This is the eleventh of 16 blogs discussing the patterns of tactics from my power and control wheel — Using the Children.Ways men use the children to maintain power and control or to punish their partner or ex-partner include demanding that she do all the childcare, making her feel guilty about the children, telling her he wouldn’t lose his temper if she kept the children quieter. Some men undermine her relationship with the children, for example when she sets clear boundaries he will then tell the children they’re allowed to do the thing their mother had said ‘no’ to. Some men also undermine her parenting by telling her she’s a bad parent and by purposefully belittling her in front of the children.

Some men use the children by threatening to take them away or kidnap them if his partner leaves him, or they threaten to have the children taken into care of child protection services or they threaten to harm the children, or actually do harm the children.

Women with children are more likely to be abused by their partner than are women without children.¹ When men do abuse their partner this increases the likelihood he will abuse the children — physically, sexually, psychologically. And the more frequent the abuse towards their partner, the higher the chance the children will be abused too.²

Many men who coercively control their partner use children as weapons to get at her, control her, and keep her in her place.

Quite soon after starting her relationship with Luke, Heather did not want to be with him because he was abusing her. She wanted to leave and do her teaching degree, however she got pregnant, but did not want to share a child with Luke, so she told him she was going to have an abortion. However, fitting with his possessive attitude, he did not want her to have an abortion so he served High Court papers on her to prevent her from having an abortion. However, as Heathersaid, “He actually dropped the court case. I just got to read the papers recently through the hospital because he tried to sue the hospital as well. I thought he was so powerful and I just couldn’t mess with him. Even when I had our son he said in one of the affidavits that ‘she’s going back to work, that she obviously doesn’t want our son, so I’ll have him those times’. So if I went back to any work of any sort of description where he thought I was neglecting our son he would be on me. I never went out because he’d say, ‘you’re not going out leaving our son with your parents’. Yet he would never offer to look after him while I went out.”

Despite Luke seeming to want to have a child, this was not his actual motivation for trying to prevent the abortion. Many men with possessive attitudes use the children to maintain power and control over their partner. Heather discussesLuke’s attitude after they separated: “He made comments like ‘I wish you loved me like you love our son’. If I went to town he would grab the pram and say, ‘I know that when I’ve got our son you won’t go far away.’ He’d say, ‘If I had our son you’d come and live with me because you wouldn’t be away from him.’ I went and said to the counsellor, ‘I don’t want to be with Luke’. I said I want it so we have smooth running, we’ve got this child now, I want to get on with my life and Luke to get on with his and sort out some sort of arrangement until our son’s older, whether he comes and visits him at my place, or we meet on a Sunday afternoon until he’s old enough to be taken on his own. I want to remain friends so it’s easier for our son. But then Luke had me on his own and said ‘there’s no way we can be friends. I’m not going to be friends with you if you’re not going to live with me’.”

Pauline describes how Chris used the children to manipulate and maintain control over her, claiming that he could not spend time with his children because he’d rather spend time elsewhere. Pauline said Chris wouldn’t agree to an access order for the children, so when they were in the Court, “he said, ‘No court or judge is telling me what to do.’ So we had it on agreement and he walked out of court and he turned around and said, ‘Stick your fucking agreement.’ He said, ‘I can’t have the kids, I want to go to Rotary gatherings.’ Contact with the children has been very much to his timetable.”

Many men use the children in an attempt to punish their partner. And the children are negatively impacted as a result.

Raewyn also discussed how her husband Brian would use the children as a tool to prevent her from getting her needs met. Raewyn said, “Once I’d left he would play games about having the children because he knew I wanted a break and he would almost bribe me and say ‘Raewyn let’s talk about marriage and why this has happened and then I’ll see if I want to have the children’. He’s still doing it now. He’s using the children to get at me and they suffer. I suffer because I don’t get my break, but they suffer the most because if he’s not happy with me he doesn’t have them. It’s not so bad but he doesn’t have them very regularly. He could go a whole school-term and not see them. I know he does this because he told a mutual friend of ours because she asked him ‘why don’t you have the children regularly every second weekend?’ He said, ‘No way I don’t want to make it easy for her, so she can have a nice weekend with her lover.’

