Verbal Abuse is Not About You

Sometimes I look at the words people type in the various search engines that lead them to my blog, and sometimes it breaks my heart.

Today there was this search: "my husband verbally abuses me because I'm fat"

I wish I could give this woman a big hug.

He doesn't abuse you because you're fat; he abuses you because he is abusive.

A good husband would never use an area of sensitivity as a weapon to hurt you. If you weren't overweight, he would find something else mean to say.

My husband is rather portly, and a bit sensitive about it. I know he feels bad about his weight and I would never want to make him feel worse. I have told him I love HIM whatever size he may be.

Even though he has said mean things to me, it would never even occur to me to call him fat. I couldn't feel good about myself if I deliberately inflicted pain on him.

So please know that whenever someone abuses you, it's not about you. It is directed towards you, but it is really about the person who is hurting you.

It is their shame, their pain, their inadequacies. Abuse is always unwarranted regardless of your imperfections. Just because you aren't perfect, doesn't mean you deserve to be abused.

I am so sorry for the pain of this woman, and every other woman and man and child who has felt the sting of ugly words. It's not your fault and you don't deserve it. You deserve love. We all do.

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Context is More Damaging than Content

My post It's not abuse, it's just my interpretation? was discussed by corboy on the Rick Ross cults and destructive groups forum. Thank you corboy for your articulate expansion of my idea .

Corboy wrote:

The person who wrote this blog has reached the heart of the matter. The horror/shock quotient is not always the content of the message, but is often influenced by WHO DELIVERS THAT MESSAGE.

The term 'verbal abuse' may not be enough to provide a full description of what accounts for the impact. I would invite us to ponder the term 'relationship-specific abuse.' For, verbal content is not enough to account for the stunning power of certain utterances or even gestures.

Its when the words or gestures or battery take place in the context of a relationship based on mutual trust, and thus shatter that trust, that it becomes abusive and trust-shattering.

For we select spouses and friends based on trust that they will never do such things to us in the first place! ('To have and to hold, to honor and to cherish...')

[snip]

If the local insane drunkard on the corner calls me a filthy name, I can write it off. The person is, clearly nuts. I have not given this person the level of radical trust that I would give a lover or ultra close friend.

But if your spouse, your lover or your close friend were, suddenly, within the existing frame of that trust-bonded relationship call you that same bad name that the nut on the corner gave you--you'd be blown away.

The book I was discussing, "The Secret of Overcoming Verbal Abuse " says that the reason your partner's remarks cut so deep is that they "cut straight into the painful self-doubts and non-acceptance of yourself you have had since early childhood" That may be for some people, some of the time, but as corboy and I have noted, it ain't necessarily so.

I hope that targets of relational abuse will not automatically accept the pronouncement that their pain is solely, or primarily, due to their old insecurities . If old pain is part of it, it certainly makes sense to work towards healing those wounds and loving yourself despite your imperfections. One very helpful mantra I got from the book was "Just because I'm not perfect, doesn't mean I deserve to be abused."

We all have imperfections, and an abuser will use your humanness as an excuse for his abuse. If there is any truth in the deprecating remarks, and your partner knows, or should know, of your sensitivity, that makes his behavior all the more deplorable. Someone who loves you does not jab you in your sensitive areas.

I realized the relational context was what made the abuse most painful, so I stopped thinking of him as 'my husband'. It wasn't that hard to do because he does very little which is consistent with that role.

I used to think of him both in terms of who he is - Bob and his relationship to me, - husband., i.e. my husband, Bob. Now, I simply think of him as "Bob". Well, not only 'Bob' actually. I think of him as Bob the emotionally handicapped guy who lives in the other side of the house.

It's easier that way. I don't expect or want anything from him that way. He's just a guy with profound limitations. I don't need to label or dehumanize him by thinking of him as "the abuser". To the best of my ability I try to cultivate an attitude of indifference.

When I can pull it off, I feel better. When I remember he is my husband, and I long for that caring connection, it hurts. But that's okay too. Sometimes it's good to just hurt for a while.

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It's not abuse, it's just my interpretation?

I want to mention a book I have mixed feelings about. The book is "The Secret of Overcoming Verbal Abuse" by Albert Ellis and Marcia Grad Powers. It is based on the principles of cognitive therapy which I am familiar with through the work of Dr. David Burns who I highly recommend. I found the ideas about changing my thoughts about the situation to be very helpful, but I will address my main area of disagreement with the authors first.

One of the main concepts of the book is: "You, and only you, create all of your feelings"

Well, ur, not really. If that were true there would be no such a thing as verbal abuse. If it were only our interpretation of events that hurts us then one could say, "Its not abuse when your husband calls you a fat, ugly, stupid, worthless cunt, it's just your interpretation of the event that leads you to feel bad." Give me a break.

Even if you know that you are not a fat, ugly, stupid, worthless cunt, you don't need to believe there is any truth to the statement to be shocked and stunned that your husband said those things. Or suppose you are overweight and maybe you aren't the brightest bulb on the tree, you certainly aren't worthless and it is horrifying that someone who claims to love you would try to use something you might feel sensitive about to demean you.

