in touch with their feminine side. Perhaps he attends a men's group or goes on men's retreats. Often he has participated extensively in therapy or twelve-step programs, or reads all the big self-help books, so he speaks the language of popular psychology and introspection. His vocabulary is sprinkled with jargon like developing closeness, working out our issues, and facing up to hard things about myself. He presents himself to women as an ally in the struggle against sex-role limitations. To some women, he seems like a dream come true.
So what's wrong with this picture? Nothing obvious yet. But this is exactly the problem: Mr. Sensitive wraps himself in one of the most persuasive covers a man can have. If you start to feel chronically mistreated by him, you are likely to assume that something is wrong with you, and if you complain about him to other people, they may think you must be spoiled: You have the New Age man, what more do you want?
The following dynamics are typical of a relationship with Mr. Sensitive and may help explain your feeling that something has gone awry:
1. You seem to be hurting his feelings constantly, though you aren't sure why, and he expects your attention to be focused endlessly on his emotional injuries. If you are in a bad mood one day and say something unfair or insensitive, it won't be enough for you to give him a sincere apology and accept responsibility. He'll go on and on about it, expecting you to grovel as if you had treated him with profound cruelty. (Notice the twist here: This is just what an abuser accuses his partner of doing to him, when all she is really looking for is a heartfelt I'm sorry.)
2. When your feelings are hurt, on the other hand, he will insist on brushing over it quickly. He may give you a stream of pop-psychology language (Just let the feelings go through you, don't hold on to them so much, or It's all in the attitude you take toward life, or No one can hurt you unless you let them) to substitute for genuine support for your feelings, especially if you are upset about something he did. None of these philosophies applies when you upset him, however.
3. With the passing of time, he increasingly casts the blame on to you for anything he is dissatisfied with in his own life; your burden of guilt keeps growing.
4. He starts to exhibit a mean side that no one else ever sees and may even become threatening or intimidating.
Mr. Sensitive has the potential to turn physically frightening, as any style of abuser can, no matter how much he may preach nonviolence. After an aggressive incident, he will speak of his actions as anger rather than as abuse, as though there were no difference between the two. He blames his assaultive behavior on you or on his emotional issues, saying that his feelings were so deeply wounded that he had no other choice.
Many people reject the possibility that Mr. Sensitive could be an abuser. I ran into this disbelief one weekend when I was leading a training course on emotional recovery, as I periodically do. My workshops focus partly on the healing effects of crying and so tend to be attended by more women than men. The males who do come have included many of the most wonderful men it has been my good fortune to know, as well as a handful of the biggest manipulators. A few years ago, a participant named Deanna approached me anxiously before a workshop. She explained that an ex-partner of hers named Brad had called her a few days ahead of the workshop to tell her he was attending the same weekend. She was uncomfortable and told him that if he showed up she would leave. He promised not to bother her, though, and said he would not bring up their relationship in any way. He was coming with his new girlfriend, which eased Deanna's worries.
I spent some time talking with Brad as the workshop was starting, without mentioning Deanna, and he seemed likeable, kind, and—what can I say?—sensitive. However, I observed within a few hours that he was in fact speaking to other people about his past with Deanna and getting them riled up about her running away from their unresolved issues. On Sunday morning, he finally provoked a scene about their relationship in front of the full workshop, which was humiliating to Deanna.
The story does not end there. I called a break, and took Brad aside. I told him that it was my understanding that he had agreed not to raise these issues and that it had become obvious to me that he had come for the weekend with the intention of doing precisely what he had promised not to. I went on to point out that he had taken Deanna's weekend away from her and that I considered this kind of power move to be abuse, especially since it was directed at an ex-partner.
Saying the word abuse to an abusive person can be like lighting a tinderbox: When you name the unmentionable secret, he goes wild. Brad got loud, rolled his eyes at what a hysterical exaggerator he considered me to be, and adopted a victim stance, saying, I beg you to stop this. Then came the most important part: He said in a screeching whine, I have only put a hand on a partner once in my life, many years ago, and I just barely pushed her away from me like this—and he shoved me hard by the shoulder—after she called my mother a sick woman.
Well, why was Brad denying a history of assault (while actually admitting to one) when I hadn't said anything about violence? The possibility that he might be physically abusive had never occurred to me before, but it certainly did now. The signs were all there: bullying Deanna that weekend and then insisting it was for her own good; feeling entitled to ignore an important agreement; blaming his earlier girlfriend for his assault of her and minimizing it—the strength of the shove he gave me would have shaken up most women. I now doubted that the assaultive incident he had described was his only occasion of physically intimidating a woman.
At this point I required Brad to leave the workshop. I then had to deal with a mini-insurrection from some of the other workshop participants, who couldn't believe I was ejecting this gentle man who was so in touch with his feelings. He cries after all; how could he be abusive.
This gentle man style of abuser tends to be highly self-centered and demanding of emotional catering. He may not be the man who has a fit because dinner is late but rather erupts because of some way his partner failed to sacrifice her own needs or interests to keep him content. He plays up how fragile he is to divert attention from the swath of destruction he leaves behind him.
The central attitudes driving Mr. Sensitive are:
• I'm against the macho men, so I couldn't be abusive.
• As long as I use a lot of psychobabble, no one is going to believe that I am mistreating you.
• I can control you by analyzing how your mind and emotions work, and what your issues are from childhood.
• I can get inside your head whether you want me there or not.
• Nothing in the world is more important than my feelings.
• Women should be grateful to me for not being like those other men.
RAMBO
Rambo is aggressive with everybody, not just his partner. He gets a thrill out of the sensation of intimidating people and strives to handle all life situations by subtly or overtly creating fear. He has an exaggerated, stereotypical view of what a man is supposed to be, which goes hand in hand with seeing women as delicate, inferior, and in need of protection. Rambo often comes from a home or neighborhood where he was the target of violence himself and learned that the only way to feel safe is to be stronger, tougher, and less caring than everybody else. He has little patience for weakness, fragility, or indecision. Often he has a criminal record for violence, theft, drunk driving, or drug dealing.
Early in a relationship, Rambo is likely to be loving and kind to his partner, like most abusers. Because he lacks fear—or pretends to—he can make a woman feel safe and protected. This style of abuser can therefore be particularly appealing to a woman who comes from a violent home herself or to one who is in the process of leaving another abusive relationship. Rambo can make you feel as though his aggressiveness would never be directed toward you, because he loves you; he wishes to look after your safety as if you were his daughter. He enjoys the role of protector, feeling like a gallant knight. However, he lacks respect for women, and this disrespect, combined with his general violent tendencies, means that it is only a matter of time before he will be the one you need protection from.
Many highly masculine men are not Rambo. The notion that all macho men are likely to abuse women is based largely on class and ethnic prejudices, the same misconceptions that allow Mr. Sensitive or Mr. Right to skate by undetected. There are plenty of tough guys out there who are friendly to everyone and avoid aggressive interactions whenever possible but enjoy lifting weights, playing rough sports, hunting, and other aspects of stereotypical masculinity. They may be good fighters, but only in self-defense. It isn't macho that women need to watch out for. The danger signs are violence and intimidation toward anyone, and disrespect and superiority toward women.
Sometimes Rambo is a psychopath or sociopath, which can make him all the more emotionally abusive and in some cases physically abusive as well. Later we will take a look at psychopaths and other mentally disordered abusers.
The central attitudes driving Rambo are:
• Strength and aggressiveness are good; compassion and conflict resolution are bad.
• Anything that could be even remotely associated with homosexuality, including walking away from possible violence or showing any fear or grief, has to be avoided at any cost.
• Femaleness and femininity (which he associates with homosexuality) are inferior. Women are here to serve men and be protected by them.
• Men should never hit women, because it is unmanly to do so. However, exceptions to this rule can be made for my own partner if her behavior is bad enough. Men need to keep their women in line.
• You are a thing that belongs to me, akin to a trophy.
THE WATER TORTURER
The Water Torturer's style proves that anger doesn't cause abuse. He can assault his partner psychologically without even raising his voice. He tends to stay calm in arguments, using his own evenness as a weapon to push her over the edge. He often has a superior or contemptuous grin on his face, smug and self-assured. He uses a repertoire of aggressive conversational tactics at low volume, including sarcasm, derision—such as openly laughing at her—mimicking her voice, and cruel, cutting remarks. Like Mr. Right, he tends to take things she has said and twist them beyond recognition to make her appear absurd, perhaps especially in front of other people. He gets to his partner through a slow but steady stream of low-level emotional assaults, and perhaps occasional shoves or other minor acts of violence that don't generally cause visible injury but may do great psychological harm. He is relentless in his quiet derision and meanness.
The impact on a woman of all these subtle tactics is that either her blood temperature rises to a boil or she feels stupid and inferior, or some combination of the two. In an argument, she may end up yelling in frustration, leaving the room crying, or sinking into silence. The Water Torturer then says, See, you're the abusive one, not me. You're the one who's yelling and refusing to talk things out rationally. I wasn't even raising my voice. It's impossible to reason with you.
The psychological effects of living with the Water Torturer can be severe. His tactics can be difficult to identify, so they sink in deeply. Women can find it difficult not to blame themselves for their reactions to what their partner does if they don't even know what to call it. When someone slaps you in the face, you know you've been slapped. But when a woman feels psychologically assaulted, with little idea why, after an argument with The Water Torturer, she may turn her frustration inward. How do you seek support from a friend, for example, when you don't know how to describe what is going wrong?
