Appl Psychoanal Studies - 2020 - Brandt - A Psychoanalytic Perspective On Victims of Domestic Violence and Coercive Control

DOI: 10.1002/aps.
1671
RESEARCH ARTICLE
A psychoanalytic perspective on victims

of domestic violence and coercive control
Stephanie Brandt MD1,2 | Marie Rudden1,3
1
Assistant Clinical Professor in Psychiatry,
Weill Cornell School of Medicine, New York,
Abstract
New York Based on long clinical and forensic experience in the assess-
2
Supervising Child and Adolescent Analyst, ment and treatment of victims of domestic violence, the
New York Psychoanalytic Institute, New York,
authors discuss some predisposing psychological factors that
New York
3 can lead to a woman's vulnerability to forming and
Training and Supervising Analyst, Berkshire
Psychoanalytic Institute, Stockbridge, maintaining an attachment to an abusive partner. Clinical
Massachusetts vignettes to illustrate some kinds of observed vulnerabilities
Correspondence along with the authors' ideas as to their origins are presented.
Stephanie Brandt, 1235 Park Avenue Suite The authors argue that these women present with some com-
1B, New York, NY 10128, USA.
mon but hidden difficulties that may go unrecognized even in
Email: sab2009@med.cornell.edu
a psychoanalytic setting. This is, in part, because of our pro-
fession's lack of familiarity with the nature of domestic vio-
lence. A more nuanced understanding of the phenomenon of
domestic violence is obscured by two crucial factors: first,
there is an initial clinical focus on the reality of significant
external obstacles to terminating these often intense bonds –
even in the face of foreseeable danger to the victim and chil-
dren; second, and perhaps more limiting, are psychoanalyti-
cally based assumptions about “characterological masochism”
that often reflect simplistic, moralistic, misogynistic assump-
tions about women that continue to inform psychoanalytic
theory in the area of family life. In addition, the authors dis-
cuss some of the interactions contained within the perpetra-
tor/victim relationship that reflect and reinforce the internal
liabilities observed in this group of victims.
KEYWORDS
domestic violence, coercive control, trauma, revictimization,

female psychology
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216 BRANDT AND RUDDEN
1 | I N T RO DU CT I O N
Domestic violence is a chronic pattern of control and intimidation that develops in the context of an intimate
relationship. This dynamic in a relationship is created and maintained through multiple vehicles of control across many
areas of the victim's personal life including physical abuse, sexual abuse, emotional abuse, psychological abuse, medical
neglect, financial manipulation, legal manipulation, social isolation, threats to a child of the relationship, and threats to
deploy others in service of the abuser's goals. Several of these vehicles for coercion and control can easily go
unrecognized in the public sphere but are readily identifiable by professionals, especially by those of us who work in an
intensive confidential setting. Evidence of these often very personal details frequently reveal a kind of power dynamic
that reflects domestic violence. The recognition of this hierarchy in a dyadic or family context has a crucial impact on
how we understand and help these often highly traumatized, at-risk women and their children. Abuse involves behavior
that largely occurs in private, or when public, is likely to be unrecognized by family or friends. It is a fundamental, well-
documented fact that domestic violence is not measured by the amount or quality of physical abuse. This is a common
misunderstanding among clinicians. Physical violence may or may not be present. The nature and purpose of this rela-
tionship dynamic is to literally control the liberty of the victim in multiple spheres of functioning. This can occur in myr-
iad ways. Since 2007, as formulated by Stark, in his seminal book, Coercive Control: How Men Entrap Women in Personal
Life, most professionals who work in this interdisciplinary area now refer to domestic violence as “coercive control.”
This is a phrase that highlights the purpose of the interpersonal dynamic, not the presence of violence per
se. Domestic violence occurs within any and all classes and ethnic groups (Black et al., 2011; Mailis, 2019;
Ritchie, 1996; Ritchie, 2000; Ritchie, 2012; Smith, Fowler, & Niolon, 2014; Buzawa et al., 2017; Snyder, 2019;
Weitzman, 2000). It must be made clear that this is a gendered form of oppression (Stark, 2007). Although complicated
by other intersectional factors, this pattern remains true across cultures. In non-heterosexual relationships, the roles
remain defined by various pseudo-gendered stereotypes (Bogat, Garcia, & Levendosky, 2013).
Often, women who are abused function quite effectively in public and at work, including as parents in the home.
Many victims manage this despite what can seem like an impossible, almost contradictory level of behavior, given
the degradation and abuse that is simultaneously directed at them by their domestic partner. This apparent incongru-
ity can lead to a clinician doubting what she is hearing and therefore doubting the level of abuse. Thus, it is quite
essential to understand that these women live in a hostage-like situation to which they have adapted. The effect of
the discrepancy between their public and private lives is often poorly understood and can result in a confused
(or worse, actively judgmental) clinician, unless the complex dynamics of domestic violence are known and recog-
nized. The psychological effects on both the victim and her children include among other things, the inevitable pres-
ence of complex post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD), as well as many other diagnosable disorders which, if not put
in context, can result in, therapeutic mismanagement (Herman, 1992; Herman, 1993; Walker, 1979).
