This is the first in a seven-part series on the effects of domestic violence.
We tend to think of domestic violence as something that happens on the other side of town, the poor side of town. The truth is, no town, no neighborhood is immune to abuse. It’s just much easier to hide when you have money, power and influence. Domestic violence doesn’t always mean blood or broken bones. Sometimes it’s not the body, it’s the mind, the heart and the spirit that sustain the most damage.
WomenSV is a local domestic abuse nonprofit that serves women from all races, religions, countries and walks of life. The one thing they all have in common is being trapped in a relationship with a powerful, sophisticated abuser. Abuse survivors can be doctors, lawyers, engineers, bankers, therapists, stay-at-home parents – and so can their abusive partners. Survivors in middle- to upper-income areas are typically strong, brave, beautiful, brilliant, accomplished women, healers with big hearts. It’s these very qualities that attract partners with similar qualities. Unfortunately, they also attract predators.
The problem with this kind of predator is they can be hard to identify because they blend in so easily with regular people. They tend to be charming, successful, ambitious and upwardly mobile. They may volunteer or donate to worthy causes. It’s generally not until further along in the relationship that another, darker side begins to emerge, indicating a preoccupation with power and control. Even then, if you don’t know what to look for, early warning signs can be easy to miss, easy to dismiss. Especially if they are charming. Especially if you’re in love.
If they had been cruel or overbearing or contemptuous on the first date, there most likely wouldn’t be a second. If they had hit you or hit on you on the first date, most likely there wouldn’t be a second.
‘Invisible’ crime
But what happens when they start out charming, woo you, win you and then once they’ve stolen your heart, set out to steal everything else – your confidence, your happiness, your peace, your freedom? What do you call this kind of identity theft? How do you develop language around this kind of “invisible” crime?
The first step in addressing it is naming it, so you know what you’re dealing with. Just as when you go to the doctor, you list your symptoms and then you get a diagnosis and a treatment plan. Where do you start, when the only vocabulary you have around domestic violence is built on terms such as “felonies” and “misdemeanors”?
Without language to put on what’s happening to you – you risk ending up with language describing and being treated only for what’s wrong with you: depression; anxiety; ADD/ADHD; chronic or even life-threatening health challenges if the abuse has gone on for years and taken a toll on your immune system; an alcohol, spending or food problem; or other ways of self-medicating/taking the edge off the pain of what lies beneath – that is, you are living with what Dr. Christiane Northrop calls an “energy vampire.”
Many of our survivors say, “If only he had beaten me, I would have proof of the abuse – not just for the authorities, but for me. If I could see the wounds, I could recognize it as abuse. I could call the police and have him arrested.” But how do you deal with the other kind of abuse, the kind that’s internal, that does the real damage, takes the longest to heal and eats away at you slowly like a cancer that’s never diagnosed?
Your intimate partner may not even raise his voice or call you names, but he has slowly, inexorably crept inside your psyche and become what one survivor called the “ultimate arbiter of all reality,” a reality in which he is always right, you are always wrong, and you find yourself not only walking but sleeping on eggshells, wondering, worrying about what will set him off next – as if he were a ticking time bomb in the battlefield that has become your home. How will you be made to pay for that next comment, accident or mistake that you or your children are bound to make?
“Management by intimidation,” “life as a zero-sum game,” “crush the competition” and “it’s not enough to win, everyone else must lose” may all be mottoes in some parts of Silicon Valley, but what happens when these “values” take root at home? When empathy and softer, more tender emotions are all seen as liabilities or weaknesses, when net worth equals human worth, and when every move/word/purchase/meal you or your children make is subject to scrutiny, criticism, control or punishment?
Dear survivor, if this describes you, take heart! Because finally we do have a term for that kind of invisible abuse. It’s called “coercive control,” and it’s a liberty crime, because it violates your fundamental human right to live in peace and freedom in your own home. And as of Oct. 1, there’s now a law against it. In part 2 of the series, we’ll learn all about this new way of looking at domestic violence and how it just might save your life.
Ruthven Darlene, M.A., is founder and director of the nonprofit WomenSV, which provides a range of services for women, and some men, experiencing domestic violence. For more information, call 996-2200, email [email protected] or visit womensv.org.