Susan said, “I had applied for a protection order, but my lawyer was so slow and didn’t think there was anything to worry about. But Anthony had left a suicide note and he left it to the kids. I read it before the kids saw it. I was a nervous wreck. Imagine if the kids had seen this and what it would have done to them. Anthonydoesn’t give up. I ended up going to a women’s refuge because I didn’t feel safe at all. I spent five days at women’s refuge. I had to take a week off work. The kids were so confused about things. They weren’t happy being there. I said to him I can’t go on, I’ve found myself a house to rent.” But Susan lived in a rural area and had no transport, so the new house was close which meant Anthony could see it.Susan said, “it was the only empty house there and I had that thing that I had to have the kids close to him because he’d say, ‘My kids have to be with me or else I’ll fight you for custody’.

Men who use coercive control against their partner, know the woman’s vulnerabilities. The love and protection that many women have for their children is one area that those men use after separation to continue coercive control.

After Raewyn left Brian, “He actually went away, overseas, for quite a while, ten months, so it was all pretty quiet. I didn’t realise how blissful that was.” However, when he returned, Brian would use conversations about the children as opportunities to abuse Raewyn.  Raewyn said, “if I rang him up to see if he wanted to have the children, he’d always have a go at me, every time. A lot of the time I was crying at the end of the phone conversations, or I’d get so mad at him. I don’t know how he does it, he just makes you feel bad. I just can’t stand him, and then it would happen the next time and the next time, because he would never say, ‘yes I want to have the children and I want to be a father’. No, no, it would be ‘Oh, you’re just using me for a babysitter.’ So the abuse was just as bad as when we were married. It was revolting. The children are still something he can get at me about, although I’m trying to not get sucked into that one.”

Some men who engage in abusive, controlling, or violent behaviours towards their partner also directly maltreat their children.

Raewyn said that although her husband never really had that much respect for her, the abuse and coercive control got worse once they had children. Raewynsaid, “When the eldest boy Paul was two years old, suddenly I felt something different, I thought what’s happened? He’d stopped bugging me and he was abusing Paul. I got scared. I thought at that time, ‘I’ve got to go, I’ve got to go.’ He was really horrible. That’s probably the most scaredest and the most I ever wanted to leave was at that point. When my son Paul was about five or six, I said to my sister, she was visiting, I said, ‘I’ve got to leave him for Paul’s sake’. She even agreed with me there, for Paul’s sake you’ve got to leave him Raewyn. And again it was like I was locked into it I couldn’t go, I just didn’t know if I had it in me to go.”

Other men who abuse their wives, may also control the children.

Raewyn gives an example of how her husband favoured one child over the other. For some children, this can create rivalries between them. Raewyn said that after she and Brian separated, “he went back to picking on me and he was also picking on Paul. And his abuse went a little bit further, because he would dote on the youngest boy, which would make it even worse for Paul. I would just be cryinginside for Paul because it was so obvious. That was horrible. I think what he was doing with the children really pushed me most to get out. The way he was treating Paul, he would know that it affected me badly. I got to the point where I used to say ‘stop picking on him’, and he knew it affected me. I think it made him do it more.”

Women with children are at higher risk than childless women, of being abused after separating from a man with a history of controlling behaviours.

When Adriana and Steve separated he threatened to kill her and he used their daughter as a pawn to control Adriana. As a result of the threat to kill her, Adriana worried how that threat would affect her daughter. She believed her daughter may be at some level of danger when she was in his care.

Adriana said her ex-husband tries to get their daughter to make a choice between them. She said it must be very very hard for her daughter to cope with his slurring at her and the family. Adriana said, “I have no control over it. There’s no way I can do anything about it, except, again be the rock, be the person who does things the right way. Being the rock means supporting her in what she wants to do, being consistent with my parenting, to be consistent with her, living ongoing in a predictable way, loving her — for me all the normal parenting things. Not saying negative things about him in front of her.”

Adriana said her ex-husband, “was a great father when we were married, but after the divorce he fails to be a father or role model to our child. He fails to be consistent about seeing her. He doesn’t support her on any level I can detect because he doesn’t support all her interests, he jeopardises all her interests. He doesn’t support her financially in any way. He uses her for his own purposes which I think is the lowest of the lowest. For example he uses her as a negotiator between us, he buys her presents and does not let her bring them home or use them.”