Domestic abuse evolves over time. There are well-known “cycles”, but a gradual escalation of the abuser's con-
trol inevitably occurs. In what can be a remarkably strategic manner, the perpetrator cuts off the victim's escape
routes. For example, he may control the couple's finances, limit the time the victim spends with her friends and fam-
ily, issue various public and private threats, and effectively coerce her via manipulation and threats towards the chil-
dren. Especially malign is the threat to a primary parent of loss of custody.
2 | EPIDEMIOLOGY
We use the nouns “he” and “she” because epidemiologically, in 90% of reported cases, abusers are male (Black
et al., 2011). Fifty thousand women were killed world-wide in 2017 by a domestic partner, spouse, or family member
(Smith et al., 2014).
Domestic violence is the third leading cause of homelessness in the United States (Fransham, 2018). In a study
by Stark and Flitcraft (1996), it was noted that one third of suicide attempts in women occur in this context. In
BRANDT AND RUDDEN 217
addition, substance use is a common means of managing the emotional distress, fear, and traumatic states that are
part of a victim's response. Fischel-Wolovick describes the myths about abused women that are often believed when alle-
gations of domestic abuse are raised in divorce litigation (Fischel-Wolovick, 2018). The abuser often counters this with
claims that the victim is causing “parental alienation” of the children. This occurs regularly despite the lack of any scientific
legitimacy to this theory which has been repeatedly debunked as “junk science”. In family court, this can result in a mother
losing custody for no credible reason, despite the children's attachment to her as the primary caretaker.
Finally, 54% of mass killings in the United States directly involved domestic violence, with a perpetrator killing family
members before the mass murder (the Sandy Hook murderer), or an earlier history of spousal abuse is revealed. For exam-
ple, the Orlando Pulse killer had previously strangled his wife, though not murdered her (Gold, 2020). Many mass mur-
derers have been exposed to domestic violence, often severe, within their families of origin. For example, Dylan Roof, of
the Charleston, South Carolina church killings, had witnessed extreme and frequent domestic violence at home.
3 | IMPACT
Adults who have been subjected to domestic violence suffer from PTSD, depression, panic states, substance abuse,
somatization, dissociative disorders, and suicidality. Children who have witnessed abuse or been the object of assault
in their homes suffer from separation anxiety, attachment difficulties, aggression, emotional detachment, delays in
development (Lieberman & McIntosh, 2011; Tronick, 2020), as well as externalizing and internalizing psychopathol-
ogy as adults. These studies include but are not limited to the fields of public health (Felitti & Anda, 1998); basic neu-
roscience (Teicher & Samson, 2016); basic developmental research (Tronick, 2020); and of course, the study of
trauma in adults and children (Van Der Kolk, 2015). The effects are long term, highly predictable, and include both
psychological and physical disability (Herzog & Schmahl, 2018). A non-psychoanalytic service provider in a domestic
violence context literature on the response to domestic violence considers this large body of research to be basic
fundamental knowledge essential in crafting a professional response to these cases.
The impact on children can be mediated to some extent by “protective mothering” even in such a hostile envi-
ronment. This is a concept that is only recently being studied (Buchanan, 2018). Unfortunately, until recently, there
has been an assumption that victims were usually impaired as caregivers. Other protective relationships and commu-
nity support, especially within the child's neighborhood and in the schools, also have a positive effect. But none are
as effective as removing the perpetrator.
Unfortunately, domestic violence thrives in cultures in which weapons are widely available (Campbell et al., 2003). The
presence of guns in the home adds to the victim's realistic sense of threat and can be used to increase her sense of
helplessness and her fear. In atomistic cultures that value privacy over frequent cooperative interaction, domestic violence
easily remains unseen and undiscovered. Finally, in families accustomed to maintaining secrets or to avoiding intimacy, the
victim of abuse is especially prone to hide what is happening to her at home. This tendency is exacerbated by the abuser's
insistence on separating his victim from others and by the abused woman's family accepting this arrangement.
4 | PREDISPOSING FACTORS
As professionals, it is extremely important not to ignore a context of coercive control or to mischaracterize a victim with a
simple diagnosis, who remains in an abusive situation. She may well live in a situation that is often realistically quite danger-
ous. In this setting, the custody of her children may be threatened, and her options for just leaving are often slim, given her
abuser's multipronged means of control. She often suffers from PTSD and depression and may be uncertain about her
own sense of reality, given her abuser's relentless attack on her sense of self-worth and her perceptions. This is commonly
referred to as “gaslighting.” However, distinct from the question of the many reasons, why she might remain in a dangerous
and denigrating situation is the exceedingly difficult, potentially controversial, question of her original susceptibility to
beginning and accepting a relationship with a man who turns out to be an abuser. At times, this happens despite some
warning signs easily visible to others. We attempt to explain some aspects of this kind of vulnerability.
