Why Does He Do That?: Inside the Minds of Angry and Controlling Men (46 page)

The only time an abusive man will deal with his issues enough to become someone you can live with is when you prove to him, and to yourself, that you are capable of living without him.
And once you succeed in doing so, you may very well decide that living without him is what you would rather do. Keep an open mind, and make sure you are not clipping your own wings on top of the clipping that he has given them. Sometimes I work with a woman who is among the fortunate ones whose partners do make deep changes, but she finds that his change has ceased to matter, because she has simply outgrown him. The fundamental principle, then, is to do what is best for
you.

W
HICH
A
BUSERS
A
RE
M
OST
L
IKELY TO
C
HANGE?

Prediction is difficult. I have had clients who were stellar participants in group and whose partners reported good progress in the early months, but who dive-bombed later on, rushing back to their worst behaviors as if reuniting with dear old friends. On the other hand, I have worked with men who were ornery during group meetings, who were slow and stubborn about taking in the concepts, yet who months later stood out for having done some of the most serious work on themselves of anyone in the program.

I have noticed some recurring themes among those abusers whose changes go the deepest and last the longest, however:

• His close friends and relatives recognize that he is abusive and tell him that he needs to deal with it. They support the abused woman instead of supporting him. I have a much more difficult time with the abuser whose friends and family back up his excuses and encourage his disrespect for the woman.
  
• He is lower than others on the scale of self-centeredness. He tends to show signs early on of having more empathy than other clients do for the pain he has caused his partner, and his empathy seems more genuine and less theatrical. The highly self-referential, arrogant abuser, on the other hand, believes that he is above criticism and considers his own opinions and insights to be the last word on the planet. So who is going to be able to persuade him that he has been cruel and selfish?
  
• His partner gets the most unreserved, unequivocal support from her friends and relatives, her religious community, and from the legal system if she needs it. The more consistently she receives the message that the abuse is in no way her fault and that her community intends to stand behind her 100 percent, the stronger and safer she feels to settle for nothing less than fully respectful treatment from her partner or ex-partner.
  
• He joins a high-quality abuser program and stays for a long time—about two years.
  

But, even in cases where all of these conditions are met, his progress still depends on whether or not he decides to carefully and seriously take each of the steps to change.

• You can’t make or even help an abusive man change. All you can do is create the context for change, and the rest is up to him.
  
• You are the best judge of whether or not he is truly developing respect for you and for your rights. Don’t put anyone else’s opinions ahead of your own.
  
• Change in an abusive man is not vague; it is highly specific. Use the information in this chapter to measure for yourself whether he is getting down to the real work of change or whether he is trying to fly by with the usual nods and winks.
  
• An abusive man won’t change by “working on his anger,” unless he also does the more difficult work of changing his entitled attitudes.
  
• Make your own recovery, and that of your children, your top priority.
  
• Abusiveness is like poison ivy, with its extensive and entrenched root system. You can’t eradicate it by lopping off the superficial signs. It has to come out by the roots, which are the man’s attitudes and beliefs regarding partner relationships.
  

P
ARTNER ABUSE
is a cyclone that leaves a swath of destruction behind it as it rips through the lives of women and children: destroyed self-confidence, loss of freedom, stalled progress, fear, bitterness, economic ruin, humiliation, heartbreak, physical injury, ugly custody battles, isolation, wedges driven between mothers and their children, confusion, mistrust between siblings, secrets, lies.

No woman should have to live this way. Neither should her children. But there are other lives that are also affected, because for every abused woman, there are friends and relatives who suffer, too, from their worry and pain over what they see happening to her. Some of those who approach me to share their anguish are men who are groping desperately for clues to how they can assist their daughters and sisters and mothers who they see being sliced to ribbons a day at a time. In fact, it is unusual for me to talk to anyone, male or female, whose life has not been saddened at some point by an abusive man.

In recent years, in my public presentations, I have increasingly addressed the effects on children who are exposed to partner abuse. While writing this book I spoke at a training session for police officers, where a young cop who was built to intimidate—about as wide as he was tall—came up to me privately during a break and said, “All this stuff you are talking about went on in my family growing up. My old man was just like what you describe, always controlling, scaring everybody. And he drove me and my mom apart, just like you said. But we all saw through him when we got older, and me and my mom are close now.” I told him how happy I was that he had become a police officer, so that when a family calls for help, they might be sent a cop who can see through the children’s eyes and remember that they are victims too.

