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Your Guide to Abuse / Incest Support.
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It is frustrating to see someone you love, drift into an abusive relationship. You stand by and watch, unable to do anything. She ignores your advice, and maybe has started to avoid you. But you still love her, and you hate to see the suffering in her eyes.

Well, there are things you can do. And there are things you shouldn't do.

Abusive Relationships

Abusive relationships are not all alike. They range from daily assaults and gun threats, to low-grade emotional abuse, and include everything in between.

In some cases, your friend is in deadly danger, and even the police are looking for her abuser. Or maybe there is no violence, but a lot of screaming, where her abuser finds fault with everything she does, and even dictates the clothes she wears. Or maybe your friend is subjected to a constant, low-grade complaining and criticism, and your friend, formerly a bright and joyful woman, is slowly wilting.

While the specifics will vary, there are some common characteristics you should know about.

Isolation

The abuser wants his victim all to himself. When he calls her 'stupid,' he doesn't want someone else to tell her she's smart. When he tells her that everything is her fault, he doesn't want someone else to tell her how it's not. He wants to inflict his will, his perspective, his world-view on her.

To achieve this, the abuser must isolate his victim. In this case, we'll talk about his wife, although it could be his girlfriend, or family, or whatever. While his tactics will vary, he has a need for absolute power and control. His first step is to drive away her friends and allies.

The abuser will do this quite deliberately. He will insult and offend her family and friends. He may be actively rude or passively negative, but he will make his wife's allies uncomfortable so they will hesitate to come back. And the longer between visits, the easier it is to make the next interval even longer. As time goes by, her friends and allies have found other things to fill their time. What used to be a close, loving relationship has dwindled into a distant acquaintance.

The abuser will reinforce this by making his wife pay a high price for every visit. He pours out anger and abuse, even if they visited when he wasn't there. (In those cases, he accuses her of sneaking around.) If she feels stronger after their visit, he accuses them of turning her against him. Reason and logic have no effect on him, and the consequences of visiting with her friends becomes so great that the wife will stop inviting them, and stop accepting their invitations.

Break The Isolation

Isolation is required for his plan to work, so you can work to break the isolation. This is delicate, but it can be done.

First, make sure that you identify the source of the insults against you. If they all come from him, and his wife doesn't dare to intervene, then realize that he is trying to drive you away. Blame him. Don't blame her.

Visit her when he's at work. Or call when he's not home. Send her a card, stop by her office, do whatever you think she'd like. Every act of reaching out to her is frustrating his plan to isolate her.

Acknowledge the Danger]

Don't make the mistake of turning this into your crusade. If your visits are causing him to hurt her more and more, then you're not helping her. Talk to her. Be honest about the situation. Tell her you don't want to cause her any trouble. Ask if there is a time you can visit that won't get her in trouble, or brainstorm with her for a way to keep in contact that won't cost her in physical or emotional suffering. If you bring it up, she will probably have suggestions -- a way to keep in contact that will cause the least amount of pain.

Of course, you are dying to tell the creep what you think of him. You want to tell him every name in the book, and you have thought of some good insults that will really get to him. You want to stand up for your friend, and tell him that he can't treat her that way. You want to just unload on the guy!

Don't do it.

Even if you just want to insist on staying until he gets home, and then look at him defiantly, don't do it if your friend doesn't want it. All you are doing is filling him with anger. And you know who he will vent it on -- your friend, that's who. He will wait until you're gone, and then make her pay for it. Yes, that's cowardly, but that's what will happen, and you haven't helped your friend at all.

Empower Your Friend

The abuser is dis-empowering your friend by taking away her self-respect, her dignity, and her authority to make any decisions. If you insist on taking steps that she doesn't want you to take, you are dis-empowering her too.