Connection and Disconnection in Abusive Relationships

TOPIC. The way in women's need for connection can lead to destructive relationships in which emotional and physical paralysis is characteristic PURPOSE. To demonstrate how a woman's sense of disconnection that occurs in abusive relationships may be misinterpreted or worse, labeled and stigmatized, by healthcare providers SOURCE. Theories of growth and development that emphasize how a woman's sense of self and value derive from being able to maintain highly empathic affiliations CONCLUSION. The behavioral manifestation of disconnection must be understood so that healthcare providers can provide the most effective care possible Key words: Abusive relationships, disconnection, emphathic affiliations, stigmatizing For women who have been victims of rape, wife rape, wife abuse, and/or childhood sexual abuse, it is now widely acknowledged that the extent of victimization they suffered has been insufficiently recognized in the past. Additionally, trauma produced by such victimization is now understood as more complex and extensive than had been previously understood (Weingourt, 1990). One aspect of the abusive relationship that continues to trouble caregivers, and leads to blaming the victim, is the woman's seeming unwillingness to acknowledge and/or leave the abusive situation. Assuming that a woman's sense of self is organized around being able to sustain highly empathic affiliations, this need for connection sometimes leads women into relationships that are destructive, and can explain the emotional and physical paralysis inherent in a battering relationship. However, women who live with abusive men do not find the "connectedness" they crave. Disconnection doesn't deter them from seeking help, however. A woman's state of disconnection may be misinterpreted by healthcare providers who regard symptoms of depression, alcohol abuse, social withdrawal, reluctance to use social resources, and repeat visits as the main problem. Kurz and Stark (1988) point out how women are stigmatized as "evasive" and "repeaters" by many emergency room medical staff, who blame the victim by believing that she refuses to change her situation and deliberately causes her own problems. Yet, this view comes from the providers' experience of the woman's disconnection. The woman usually senses the stigmatization, which increases her emotional disconnection and paralysis. Relevant Literatures Carol Gilligan (1982) has spent years studying the way in which girls think about social issues and choose to interact with boys. Her research on girls' responses to moral dilemmas suggests that girls are sensitive to the pain, pleasure, and needs of both sides of a conflict. She concluded, too, that many women assume full responsibility for the caring in relationships, often attending to the needs of others at the expense of their own. Women place high value on their ability to care. For women, self-esteem is related to the degree of emotional closeness, shared understanding, and mutual regard they have in their relationship. In Toward a New Psychology of Women (1986), Jean Baker Miller describes characteristics of dominant and subordinate groups in our society. She notes that inequality of power and status among people tends to include the perception that the "inferior" person has less intrinsic worth and value than does the dominant person. The subordinate group is seen as defective or substandard, and all individuals within the group are judged, and judge themselves, accordingly. Women, as members of a group, have been labeled substandard and inferior by dominant groups, men, Miller insists. All subordinate groups share certain characteristics. Individuals in the group are considered well-adjusted, by dominant group standards, if they adopt characteristics of being childlike, passive, weak, and helpless. In addition, individuals in the subordinate group tend to know more about individuals in the dominant group, with whom they associate, than they know about themselves. …