We know that victimizers are known to target women whom they sense they can control to get their own needs
met. They are disinclined to invest in relationships with women who stress their own points of view, who do not
guiltily accept blame when there is a disagreement, and who offer nurturing only when this is reciprocated. Although
there is no “DSM diagnostic category” into which these men fall, the intensity of their narcissism is not debatable.
In their powerful essay on the motivations and myths surrounding sexually violent men, that is, marital rapists, in
the context of coercive control, Eastel and mc Ormand-Plummer (2017: p. 33–43) list the following purposes:
(a) domination of the woman, (b) anger and retaliation, (c) insecurity in relation to women, (d) sadistic sexual pleasure,
(e) a preference for coercive unwanted sex despite the availability of the woman, and (f) entitlement to this form of
sexual satisfaction. Although the first three may seem obvious and characterize all aspects of coercive control, it is
the last three that we wish to emphasize. When clinicians fail to acknowledge these factors, they tend to hold to a
dangerous assumption that these men are simply “out of control” or have “anger management issues”
(Fonagy, 1999). Parkinson (2017: p. 44–54) details the results of semi-structured interviews with 24 women victims
of diverse background, which included questions about marital rape: the most important finding was that the
women's abusers (except for one), refused to define their own behavior as rape. The author found this minimization
to have been actually condoned and endorsed by various professionals who were made aware of it. Such a disturbing
finding underscores the significant need for educating clinicians about domestic violence in all its forms.
In his groundbreaking book Why Does He Do That? Inside the Minds of Angry and Controlling Men Bancroft, a
counselor of over 2000 abusive men describes the profiles of distinct types of abusers. His contributions are quite
fundamental in this area and make it clear how strategic and intentional the approach to a vulnerable woman can
be. He begins with the plea that we understand that the women involved are painfully aware that their partners
are men who also may have demonstrated some quite admirable traits which co-exist with their coerciveness. He
emphasizes the dilemma this poses for the victims and for those clinicians who find the tenacity of their relation-
ships bewildering. He states: “One of the obstacles to recognizing chronic mistreatment in relationships is that
most abusive men simply do not seem like abusers. They have many good qualities, including times of kindness,
warmth, and humor, especially in the initial period of a relationship. An abuser's friends may think the world of
him. He may have a successful work life and have no problems with drugs or alcohol. He may simply not fit any-
one's image of a cruel or intimidating person. So, when a woman feels her relationship spinning out of control, it is
unlikely to occur to her that her partner is an abuser” (Bancroft, 2002 p. 57). Based on his work, Bancroft's defines
ten basic profiles of the abuser's motivations and characteristic strategies. He notes varying degrees of entitlement,
a ready sense of victimization, grandiosity, the use of subtle but devastating gaslighting, and psychological degra-
dation. He highlights the initial approaches made by these men and describes their ultimate appeal to an unwitting
but receptive female partner. He also describes in detail the more specific kinds of entrapment that occur as the relation-
ship evolves. In an important caution to therapists, Bancroft writes, “neutrality” actually serves the interest of the perpetra-
tor much more than those of the victim and so it is not “neutral”… to him it means that you see the couple's problems as
partly her fault and partly his fault, which means it is not abuse …. In reality, to remain neutral is to collude with an abusive
man, even if that is not your goal” (Bancroft, 2002: p. 707). In other words, ideas regarding ‘“bidirectionality”, or, put more
simply, the commonly heard explanation ‘it takes two to tango’ has no place in this context.
With this summary of what we know about the nature of abusive men, its clear that women can be targeted in different
ways, depending on the particular approach of the abuser and on the woman's particular vulnerability. Domestic violence is
no accident, nor is it an isolated “anger management” problem. It is a common strategy used against vulnerable women.
As mentioned earlier, much of the psychoanalytic reference to domestic abuse has been flawed due to a lack of
understanding of its cultural context, manifestations, and consequences. The early psychoanalytic literature particu-
larly contains multiple references to “female masochism” as a causal explanation for tolerating abuse. This involves a
tragic logical fallacy common in psychoanalytic theorizing: “Posthoc ergo propter hoc,” or mistaking correlation with
causality (Brenner, 1959; Cooper, 1988; Freud, 1916; Freud, 1924; Grossman, 1986).
This major error continues to be perpetuated even now. The authors have often noticed in supervisions that
many psychodynamically oriented clinicians continue to attribute an active – if unconscious – enjoyment on the vic-
tim's part to being degraded, as well as a wish/desire on her part to be passively submissive.