Many coercively controlling men (especially if they have money) use children to battle for contact or day-to-day care in the family court.

Research shows that many of those men are able to put on a charming façade when outsiders observe their fathering. Adriana said, “The court system is quite steadfast on any access. The court believes any relationship with the father is better than no relationship — even if it hurts the child. Not necessarily physically because he hasn’t been physically violent. We had a couple of psychologist’s reports and the psychologist looked at the way he behaves towards her for an hour and made an assessment of that. The report showed nothing like the reality. It didn’t show things like the fact he calls her up and asks whether she’s slim or not. But again I had no control over that because he is her parent, he is a guardian so he has amazing power not only over her, but over me and it is given to him by the legal system and by the structure. There’s the hard bit because there’s no way as an individual that I can fight it. He’s got the right to make decisions for her, which obviously influences my life.”

Elizabeth said that, David “took out custody proceedings yet there was no way he could look after the kids” because as Elizabeth said, she had “looked after them all the time that we’d had them. They were little children.”

Using the children in this way to maintain control over Elizabeth was despairing for her. She said that David “had these people he called nannies, they were just girls that he had picked up wherever he picked them up that he called nannies. I remember one holiday I dropped the girls around there so that he could pay a teenager to look after them while I went out cleaning. The whole thing was just soback to front. I would say, ‘I’ll look after the kids. I’ll have the kids.’ ‘Oh no no.’ There was no way he was going to let that happen. We went to mediation, we went through the whole legal process, and to mediation for custody of the kids, and the kids had lawyers and the kids had psychological reports and that whole business — which was very hair raising. And he has this wonderfully charming persona, he is very proper and very charming and of course he’s got his professional life and his lovely home and here I am scraping to stay alive.”

Many men who abuse their partners, show a lack of responsibility as fathers.

These fathers lack interest and involvement and do not fulfill the huge range of parenting tasks required. Instead, the mother often has to take up the slack and do all the things for the children that the father neglects to do, such as organising school camp, all the equipment and logistical arrangements that go along with that, organising school uniforms, medical appointments, ensuring medication is administered on schedule, ensuring children have a balanced healthy diet, and so forth. Many men who control their partners just want the public kudos of being a father, but not all the hard work that committed healthy parenting requires.

Elizabeth said, “When I left, I stayed at my girlfriend’s. The children were living in the house where he was living. I used to come in at seven o’clock in the morning to seven at night to look after them, as we had four children at that stage and the youngest was three. He used to leave me lists of things to do, I had to do this and I had to do that. If I went to the supermarket to buy food he wanted to see the receipt to make sure that I hadn’t bought anything for myself. I couldn’t get onto a benefit because even though I was looking after the kids 12 hours a day, because they were sleeping at his house, I couldn’t claim a benefit, because technically they were in his care. Not that I was really into looking at benefits at that stage, because I never saw myself as someone who should be going on a benefit. I couldn’t claim child support because again they were in his custody, that is where they spent the night is the thing that counts.”

Children are impacted in a variety of ways when their father uses them as a tool to control their mother.

How children are impacted depends on their age, the kind of control and manipulation they experience, the strength of bond they have with their father, mother and siblings and the degree to which their father undermines those bonds. Children’s needs for psychological and physical safety may be diminished, their ability to focus and enjoy school may be impeded and some children may develop physical illnesses. Children may try to stop the abuse, while others may feel powerless to change anything. Some children become confused, anxious or depressed. Yet other children may be very resilient — especially if they have good stable supports and they are able to talk to trusted family, friends or people in the wider community about what they are experiencing.