The Water Torturer tends to genuinely believe that there is nothing unusual about his behavior. When his partner starts to confront him with his abusiveness—which she usually does sooner or later—he looks at her as if she were crazy and says, What the hell are you talking about? I've never done anything to you. Friends and relatives who have witnessed the couple's interactions may back him up. They shake their heads and say to each other, I don't know what goes on with her. She just explodes at him sometimes, and he's so low-key. Their children can develop the impression that Mom blows up over nothing. She herself may start to wonder if there is something psychologically wrong with her.
The Water Torturer is payback-oriented like most abusive men, but he may hide it better. If he is physically abusive, his violence may take the form of cold-hearted slaps for your own good or to get you to wake up rather than explosive rage. His moves appear carefully thought out, and he rarely makes obvious mistakes—such as letting his abusiveness show in public—that could turn other people against him or get him in legal trouble.
If you are involved with a Water Torturer, you may struggle for years trying to figure out what is happening. You may feel that you overreact to his behavior and that he isn't really so bad. But the effects of his control and contempt have crept up on you over the years. If you finally leave him, you may experience intense periods of delayed rage, as you become conscious of how quietly but deathly oppressive he was.
This style of man rarely lasts long in an abuser program unless he has a court order. He is so accustomed to having complete success with his tactics that he can't tolerate an environment where the counselors recognize and name his maneuvers and don't let him get away with them. He tends to rapidly decide that his group leaders are as crazy as his partner and heads for the door.
The central attitudes driving the Water Torturer are:
• You are crazy. You fly off the handle over nothing.
• I can easily convince other people that you're the one who is messed up.
• As long as I'm calm, you can't call anything I do abusive, no matter how cruel.
• I know exactly how to get under your skin.
THE VICTIM
Life has been hard and unfair for the Victim. To hear him tell it, his intelligence has been chronically underestimated; he has been burned by people he trusted; and his good intentions have been misunderstood. The Victim appeals to a woman's compassion and desire to feel that she can make a difference in his life. He often tells persuasive and heart-rending stories about how he was abused by his former partner, sometimes adding the tragic element that she is now restricting or preventing his contact with his children. He maneuvers the woman into hating his ex-partner and may succeed in enlisting her in a campaign of harassment, rumor spreading, or battling for custody.
As a counselor of abusive men, I have dozens of times been in the position of interviewing a man's former partner and then speaking with the new one. The new partner usually speaks at length about what a wicked witch the woman before her was. I can't tell her what I know, much as I wish I could, because of my responsibility to protect the confidentiality and safety of the former partner. All I can say is: I always recommend, whenever there are claims of emotional or physical abuse, that women talk to each other directly and not just accept the man's denial.
Women sometimes ask me: But what if a man I am dating really was victimized by his former girlfriend? How can I tell the difference? Here are some things to watch for:
1. If you listen carefully, you often can hear the difference between anger toward an ex-partner, which would not be worrisome in itself, and disrespect or contempt, which should raise warning flags. A man who has left a relationship with bitterness should nonetheless be able to talk about his ex-partner as a human being, with some understanding of what her side of the conflicts was and some ways he might have contributed to what went wrong. If he speaks in degrading or superior ways about her, or makes everything that went wrong in the relationship her fault, be careful, because it is likely that he was the abusive one.
2. Try to get him to talk about his own conduct in the relationship, especially around the time of the breakup. If he blames his own behavior on her, that's a bad sign.
3. Be particularly careful with a man who claims to have been the victim of physical violence by a previous female partner. The great majority of men who make such claims are physical abusers. Ask him for as much detail as you can about the violent incidents, and then try to talk to her or seek out anyone else who could give you a different perspective on what happened. Watch for warning signs of abusiveness (see Chapter 5).
4. Pay attention to how he talks and thinks about abused women. A genuine male victim tends to feel sympathy for abused women and support their cause. The Victim, on the other hand, often says that women exaggerate or fabricate their claims of abuse or insists that men are abused just as much as women are.
The Victim may adopt the language of abuse victims, claiming, for example, that his ex-partner was focused on power and control, disrespected him, and always had to have her own way. In a few years, he will be using similar reality-inversion language about you—unless, of course, you kowtow to him to his satisfaction.
The Victim is highly self-centered in relationships. Everything seems to revolve around his wounds, and he keeps himself at the center of attention. If you have children, he tries to get them to feel sorry for him as well. He seems forever to be telling you: You don't understand me, you don't appreciate me, you hold my mistakes over my head. Yet you sense that the dynamic is actually the other way around. If you stand up to him about these distortions, he tells you that you are abusing him or says, You just can't tolerate my standing up to your bullying. This recurring inversion of reality is similar to what happens with Mr. Sensitive, but without the introspective psychology, gentle man, or recovering alcoholic routines. If you leave him, you risk his seeking custody of your children, presenting himself to the court as the victim of your abuse and of your efforts to turn the children against him.
Often the Victim claims to be victimized not only by you but also by his boss, his parents, the neighbors, his friends, and strangers on the street. Everyone is always wronging him, and he is always blameless.
When the Victim joins an abuser group, his story tends to go like this: I put up with my partner's mistreatment of me for years, and I never fought back or even tried to defend myself. But I finally couldn't take it anymore, and I started to give her back a little taste of what she was doing to me. So now I've been labeled abusive. Women are allowed to do those things and nobody cares, but as soon as a man does it he's a pariah.
This line of reasoning many times develops into a discussion of how men are the victims of women overall in society, because women run the world. This is a startling distortion, given which gender actually dominates almost all legislatures, police departments, judgeships, businesses, and so on ad nauseam. When I point out this reality to the Victim, he describes a kind of paranoid fantasy in which women are behind the scenes secretly pulling the strings, largely by getting men to feel sorry for them. His capacity for turning things into their opposites in this way is a central cause of his abusiveness.
If you are involved with the Victim and want to escape his abuse, you may find that you feel guilty toward him, despite his treatment of you, and have difficulty ending the relationship as a result. You may feel that because his life has been so hard, you are reluctant to add to his pain by abandoning him. You may worry that he won't take care of himself if you leave, that he will wither away from depression, won't eat or sleep, or might even try to kill himself. The Victim knows how to present himself as helpless and pathetic so that you will find it harder to take your own life back.
The central attitudes driving the Victim are:
• Everybody has done me wrong, especially the women I’ve been involved with. Poor me.
• When you accuse me of being abusive, you are joining the parade of people who have been cruel and unfair to me. It proves you're just like the rest.
• It's justifiable for me to do to you whatever I feel you are doing to me, and even to make it quite a bit worse to make sure you get the message.
• Women who complain of mistreatment by men, such as relationship abuse or sexual harassment, are anti-male and out for blood.
• I've had it so hard that I'm not responsible for my actions.
THE TERRORIST
I worked for a few months with an abused woman named Gloria who was wondering how much longer she would be alive. Her husband, Gerald, would glare at her, drum his fingers methodically on the table, and say: You have six months left. Things better shape up around here. Six months. Her head would swim and her heart would race with fear, and she would plead with him to tell what exactly he planned to do to her at the end of that period. And he would answer, with maybe just a hint of a cold smile: Just wait and see, just wait and see. Six months, Gloria. Gerald had never laid a hand on Gloria in the five years they had been together, but she was terrified. She started working with me on making an escape plan to run away with their two-year-old son.
The Terrorist tends to be both highly controlling and extremely demanding. His worst aspect, however, is that he frequently reminds his partner that he could physically rip her to pieces or even kill her. He doesn't necessarily beat her, however; some abusers know how to terrorize their partners with threats, strange veiled statements, and bizarre behaviors. One of my violent clients cut an article out of the newspaper about a woman who had been murdered by her husband, and he taped it up on the refrigerator. Another man responded to his partner's announcement that she was leaving him by spilling the blood of an animal in front of the house. Another client would take out his gun when he was angry at his partner but would insist that he was just going to clean it and that it had nothing to do with her.
Unlike most other abusers, the Terrorist often seems to be sadistic: He gets enjoyment out of causing pain and fear and seems to find cruelty thrilling. He is likely to have been severely abused as a child, which generally is not true of other abusers. However, you cannot help him to heal. This may be difficult to accept, since the hope of helping him overcome his problems may be what gets you through the terror of living with him. The Terrorist's problems are much too deep for a partner to solve, as they involve a complex weave of serious psychological problems with the typical destructive nature of an abuser. You need to focus instead on getting yourself safe. The Terrorist's top goal is to paralyze you with fear so that you won't dare think of leaving him or cheating on him. The great majority of abusers who make lethal threats against their partners never carry them out, but that still leaves many who do. The trauma of living with this kind of terror can be profound and can make it extremely difficult for you to think clearly about strategies for escaping to safety. However, most women do manage to get out. The critical first step is to seek confidential help as soon as possible. Begin by calling an abuse hotline as soon as you safely can (see Resources). There are more suggestions in Chapter 9.
When a woman does leave the Terrorist, he may stalk or threaten her, and this dangerous harassment can continue for a long time. If the couple has children, he may attempt to get custody or unsupervised visitation, so that he can terrorize or control her through the children. He also may use information he has about her, such as where she works or where her parents live, to track her and to threaten her loved ones. It is essential that friends, relatives, courts, and communities understand the realities of these risks and give the woman the most complete support and protection possible, while simultaneously taking steps to hold the abuser accountable. It may be possible to stop the Terrorist from escalating to murder, but only if he gets a strong message that stalking and threatening an ex-partner is unacceptable, that he is responsible for his own actions, and that the community is prepared to jail him if his threatening behavior does not stop immediately. Actions short of these are often insufficient.
