Domestic Violence: The Cycle of Abuse and the Mindset of the Abuser

Jessica Sewell, Trecia Mayo, Julia Morin, Dionne Spencer, and Amanda Wing

When most people think about the cycle of abuse they think about it as a spinning wheel of different stages that people who are in abusive relationships go through and it keeps repeating. However, this is only part of what is really going on and every case is different. Looking at the cycle of abuse and its different stages it would consist of the tension building stage, explosion stage, making-up stage, and the calm stage.  Here are the different things that go on during each stage of abuse that I got from http://www.domesticviolence.org/cycle-of-violence/.

“Tension Building

·      Abuser starts to get angry

·      Abuse may begin

·      There is a breakdown of communication

·      Victim feels the need to keep the abuser calm

·      Tension becomes too much

·      Victim feels like they are 'walking on egg shells'

Incident

·      Any type of abuse occurs (physical/sexual/emotional)

Making-Up

·      Abuser may apologize for abuse

·      Abuser may promise it will never happen again

·      Abuser may blame the victim for causing the abuse

·      Abuser may deny abuse took place or say it was not as bad as the victim claims

Calm

·      Abuser acts like the abuse never happened

·      Physical abuse may not be taking place

·      Promises made during 'making-up' may be met

·      Victim may hope that the abuse is over

·      Abuser may give gifts to victim”

 

We had a guest speaker, Nathan Brewer, come into our classroom yesterday and talk about domestic violence. I really liked how he said that it is not a “cycle” of abuse because that gives the illusion that the same amount of time is spent in each of the different stages. However, the cycle of abuse is more like a funnel where the more times an abusive relationship goes through the stages, the less amount of time until the next set of stages. Eventually, it is only a continuous cycle that consist of the tension building and explosion stages and does not include the making-up or calm stages.

In my opinion the mindset of an abuser has to do with their personality and how they can so easily manipulate a person by using different methods to take control and have power over them. Abusers have very similar thinking and behavioral patterns that include blaming other people instead of taking responsibility for their actions, making excuses to justify what they did, and thinking they would have a better life if it weren’t for other people keeping them down.

The different methods that an abuser uses to get power and control over the victim are isolating the victim, making the victim dependent on the abuser, making threats, having different reactions to the same situation, and degrading the victim. Some of the different tactics the abuser uses to take control are domination, verbal assault, gaslighting (to drive someone crazy), and blackmail.

These different methods and tactics are done to destroy the victim’s sense of their identity and to gain power and control. Therefore, people need to be aware of the different stages of abuse and what is going on during the stages as well as realize that this model doesn’t fit every situation of abuse and there will be variations. Also, people need to keep in mind about what is going through the abuser’s mind and how it operates. Most abusers are very charismatic and don’t seem as though they would be abuser so don’t assume anything.

 

QUESTIONS:

Why do you think that the amount of time in each cycle of the abuse becomes more frequent?

Why is the abuser trying to gain power and control over a person?

 

REFERENCES

 

http://www.sascwr.org/files/www/resources_pdfs/abuse/The_cycle_of_violence_in_domestic_abuse.pdf

http://www.googobits.com/articles/2446-inside-the-mind-of-an-abuser-what-you-need-to-know.html

http://www.domesticviolence.org/cycle-of-violence/