Happily, in 1979, Lenore Walker in her book, The Battered Woman, described the syndrome that results from being
abused and thereby began a movement to better understand this phenomenon. Judith Herman, a psychoanalyst herself,
authored the influential book Trauma and Recovery in 1992, which recognized that women subject to the particular hostage
situation, that is, domestic violence, often respond with traumatic syndromes that can be incapacitating and limit their ability
to escape. These authors focus largely on the impact of domestic violence and not on the predisposing factors we will address
here. The question of susceptibility understandably became somewhat off limits, as it was assumed to reflect the sexist atti-
tude that had previously dominated psychological theory. In addition, this question was seen as a way to obscure legitimate
inquiry into the often devastating realities which make it difficult for women to leave these relationships. These obstacles
have been repeatedly clarified by authors and practitioners in other disciplines such as sociology, feminist theory, and law. In
psychology, and to a lesser extent in psychoanalytic theory, the focus thus far has been largely on trauma theory and on
PTSD (Van der Kolk, 2015) in abused women and children, but not on the psychological factors that can lead to a woman's
initially accepting or being targeted for this kind of relationship.
A few psychoanalysts have addressed the far-reaching internal effects of maltreatment, deprivation, and abuse. The
most comprehensive is Leonard Shengold's work, in his book Soul Murder (Shengold, 1989). Other mental health professionals
have addressed the important question of the frequency of “revictimization” in adult survivors of childhood abuse
(Arata, 2002; Cloitre & Rosenberg, 2006; Fortier et al., 2009; Walker, Freud, Ellis, Fraine, & Wilson, 2019; Widom, Czaja, &
Dutton, 2008; Jaffee et al., 2019). It is by now clear that chronic PTSD, the inevitable result of long-term abuse and neglect
creates a kind of blindness to the initial warning signs presented by abusers. Some credit “trauma repetition” as a cause of the
vulnerability to repeated abuse. In 1981, Dutton and Painter (1981) originally described what they called “trauma bonding”
the currently accepted term for the intense and tenacious bond between abusers and victims. The authors acknowledge that
this concept, though important, is more descriptive than explanatory.
More recently, Freyd and Birrell (2013) have coined the term “betrayal trauma”, a useful concept that can explain
the difficulties one faces as a child or as an adult in recognizing that a loved one is abusive. Freyd has also formulated
a useful acronym “DARVO” to describe an abuser's typical response to confrontation reflecting this common sequen-
tial response - denial, attack, reversal of victim and oppressor (Harsey et al., 2017). For a victim, preserving the rela-
tionship can feel like a matter of psychological life and death and thus fuels a denial of the pattern and dangers
inherent in domestic violence. Abby Stein, in her remarkable book Cupid's Knife details her interviews with battered
women and focuses on the inhibition of aggression that curtails these women's self-protective responses
(Stein, 2013). Other analytic authors such as Goldner, Metz, and Covington have also contributed to the literature on
various forms of treatment and their limitations (Covington, 2017; Goldner, 2004; Metz, Calmet, & Thevenot, 2018).
In our view, the most important psychoanalytic contribution to our understanding of an abused victim's responses is
Frenkel's paper on a specific form of identification with the aggressor (Frankel, 2004). In this paper, he advances Anna
Freud's early work to include a victim's identification with the abuser's vision of her, not as a separate person, but as a vic-
tim. We know that it is adaptive, even a matter of safety, to have honed the ability to recognize and react to signals of
impending abuse. A victim maintains a vigilant attunement to variations in her abuser's mental state. Through such a
mechanism, she has learned to consciously appease and mollify and sometimes preempt an attack. But what is so central
to Frenkel's theses is that she also unconsciously identifies with the abuser's vision of her by sometimes developing a per-
sonality structure beyond situation specific symptoms characterized by submissiveness and palpable fear. In one author's
experience, this state of identification with the abuser's wishes formed into three separate dissociative states mobilized
for self-protection. They had names, such as “Mouse”, “Robot”, and “Gone”. In other words, identification with the aggres-
sor is not only a reversible or transient trauma symptom but can be a more basic feature of developing personality. In fact,
permanent character change secondary to massive traumatization can occur even in adults who have been held in captiv-
ity. Both at a conscious and unconscious level, a victim can accepts what is projected into her in the form of an organized
identification – an identification which her victimizer's abuser desires. This is the opposite of an identification with the
aggressor himself. It also illustrates the powerful effect of projective identification systems within the dyad. These self-
perpetuating cycles of projection and identification are the subject of other authors' work, especially in couple treatments
(Goldner, 2004). Thus, the woman acts the part assigned to her by the abuser as a form of adaptation to provide some
measure of security in a near-hostage setting. What is so important about this idea is that this is a largely unconscious
process. Nonetheless, it is one that may be quite apparent in the treatment of many abused women. For many women,
this defense mechanism was adopted within an abusive childhood setting and is easily redeployed in the current adult
relationship. This is a much more advanced concept than simple identification and includes the permanent circuitry of
projective identification that is so pervasive in these relationships.