Watch out for blogs on the following control tactics:

One-Sided power games
Mind games
Inappropriate restrictions
Isolation
Over-protection & ‘caring’
Emotional unkindness & violation of trust
Degradation & Suppression of Potential
Separation Abuse
Using social institutions & social prejudices
Denial, Minimising, Blaming
Economic abuse
Sexual abuse
Symbolic aggression
Domestic slavery
Physical violence

References:

1. Humphreys C. Domestic violence and child protection: Challenging directions for practice. Australian Domestic and Family Violence Clearinghouse: Issues Paper 13. 2007.
   http://www.austdvclearinghouse.unsw.edu.au/documents/IssuesPaper_13.pdf.
2. Baker LL, Cunningham AJ. Helping children thrive: Supporting woman abuse survivors as mothers. London, ON, Canada: Centre for Children & Families in the Justice System, London Family Court Clinic, Inc., 2004.
   http://www.lfcc.on.ca/HCT_SWASM.pdf.

Tagged as: Child custody, Power and control, Tactics

By Donna Andersen April 22, 201320 CommentsRead More →

An open letter to lawyers who have clients involved with sociopaths

Dear Mr. or Ms. Esquire,

When a client tells you his or her opponent is a sociopath, please be aware of the ramifications for your legal case.

First of all, do not disregard the statement just because the opponent hasn’t killed anyone. A common perception is that sociopaths are all deranged serial killers. This is not true—only a small percentage of sociopaths commit murder. But all sociopaths are social predators, and live by exploiting others.

Frequently this is financial exploitation—many sociopaths are skilled con artists—but not always. Sociopaths also target people who can provide them with a place to live, business connections, sex, housekeeping or other support services, children, or a respectable image in the community while they live double lives.  The point is that sociopaths intentionally use manipulation and deceit to hook their target. They continue the manipulation and deceit to keep the exploitation going, bleeding the target until there is nothing left. At that point, some sociopaths abandon the target, moving on without a backward glance.

Sometimes, however, the target gets wise to the sociopath, and wants to end the involvement. At this point, some sociopaths become enraged at the possibility of losing control, and set out to crush the target. They are not interested in compromise or equitable distribution. They do not want to give the target whatever he or she is entitled to. They want to grind the target into the dirt.

What you need to understand about sociopaths

1. A sociopath’s prime objective is power and control. All they want is to win.

2. Sociopaths love the drama of court because it gives them an opportunity to win. They do not consider the possibility that they may lose. If they do lose, they view it a bump in the road, and figure out how to attack the target again. Forcing the target to incur steadily mounting legal expenses is considered a win.

3. Sociopaths lie. They lie convincingly. They have no qualms about lying in court documents or on the witness stand.

4. Sociopaths manipulate other people to lie for them. These witnesses may not know they are lying—they may simply believe everything that the sociopath has told them, because sociopaths are so convincing.

5. Sociopaths feel no obligation to follow court orders or the law. They only follow court orders or the law if they perceive an advantage in doing so. But they are experts at figuring out ways to use the law to further their objective, which is to crush your client.

How people become targets

Most of us believe that people are basically good inside and everybody just wants to be loved. Because we do not know that there are exceptions to these beliefs—namely, sociopaths—we have huge blind spots that these predators can exploit.

No normal person intentionally becomes involved with a lying, manipulative sociopath. So when your client tells you outrageous stories of the sociopath’s behavior, and also says he or she never knew about the behavior, or accepted the sociopath’s explanations, your client is most likely telling the truth.

How do these entanglements happen? Sociopaths are always on the lookout for people they can use. When they encounter someone through any social interaction, they quickly evaluate whether that person has something that they want. If the answer is yes, they assess the person for vulnerabilities. Then they figure out how to exploit the person’s vulnerabilities to achieve their objective.

Sociopaths engage in calculated seduction. If you’re handling a divorce case, the seduction was romantic. If it’s some other type of case, the seduction may have involved shared beliefs, aspirations or goals. Either way, in the beginning of the involvement the target is subject to a wonderful honeymoon of admiration and promise.

Once the target is hooked, the sociopath begins the exploitation, while simultaneously ramping up manipulation to keep the target under control. This may involve:

• Isolating the target from his or her support network
• Emotional, psychological, verbal, physical, sexual or financial abuse
• Gaslighting—making the target doubt his or her own perceptions

What you need to understand about the target

1. Involvement with a sociopath is like living in a black hole of chaos. Your client, the target, has probably had every aspect of his or her life disrupted:

• Career interrupted
• Finances ruined
• Health compromised
• Home and property neglected
• Relationships shattered

By the time the legal action commenced, your client may have already been in free fall for a long time. He or she may feel overwhelmed by the magnitude of the issues that need to be addressed.