Chapter 10 contains more information for a woman who is involved in a custody or visitation battle with an abuser or for those who are concerned that one may start.
The central attitudes driving the Terrorist are:
• You have no right to defy me or leave me. Your life is in my hands.
• Women are evil and have to be kept terrorized to prevent that evil from coming forth.
• I would rather die than accept your right to independence.
• The children are one of the best tools I can use to make you fearful.
• Seeing you terrified is exciting and satisfying.
THE DEMAND MAN
The Demand Man is highly entitled. He expects his partner's life to revolve around meeting his needs and is angry and blaming if anything gets in the way. He becomes enraged if he isn't catered to or if he is inconvenienced in even a minor way. The partner of this man comes to feel that nothing she does is ever good enough and that it is impossible to make him happy. He criticizes her frequently, usually about things that he thinks she should have done—or done better—for him.
Is every highly demanding partner an abuser? No. There are specific elements to the Demand Man's style:
1. He has little sense of give and take. His demands for emotional support, favors, caretaking, or sexual attention are well out of proportion to his contributions; he constantly feels that you owe him, things that he has done nothing to earn.
2. He exaggerates and overvalues his own contributions. If he was generous one day back in 1997, you are probably still hearing about it today as proof of how wonderfully he treats you and how ungrateful you are. He seems to keep a mental list of any favors or kindnesses he ever does and expects each one paid back at a heavy interest rate. He thinks you owe him tremendous gratitude for meeting the ordinary responsibilities of daily life—when he does—but takes your contributions for granted.
3. When he doesn't get what he feels is his due, he punishes you for letting him down.
4. When he is generous or supportive, it's because he feels like it. When he isn't in the mood to give anything, he doesn't. He is positive or loving toward you when he feels the need to prove to himself or to others that he is a good person, or when there is something that he is about to demand in return; in other words, it's about him, not you. The longer you have been with him, the more his generous-seeming actions appear self-serving.
5. If your needs ever conflict with his, he is furious. At these times he attacks you as self-centered or, inflexible, turning reality on its head with statements such as, All you care about is yourself! He tends to work hard to convince outsiders of how selfish and ungrateful you are, speaking in a hurt voice about all the things he does for you.
At the same time, the Demand Man is likely to be furious if anything is demanded of him. Not only are you not supposed to demand any favors, you aren't even supposed to ask him to take care of his own obligations. If you ask him to clean up a mess he's left, he responds, I'm not your fucking servant. If you ask him to pay money he owes you or to work more hours to help out with the household expenses, he says, You're a typical woman, all you want from me is my money. If you complain to him of how rarely he is there for you, he'll say, You are a needy, controlling bitch. He keeps twisting things around backward in these ways, so that any effort you make to discuss your needs or his responsibilities switches abruptly to being about his needs and your responsibilities.
The Demand Man is sometimes less controlling than other abusers as long as he is getting his needs met on his terms. He may allow you to have your own friendships or support you in pursuing your own career. But the effects on you of your partner's extreme entitlement can be just as destructive as severe control.
The central attitudes driving the Demand Man are:
• It's your job to do things for me, including taking care of my responsibilities if I drop the ball on them. If I'm unhappy about any aspect of my life, whether it has to do with our relationship or not, it's your fault.
• You should not place demands on me at all. You should be grateful for whatever I choose to give.
• I am above criticism.
• I am a very loving and giving partner. You're lucky to have me.
THE DRILL SERGEANT
The Drill Sergeant takes controlling behavior to its extreme, running his partner's life in every way that he can. He criticizes her clothing, tells her whether she can go out or not, interferes with her work. He wants her to have no one close to her, so he ruins her relationships with friends and relatives or simply forbids her to see them. He may listen to her phone calls or read her mail, or require the children to report on her activities any time he is away. If she isn't home by his appointed curfew at night, she is at risk for abuse. She feels like a little girl living with a tyrannical father, with no more freedom than an eight-year-old would have.
The Drill Sergeant is often fanatically jealous. He verbally assaults his partner with accusations that she is cheating on him or checking out other men and tosses crass and disturbing sexual terms into his tirades. He may augment his hateful remarks about his partner with hideous comments about females in general, such as, All women are whores. The emotional experience of these verbal attacks can be similar to that of a sexual assault: The woman is left feeling violated, debased, and traumatized. At the same time, this style of abuser more often than not is out having affairs himself. It isn't fidelity he cares about; it's possession.
The Drill Sergeant is, unfortunately, almost sure to be physically violent sooner or later, probably beginning with threats and then eventually escalating to assault. If his partner stands up to him, such as by attempting to preserve any of her rights to freedom, his violence and threats are likely to escalate until she is hurt or terrified enough that she submits to his control. He is a risk to beat his partner up to the point of severe injury.
Getting away from the Drill Sergeant can be difficult. Since he monitors the woman's movements so closely, it is a challenge for her to get to a support group for abused women or to seek other kinds of support. Since he isolates her from people, she has to draw entirely on her own strength, and many days she may feel like she doesn't have much strength left. And since from time to time he is probably openly violent, she is forced to consider what the consequences of attempting to leave him could be, including whether he might try to kill her.
If your partner is a Drill Sergeant, your situation is a dangerous one. You may have to use some courage—as well as careful vigilance—to even get the opportunity to read this book. Perhaps you are hiding it under a mattress or reading it at someone else's house in quick bits. Don't give up. Many women have gone through this kind of captivity and have found a way to escape, even if it takes some time. The single most important thing to do is to seek opportunities to phone a hotline for abused women (see Resources in the back of this book). Call them to speak for five minutes if that's all you can safely do for now. Call every day if you can. The hot line is the beginning of the path to freedom.
You may be sorely tempted to have a secret affair, since your partner shows you so little kindness or tenderness. A positive sexual connection may be especially affirming for you, because of how sexually degrading the Drill Sergeant tends to be. But cheating on him can be deadly if he catches you. Consider holding off on seeing other men until you have gotten yourself safe.
The Drill Sergeant often has some psychological problems. Although mental health issues do not cause abusiveness, they can intensify a man's violent tendencies. If he sometimes seems to become convinced of things that are obviously not true, has trouble getting along with people in general, was severely abused or neglected as a child, or has other indications of mental illness, you need to take even greater caution.
To read more about dealing with dangerous abusers, see The Terrorist later in this chapter (p. 99) and Leaving an Abuser Safely in Chapter 9 (p. 225).
The central attitudes driving the Drill Sergeant are:
• I need to control your every move or you will do it wrong.
• I know the exact way that everything should be done.
• You shouldn't have anyone else—or any thing else—in your life besides me.
• I am going to watch you like a hawk to keep you from developing strength or independence.
• I love you more than anyone in the world, but you disgust me.
THE PLAYER
The Player is usually good looking and often sexy. (But sometimes he just thinks he is.) In the early part of a relationship he seems head over heels in love and wants to spend as much time as possible in bed together. He is a pretty good lover. You may feel lucky that you have caught someone who knows how to turn you on and feel proud to be seen with him. Your self-opinion gets a nice boost.
After a while, though, a few things start to bother you. You notice that apart from sex his interest in you is waning, and even his sexual energy is dropping off a little. He seems to lock his eyes pretty hard onto women that walk by. He flirts with waitresses, clerks, or even friends of yours. Sexual undertones seem to run through most of his interactions with females, except for ones he finds completely unattractive. Rumors start to come back to you that he's been seen with this woman, that he is sleeping with that one, that he is pursuing another one but she isn't interested yet. At first you discount these rumors as hurtful gossip, but after a while you start to wonder.
The Player often starts to stall on moving in together or agreeing to be exclusive, even though earlier he couldn't wait to get serious. He may say that he's been hurt or has a fear of commitment (I'm just not ready), but the real issue is that he doesn't want restrictions on his freedom. Much of his satisfaction in life comes from exploiting women and feeling like a sexual animal. Women around the Player seem to get angry at each other a lot, rather than at him, and sometimes get into physical confrontations. These tensions work out well for him, diverting attention from his infidelity and dishonesty. He sets up this dynamic with some combination of the following tactics:
1. He knows how to make each woman feel that she's the special one and yet at the same time keep her off balance, so that she never feels quite sure of where she stands with him.
2. He tells each one that the others are lying about their involvements with him because they are jealous of her, or because he turned them down, or because he used to be involved with them but isn't anymore.
3. He tells each one stories about how other women have mistreated him, or shares other bits of information—largely invented—to make previous, or current, women in his life sound conniving, vindictive, or addicted to substances.
4. He breaks up with women and gets back together with them, so that no one can keep track of what's going on.
5. He includes one or two women in his circle who feel unattractive, because he knows he can have more power over them, and manipulates them into hating the women who are seen as more attractive.
If this is your partner's style, you won't necessarily ever be sure whether he is really having sex with other women or if he just flirts because he enjoys the attention and likes you to feel threatened. He may hotly deny that he ever cheats and try to turn the tables by accusing you of being too suspicious. But even if he's telling the truth—which he probably isn't—his constant flirtatious behavior can be as damaging as actual affairs. Either way, he will damage your other relationships, because you will start to perceive any woman as a potential threat to you. If he has a history of hitting on women who are close to you, such as your sister or best friend, you can end up isolated from the women you care about most, because you're afraid he will have affairs with them unless you keep them away.
