Tuesday, December 16, 2008

abused women

Women in abusive relationships can bind emotionally to the abuser as a survival tool, just as hostages bind to captors in the so-called Stockholm syndrome. The bonding improves one’s chances of surviving. It’s simply smart to do if one cannot escape. A woman in such a relationship fears that an escape attempt will invite retaliation and possible death. The Stockholm syndrome provides further explanation of why women have trouble leaving an abusive relationship. The Stockholm syndrome is named for a phenomenon noted among some hostages in Sweden who came to see their captors as their protectors and later even visited them in jail. Four conditions led to its development. A person threatens another’s survival, that person shows some small kindness, the victim is unable to escape, and the victim is isolated from outsiders. Even the temporary cessation of abuse can be taken as the kindness. The victim can seize upon the small kindness as the first sign she may be able to survive this. The isolation can be either physical or ideological, as when a woman has contact only with people who defend the abuser or tell her such things as, “You made your bed, now lie in it.” To win the abuser over, she tries to look at the world from his perspective and comes to agree with him that she is not being abused, or that she deserves it. The syndrome helps explain why many young women in abusive relationships can deny or minimize the violence. If a therapist pushes a woman to leave an abusive relationship before she is ready, the woman is likely to leave the therapist instead. The therapist must learn to really respect the woman’s bond to the abuser as a survival strategy.

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