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March 29, 2024, 01:53:18 PM

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Victim blaming.

Started by holyzombiejesus, November 27, 2019, 01:57:12 PM

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holyzombiejesus

I'm working with a family and the mum rang me last week to say that she needed help as the dad (her ex-partner) had attacked her in front of her children. We went out and helped, ensured they were in a place of safety, made referrals so she could get help (including new home) but this week she has taken the kids and herself back to him.  I'm really struggling with this. Feel so angry towards him, obviously, but also so pissed off with the mum. I know this is wrong of me, she's a victim and shouldn't be blamed but it just seems so fucking stupid and wrong for her to take the children back to him. In a way, and again I know this is wrong, I feel angrier with her than I do the cunt who assaulted her.

I know I am being unfair and should probably get some training about DV and victim blaming (this is my first case (professionally) regarding DV) but in my private life I guess I've also felt really exasperation that female friends have gone back to or defended violent partners. I was friends with a couple where the boyfriend was intimidating and hitting his girlfriend and I ended up almost having a breakdown myself and not being the bloke's friend any more. What I'm trying to say is that I'm the victim here. A few weeks later we were in the pub and the girlfriend (who had by now split up with him) started saying that he wasn't that bad and making excuses for him. I've not seen her since (for other reasons as well). Again, I know that there are so many other things at play here and that we should be very careful about not using language that blames or accuses victims but has anyone else felt this frustration? Not just because of the woman going back to the cunt but putting her kids back there too?

Buelligan

Yep, with my mum.  It went on an on.  When he attacked me, really injured me badly (my mum wasn't there), she took his side.  That really poisoned our relationship for a long while. 

In the end I did finally get her away from him (I was an adult by this time) but he stalked us, managed to find us and really made life a living hell, all the time she was attempting recovery from cancer.  You have no idea how frustrating and painful this was.  How it destroyed (I don't think I'm overstating this) all of us.

It's not a simple thing at all.  I think women (some women) are almost conditioned to believe that if they just give a little more, be a bit more understanding, they can save the poor damaged hero that's suffering.  And that they should be doing this, if they're not, they're not normal.  I learned that you can support others, should and must always support others, but never kid yourself you can save them.  You're doing fucking well if you can sort your own shit.  You just have to do the right thing, give people a chance and let them go.

It's her birthday today, she was a beautiful (really remarkably physically beautiful), extremely clever, funny, woman.

This is insanely common though, isn't it? Perhaps a blend of low self esteem, fear that the alternatives might be worse (poverty, lonliness etc), and maybe a tendency for abusive men to know how to seek out dependent partners and to make them more dependent on them - isolating them from support and so on.

You will perhaps tell me different, but my understanding was that it often takes the abused many attempts to leave, and that there are regularly lapses and changes of mind - all of the above and evidence that there are improvements before it all starts again. I too have seen it in my circle, and it's baffling, but can also think of times in my life where I've accepted less than stellar behaviour (nothing on this scale), and have made efforts to consider why I thought some of these things acceptable, or even normal at the time.

Flouncer

Quote from: Buelligan on November 27, 2019, 02:08:09 PMIt's not a simple thing at all.  I think women (some women) are almost conditioned to believe that if they just give a little more, be a bit more understanding, they can save the poor damaged hero that's suffering.

This is fucking spot on. Some women are thoroughly conditioned to accept abuse from men [PAGING FUNCRUSHER] and have a strongly-rooted way of looking at the abuse they receive that makes them inclined to minimise it to the point that they'll pretty much pretend it didn't happen when they're not on the sharp end of it. I have a friend in an abusive relationship and I'm getting pretty sick of hearing about it to be honest; it hurts me massively to think that someone I care about so much is being abused like this but won't remove herself from the situation. Last time I called him a prick she started defending him, in the face of everything she's told me about what he's done to her (we're talking physical abuse, taking advantage of her financially, accusing her of cheating and calling her a slag, prolonged and severe emotional abuse) - it's got to the point where I just don't want to know any more. It just makes me sick to my stomach and there's nothing I can do about it beyond pointing out to her that it's not normal to treat people like that, which seems to have no effect.

Flouncer

Quote from: drummersaredeaf on November 27, 2019, 02:13:57 PM
This is insanely common though, isn't it? Perhaps a blend of low self esteem, fear that the alternatives might be worse (poverty, lonliness etc), and maybe a tendency for abusive men to know how to seek out dependent partners and to make them more dependent on them - isolating them from support and so on.