Chronic infidelity is abusive in itself, but the Player doesn't stop there. He is irresponsible, callous in dealing with his partner's feelings, and periodically verbally abusive. As the relationship progresses, he may start to go for long periods giving his partner next to no attention and barely speaking to her, so she feels shelved. He probably refuses to take responsibility for safe sex (such as using a condom), and he may have fathered children who he is not supporting. His abusiveness can escalate abruptly if he is confronted or caught in his infidelities, and he may turn physically frightening at this point. In a strange but dangerous twist, the Player sometimes hits his partner for catching him cheating rather than the reverse.
The Player's constant flirting and cheating help him to get away with other forms of mistreatment. His partner is likely to focus on her hurt feelings about his infidelities and pour effort into stopping him from straying and, in the process, lose sight of his pattern of abuse. When she asks me whether I think her partner will ever settle down and be faithful to her—if they get married, for example—I answer, He may some day, but what you will have then is a faithful abuser. His promiscuity is a symptom of a deeper problem: He is incapable of taking women seriously as human beings rather than as playthings. With that mind-set, he'll be a destructive partner whether he cheats or not.
The Players I have worked with sometimes claim to suffer from sex addiction, and join Sex and Love Addicts Anonymous (which they may discover is a good place to pick up women). But sex addiction doesn't cause dishonesty, verbal abusiveness, or intimidating behavior. The Player is not a sex addict at all. If he is addicted to anything, it's to the thrill of using women without regard for the effects on them.
The central attitudes driving the Player are:
• Women were put on this earth to have sex with men—especially me.
• Women who want sex are too loose, and women who refuse sex are too uptight. (!)
• It's not my fault that women find me irresistible. (This is a word-for-word quotation from a number of my clients.) It's not fair to expect me to refuse temptation when it's all around me; women seduce me sometimes, and I can't help it.
• If you act like you need anything from me, I am going to ignore you. I'm in this relationship when it's convenient for me and when I feel like it.
• Women who want the nonsexual aspects of themselves appreciated are bitches.
• If you could meet my sexual needs, I wouldn't have to turn to other women.
THE MENTALLY ILL OR ADDICTED ABUSER
This last category is not actually separate from the others; an abusive man of any of the aforementioned styles can also have psychiatric or substance-abuse problems, although the majority do not. Even when mental illness or addiction is a factor, it is not the cause of a man's abuse of his partner, but it can contribute to the severity of his problem and his resistance to change. When these additional problems are present, it is important to be aware of the following points:
1. Certain mental illnesses can increase the chance that an abuser will be dangerous and use physical violence. These include paranoia, severe depression, delusions or hallucinations (psychosis), obsessive-compulsive disorder, and antisocial personality disorder known as psychopathy or sociopathy). These psychiatric conditions also make it next to impossible for an abuser to change, at least until the mental illness has been brought under control through therapy and/or medication, which can take years. Even if the mental illness is properly treated, his abusiveness won't necessarily change.
2. An abuser's reactions to going on or off medication are unpredictable. A woman should take extra precautions for her safety at such a time. Abusers tend to go off medication before long—I have had few clients who were consistent and responsible about taking their meds in the long term. They don't like the side effects, and they are too selfish to care about the implications of the mental illness for their partners or children.
3. The potential danger of a mentally ill abuser has to be assessed by looking at the severity of his psychiatric symptoms in combination with the severity of his abuse characteristics. Looking at his psychiatric symptoms alone can lead to underestimating how dangerous he is.
4. Antisocial personality disorder is present in only a small percentage of abusers but can be important. Those who suffer from this condition lack a conscience and thus are repeatedly involved in behaviors that are harmful to others. Some signs of this condition include: (a) He started getting into illegal behavior when he was still a teenager; (b) his dishonest or aggressive behavior involves situations unrelated to his partner, rather than being restricted to her; (c) he periodically gets into trouble at workplaces or in other contexts for stealing, threatening, or refusing to follow instructions and is likely to have a considerable criminal record by about age thirty, though the offenses may be largely minor ones; (d) he is severely and chronically irresponsible in a way that disrupts the lives of others or creates danger; and (e) he tends to cheat on women a lot, turn them against each other, and maintain shallow relationships with them. The psychopath's physical violence is not necessarily severe, contrary to the popular image, but he may be very dangerous nonetheless. Antisocial personality disorder is very difficult to change through therapy, and there is no effective medication for treating it. It is highly compatible with abusiveness toward women.
5. Those who suffer from narcissistic personality disorder have a highly distorted self-image. They are unable to accept that they might have faults and therefore are unable to imagine how other people perceive them. This condition is highly compatible with abusiveness, though it is present in only a small percentage of abusive men. Clues to the presence of this disorder include: (a) Your partner's self-centeredness is severe, and it carries over into situations that don't involve you; (b) he seems to relate everything back to himself; and (c) he is outraged whenever anyone criticizes him and is incapable of considering that he could ever be anything other than kind and generous. This disorder is highly resistant to therapy and is not treatable with medication. The abuser with this disorder is not able to change substantially through an abuser program either, although he sometimes makes some minor improvements.
6. Many abusers who are not mentally ill want women to think that they are, in order to avoid responsibility for their attitudes and behavior.
Substance abuse, like mental illness, does not cause partner abuse but can increase the risk of violence. Like the mentally ill abuser, the addicted abuser doesn't change unless he deals with his addiction, and even that is only the first step. Chapter 8 examines the role that substances play in partner abuse.
The attitudes driving the mentally ill or addicted batterer are the same as those of of ther abusers and will likely follow the pattern of one of the nine styles described above. In addition, the following attitudes tend to be present:
• I am not responsible for my actions because of my psychological or substance problems.
• If you challenge me about my abusiveness, you are being mean to me, considering these other problems I have. It also shows that you don't understand my other problems.
• I'm not abusive, I'm just———(alcoholic, drug addicted, manic-depressive, an adult child of alcoholics, or whatever his condition may be).
• If you challenge me, it will trigger my addiction or mental illness, and you'll be responsible for what I do.
Although I have focused on the emotionally abusive styles of these different kinds of abusers, any of them may also use physical violence, including sexual assault. Although the Terrorist and the Drill Sergeant are especially likely to become dangerous, they are not the only ones who may do so. Many abusers occasionally use physical violence or threats as a way to intimidate you when they feel that their power or control over you is slipping; violence for them is a kind of trump card they use when their normal patterns of psychological abuse are not getting them the degree of control they feel entitled to. If you are concerned about how dangerous your partner may be, see Is He Going to Get Violent? in Chapter 6 and Leaving an Abuser Safely in Chapter 9.
• Tremendous variation exists among abusive styles. Your abusive partner may be of a type I haven't encountered yet, but that doesn't make him any less real. Many men are mixtures of different aspects."
• An abuser may change so much from day to day that he couldn't belong to any type. This style of abuser is so unpredictable that his partner can never make sense out of what she is living with."
• An abuser of any type can have days when he turns loving, attentive, and thoughtful. At these times, you may feel that his problem has finally gone away and that the relationship will return to its rosy beginning. However, abuse always comes back eventually unless the abuser has dealt with his abusiveness."
MR. RIGHT
Mr. Right considers himself the ultimate authority on every subject under the sun; you might call him Mr. Always Right. He speaks with absolute certainty, brushing your opinions aside like annoying gnats. He seems to see the world as a huge classroom, in which he is the teacher and you are his student. He finds little of value in your thoughts or insights, so he seeks to empty out your head and fill it up with his jewels of brilliance. When Mr. Right sits in one of my groups for abusive, men, he often speaks of his partner as if she were in danger from her own idiocy and he needs to save her from herself. Mr. Right has difficulty speaking to his partner—or about her—without a ring of condescension in his voice. And in a conflict his arrogance gets even worse.
Mr. Right's superiority is a convenient way for him to get what he wants. When he and his partner are arguing about their conflicting desires, he turns it into a clash between Right and Wrong or between Intelligence and Stupidity. He ridicules and discredits her perspective so that he can escape dealing with it. Here is a conversation I had with a Mr. Right whom I worked with in one of my abuser groups:
BANCROFT: Pat, do you have any abusive behaviors to report from this past week?
PAT: Well, I did yell at Gwen once and called her bitch. We were fighting about money, as usual.
BANCROFT: What was Gwen's perspective in the argument?
PAT: She thinks money grows on trees.
BANCROFT: Gwen said that money grows on trees?
PAT: Well no, not just like that. But that's how she acts.
BANCROFT: Let's try again. What was she saying in the argument?
PAT: She thinks we have enough money to get both of the children whole new sets of clothes. But we just bought all new stuff for them only a few weeks ago. And we just don't have it in the bank right now.
BANCROFT: Does Gwen agree that the last round of shopping was only a few weeks ago?
PAT: No, she says it was four months ago, at the beginning of the summer, which is a crock. I can remember that the summer was more than half over.
BANCROFT: So her memory is different from yours. Did she say why she thinks it was earlier?
PAT: Of course not, she's…Well, maybe she said something about how she remembers she paid the credit card bill for those clothes while the children were still in school. But she's wrong.
BANCROFT: Now, you said that the money simply isn't there. Gwen obviously thinks differently. Where does she think the money should come from?
PAT: I already told you, she wants me to be a magician who can just make it appear.
BANCROFT: But she must have been making points about it. What was she saying?
PAT: Oh, I don't know…She says we should sell our car and get a shit box, which would just end up costing us more in the long run, plus I don't want to deal with it.
BANCROFT: What do you drive now?
PAT: A Saab.
BANCROFT: Let me guess. She would like to trade the Saab in on a reliable car that has lower monthly payments, cheaper parts, and fewer repair bills.