We all have a stake in ending abuse, if not for ourselves, then for our loved ones who may be targets or bystanders or who may find themselves mired in an abusive relationship someday. Anyone who chooses to can play an important role in chasing this scourge out of our homes, our communities, and our nations.

Abuse is a solvable problem.
We know where it comes from; we know why abusers are reluctant to change; and we know what it takes to make abuse stop. Abusers specialize in creating mystery and intrigue, but when we clear the smoke away we are left with an obvious moral wrong and a straightforward task to set it right. All that is required is the clarity of our minds and the will of our communities.

Throughout this book, I have been putting forth my suggestions to abused women about steps that they can take to make sense out of what is occurring, to seek safety, and to set their own healing in motion. I have a few more words of advice for them, but most of this chapter is directed at
everyone
—male or female, survivor of abuse or not, young or old—who is interested in helping to end abuse.

W
HAT THE
A
BUSED
W
OMAN
C
AN
D
O

My primary message to you is this: An abuser distorts the life and mind of his abused partner, so that she becomes focused on him. The main way out of the abuse vortex, therefore, is to reorient your thinking so that you devote your attention to yourself and to your children. I hope this book has helped to solve some puzzles for you about what is going on in your partner’s mind. Now see if you can stop puzzling about him and turn your energy toward moving yourself forward on your chosen course.

Most of this chapter talks about the ways in which people can transform the attitudes toward abuse that prevail in their communities. Please don’t concern yourself with these suggestions unless you are sure you are ready for them. If you jump from trying to take care of your own abusive relationship to trying to take care of other abused women, you may forget that you deserve caretaking for yourself. Let other people take on the world for now and just be the “hero of your own life,” as one book refers to abused women. Taking action in your community against the abuse of women may be an empowering and healing activity for you, but not if you take it on too soon. You’ll know when you’re ready.

I have woven practical ideas through all of the previous chapters. I would like to leave you with just a few more thoughts:

• Get support for yourself no matter how. Find someone somewhere who can understand what you are going through, who can be trusted with confidences, and who can help you hold on to your sense of reality.
  Reach out.
  
• Keep a journal to document your experience, so that when your partner is making you crazy with mind games or with sudden “good” behavior, you can look back through your writings and remember who you really are and what he really does.
  
• Stay away from people who aren’t good for you, who don’t understand, who say things that push you down into self-blame.
  
• Do anything you can think of that’s good for you, that nurtures your soul. Even women who have extraordinarily controlling partners often can find some ruse that will free them long enough to work out, take a class, go for a walk, or just get some time alone to think.
  
• Keep your abusive partner out of your head as much as you can. Use this book to help you understand what he is doing; naming and understanding is power. If you can understand how he thinks, you can avoid absorbing his thinking yourself and prevent him from crawling inside your head.
  
• Don’t blame yourself when you don’t reach your goals right away, when, for instance, you break down and get back together with him. Just pull yourself together and try again. You will succeed eventually, perhaps even on your very next attempt.
  

H
OW TO
S
UPPORT AN
A
BUSED
W
OMAN

If you would like to make a significant difference in the life of an abused woman you care about, keep the following principle fresh in your mind:
Your goal is to be the complete opposite of what the abuser is.

THE ABUSER:
Pressures her severely

SO YOU SHOULD:
Be patient. Remember that it takes time for an abused woman to sort out her confusion and figure out how to handle her situation. It is not helpful for her to try to follow
your
timetable for when she should stand up to her partner, leave him, call the police, or whatever step you want her to take. You need to respect her judgment regarding when she is ready to take action—something the abuser never does.

THE ABUSER:
Talks down to her

SO YOU SHOULD:
Address her as an equal. Avoid all traces of condescension or superior knowledge in your voice. This caution applies just as much or more to professionals. If you speak to an abused woman as if you are smarter or wiser than she is, or as if she is going through something that could never happen to
you,
then you inadvertently confirm exactly what the abuser has been telling her, which is that she is beneath him. Remember, your actions speak louder than your words.

THE ABUSER:
Thinks he knows what is good for her better than she does

SO YOU SHOULD:
Treat her as the expert on her own life. Don’t assume that you know what she needs to do. I have sometimes given abused women suggestions that I thought were exactly right but turned out to be terrible for that particular situation. Ask
her
what she thinks might work and,
without pressuring her,
offer suggestions, respecting her explanations for why certain courses of action would not be helpful. Don’t tell her what to do.

