For a man to batter his wife is a reprehensible thing for him to do. But if he is to be treated successfully in therapy, his deep emotional pain and terrible interpersonal dilemma must be heard and worked through.
Donald Dutton is a psychologist in Vancouver, B.C. who has studied and treated male batterers for the past twenty years. He has just reported his findings in his book, The Batterer: A Psychological Profile.
The batterer, Dutton found, was raised by a rejecting and abusive father and by a mother who was inconsistent in her care of him. As a result, he grew up with low self-esteem and a sense he is not lovable. Rather than face his painful feelings about himself, however, he avoids them through anger or blaming others, especially his wife.
Based on his experience with his mother, the batterer has a negative view of women. Just as he could not depend upon his mother to be there for him on a consistent basis, he believes he cannot depend on his wife. He is afraid she will leave him for someone else, someone whom he fears will be a better lover or husband than he. Regretably for him, his violence can cause his wife to stop loving him, thereby confirming his worst fear.
The batterer carries what Dutton calls "masked dependency" and it constitutes his central, painful dilemma. He is very dependent upon his wife but afraid to admit it. He doesn't know if he can fully trust her and to admit to his dependency is to appear weak. Terrified she will leave him, he uses violence to keep her tied to him.
The purpose of the batterer's physical and emotional abuse of his wife is control. By tearing down her self-esteem, he hopes to keep her dependent upon him.
Two primitive defense mechanisms the batterer uses to deal with his emotions are projection and splitting. In projection, he sees his wife as angry or wanting to act out sexually rather than himself. In splitting, he sees her as either a good wife or a bad wife just as he saw his mother the same way. Splitting explains why a batterer can treat his wife like a whore one day and a madonna the next, why he goes from being at her throat in rage to being at her feet in remorse.
About 40 percent of batterers are so psychopathic that they cannot be treated successfully in psychotherapy, but the remainder can. What a batterer in therapy has to do is admit to his abusive behavior and take full responsibility for it. He must quit blaming his wife and realize he can control his anger no matter what his wife does to make him angry.
Anger management, communication and negotiation skills, healthy assertiveness, awareness of emotions, better self-esteem, what constitutes abuse - these are all issues the batterer must work on in therapy. But perhaps the most difficult task for the batterer in treatment is to contact and grieve his deep childhood wounds. This can be especially difficult because most batterers, like many psychotherapy patients, either don't remember much about their childhood or deny its impact on them. But this deeper, painful work must be done.
Often the batterer will seek therapy only when he realizes his wife will leave him if he doesn't. Some have to be court ordered to get and keep them in treatment. Group, individual and couples therapy can be used, but couples counseling is possible only if the wife wants to save the marriage and her safety can be assured.
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