Other authors who work directly with domestic violence victims do so largely from the perspective of trauma and
attachment theory. Their individual papers are contained in a special 2017 volume of the Journal of Trauma & Dissociation.
Although their focus is on severe dissociative identity disorder as a consequence of abuse and maltreatment, their obser-
vations about the etiology and risk factors involved for women in abusive relationships, a common occurrence in this pop-
ulation, is worth noting. In introducing this volume, Middleton, Sachs, and Dorahy (2017: p.4) remind us of their purpose.
“Recent history has seen an important (if insufficient) openness of society to recognizing multiple
forms of trauma, as well as progression of human rights and the related issues of gender, sexual, racial,
and religious/ethnic equality. The manner in which the relationship between abusers and their victims
maintains silence and acquiescence is the central reason for many grievous crimes never being
reported. And even where they are reported, the victim's attachment to their perpetrator is such that
police and child protection authorities are frequently stymied in their actions. Indeed, they may ratio-
nalize nonintervention on the basis that such victims are uncooperative, somehow active participants,
of such low value, as to not merit active assistance – in effect a powerless underclass”.
These authors' purpose is similar to Stark's call to recognize the complexity of these situations, though their
attention is toward an internal process.
Krüger and Fletcher (2017) in a well-designed study of 116 women, via self-reported questionnaire found that there
is a strong correlation between emotional neglect (i.e. NO overt physical or sexual abuse) by biological parents with an
involvement, later in life, in an overtly abusive relationship. There has been little research on the difference in childhood
adaptation to neglect and deprivation versus the child’s response to the various forms of overt i.e. concretely visible
abuse. Prior studies tended to conflate these kinds of childhood adversities, in part, because various forms of abuse and
neglect tend to evolve in the same families over time. In addition, studying these different forms of maltreatment, in ret-
rospect, as is necessary, poses complex research design problems.
Kluft (2017) describes a response to early trauma that he calls “weaponized sex” as an adaptation to an abusive
home. Experiencing an early environment of abuse/neglect may lead some victims to use sexuality as tool of inter-
personal mastery. This is turning passive to active not be a simple repetition of trauma. Kluft recognizes that “what
therapists see as revictimization and severe dysfunction is sometimes seen (by) traumatized individuals (to be) secu-
rity, strength, and reassurance in the power of their sexual behaviors”.
Dorahy (2017) makes the important observation that the experience of shame, so common in abuse victims, may
be an extremely complicated defensive compromise formation. According to this author, the victim's intense shame
may defend against her dissociated/disowned awareness of her abuser's malignant behavior. Through shame, the vic-
tim punishes herself for the rage she might wish to direct at her abuser, while protecting him from an aggressive attack,
that might undermine his emotional stability and even endanger the woman. Thus, as Dorahy writes “in shame, the self
is the failure and others may reject or be critical of this exposed, flawed self” (2017: p.143). But, this kind of defensive
adaptation involves a significant distortion in the victim's sense of reality and can limit her appreciation of danger and
the futility of her situation. It can compromise the victim's ability to conceive of leaving the relationship.
Also relevant to this discussion is Sach's paper (2017) in which she outlines categories of childhood relational trauma
that correlate with discrete types of attachment difficulties in adulthood. In the first group, she described women who
remain tied to their original objects. For this group, “a sense of safety and closeness (i.e., what may feel like what may feel
like “secure” attachment) can only be reached through highly abusive engagement; anything else is experienced as superfi-
cial, cold, or irrelevant” (2017: p85). This paradoxical assumption that only malignant attachment provides security may
therefore preclude accepting anything but transactional superficial help from any service provider or clinician. These are
women who have never separated from their primary objects at all and cannot usually experience safety or attunement in
the context of a therapeutic relationship. Although not among the cases described here, these are a group victims well
known to domestic violence advocates. Sachs further describes a second group, more like the cases we describe, of
women, who have detached from their primary objects and were able to accept some non-parental early positive attach-
ments that were not destructive. This often occurs via a teacher or other person in loco parentis. These women can have
areas of attachment and interpersonal functioning that allow for more constructive attachments. Nonetheless, “the victim
may maintain a life of self-harm, vulnerability to grooming, involvement in crime, or choosing abusive partners. These
unconscious (or dissociative) choices demonstrate that the woman, when distressed, still strives to engage their attachment
figure through being hurt” by them (Sachs, 2017: p. 91). Her point is that despite their overt presentation, these are still
women at risk (2017: p.90). In her last group, Sachs makes the key point, that is, there is more than one developmental tra-
jectory that can lead to an adult openness to an abusive man. Not all victims have a shockingly traumatic experience of
overt and obvious parental abuse or other traumatic history. Trauma theory tends to encourage that kind of assumption in
clinicians and patients look for specific identifiable events that would then we can dynamically tie to regressive defenses.