2. Involvement with a sociopath can cause post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD). At one time PTSD was diagnosed only in relation to a single traumatic event that involved risk of serious injury or death, coupled with intense fear, horror or helplessness. A new definition identifies a type of PTSD that results from cumulative trauma and long-term injury.

3. PTSD is a psychiatric injury (not a mental illness). PTSD causes biochemical changes in the brain and affects certain areas of the brain’s anatomy. Common symptoms include intrusive thoughts, nightmares, flashbacks, difficulty concentrating and exhaustion.

4. The litigation against the sociopath makes your client re-experience the underlying trauma and triggers the symptoms of PTSD. Dr. Karin Huffer, in her book Unlocking Justice, explains what happens:

Mentally reliving the trauma during legal proceedings simultaneously activates parts of the brain that support intense emotions while diminishing the functions of the central nervous system that controls motor output, regulates physiological arousal, and impedes the ability to communicate in words. Memory fails and intrusive emotions sabotage concentration on the task at hand. Litigants feel incapable of the spontaneous verbal response and interaction required in typical courtroom exchanges. As a result, the litigant with PTSD might be driven to avoid topics. They literally do not hear them. They disconnect when they need to engage. And, at times, they clearly are nonfunctional and are unable to communicate their symptoms and needs in a formal manner accepted by the courts.

5. Targets of sociopaths have been deceived, betrayed and perhaps subject to violence. They approach the courts expecting justice, which sociopaths actively thwart. When justice is denied, and targets instead experience profound and prolonged injustice, their PTSD takes on another dimension, which Huffer identifies as “Legal Abuse Syndrome.”

Your client’s experience

The goal of this letter, Mr. or Ms. Esquire, is to help you understand what your client has experienced. My objective is to explain why he or she may be having difficulties with the litigation process, and difficulties moving on in life. The sociopath intentionally used your client—perhaps for years—and may be intentionally attempting to destroy him or her now.

Your client is not irrational, lazy or obstinate. Your client is having a normal reaction to profound betrayal.

Sincerely,

Donna Andersen
Author, Lovefraud.com, and a former litigant against a sociopath

High Conflict Divorce and Children

The short-term symptoms of emotional damage on a child are usually obvious. The child, caught in a conflict between warring parents, and not wishing to offend either one, daily walks a tightrope between them. Over time, children of high-conflict divorce learn what pleases each parent and conduct themselves accordingly. They say what each parent wants to hear, and it is not unusual for the child to join in criticism of whichever parent is not present at the time. It is common for such children to tell each parent that they want to live with that parent. All of the child’s energy goes into surviving in the battle between the parents. Is it any wonder that teachers soon report an attention deficit and that school grades fall? Is it any surprise that the child shows great suppressed anger and starts to act aggressively toward playmates? Can you blame a child for being angry at being put in an impossible position by people over whom the child has no control? 

The long-term emotional damage to children as a result of the improper conduct of their parents during a divorce inhibits their ability to lead happy and productive lives within the society. 

The alienated child will have a skewed view of adults and of the gender of the parent who is the victim of the alienation. The abandoned child will find it hard to fully trust as an adult, especially those who should be very close and deeply loved. Indeed some abandoned children may spend their early adult years in the unhealthy search for a mate who will serve in the role of the parent who has abandoned the child. The child who witnesses abuse, physical or verbal, is far more likely to so abuse family members later in life. 

Children who walk a tightrope, telling each parent what that parent wants to hear, over time lose touch with their own true feelings and needs. They have lost part of their grasp on reality. Such a loss can produce serious emotional disorders that may — without serious therapeutic interventions — last a lifetime. At the least, it is likely that these children will find it difficult to establish a lifelong love relationship.

What Financial Abuse Looks Like in Relationships

Do you know the warning signs of too much cash control in a relationship?