This is certainly the case with the woman I just mentioned - every bloke she goes out with turns out to be like this. These scumbags pick up the signals and can sniff out women who are conditioned to accept the sort of abuse they're invariably going to inflict on their partners.

buttgammon

My aunt recently separated from her husband of 50 years. I knew he had a temper and could be weird and irrational occasionally but I didn't realise he'd been physically and emotionally abusive for their whole relationship (which started when they were teenagers). It's been difficult to see it all unfold, and my sympathy genuinely has been with my aunt, but despite the fact that this man has put her through over half a century of abuse, a lot of my family seem to have sided with him, including their son. It's not even entirely victim blaming; some of it is simply ignorance and stupidity, but it's bizarre to see how other people react.

One thing that's made me very angry is finding out that he tried to kill their daughter when she was a baby. She's now well in her forties, but he was clearly physically and emotionally abusive to her for a long time too, and realising my aunt stayed in a relationship where this was happening to her child was confusing and unsettling. Their daughter is angry too, and she seems to pin most of the blame on her mum, perhaps because of this but weirdly, because she seems to blame her for the demise of the marriage. I'm well capable of understanding my aunt's position in the abstract (not least because the level of control was so pervasive that it would have been hard for her to imagine a world outside her awful marriage), but thinking about her finding her husband trying to smother their child and still staying is much more difficult to understand.

Buelligan

I don't think anyone who hasn't lived through years of controlling abusive behaviour themselves can possibly understand the effect it has on people and their ability to make decisions and judge appropriate responses.  Even when you have been through it it's very difficult to understand.

No one throws away fifty years of marriage on a whim.

H-O-W-L

Quote from: Buelligan on November 27, 2019, 08:43:44 PM
I don't think anyone who hasn't lived through years of controlling abusive behaviour themselves can possibly understand the effect it has on people and their ability to make decisions and judge appropriate responses.  Even when you have been through it it's very difficult to understand.

I unfortunately am able to agree with this wholeheartedly. I was trying to discuss this with a friend on Monday while she was helping me out of an anxiety attack and I just couldn't put into words how self-doubting I am on an innate level, even despite my conscious mind screaming against my self-doubt, and even despite all the therapy I've been through to deal with it.

H-O-W-L

And then trying to explain how fucked up you feel, how fucked up you are, how you are basically full of broken glass for the rest of your life, feels like becoming a burden in itself, and makes you feel like you're stressing other people, and that's a strong-arse trigger, and you go down that spiral again and again and again, circling the drain like flotsam and jetsam.

And that's only if you have a support network that can accept and understand that you have problems, as a result of abuse -- most people will just think you're fucked up and walk away from you.

Buelligan

I'm sorry for your pain, HOWL.  I found a practice, making one good calm hour, feeling good about it, stringing on to the next good calm hour, stringing that on, maybe making a necklace of a day's hours.  All good, all calm, all beautiful.  Then making another pearl with the next day, keeping going, each bead as beautiful as the last.  Sometimes you're going to drop one, sometimes, there'll be a few shitty beads in a row but, even with those, try to see something beautiful in them.  Make a necklace of lovely memories.

You can't change the past but you can learn to live with it and make the future, yours, how you want it.

H-O-W-L

Quote from: Buelligan on November 27, 2019, 08:54:05 PM
I'm sorry for your pain, HOWL.  I found a practice, making one good calm hour, feeling good about it, stringing on to the next good calm hour, stringing that on, maybe making a necklace of a day's hours.  All good, all calm, all beautiful.  Then making another pearl with the next day, keeping going, each bead as beautiful as the last.  Sometimes you're going to drop one, sometimes, there'll be a few shitty beads in a row but, even with those, try to see something beautiful in them.  Make a necklace of lovely memories to hide those scars.

Aye, much appreciated for the sympathy. I've started making time to just go sit in the garden for a while with some tea and some soft jazz and just relax. Sometimes it's for an hour, sometimes it's for four. That combined with the CBT I went through in March has made dealing with things a lot easier, but obviously there are neurochemical barriers I've yet to get over. I think that's the most important thing to remember with any kind of trauma recovery or general mental wellness, as trite as it is to say, is that you take it in single, but continual, steps.

Buelligan

You're absolutely right, IMO, enough little steps can take you anywhere.

bgmnts

My dad abused my mum and she got away, thankfully. Couldn't be happier with her decision to bin the cunt, try a few more times and then go through a long period of not being arsed about men.