I.e. triggers. Sach’s point is important for clinicians, as she makes the key essential point that we are also making. We want
to emphasize that the childhood of adult abuse victims may not be characterized by overt abuse, but rather by an emo-
tionally (or literally) absent or deficient parent. These are homes characterized by depressed, absent or inadequate parents
who for a variety of reasons may not be able to keep the child “in mind”. In this group, the attachment behavior is based
on a developing child's fantasy attachment to the inadequate parent. The attachment can often be based on a well-recog-
nized pattern of identification with realistic or fantasied depressive, suicidal, and self-destructive parental behavior that
becomes a more persistent identification. However, in adulthood, the need to psychologically “keep” the inadequate parent
can easily take the form of accepting a seriously limited partner. This can fulfill the need to share in misery and provide
endless opportunity to “fix” that partner. What Sach's work demonstrates, at an unusually basic and internal level is that
there are many pathways that can lead to the acceptance of an abusive partner.
Lastly, Liotta (Liotta, 2017) presents an interesting view of the development of disorganized attachment, a concept
that is often invoked as a risk factor for abusive behavior and/or victimization. Research on disorganization of infant
attachment provides evidence that it can be caused not only by violent aggression or very early sexual abuse but also by
covert maltreating behavior, which includes the abdication of the caregiver's responsibility to soothe the infant's distress.
This is what is so beautifully captured in Tronick's “Still Face” studies (Tronick, 2020). Liotta's paper argues that both overtly
abusive caregivers and merely “abdicating” caregivers may cause disorganization of infant attachment through a simulta-
neous activation of the motivational systems governing attachment versus those that govern basic survival defenses in the
infant. The effect of what we might then call “conflicting motivational systems” is illustrated in our cases.
This summary of recent contributions to the literature on domestic violence victims now leads us to a discussion
of three cases. We will provide our own formulations incorporating these recent advances as well as utilizing concepts
that were originally applied to a wider range of women who manifest self-destructive and self-denying behavior.
5 | CLINICAL VIGNETTES
5.1 | Case #1
Ms. A was emotionally and physically abused by her mother and physically abused by her older brother during her
childhood. Her father, frightened by his wife's violent outbursts, did not protect her from mother's or brother's physi-
cal violence and appeared defensively disconnected from what was happening in their home.
When she began her treatment, Ms. A described her brother's violence toward her, but was now extremely sym-
pathetic toward him, trying hard to change his life for the better because “He was a victim in our home too”. She
clearly felt obliged to be the person who could “fix her family”.
About a year into the treatment, she confided that her husband sometimes pushed or hit her, controlled their
finances, denigrated her attempts at education as “too expensive”, and frequently demeaned her by likening her to
her mother, whom he termed “vicious and crazy”. He blamed her for their sexual difficulties, although she learned
later that he had had sexual problems with a previous partner. He would spend money lavishly on himself but
begrudge her almost any purchase. Ms. A would rebel against his control but later feel guilty about her anger. Fur-
ther, she felt that it was her obligation to “fix him, too”. In fact, Ms. A had learned at her mother and brother's knees
how to anticipate their rage and condemnation and how to deny and squelch her own experience to mollify them.
Over the course of her treatment, Ms. A gradually became aware of the extent of her husband's projections and
projective identification toward her. His mother had been narcissistically absorbed and very demanding. Mr. A attrib-
uted these traits to his wife, while denying them in his mother. He was threatened by his wife's increasing autonomy
and diminished guilt through therapy and at the same time, demeaned her and refused to help when she felt most
vulnerable.
Fortunately, Ms. A began to realize how little she asked for herself, how guilty she was about any aggression on
her part, and how she could begin to simply refuse to accept his projections. She no longer felt obliged to “cure him”
and began to experience more objectivity in the ways in which she perceived him and herself. She became less guilty
about her sexuality, realizing how much she had squelched in herself out of fear of her mother's wrath and envy. Fur-
ther, she became aware that she had been searching for a man more powerful than her father, someone who would
protect her, but in fact, had chosen someone who was similarly self-absorbed.
As the treatment neared its end, Ms. A began to identify the traumatic repetitions from the past to which she
had consigned herself in her marriage. Further, she became able to identify her fear of her own internalized malevo-
lent “objects,” which bore aspects of her mother's and brother's actual aggressive rages but also carried nightmarish
elaborations of them. Unconsciously, any inclination on her part to access her own aggression would cause her to
switch into a humiliated stance out of fear of her own aggression and of triggering her husband's. Finally, she realized
how her family of origin had emphasized secrecy and realized that she no longer had to keep her abuse silent.
