Although inevitably in my vision of abuse appears the image of the abused woman , since socially there is more talk of abuse towards women (its incidence is undeniably greater) than towards men, I am a woman and, moreover, due to both my life and professional career, I tend to heel, to get excited and resonate with it.

And although there are many, too many, women who are subjected to their partners, I want to talk about the situation of psychological abuse per se, as I understand it as a type of relationship that can affect both men and women. I am referring to a couple’s relationship with a marked inequality of power and subjugation in treatment.

Living through psychological abuse

What makes a person decide (because it is still a decision) to place himself in a type of relationship like this, in which the other is on a higher plane, possesses the supreme truth, pulls the strings of “my” personal reality? What experiences have I had to go through in order to accept a humiliating treatment as something normal, to accept that it intimidates me, that it objectifies me, that it degrades me, that it overloads me with responsibilities, that it deprives me in my social and family relationships, that it subjectively distorts reality? that it is only worth “his” vision of the facts, creating in “me” constant confusion and doubt, pointing to me as the source of the conflicts…, to accept even the possibility of death as an alternative or natural and sometimes even attractive resolution to the reality that “I am” living?

Because the truth is that there is a moment in the life trajectory of this type of relationship in which the subdued party feels, intuits and knows that if the other party “loses his head” he can end his life and, depending on the moment in which he finds himself, he can interpret it and live it with total naturalness, even to a certain extent, due to the poetic peace that this image evokes… until he is aware that this is not what he wants to live , that he does not maintain a relationship of respect and love, that there are limits that should not be crossed and that he does not have to die for it.

The paradox is that when he gathers forces to withdraw and denounce, in many cases his life is really in danger.

Victim and offender

As I mentioned earlier, in my experience I have found that those who seek submissive relationships have generally experienced situations of abuse and mistreatment in childhood, mostly by members of their own family or by people very close to them.

But the same goes for those who end up becoming abusers. We find that both persons have their roots in a childhood marked by abuse in any of its manifestations and intensities, but that the basic personality of each one makes the outcome and development practically opposite. They are the two sides of the same coin, of the same problem, of the same reality, resolved in opposite ways.

Guilt goes the other way

In the case of the submissive person, she feels in the deepest part of her being an extreme need to please and to please the other , to feel accepted, to feel loved, to feel taken care of, to feel worthy, to feel a person, to feel complete. To this end, she even disappears as an individual, her tastes become those of the other, her inclinations, preferences and reasoning are those of the other, as is her feeling and her interpretation of reality, it is dependence in its maximum degree; however, if she cannot assume them, then the submissive is silenced, silenced, reserved, set aside… with the objective, precisely, of not generating conflict, so as not to feel rejected, or judged, or criticized, or vilified, or attacked, or degraded.

He cannot defend himself, he cannot justify his disagreement, he has no tools or discourse to do so . His heart is shattered, his whole being is submerged in suffering, in a silent cry, in a heartbreaking and mute roar… because he cannot even express it openly, he eats it, swallows it, longing to disappear, often longing to die. During all the time, the long and eternal period in which the “supreme being” decides not to speak to him, not to touch him, not to look at him, not to hear him… keeping himself in his distant and cold sphere like an ice floe, with his airs of “wounded wolf”, of “suffering victim”, of “abandoned child”…. until, after a few days, and after the constant, meticulous, maternal and complacent care of the submissive, he decides that the damage has been repaired, coming back to him in a magnanimous gesture of forgiveness, indulgence and apparent compassion.

This scene is maintained until after a certain time another event occurs that forces him to repeat this gesture, due to his little tolerance to frustration, to his mental rigidity, to his need for control, to his narcissism, to his extreme insecurity… manifested from a position of authentic victim as an incapacity of the other to understand him, for putting him in the position of having to react in this way, for feeling “forced” to be so categorical, so distant, so empty, so mean… breaking up their partner again and again, eroding their self-esteem, disintegrating their soul, destroying their person, annihilating any hint of joy, authenticity, independence, self-confidence, humanity.

A circle that is repeated repeatedly until a spark emerges, takes hold and grows inside the submissive, allowing him to take a step aside to begin to walk another path, to live another reality, to choose another present and to glimpse another future.

Bibliographic references:

  • Vicente, J.C., “Manipuladores cotidianos: manual de supervivencia”. Desclée de Brouwer, 2006.
  • Leonore E.A. Walker, “Battered Woman Syndrome,” Brouwer’s Declee, 2012.