PAT: Yeah, that's what I said, a shit box.
What Pat revealed in this exchange was that each time Gwen attempts to stand up for herself or put forth her views, he twists her statements to make them sound absurd. Notice how long it took me to drag out of him what Gwen's opinions actually were. Gwen naturally came out feeling stifled by Pat, as there was nothing she could do to get her views heard and taken seriously. Part of why Pat is convinced that Gwen is stupid is that he is so exaggeratedly certain of his own wisdom and clarity. Since she continues to disagree with him, he takes that as proof of her foolishness.
When Mr. Right decides to take control of a conversation, he switches into his Voice of Truth, giving the definitive pronouncement on what is the correct answer or the proper outlook. Abuse counselors call this tactic defining reality. Over time, his tone of authority can cause his partner to doubt her own judgment and come to see herself as not very bright. I notice how often I am speaking with the intelligent-sounding partner of one of my clients, only to have her say to me: I'm not that smart. The abuser wants her to doubt her mental abilities in this way, so that he can control her better.
Besides knowing all about the world, Mr. Right is also an expert on your life and how you should live it. He has the answers to your conflicts at work, how you should spend your time, and how you should raise your children. He is especially knowledgeable about your faults, and he likes to inventory what is wrong with you, as if tearing you down were the way to improve you. He may seem to enjoy periodically straightening you out in front of other people to humiliate you, thereby establishing his unquestionable intellectual superiority. When Mr. Right's partner refuses to defer to his sophisticated knowledge, he is likely to escalate to insulting her, calling her names, or mocking her with imitation. If he's still not satisfied that he has brought her down low enough, he may reach for bigger guns, such as ruining evening plans, leaving places without her, or saying bad things about her to other people. If he is physically assaultive, then this is the time he may throw things, raise fists, or attack violently. In short, Mr. Right finds some way to ensure that his partner regrets her insistence on having her own mind.
Mr. Right in some respects is a less violent and frightening version of the Drill Sergeant (see p. 86), but Mr. Right's control tends to be especially focused on telling his partner how to think. His partner feels suffocated by his control, as if he were watching her every move under a microscope.
Mr. Right tries to sanitize his bullying by telling me, I have strong opinions or I like debating ideas. This is like a bank robber saying, I'm interested in financial issues. Mr. Right isn't interested in debating ideas; he wants to impose his own.
The central attitudes driving Mr. Right are:
• You should be in awe of my intelligence and should look up to me intellectually. I know better than you do, even about what's good for you.
• Your opinions aren't worth listening to carefully or taking seriously.
• The fact that you sometimes disagree with me shows how sloppy your thinking is.
• If you would just accept that I know what's right, our relationship would go much better. Your own life would go better, too.
• When you disagree with me about something, no matter how respectfully or meekly, that's mistreatment of me.
• If I put you down for long enough, some day you'll see.
MR. SENSITIVE
Mr. Sensitive appears to be the diametric opposite of the Drill Sergeant. He is soft-spoken, gentle, and supportive—when he isn't being abusive. He loves the language of feelings, openly sharing his insecurities, his fears, and his emotional injuries. He hugs other men. He may speak out about the absurdity of war or the need for men to get in touch with their feminine side. Perhaps he attends a men's group or goes on men's retreats. Often he has participated extensively in therapy or twelve-step programs, or reads all the big self-help books, so he speaks the language of popular psychology and introspection. His vocabulary is sprinkled with jargon like developing closeness, working out our issues, and facing up to hard things about myself. He presents himself to women as an ally in the struggle against sex-role limitations. To some women, he seems like a dream come true.
So what's wrong with this picture? Nothing obvious yet. But this is exactly the problem: Mr. Sensitive wraps himself in one of the most persuasive covers a man can have. If you start to feel chronically mistreated by him, you are likely to assume that something is wrong with you, and if you complain about him to other people, they may think you must be spoiled: You have the New Age man, what more do you want?
The following dynamics are typical of a relationship with Mr. Sensitive and may help explain your feeling that something has gone awry:
1. You seem to be hurting his feelings constantly, though you aren't sure why, and he expects your attention to be focused endlessly on his emotional injuries. If you are in a bad mood one day and say something unfair or insensitive, it won't be enough for you to give him a sincere apology and accept responsibility. He'll go on and on about it, expecting you to grovel as if you had treated him with profound cruelty. (Notice the twist here: This is just what an abuser accuses his partner of doing to him, when all she is really looking for is a heartfelt I'm sorry.)
2. When your feelings are hurt, on the other hand, he will insist on brushing over it quickly. He may give you a stream of pop-psychology language (Just let the feelings go through you, don't hold on to them so much, or It's all in the attitude you take toward life, or No one can hurt you unless you let them) to substitute for genuine support for your feelings, especially if you are upset about something he did. None of these philosophies applies when you upset him, however.
3. With the passing of time, he increasingly casts the blame on to you for anything he is dissatisfied with in his own life; your burden of guilt keeps growing.
4. He starts to exhibit a mean side that no one else ever sees and may even become threatening or intimidating.
Mr. Sensitive has the potential to turn physically frightening, as any style of abuser can, no matter how much he may preach nonviolence. After an aggressive incident, he will speak of his actions as anger rather than as abuse, as though there were no difference between the two. He blames his assaultive behavior on you or on his emotional issues, saying that his feelings were so deeply wounded that he had no other choice.
Many people reject the possibility that Mr. Sensitive could be an abuser. I ran into this disbelief one weekend when I was leading a training course on emotional recovery, as I periodically do. My workshops focus partly on the healing effects of crying and so tend to be attended by more women than men. The males who do come have included many of the most wonderful men it has been my good fortune to know, as well as a handful of the biggest manipulators. A few years ago, a participant named Deanna approached me anxiously before a workshop. She explained that an ex-partner of hers named Brad had called her a few days ahead of the workshop to tell her he was attending the same weekend. She was uncomfortable and told him that if he showed up she would leave. He promised not to bother her, though, and said he would not bring up their relationship in any way. He was coming with his new girlfriend, which eased Deanna's worries.
I spent some time talking with Brad as the workshop was starting, without mentioning Deanna, and he seemed likeable, kind, and—what can I say?—sensitive. However, I observed within a few hours that he was in fact speaking to other people about his past with Deanna and getting them riled up about her running away from their unresolved issues. On Sunday morning, he finally provoked a scene about their relationship in front of the full workshop, which was humiliating to Deanna.
The story does not end there. I called a break, and took Brad aside. I told him that it was my understanding that he had agreed not to raise these issues and that it had become obvious to me that he had come for the weekend with the intention of doing precisely what he had promised not to. I went on to point out that he had taken Deanna's weekend away from her and that I considered this kind of power move to be abuse, especially since it was directed at an ex-partner.
Saying the word abuse to an abusive person can be like lighting a tinderbox: When you name the unmentionable secret, he goes wild. Brad got loud, rolled his eyes at what a hysterical exaggerator he considered me to be, and adopted a victim stance, saying, I beg you to stop this. Then came the most important part: He said in a screeching whine, I have only put a hand on a partner once in my life, many years ago, and I just barely pushed her away from me like this—and he shoved me hard by the shoulder—after she called my mother a sick woman.
Well, why was Brad denying a history of assault (while actually admitting to one) when I hadn't said anything about violence? The possibility that he might be physically abusive had never occurred to me before, but it certainly did now. The signs were all there: bullying Deanna that weekend and then insisting it was for her own good; feeling entitled to ignore an important agreement; blaming his earlier girlfriend for his assault of her and minimizing it—the strength of the shove he gave me would have shaken up most women. I now doubted that the assaultive incident he had described was his only occasion of physically intimidating a woman.
At this point I required Brad to leave the workshop. I then had to deal with a mini-insurrection from some of the other workshop participants, who couldn't believe I was ejecting this gentle man who was so in touch with his feelings. He cries after all; how could he be abusive.
This gentle man style of abuser tends to be highly self-centered and demanding of emotional catering. He may not be the man who has a fit because dinner is late but rather erupts because of some way his partner failed to sacrifice her own needs or interests to keep him content. He plays up how fragile he is to divert attention from the swath of destruction he leaves behind him.
The central attitudes driving Mr. Sensitive are:
• I'm against the macho men, so I couldn't be abusive.
• As long as I use a lot of psychobabble, no one is going to believe that I am mistreating you.
• I can control you by analyzing how your mind and emotions work, and what your issues are from childhood.
• I can get inside your head whether you want me there or not.
• Nothing in the world is more important than my feelings.
• Women should be grateful to me for not being like those other men.
RAMBO
Rambo is aggressive with everybody, not just his partner. He gets a thrill out of the sensation of intimidating people and strives to handle all life situations by subtly or overtly creating fear. He has an exaggerated, stereotypical view of what a man is supposed to be, which goes hand in hand with seeing women as delicate, inferior, and in need of protection. Rambo often comes from a home or neighborhood where he was the target of violence himself and learned that the only way to feel safe is to be stronger, tougher, and less caring than everybody else. He has little patience for weakness, fragility, or indecision. Often he has a criminal record for violence, theft, drunk driving, or drug dealing.
Early in a relationship, Rambo is likely to be loving and kind to his partner, like most abusers. Because he lacks fear—or pretends to—he can make a woman feel safe and protected. This style of abuser can therefore be particularly appealing to a woman who comes from a violent home herself or to one who is in the process of leaving another abusive relationship. Rambo can make you feel as though his aggressiveness would never be directed toward you, because he loves you; he wishes to look after your safety as if you were his daughter. He enjoys the role of protector, feeling like a gallant knight. However, he lacks respect for women, and this disrespect, combined with his general violent tendencies, means that it is only a matter of time before he will be the one you need protection from.