5.2 | Case #2
Ms. J was a professional in an extremely competitive male-dominated field. Her middle-class upbringing was charac-
terized by a profound lack of parental protectiveness, despite her reports of repeated episodes of terrifying verbal
threats and near assault by family, friends or neighbors. She was treated as if she were invulnerable, without emo-
tional or even physical needs, and told that she could “take it” and should just “ignore it,” because she was “better
than them”. She was the appointed caretaker of her siblings and became terrified of displeasing her mother by failing
at this task. Despite Ms. J’s tending to the younger children a role largely assumed by the family, there was a persis-
tent family myth in which her mother was seen as more feminine and self-sacrificing than her daughter. The bewil-
dering message of her parents' actual neglect, while they praised her for being invulnerable and needing little,
resulted in a profound tendency on her part to adopt the role of invulnerable caretaker as the only means available
to feeling safe and loved. She buried her awareness that there was something “wrong,” keeping her sense of the real-
ity of the situation, both consciously and unconsciously, to herself.
Ms. J came into analytic treatment prompted by her recognition that she could not leave her abusive husband
despite few external obstacles. She was the breadwinner and at least intellectually was well aware of being exploited
and quite viciously abused by her husband's tirades and his manipulation of the children to rage against her. She was
aware that she was behaving like a “little elephant” who could not leave the circus even though it had been clear for a
long time that there was no longer “a chain around his legs keeping him there”. She could not explain her reluctance
except as follows. Whenever her husband or her children berated her, she would default to a state where she felt
responsible for “fixing their problem”, which meant that she was on-call for any demand from them, however, frivolous.
She would lose all perspective on the irrationality of her sense of obligation while in that self-state and would then
become so depleted emotionally and physically from managing their demands that her exhaustion alone made it diffi-
cult for her to act on her own behalf. Gradually she could eventually view herself as regularly entering this highly
scripted, altered state triggered by the aggressive complaints from her family about her “lack of caring” and by their
unreasonable demands. In her work life, it was not at all visible how unable she was at mobilizing self-protective
agency. But she was often in a state of “confusion” when called upon to manage the bewildering home situation, in
which she was the object of considerable aggression. Nonetheless, in her career, her sense of responsibility and ability
to manage others and take charge, even when others could not, was an ability that was easily available to her.
Gradually, Ms. J became aware of the devastating effect of her history of neglect that hid behind her idealization
of her parents, especially her mother. She became aware that she was in fact as vulnerable as anyone. She gave up
her need to protect the family's myth about her role as an invulnerable caretaker. She began to recognize the past
and current blatant exploitation of her considerable strengths. She was able to tolerate her anger and not confuse
her need to assert and protect herself with forbidden aggression. As her marriage was an obvious repetition of the
same kind of exploitation and neglect, covered by idealization of her tremendous abilities, she eventually was able to
extricate herself and her children from a dangerous level of domestic violence.
5.3 | Case # 3
Dr. K was raised in a middle-class family that valued ambition and success but only in the men in the family. Although
there was no history of overt abuse, she was treated as if mentally deficient and relegated to be her mother's secret
caretaker. Her ability to handle her mother's serious mental illness was the source of tremendous praise by her father
which she both craved and resented. It was only when she attempted to give up this role that her father would
undermine and humiliate her. It was clear that both parents' attitude toward her included the idea that she was not
the “feminine type”. The mother was viewed as the loving, brilliant, and beautiful homemaker who had sacrificed her-
self for her husband and children. This fantasy about the mother was encouraged by the entire family though it was
transparently untrue. Dr. K. was told that she could be a dental hygienist if she worked hard. This was stated, despite
her excellent academic performance and eventual enrollment in an Ivy league college.
Dr. K. entered psychoanalysis with a traditionally trained analyst after a period of psychotherapy with a motherly
woman who had been a source of considerable support. Despite that support, however, she had married a man dur-
ing her therapy who both neglected and exploited her as his caretaker. She was expected to support his career and
diminish her own, a transparent repetition of her childhood. Dr. K. had decided that analysis might help her to under-
stand why she had been drawn to, and continued in, such a relationship. In the analysis, however, she was told
repeatedly that her husband's neglect and eventual overt abuse was her fault, that she asked for too much, enjoyed
provoking him, and that it was simply untrue that she was being victimized. Interpretations focused on her “masoch-
istic enjoyment” of experiencing herself as a victim. This analytic gaslighting went on for years, despite the eventual
marked overt deterioration of her spouse's mental state.
Eventually, Dr. K ended her analysis and consulted with another analyst about her situation. The second analyst
did not question her sense of reality but fairly quickly interpreted (rather than reenacted) her historical, oedipally based
need to accept her father's denial of her “femininity” (meaning that aspect that was ceded to the mother) and her obvi-
ous intellectual gifts in order to maintain her relationship with her parents. That need kept her in a marriage in which
her strengths and attractiveness were actively denigrated and her sense of reality repeatedly questioned. The new ana-
lyst also helped Dr. K. see that her father's overt denial of her gifts had co-existed with subtly expressed indications
that they were also highly attractive to him but that their appeal could never be overtly expressed. Such an acknowl-
edgment would undermine the carefully maintained myth of her mother's brilliance and beauty. Dr. K had registered
these subtle expressions but felt immensely guilty about them, fearing that her mother's fragile mental state would be
sacrificed had her own gifts been recognized. This unconscious wish to please the father, and oedipal guilt (as if in some
sense she was a victor) had also mightily contributed to her remaining in a frustrating and degrading situation, rather
than leaving to seek a partner who could enjoy her mind, her personality, and her sexual appeal overtly.