• By Gina Coburn and Kimberly Weisz
• Email the authors
• April 3, 2013

 Email

 Print

  Comment

    

 Upload Photos and Videos

Operation for HOPE Foundation provides micro-emergency loans to remove economic barriers for domestic violence victims to reach and remain safe. However, starting over for many is just the beginning of overwhelming and devastating consequences. In regards to financial hardship, it’s never easy to start over and it’s especially not easy for victims of abuse. As domestic violence is about power and control, abusers often isolate their partners and financial abuse tactics are commonly used. Generally the abuser controls every aspect of their lives, from how all of the money is spent, managing each of the bank accounts and paying all the bills, controlling all credit cards and any access to living independently in the outside world. Many abusers do not allow their partner to work or earn money. Instead of negotiating the family finances and working through the income and debt ratios as most healthy couples do, financially abusive relationships are about maintaining that power and control over the other person and trapping them into a relationship making them feel helpless and totally dependent.

Financial abuse along with domestic violence abuse can happen to anyone regardless of their income, education or independent success. Additional warning signs to help determine if you may be in a financially abusive relationship includes:

• Making you feel as though you don’t have a right to know any details about money or household decisions.
• Forbid you from working or attending school or training sessions to get ahead.
• Overuse your credit cards or refuse to pay the bills.
• Force you to file fraudulent tax returns.
• Prevent you from obtaining or using credit cards.
• Interfere with your performance at work through harassing activities like frequent telephone calls, emails or visits to your workplace.
• Not allow you to have any money on your own.
• Controlling your cell phone and activity involving any bill.

Victims of domestic violence need to achieve financial independence as well as freedom from abuse.  The mission of the Allstate Foundation through a grant provided to Operation for HOPE Foundation is to provide free financial training and social support services for strategies that can help victims better understand and empower them to regain control over their economic provisions and finances. The Allstate Foundation offers several financial management modules and curriculum for teaching victims of domestic violence about financial independence.

First if you feel that you are in an abusive relationship, please work with a domestic violence advocate or service provider to help you develop a plan that will keep you and your family safe. Seeking the help of an advocate who will provide a risk assessment and evaluate your needs and help with safety planning is an important step for you in preparing to leave an abusive relationship. You may also want to consider filing a temporary restraining order or stay away order especially if you have experienced threats or feel that you are in any danger.

Always taking care of yourself and your children is your No. 1 priority. If you have an option of planning to leave the abusive relationship, consider finding ways to save some cash for yourself for emergencies, by saving change from purchases, receiving performance bonuses from work or cash tips and stashing away in a safe place with a friend, secret bank account or safety deposit box.

With education, assistance and support you can become a successful money manager and work toward setting and achieving your own financial goals depending on your personal needs.

Your financial status may change dramatically after leaving your partner. Estimate your current living expenses, including any money you may spend on the children. Some of the assets that may be divided in a divorce include your home, savings, retirement plans, and household items—furniture, dishes, tools and equipment.

In addition to working with Allstate Foundation, Operation for HOPE Foundation was awarded through 4imprint-One by One Charitable Giving a variety of flash drives to provide case managers and community partners for victims of domestic violence to store their documents and records. It’s important to have copies of critical documents stored in a safe place. Documentation regarding joint property can also be very helpful along with photographs of pay check stubs, tax returns, life insurance policies, birth certificates, restraining orders and any important documents that need to be readily available.

Allstate is committed to helping victims and survivors build their financial skills. The Allstate’s Financial Empowerment Curriculum, along with all of the support of our community partners will help victims of domestic violence abuse gain personal and financial independence. Once independence skills are learned, the feeling of financial success will follow.

During this difficult time, remaining safe is the utmost importance. If you feel you are in immediate danger, call 9-1-1.

Resources:

• Operation For HOPE Foundation
• National Domestic Violence Hotline, 1-800-799-7233
• National Dating Helpline, 1-866-331-9474
• National Center for Victims of Crime Hotline, 1-800-394-2255
• San Diego Domestic Violence Hotline, 1-888-385-4657

About this column: Voices End Violence is written by leaders, members and supporters of Operation for HOPE Foundation—a nonprofit that raises awareness about domestic violence and offers resources to survivors. For more information, visit operationforhope.org/Related Topics: Domestic Violence