The worst part for me isn't the actual words, it is that this person who claims to love me, my husband, is trying make me feel bad, whether I accept his assessment of me or not. You could be a fashion model with a genuis IQ and still be hurt, not because you believe the words, but because your husband spoke them, and tried to make you feel "less than".

"You, and only you, create all of your feelings" is no more true than the old "sticks & stones may break my bones but words will never hurt me" routine. Or the classic "I'm not responsible for your feelings". Where did that come from? Is it some co-dependency recovery run amok? I usually hear someone say "I'm not responsible for his/her feelings" from people who have just done something particularly shitty to another person and now wish to absolve themselves of any responsibility for the harm they caused. But I digress.

Later in the book the authors appear to contradict their main thesis and acknowledge that while you have some choice about how you feel, that it is not a complete choice. I agree.

I would not recommend this book as the first one to read about verbal abuse. Patricia Evan's book is far superior. Evan's book validates the pain, confusion and frustration. It is important to first feel the pain. It's also important to move out of pain. That's where the Ellis/Powers concepts helped me.

I'll post about the helpful aspects of the book next time. (Unless something more interesting or urgent comes up.)

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Verbal Abuse Bingo

I have been working on learning to detach, to see his behavior as the immature silliness that it is. When he is unable to upset me, he is deprived of the payoff of feeling powerful. Patricia Evans suggested his name calling is at the emotional level of a three year old calling someone a 'pooh pooh head'.

So I look for ways to see the absurdity and not let it get to me. I have created Verbal Abuse Bingo cards. I am thinking of putting a couple of them in the kitchen, and inviting him to play too. When I hear that type of abuse, I would go get my card and cheerfully mark out that spot with a flourish.

When I get 5 in a row - I'll gleefully yell out "Verbal Abuse Bingo!"

It might put some fun in dysfunctional and maybe keep him mindful.

He is so contrary he may stop the abuse just to block me from getting Bingo.

Let's Make a Deal

So last night he tells me he is sorry he called me a bitch. Unfortunately, further conversation revealed that he is still holding me responsible for how he behaves.

I told him that in order to feel safe with him again, I need to know that he accepts full responsibility for his behavior and that name calling will not happen in the future under any circumstances.

"What?", he said. "You want me to just unilaterally disarm?" "This isn't a war", I told him. "Weapons have no place in a marriage."

I pointed out that I had stopped yelling, because I knew it bothered him. I no longer slam doors. I don't try to continuing engaging with him when he wants to stop talking, even though he has not kept a 'time out' agreement in a year. (When he takes a 'time out' it doesn't mean he is going to go calm down so we can better discuss the issue. It is his way of disengaging for weeks.) "I did all that", I told him, "and your behavior has not changed."

He wouldn't agree to a ban on name calling regardless of circumstances. (double standard here). Basically, he says if I do something to make him mad (like tell him I am upset about something he did or didn't do) then he will reserve the right to 'fight back'.

This is what Lundy Bancroft says in "Why does he do that?"

He justifies his hurtful or frightening acts or says that you "made him do it."

The abuser uses your behavior as an excuse for his own. He therefore refuses to commit unconditionally to stop using a degrading or intimidating behavior. Instead, he insists on setting up a quid pro quo, where he says he'll stop some form of abuse if you agree to give up something that bothers him, which often will be something that you have every right to do.

So I'm not going to take that 'deal'. I could use 'I feel' statements and stroking and never raise my voice over a whisper and he would still find a way to justify abuse.

Just because I'm not perfect
doesn't mean I deserve to be abused.

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I hate my husband.

I know I'm not alone. I don't know if any other women hate my husband, but I'm pretty sure there are other women who hate their husbands. We just don't say so do we. But we think it, and we feel it.

I hate him for treating me so disrespectfully. I hate him for calling me "bitch", "cunt". Those words cut deep and a woman can never feel the same way about a man after he calls her that.

I hate him for forgetting I am a woman and treating me like his servant.

I hate him for rarely sleeping in the same bed with me.

I hate him for rarely taking a vacation with me.

I hate him for rarely taking me out on a date.

I hate him for rarely bringing me flowers.

I hate his cluelessness.

I hate him for making sexual comments about other women.

I hate him for looking at porn.

I hate him for only making love to me once a month since we got married.

I hate him for being so cheap with me even though he has lots of money.

He is so fucking lazy. He is the laziest man I have ever seen. I had no idea. His schedule:

noon: wake up
-1:30 lay in bed
-3:00 get up and eat breakfast.
-4:30 get the mail and read catalogs and offers for miracle cures.
-6:30 go on internet
-8:00 make dinner and eat
-11:00 play the guitar
-3:00 back on the internet

except on rare occasions, schedule does not include housework, or even moving his own shit off the dining table or anywhere else.

Okay. I admit it, I sound like a bitch. But which came first? The way he treated me came first. I was not like this before.

Why doesn't she just leave you ask? I am. I am leaving. There's a world out there.There is life out there. I want to live again.
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