Many highly masculine men are not Rambo. The notion that all macho men are likely to abuse women is based largely on class and ethnic prejudices, the same misconceptions that allow Mr. Sensitive or Mr. Right to skate by undetected. There are plenty of tough guys out there who are friendly to everyone and avoid aggressive interactions whenever possible but enjoy lifting weights, playing rough sports, hunting, and other aspects of stereotypical masculinity. They may be good fighters, but only in self-defense. It isn't macho that women need to watch out for. The danger signs are violence and intimidation toward anyone, and disrespect and superiority toward women.
Sometimes Rambo is a psychopath or sociopath, which can make him all the more emotionally abusive and in some cases physically abusive as well. Later we will take a look at psychopaths and other mentally disordered abusers.
The central attitudes driving Rambo are:
• Strength and aggressiveness are good; compassion and conflict resolution are bad.
• Anything that could be even remotely associated with homosexuality, including walking away from possible violence or showing any fear or grief, has to be avoided at any cost.
• Femaleness and femininity (which he associates with homosexuality) are inferior. Women are here to serve men and be protected by them.
• Men should never hit women, because it is unmanly to do so. However, exceptions to this rule can be made for my own partner if her behavior is bad enough. Men need to keep their women in line.
• You are a thing that belongs to me, akin to a trophy.
THE WATER TORTURER
The Water Torturer's style proves that anger doesn't cause abuse. He can assault his partner psychologically without even raising his voice. He tends to stay calm in arguments, using his own evenness as a weapon to push her over the edge. He often has a superior or contemptuous grin on his face, smug and self-assured. He uses a repertoire of aggressive conversational tactics at low volume, including sarcasm, derision—such as openly laughing at her—mimicking her voice, and cruel, cutting remarks. Like Mr. Right, he tends to take things she has said and twist them beyond recognition to make her appear absurd, perhaps especially in front of other people. He gets to his partner through a slow but steady stream of low-level emotional assaults, and perhaps occasional shoves or other minor acts of violence that don't generally cause visible injury but may do great psychological harm. He is relentless in his quiet derision and meanness.
The impact on a woman of all these subtle tactics is that either her blood temperature rises to a boil or she feels stupid and inferior, or some combination of the two. In an argument, she may end up yelling in frustration, leaving the room crying, or sinking into silence. The Water Torturer then says, See, you're the abusive one, not me. You're the one who's yelling and refusing to talk things out rationally. I wasn't even raising my voice. It's impossible to reason with you.
The psychological effects of living with the Water Torturer can be severe. His tactics can be difficult to identify, so they sink in deeply. Women can find it difficult not to blame themselves for their reactions to what their partner does if they don't even know what to call it. When someone slaps you in the face, you know you've been slapped. But when a woman feels psychologically assaulted, with little idea why, after an argument with The Water Torturer, she may turn her frustration inward. How do you seek support from a friend, for example, when you don't know how to describe what is going wrong?
The Water Torturer tends to genuinely believe that there is nothing unusual about his behavior. When his partner starts to confront him with his abusiveness—which she usually does sooner or later—he looks at her as if she were crazy and says, What the hell are you talking about? I've never done anything to you. Friends and relatives who have witnessed the couple's interactions may back him up. They shake their heads and say to each other, I don't know what goes on with her. She just explodes at him sometimes, and he's so low-key. Their children can develop the impression that Mom blows up over nothing. She herself may start to wonder if there is something psychologically wrong with her.
The Water Torturer is payback-oriented like most abusive men, but he may hide it better. If he is physically abusive, his violence may take the form of cold-hearted slaps for your own good or to get you to wake up rather than explosive rage. His moves appear carefully thought out, and he rarely makes obvious mistakes—such as letting his abusiveness show in public—that could turn other people against him or get him in legal trouble.
If you are involved with a Water Torturer, you may struggle for years trying to figure out what is happening. You may feel that you overreact to his behavior and that he isn't really so bad. But the effects of his control and contempt have crept up on you over the years. If you finally leave him, you may experience intense periods of delayed rage, as you become conscious of how quietly but deathly oppressive he was.
This style of man rarely lasts long in an abuser program unless he has a court order. He is so accustomed to having complete success with his tactics that he can't tolerate an environment where the counselors recognize and name his maneuvers and don't let him get away with them. He tends to rapidly decide that his group leaders are as crazy as his partner and heads for the door.
The central attitudes driving the Water Torturer are:
• You are crazy. You fly off the handle over nothing.
• I can easily convince other people that you're the one who is messed up.
• As long as I'm calm, you can't call anything I do abusive, no matter how cruel.
• I know exactly how to get under your skin.
THE VICTIM
Life has been hard and unfair for the Victim. To hear him tell it, his intelligence has been chronically underestimated; he has been burned by people he trusted; and his good intentions have been misunderstood. The Victim appeals to a woman's compassion and desire to feel that she can make a difference in his life. He often tells persuasive and heart-rending stories about how he was abused by his former partner, sometimes adding the tragic element that she is now restricting or preventing his contact with his children. He maneuvers the woman into hating his ex-partner and may succeed in enlisting her in a campaign of harassment, rumor spreading, or battling for custody.
As a counselor of abusive men, I have dozens of times been in the position of interviewing a man's former partner and then speaking with the new one. The new partner usually speaks at length about what a wicked witch the woman before her was. I can't tell her what I know, much as I wish I could, because of my responsibility to protect the confidentiality and safety of the former partner. All I can say is: I always recommend, whenever there are claims of emotional or physical abuse, that women talk to each other directly and not just accept the man's denial.
Women sometimes ask me: But what if a man I am dating really was victimized by his former girlfriend? How can I tell the difference? Here are some things to watch for:
1. If you listen carefully, you often can hear the difference between anger toward an ex-partner, which would not be worrisome in itself, and disrespect or contempt, which should raise warning flags. A man who has left a relationship with bitterness should nonetheless be able to talk about his ex-partner as a human being, with some understanding of what her side of the conflicts was and some ways he might have contributed to what went wrong. If he speaks in degrading or superior ways about her, or makes everything that went wrong in the relationship her fault, be careful, because it is likely that he was the abusive one.
2. Try to get him to talk about his own conduct in the relationship, especially around the time of the breakup. If he blames his own behavior on her, that's a bad sign.
3. Be particularly careful with a man who claims to have been the victim of physical violence by a previous female partner. The great majority of men who make such claims are physical abusers. Ask him for as much detail as you can about the violent incidents, and then try to talk to her or seek out anyone else who could give you a different perspective on what happened. Watch for warning signs of abusiveness (see Chapter 5).
4. Pay attention to how he talks and thinks about abused women. A genuine male victim tends to feel sympathy for abused women and support their cause. The Victim, on the other hand, often says that women exaggerate or fabricate their claims of abuse or insists that men are abused just as much as women are.
The Victim may adopt the language of abuse victims, claiming, for example, that his ex-partner was focused on power and control, disrespected him, and always had to have her own way. In a few years, he will be using similar reality-inversion language about you—unless, of course, you kowtow to him to his satisfaction.
The Victim is highly self-centered in relationships. Everything seems to revolve around his wounds, and he keeps himself at the center of attention. If you have children, he tries to get them to feel sorry for him as well. He seems forever to be telling you: You don't understand me, you don't appreciate me, you hold my mistakes over my head. Yet you sense that the dynamic is actually the other way around. If you stand up to him about these distortions, he tells you that you are abusing him or says, You just can't tolerate my standing up to your bullying. This recurring inversion of reality is similar to what happens with Mr. Sensitive, but without the introspective psychology, gentle man, or recovering alcoholic routines. If you leave him, you risk his seeking custody of your children, presenting himself to the court as the victim of your abuse and of your efforts to turn the children against him.
Often the Victim claims to be victimized not only by you but also by his boss, his parents, the neighbors, his friends, and strangers on the street. Everyone is always wronging him, and he is always blameless.
When the Victim joins an abuser group, his story tends to go like this: I put up with my partner's mistreatment of me for years, and I never fought back or even tried to defend myself. But I finally couldn't take it anymore, and I started to give her back a little taste of what she was doing to me. So now I've been labeled abusive. Women are allowed to do those things and nobody cares, but as soon as a man does it he's a pariah.
This line of reasoning many times develops into a discussion of how men are the victims of women overall in society, because women run the world. This is a startling distortion, given which gender actually dominates almost all legislatures, police departments, judgeships, businesses, and so on ad nauseam. When I point out this reality to the Victim, he describes a kind of paranoid fantasy in which women are behind the scenes secretly pulling the strings, largely by getting men to feel sorry for them. His capacity for turning things into their opposites in this way is a central cause of his abusiveness.
If you are involved with the Victim and want to escape his abuse, you may find that you feel guilty toward him, despite his treatment of you, and have difficulty ending the relationship as a result. You may feel that because his life has been so hard, you are reluctant to add to his pain by abandoning him. You may worry that he won't take care of himself if you leave, that he will wither away from depression, won't eat or sleep, or might even try to kill himself. The Victim knows how to present himself as helpless and pathetic so that you will find it harder to take your own life back.
The central attitudes driving the Victim are:
• Everybody has done me wrong, especially the women I’ve been involved with. Poor me.
• When you accuse me of being abusive, you are joining the parade of people who have been cruel and unfair to me. It proves you're just like the rest.
