The 2007 report of Women’s Aid, an Irish organisation to assist abused women, shows that reports of emotional or psychological abuse were greater than any other type of abuse. The same is true for Canada and the United States. All classes, races, genders and ages are targets for emotional abuse. In his blog, Healing the Scars of Emotional Abuse, Gregory Jantz holds that emotional abuse can be inflicted through words, actions, neglect and spirituality.
Linda’s story reflects this. Stephen ignored her pleas to converse with her. It was as if she did not exist, or did not matter. He let her know that watching TV was more important to him than talking to her. He used silence, insults or blaming to defeat her
“Stephen was never really interested in my conversations about any item I would bring up. He would look at the TV and barely answer me. Sometimes I would sit on the couch beside him and wait for him to respond, and eventually say, “Are you going to respond?” He never had interest in these conversations.
He had a brick wall around him and he would raise it around him anytime I tried to talk about our issues, and so things got worse and worse. Sometimes when I tried to talk to him about our problems he would imitate me with his hands and say “blaa blaa do you ever shut up?” The first time he said that to me I told him not to talk to me like that, and say, “Who do you think you are talking to, but he would tell me “fuck off”, and leave the house.
I didn’t feel one bit loved or cared for. A gap began to grow between us and it grew bigger and bigger. He used to say to me “we are like two people sharing a house”. I would respond, “how can you expect me to be intimate or close to you, you hurt me every other week with your disappearing acts, and your lack of interest in me and your son. And our life! Where is the old us gone?” “
As this brief abusive marriage progressed, Stephen continued to tighten the emotional noose, and being ridiculed, mocked, ignored, and insulted, became a way of life for her
“Slowly I was being told he wasn’t happy with me no matter what I did. He used to say I was always on the go, and to ‘chill’. I would look at him and say, “I have a full time job, the only permanent one in this household, you don’t help with the cleaning or chores, you barely ever pick Jack up from crèche, you don’t sort out the bills, or when things have to be paid, or how the money should be spent. I am running the whole household, and looking after Jack. You are never here to do anything with him, so how can you expect me not to be busy”. When I would ask him to change Jack’s nappy he would say, “Ah you do it please, and give me a sarcastic smile”. I would say, “No! You do it for a change”. But he wouldn’t, and I used to end up doing it, or the child wouldn’t be changed. When I did leave, the whole single mother thing never really scared me. The way I see it, I have been a single mother to Jack since he was born.”
Adapted from Jim O’Shea’s book Abuse. Domestic Violence, Workplace and School Bullying published by Cork University Press
PSYCHOTHERAPISTS IN TIPPERARY
THERAPISTS IN TIPPERARY
ABUSE
DOMESTIC VIOLENCE
DEATH OF A CHILD