DOMESTIC ABUSE THERAPY

Self-Help for Domestic Violence

Domestic abuse costs the UK nation £23bn a year, and UK NHS at least £1.4bn a year.

Two major treatments: CBT and community Duluth model.

1. Cognitive behaviour therapy (CBT)

An effective treatment for abusive partners who volunteer for help.

It focuses on thoughts and feelings often learnt in childhood, which drive the abuser to be violent in situations they think are threatening.

Aggression is viewed as a response to a well-meaning behaviour from the partner that is misperceived by the abuser.

In Abuser Schema Therapy (AST) abusers learn to identify triggers to their aggression and how to anticipate and correct their reactions in advance. Participants must be motivated.

CBT is also rapidly becoming the treatment of choice for victims because their abusive experiences have lead then to develop Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD) and ideas of being unlovable and weak.

HOPE is an American intervention (not related to the title of this book) provided to women living in domestic violence shelters. It stands for Helping to Overcome PTSD through Empowerment.

Cognitive Behaviour Therapy:

Couples in an Abusive relationship

Anger Management

Awkward situations in relationships can produce difficult emotions for both persons involved.

These difficult emotions often contain anger.

If you can control the anger, the situation can be seen more clearly.

Anger can have a detrimental effect on self-esteem in both people, which is magnified by faulty self-talk.

The material for this post comes from my own clinical experience and I have found inspiration in the book by Robert Geffner with Carol Mantooth: “Workbook to accompany Ending Spouse/partner Abuse” published by Springer 2000.

How to Manage Anger by Desensitisation

1. Recall a series of situations that produce anger in you.

2. List them in order of increasing anger.

3. Start with the one that produces least anger.

4. Lie down and put yourself in a relaxed state of body and mind.

5. Imagine the anger-producing situation.

6. See yourself coping with it.

7. Repeat the image until you are immune to the situation.

8. Move onto the next scene in order of difficulty.

Avoid Habits of Thinking

Anger is born out of key situations in your relationship.

You may need to listen to each other more and avoid these habits of thinking.

1. Comparing: do not try to judge people to see how they measure up to some imposed external criterion.

2. Mind-reading: do not assume that you know what someone is thinking.

3. Filtering: make sure that you listen to all that a person is saying.

4. Identifying: do not refer everything to your own experience.

5. Advising: do not intrude into someone’s situation and try to solve their problems for them without permission.

6. Being right: do not always try to be right.

7. Criticism: do not be critical without also being constructive.

Recognise the Anger Style in the relationship

1. People who are angry at everything, even the simplest things in everyday life.

2. People who sulk extensively when they are angry.

3. People who get upset inside, then express it indirectly.

4. People who are quick to flare up, but forget it easily.

5. People who channel their anger by being critical of others.

Self-esteem

The value we place on ourselves. It is important because it determines how we let others treat us, and how resilient we are in life situations.

Remedies to enhance self-esteem

1. Accept the past.

2. Stop using “should “ and “ought” on yourself.

3. Be proud of good experiences in your life.

4. Make positive future goals.

5. Recognise and block negative thoughts.

6. Be aware of what makes you think negatively. You might need to avoid these situations.

7.Stop being unrealistic about yourself and other’s possibilities .

8. Be nice to people and encourage them to be nice to you.

9. Look after your needs. It will make you feel worthwhile.

Recognising faulty self-talk

Faulty self-talk is accepted like fake news that you give yourself.

1. “If she’s out alone, then someone will pick her up.”

2.”He never does what I want.”

3. “I need to show her I’m in control.”

4. “If she/he talks to another man/woman, then they’ll go to bed together.”

5. “No matter what I do, it won’t be enough.”

Recognise the thoughts and block them, replacing them with more adaptive truthful statements, which are usually the opposite or exception to the rule. Begin by saying “ This line of thought is unproductive.”

Remember:

1. Be assertive, not aggressive.

2. You don’t always have to give reasons for how you feel.

3. Assertive people give more compliments than criticisms to others.

2. Co-ordinated Community Programmes

The Duluth Domestic Abuse Intervention Project (DAIP) established in 1981, was initially designed as an intervention program in America to be applied to men, in lieu of jail time.

The Duluth model aims to develop and statutory multi-agency framework to apply sanctions to punish the abuser and to protect the person who is being abused.

This model is not very effective in producing lasting behaviour change in the abuser since it is coercive rather than encouraging co-operation and motivation.

A development in the UK involves Domestic Violence Perpetrator Programmes (DVPP) (accredited by the Respect Criteria) in Co-ordinated Community Responses. These have been successful, though they are still problematic.