• It's justifiable for me to do to you whatever I feel you are doing to me, and even to make it quite a bit worse to make sure you get the message.
• Women who complain of mistreatment by men, such as relationship abuse or sexual harassment, are anti-male and out for blood.
• I've had it so hard that I'm not responsible for my actions.
THE TERRORIST
I worked for a few months with an abused woman named Gloria who was wondering how much longer she would be alive. Her husband, Gerald, would glare at her, drum his fingers methodically on the table, and say: You have six months left. Things better shape up around here. Six months. Her head would swim and her heart would race with fear, and she would plead with him to tell what exactly he planned to do to her at the end of that period. And he would answer, with maybe just a hint of a cold smile: Just wait and see, just wait and see. Six months, Gloria. Gerald had never laid a hand on Gloria in the five years they had been together, but she was terrified. She started working with me on making an escape plan to run away with their two-year-old son.
The Terrorist tends to be both highly controlling and extremely demanding. His worst aspect, however, is that he frequently reminds his partner that he could physically rip her to pieces or even kill her. He doesn't necessarily beat her, however; some abusers know how to terrorize their partners with threats, strange veiled statements, and bizarre behaviors. One of my violent clients cut an article out of the newspaper about a woman who had been murdered by her husband, and he taped it up on the refrigerator. Another man responded to his partner's announcement that she was leaving him by spilling the blood of an animal in front of the house. Another client would take out his gun when he was angry at his partner but would insist that he was just going to clean it and that it had nothing to do with her.
Unlike most other abusers, the Terrorist often seems to be sadistic: He gets enjoyment out of causing pain and fear and seems to find cruelty thrilling. He is likely to have been severely abused as a child, which generally is not true of other abusers. However, you cannot help him to heal. This may be difficult to accept, since the hope of helping him overcome his problems may be what gets you through the terror of living with him. The Terrorist's problems are much too deep for a partner to solve, as they involve a complex weave of serious psychological problems with the typical destructive nature of an abuser. You need to focus instead on getting yourself safe. The Terrorist's top goal is to paralyze you with fear so that you won't dare think of leaving him or cheating on him. The great majority of abusers who make lethal threats against their partners never carry them out, but that still leaves many who do. The trauma of living with this kind of terror can be profound and can make it extremely difficult for you to think clearly about strategies for escaping to safety. However, most women do manage to get out. The critical first step is to seek confidential help as soon as possible. Begin by calling an abuse hotline as soon as you safely can (see Resources). There are more suggestions in Chapter 9.
When a woman does leave the Terrorist, he may stalk or threaten her, and this dangerous harassment can continue for a long time. If the couple has children, he may attempt to get custody or unsupervised visitation, so that he can terrorize or control her through the children. He also may use information he has about her, such as where she works or where her parents live, to track her and to threaten her loved ones. It is essential that friends, relatives, courts, and communities understand the realities of these risks and give the woman the most complete support and protection possible, while simultaneously taking steps to hold the abuser accountable. It may be possible to stop the Terrorist from escalating to murder, but only if he gets a strong message that stalking and threatening an ex-partner is unacceptable, that he is responsible for his own actions, and that the community is prepared to jail him if his threatening behavior does not stop immediately. Actions short of these are often insufficient.
Chapter 10 contains more information for a woman who is involved in a custody or visitation battle with an abuser or for those who are concerned that one may start.
The central attitudes driving the Terrorist are:
• You have no right to defy me or leave me. Your life is in my hands.
• Women are evil and have to be kept terrorized to prevent that evil from coming forth.
• I would rather die than accept your right to independence.
• The children are one of the best tools I can use to make you fearful.
• Seeing you terrified is exciting and satisfying.
THE DEMAND MAN
The Demand Man is highly entitled. He expects his partner's life to revolve around meeting his needs and is angry and blaming if anything gets in the way. He becomes enraged if he isn't catered to or if he is inconvenienced in even a minor way. The partner of this man comes to feel that nothing she does is ever good enough and that it is impossible to make him happy. He criticizes her frequently, usually about things that he thinks she should have done—or done better—for him.
Is every highly demanding partner an abuser? No. There are specific elements to the Demand Man's style:
1. He has little sense of give and take. His demands for emotional support, favors, caretaking, or sexual attention are well out of proportion to his contributions; he constantly feels that you owe him, things that he has done nothing to earn.
2. He exaggerates and overvalues his own contributions. If he was generous one day back in 1997, you are probably still hearing about it today as proof of how wonderfully he treats you and how ungrateful you are. He seems to keep a mental list of any favors or kindnesses he ever does and expects each one paid back at a heavy interest rate. He thinks you owe him tremendous gratitude for meeting the ordinary responsibilities of daily life—when he does—but takes your contributions for granted.
3. When he doesn't get what he feels is his due, he punishes you for letting him down.
4. When he is generous or supportive, it's because he feels like it. When he isn't in the mood to give anything, he doesn't. He is positive or loving toward you when he feels the need to prove to himself or to others that he is a good person, or when there is something that he is about to demand in return; in other words, it's about him, not you. The longer you have been with him, the more his generous-seeming actions appear self-serving.
5. If your needs ever conflict with his, he is furious. At these times he attacks you as self-centered or, inflexible, turning reality on its head with statements such as, All you care about is yourself! He tends to work hard to convince outsiders of how selfish and ungrateful you are, speaking in a hurt voice about all the things he does for you.
At the same time, the Demand Man is likely to be furious if anything is demanded of him. Not only are you not supposed to demand any favors, you aren't even supposed to ask him to take care of his own obligations. If you ask him to clean up a mess he's left, he responds, I'm not your fucking servant. If you ask him to pay money he owes you or to work more hours to help out with the household expenses, he says, You're a typical woman, all you want from me is my money. If you complain to him of how rarely he is there for you, he'll say, You are a needy, controlling bitch. He keeps twisting things around backward in these ways, so that any effort you make to discuss your needs or his responsibilities switches abruptly to being about his needs and your responsibilities.
The Demand Man is sometimes less controlling than other abusers as long as he is getting his needs met on his terms. He may allow you to have your own friendships or support you in pursuing your own career. But the effects on you of your partner's extreme entitlement can be just as destructive as severe control.
The central attitudes driving the Demand Man are:
• It's your job to do things for me, including taking care of my responsibilities if I drop the ball on them. If I'm unhappy about any aspect of my life, whether it has to do with our relationship or not, it's your fault.
• You should not place demands on me at all. You should be grateful for whatever I choose to give.
• I am above criticism.
• I am a very loving and giving partner. You're lucky to have me.
THE DRILL SERGEANT
The Drill Sergeant takes controlling behavior to its extreme, running his partner's life in every way that he can. He criticizes her clothing, tells her whether she can go out or not, interferes with her work. He wants her to have no one close to her, so he ruins her relationships with friends and relatives or simply forbids her to see them. He may listen to her phone calls or read her mail, or require the children to report on her activities any time he is away. If she isn't home by his appointed curfew at night, she is at risk for abuse. She feels like a little girl living with a tyrannical father, with no more freedom than an eight-year-old would have.
The Drill Sergeant is often fanatically jealous. He verbally assaults his partner with accusations that she is cheating on him or checking out other men and tosses crass and disturbing sexual terms into his tirades. He may augment his hateful remarks about his partner with hideous comments about females in general, such as, All women are whores. The emotional experience of these verbal attacks can be similar to that of a sexual assault: The woman is left feeling violated, debased, and traumatized. At the same time, this style of abuser more often than not is out having affairs himself. It isn't fidelity he cares about; it's possession.
The Drill Sergeant is, unfortunately, almost sure to be physically violent sooner or later, probably beginning with threats and then eventually escalating to assault. If his partner stands up to him, such as by attempting to preserve any of her rights to freedom, his violence and threats are likely to escalate until she is hurt or terrified enough that she submits to his control. He is a risk to beat his partner up to the point of severe injury.
Getting away from the Drill Sergeant can be difficult. Since he monitors the woman's movements so closely, it is a challenge for her to get to a support group for abused women or to seek other kinds of support. Since he isolates her from people, she has to draw entirely on her own strength, and many days she may feel like she doesn't have much strength left. And since from time to time he is probably openly violent, she is forced to consider what the consequences of attempting to leave him could be, including whether he might try to kill her.
If your partner is a Drill Sergeant, your situation is a dangerous one. You may have to use some courage—as well as careful vigilance—to even get the opportunity to read this book. Perhaps you are hiding it under a mattress or reading it at someone else's house in quick bits. Don't give up. Many women have gone through this kind of captivity and have found a way to escape, even if it takes some time. The single most important thing to do is to seek opportunities to phone a hotline for abused women (see Resources in the back of this book). Call them to speak for five minutes if that's all you can safely do for now. Call every day if you can. The hot line is the beginning of the path to freedom.
You may be sorely tempted to have a secret affair, since your partner shows you so little kindness or tenderness. A positive sexual connection may be especially affirming for you, because of how sexually degrading the Drill Sergeant tends to be. But cheating on him can be deadly if he catches you. Consider holding off on seeing other men until you have gotten yourself safe.
The Drill Sergeant often has some psychological problems. Although mental health issues do not cause abusiveness, they can intensify a man's violent tendencies. If he sometimes seems to become convinced of things that are obviously not true, has trouble getting along with people in general, was severely abused or neglected as a child, or has other indications of mental illness, you need to take even greater caution.
To read more about dealing with dangerous abusers, see The Terrorist later in this chapter (p. 99) and Leaving an Abuser Safely in Chapter 9 (p. 225).