THE ABUSER:
Dominates conversations

SO YOU SHOULD:
Listen more and talk less. The temptation may be great to convince her what a “jerk” he is, to analyze his motives, to give speeches covering entire chapters of this book. But talking too much inadvertently communicates to her that your thoughts are more important than hers, which is exactly how the abuser treats her. If you want her to value her own feelings and opinions, then you have to show her that
you
value them.

THE ABUSER:
Believes he has the right to control her life

SO YOU SHOULD:
Respect her right to self-determination. She is entitled to make decisions that are not exactly what you would choose, including the decision to stay with her abusive partner or to return to him after a separation. You can’t convince a woman that her life belongs to her if you are simultaneously acting like it belongs to you. Stay by her even when she makes choices that you don’t like.

THE ABUSER:
Assumes he understands her children and their needs better than she does

SO YOU SHOULD:
Assume that she is a competent, caring mother. Remember that there is no simple way to determine what is best for the children of an abused woman. Even if she leaves the abuser, the children’s problems are not necessarily over, and sometimes abusers actually create
worse
difficulties for the children postseparation than before. You cannot help her to find the best path for her children unless you have a realistic grasp of the complicated set of choices that face her.

THE ABUSER:
Thinks
for
her

SO YOU SHOULD:
Think
with
her. Don’t assume the role of teacher or rescuer. Instead, join forces with her as a respectful and equal team member.

Notice that being the opposite of the abuser does not simply mean
saying
the opposite of what he says. If he beseeches her with, “Don’t leave me, don’t leave me,” and you stand on the other side badgering her with, “Leave him, leave him,” she will feel that you’re much like him; you are both pressuring her to accept your judgment of what she should do. Neither of you is asking the empowering question, “What do
you
want to do?”

D
EALING WITH
Y
OUR
O
WN
F
RUSTRATIONS

Because empowerment and recovery for an abused woman can be a long process, people who want to be there for her tend to go through periods when their patience wears thin. They are tempted to aim their frustration at the woman herself, saying, “Well, if you put such a low value on yourself as to choose to be abused, I can’t keep hanging around,” or “If you care about him more than you care about your children, you’re as sick as he is.” I understand why you feel irritated, but it doesn’t make sense to put her down. The message you send with such an outburst is that you think she is causing herself to be abused, which is just what the abuser is telling her. And the last thing you want to do is support his message.

One of the biggest mistakes made by people who wish to help an abused woman is to measure success by whether or not she leaves her abusive partner. If the woman feels unable or unready to end her relationship, or if she does separate for a period but then goes back to him, people who have attempted to help tend to feel that their effort failed and often channel this frustration into blaming the abused woman. A better measure of success for the person helping is how well you have respected the woman’s right to run her own life—which the abusive man does not do—and how well you have helped her to think of strategies to increase her safety. If you stay focused on these goals you will feel less frustrated as a helper and will be a more valuable resource for the woman.

Here is a mental exercise you can do to help you through your impatience. Think about your own life for a moment, and consider some problem that has been difficult for you to solve. Perhaps you have had difficulty finding a job you really like; perhaps you have a weight problem or some other health problem; perhaps you wish to quit smoking; perhaps you are unhappy in your current relationship or unhappy being single. Now think about a time when friends or relatives were jumping in to tell you what you should do about the challenge facing you. How much did that help? Did they gloss over the complexities, making solutions sound simpler than they really are? Did they become impatient when you were reluctant to take the steps that they proposed? How did their impatience feel to you?

Other people’s problems almost always appear simpler than our own. Sentences that start with “If I were you, I would…” rarely help. When people start to impose their solutions on me, for example, I feel the desire to respond: “If you are such an expert on how I should wend my way through life’s obstacles, why are there still important sources of unhappiness in
your
life? Why haven’t you made everything perfect for yourself?” No life situation is as simple as it may appear from the outside.

When your frustration is about to get the best of you, seek support for yourself. Talk to someone you care about. Share how painful it is to be unable to instantly pluck the abused woman from her thorny trap, which of course is what you wish you could do, as do I. Tell about the rage you feel toward the man who is abusing her. Then prepare yourself to go back and be patient and loving with the woman you are trying to help. Abused women tell me over and over again that nothing has mattered more to their progress toward safety and recovery than the love and support of friends, relatives, and respectful professionals.

One more word of caution: I observe that many people are eager to find
something
wrong with an abused woman, because if they can’t, they are confronted with the uncomfortable reality that any woman can be abused. The urge to find fault in her interferes with your ability to help her—and ultimately colludes with the abusive man.

W
HAT
I
F
S
HE
D
OESN’T
B
ELIEVE
S
HE
I
S
B
EING
A
BUSED?