AKA KIDS WHO SIDE WITH THE ABUSER By the time children pull away from their mothers, they’re profoundly wounded. They wouldn’t pull away otherwise. On a deep level they desperately want to be close to her. Those loving feelings may be buried under huge piles of emotional injury, but they’re still there. They distanced themselves…
NOTE: The first 30 pages of In Custody are now free for anyone to read. Go to the book’s website, InCustodyTheNovel.com, and click on “Read Chapters 1-5.” I’ll give the short answer first. I wanted something we could hand to people who don’t get it. I wanted to be able to tell them that…
In Part 1 of this post, I began exploring some of the reasons why kids may side with a man who abuses their mother, especially if he’s their father. We looked in particular at kids’ desperate desire to feel safe – and it feels safer to be on the abuser’s team — and their desire…
Several weeks ago, I wrote a post about kids who see through the abuser. To my surprise, it was the most popular piece I’d put up in a long time; a lot of my readers are trying to see through kids’ eyes. How do young people form their understandings of what is happening when their…
I received a large (and at times agitated) response to my post on the difference between abusive men and narcissists. In the midst of those dialogues I promised to pursue the issues further in a Part 2. In the mean time, I wrote a post explaining my view of narcissists, to help clarify the…
Divorce professionals are fond of saying that children feel “caught in the middle.” But a lot of kids don’t feel that way at all. They see clearly where the abuse is coming from, and they recognize their dad or step-dad’s manipulations. They wish he would stop bullying Mom and stop bullying them. They wish he…
Lately it has become all the rage to refer to all men who abuse women as “narcissists.” In fact the terms “abuser” and “male abuser” seem to be fading away. I generally don’t like to debate about word choices, but this time it matters. The change to using the term “narcissists” is a mistake. Here’s…
It’s time to say the obvious truth straight up. No pretty ribbons, no proving how “reasonable” I am by sugar-coating the harsh reality of what’s actually happening. Here it is: The family court system across the continent has become the moral equivalent of a slave trade. Mothers and children have no rights at…
KEY SIGNS OF A HEALTHY RELATIONSHIP Over the years, many people have said to me, “Lists exist out there of warning signs of an abusive partner – which is good to have – but what are the signs of the opposite? How do I know when I’m in a healthy relationship?” Here are some ideas…
I promised that in the next installment in this series I would address what groups can do, including established domestic violence programs. What I’m writing about in this post is groups that work to provide services for survivors of abuse. (I wrote in the last post about the need for groups that are focused…