The central attitudes driving the Drill Sergeant are:
• I need to control your every move or you will do it wrong.
• I know the exact way that everything should be done.
• You shouldn't have anyone else—or any thing else—in your life besides me.
• I am going to watch you like a hawk to keep you from developing strength or independence.
• I love you more than anyone in the world, but you disgust me.
THE PLAYER
The Player is usually good looking and often sexy. (But sometimes he just thinks he is.) In the early part of a relationship he seems head over heels in love and wants to spend as much time as possible in bed together. He is a pretty good lover. You may feel lucky that you have caught someone who knows how to turn you on and feel proud to be seen with him. Your self-opinion gets a nice boost.
After a while, though, a few things start to bother you. You notice that apart from sex his interest in you is waning, and even his sexual energy is dropping off a little. He seems to lock his eyes pretty hard onto women that walk by. He flirts with waitresses, clerks, or even friends of yours. Sexual undertones seem to run through most of his interactions with females, except for ones he finds completely unattractive. Rumors start to come back to you that he's been seen with this woman, that he is sleeping with that one, that he is pursuing another one but she isn't interested yet. At first you discount these rumors as hurtful gossip, but after a while you start to wonder.
The Player often starts to stall on moving in together or agreeing to be exclusive, even though earlier he couldn't wait to get serious. He may say that he's been hurt or has a fear of commitment (I'm just not ready), but the real issue is that he doesn't want restrictions on his freedom. Much of his satisfaction in life comes from exploiting women and feeling like a sexual animal. Women around the Player seem to get angry at each other a lot, rather than at him, and sometimes get into physical confrontations. These tensions work out well for him, diverting attention from his infidelity and dishonesty. He sets up this dynamic with some combination of the following tactics:
1. He knows how to make each woman feel that she's the special one and yet at the same time keep her off balance, so that she never feels quite sure of where she stands with him.
2. He tells each one that the others are lying about their involvements with him because they are jealous of her, or because he turned them down, or because he used to be involved with them but isn't anymore.
3. He tells each one stories about how other women have mistreated him, or shares other bits of information—largely invented—to make previous, or current, women in his life sound conniving, vindictive, or addicted to substances.
4. He breaks up with women and gets back together with them, so that no one can keep track of what's going on.
5. He includes one or two women in his circle who feel unattractive, because he knows he can have more power over them, and manipulates them into hating the women who are seen as more attractive.
If this is your partner's style, you won't necessarily ever be sure whether he is really having sex with other women or if he just flirts because he enjoys the attention and likes you to feel threatened. He may hotly deny that he ever cheats and try to turn the tables by accusing you of being too suspicious. But even if he's telling the truth—which he probably isn't—his constant flirtatious behavior can be as damaging as actual affairs. Either way, he will damage your other relationships, because you will start to perceive any woman as a potential threat to you. If he has a history of hitting on women who are close to you, such as your sister or best friend, you can end up isolated from the women you care about most, because you're afraid he will have affairs with them unless you keep them away.
Chronic infidelity is abusive in itself, but the Player doesn't stop there. He is irresponsible, callous in dealing with his partner's feelings, and periodically verbally abusive. As the relationship progresses, he may start to go for long periods giving his partner next to no attention and barely speaking to her, so she feels shelved. He probably refuses to take responsibility for safe sex (such as using a condom), and he may have fathered children who he is not supporting. His abusiveness can escalate abruptly if he is confronted or caught in his infidelities, and he may turn physically frightening at this point. In a strange but dangerous twist, the Player sometimes hits his partner for catching him cheating rather than the reverse.
The Player's constant flirting and cheating help him to get away with other forms of mistreatment. His partner is likely to focus on her hurt feelings about his infidelities and pour effort into stopping him from straying and, in the process, lose sight of his pattern of abuse. When she asks me whether I think her partner will ever settle down and be faithful to her—if they get married, for example—I answer, He may some day, but what you will have then is a faithful abuser. His promiscuity is a symptom of a deeper problem: He is incapable of taking women seriously as human beings rather than as playthings. With that mind-set, he'll be a destructive partner whether he cheats or not.
The Players I have worked with sometimes claim to suffer from sex addiction, and join Sex and Love Addicts Anonymous (which they may discover is a good place to pick up women). But sex addiction doesn't cause dishonesty, verbal abusiveness, or intimidating behavior. The Player is not a sex addict at all. If he is addicted to anything, it's to the thrill of using women without regard for the effects on them.
The central attitudes driving the Player are:
• Women were put on this earth to have sex with men—especially me.
• Women who want sex are too loose, and women who refuse sex are too uptight. (!)
• It's not my fault that women find me irresistible. (This is a word-for-word quotation from a number of my clients.) It's not fair to expect me to refuse temptation when it's all around me; women seduce me sometimes, and I can't help it.
• If you act like you need anything from me, I am going to ignore you. I'm in this relationship when it's convenient for me and when I feel like it.
• Women who want the nonsexual aspects of themselves appreciated are bitches.
• If you could meet my sexual needs, I wouldn't have to turn to other women.
THE MENTALLY ILL OR ADDICTED ABUSER
This last category is not actually separate from the others; an abusive man of any of the aforementioned styles can also have psychiatric or substance-abuse problems, although the majority do not. Even when mental illness or addiction is a factor, it is not the cause of a man's abuse of his partner, but it can contribute to the severity of his problem and his resistance to change. When these additional problems are present, it is important to be aware of the following points:
1. Certain mental illnesses can increase the chance that an abuser will be dangerous and use physical violence. These include paranoia, severe depression, delusions or hallucinations (psychosis), obsessive-compulsive disorder, and antisocial personality disorder known as psychopathy or sociopathy). These psychiatric conditions also make it next to impossible for an abuser to change, at least until the mental illness has been brought under control through therapy and/or medication, which can take years. Even if the mental illness is properly treated, his abusiveness won't necessarily change.
2. An abuser's reactions to going on or off medication are unpredictable. A woman should take extra precautions for her safety at such a time. Abusers tend to go off medication before long—I have had few clients who were consistent and responsible about taking their meds in the long term. They don't like the side effects, and they are too selfish to care about the implications of the mental illness for their partners or children.
3. The potential danger of a mentally ill abuser has to be assessed by looking at the severity of his psychiatric symptoms in combination with the severity of his abuse characteristics. Looking at his psychiatric symptoms alone can lead to underestimating how dangerous he is.
4. Antisocial personality disorder is present in only a small percentage of abusers but can be important. Those who suffer from this condition lack a conscience and thus are repeatedly involved in behaviors that are harmful to others. Some signs of this condition include: (a) He started getting into illegal behavior when he was still a teenager; (b) his dishonest or aggressive behavior involves situations unrelated to his partner, rather than being restricted to her; (c) he periodically gets into trouble at workplaces or in other contexts for stealing, threatening, or refusing to follow instructions and is likely to have a considerable criminal record by about age thirty, though the offenses may be largely minor ones; (d) he is severely and chronically irresponsible in a way that disrupts the lives of others or creates danger; and (e) he tends to cheat on women a lot, turn them against each other, and maintain shallow relationships with them. The psychopath's physical violence is not necessarily severe, contrary to the popular image, but he may be very dangerous nonetheless. Antisocial personality disorder is very difficult to change through therapy, and there is no effective medication for treating it. It is highly compatible with abusiveness toward women.
5. Those who suffer from narcissistic personality disorder have a highly distorted self-image. They are unable to accept that they might have faults and therefore are unable to imagine how other people perceive them. This condition is highly compatible with abusiveness, though it is present in only a small percentage of abusive men. Clues to the presence of this disorder include: (a) Your partner's self-centeredness is severe, and it carries over into situations that don't involve you; (b) he seems to relate everything back to himself; and (c) he is outraged whenever anyone criticizes him and is incapable of considering that he could ever be anything other than kind and generous. This disorder is highly resistant to therapy and is not treatable with medication. The abuser with this disorder is not able to change substantially through an abuser program either, although he sometimes makes some minor improvements.
6. Many abusers who are not mentally ill want women to think that they are, in order to avoid responsibility for their attitudes and behavior.
Substance abuse, like mental illness, does not cause partner abuse but can increase the risk of violence. Like the mentally ill abuser, the addicted abuser doesn't change unless he deals with his addiction, and even that is only the first step. Chapter 8 examines the role that substances play in partner abuse.
The attitudes driving the mentally ill or addicted batterer are the same as those of of ther abusers and will likely follow the pattern of one of the nine styles described above. In addition, the following attitudes tend to be present:
• I am not responsible for my actions because of my psychological or substance problems.
• If you challenge me about my abusiveness, you are being mean to me, considering these other problems I have. It also shows that you don't understand my other problems.
• I'm not abusive, I'm just———(alcoholic, drug addicted, manic-depressive, an adult child of alcoholics, or whatever his condition may be).
• If you challenge me, it will trigger my addiction or mental illness, and you'll be responsible for what I do.
Although I have focused on the emotionally abusive styles of these different kinds of abusers, any of them may also use physical violence, including sexual assault. Although the Terrorist and the Drill Sergeant are especially likely to become dangerous, they are not the only ones who may do so. Many abusers occasionally use physical violence or threats as a way to intimidate you when they feel that their power or control over you is slipping; violence for them is a kind of trump card they use when their normal patterns of psychological abuse are not getting them the degree of control they feel entitled to. If you are concerned about how dangerous your partner may be, see Is He Going to Get Violent? in Chapter 6 and Leaving an Abuser Safely in Chapter 9.