With these insights, Dr. K began the process of extracting herself from her marriage.
6 | DISCUSSION
The authors offer the following observations about some central clinical features and underlying dynamics illustrated
by these cases. One caveat: we want to be clear about the limited scope of our observations. We do not claim that
these formulations pertain to women who may have 1. External challenges that prevent ordinary self-protective agency
2. Women whose race, gender or sexual preference or identity, socioeconomic background, or culture differ from our
cases. These are women who were raised and live in a white upper middle-class American context of relative privilege.
6.1 | Identification with the aggressor
It has become customary to refer to some abused women as having a “traumatic bond” with their abusers (Dutton &
Painter, 1981). They remain attached to an abuser despite great suffering and often accompanying guilt and shame. And in
some cases, like those described above, there is no obvious external obstacle, such as a major safety issue, economic, or
immigration threats, nor a fear of loss of custody. So, we ask – what does trauma bonding really mean? We believe that
Frenkel (Frankel, 2004) gets to the heart of this best by proposing a defensive underlying identification with the abuser's
projected and demanded view of his victim as a need fulfilling object. To survive what may be a life-threatening situation,
it is much more comfortable to know and accept your role and not displease your “captor.” This is a process that goes on
unconsciously. It is an adaptation that frequently develops in patients who were physically abused and/or neglected in
childhood. The woman's own need for a quasi-magical sense of control within the relationship may look superficially like
appeasement. But it develops as a way of feeling secure and safe. That means that this pervasive identification with being
a victim may also serve underlying and unconscious ideas about the basically malicious nature of attachment between peo-
ple. This kind of “identification with the aggressor” can be transient, but it can also be an early adaptation that encom-
passes many aspects of emerging ego functioning in response to abuse/deprivation in early attachment relationships. Of
course, identification with the aggressor's “assigned” identity may be imposed on a child and can also be enhanced and
supported by intrafamily role assignments. But, the underlying assumptions regarding rigid hierarchies in intimate relation-
ships can appear in adult relationships where this pattern is repeated with a consciously chosen partner.
The women we describe were found to come from families that assigned them a particular, often confusing and
very limiting role while ignoring the reality of who they actually were. This seemed to occur in order to stabilize the
rest of the family's functioning, as in each case, one of the parents was highly fragile emotionally. In Case #1, the
mother seemed grandiose, sociopathic, and disturbed. In Case #2, the role of caretaker for her siblings permitted
some security and also became a major source of self-esteem. The double message of being valued only in terms of
her worth to other members of the family was very prominent for Ms. J. For her, the expression of anger, doubt, and
ambition was only permitted on behalf of others. It is noteworthy that Ms. J recalled consciously burying the part of
her awareness that was in conflict with both parents' view of her actual person. For Dr. K, her parents' undermining
of her intelligence lead to her apparent lack of ambition, agency, and basic pride in her abilities. Her own significant
intellectual endowment, vastly underestimated by her parents, remained unknown to her. Nonetheless without giv-
ing herself credit, in reality, she functioned at a remarkably high level, reflecting the contradictory, split, and partially
disowned identifications that can evolve to manage such a split in parental attitude. She could function admirably
but could not recognize this as her own accomplishment.
It can be quite obvious that in these cases and many others like them, there is a “repetition of trauma”. There is
an apparently conscious choice of a partner who is initially seen to be the opposite of an undesirable aspect of a
“weak” (or unprotective) father; but this man may turn out to be emotionally similar in his self-absorption. That part-
ner may also share features of a controlling and abusive mother. This kind of formulation has its basis in both Freud-
ian theories about the “repetition compulsion”, as well as in more modern ideas about the triggering of traumatic
flashbacks to familiar early disorganizing affect states, that is, traumatic states. It is the basis of much of the literature
on “revictimization” that we cited above. That is, to say we seek out what we knew before. As we see in these cases,
sometimes, this “disruptive affect trigger” can manifest as an abrupt change of “self-state” (or what some might call
dissociation). Therefore, in the presence of the therapist, there is clarity about abuse, but once returning to the abu-
sive environment, there is a shift back to the other state that allows more easily for victimization. The conscious
experience is that what is learned seems forgotten. We have found that it is quite possible for a patient to become
aware of this change, back and forth over time. As it becomes ego dystonic, it then can be open to analytic inquiry.
However, without that insight, in the presence of an abuser, it is almost inevitable that this shift in state will recur.
Thus, whatever insight may occur in the office may be lost for quite some time once back at home. This can be
intensely frustrating to clinicians who easily see the resilience and adaptive capacity of these women but do not rec-
ognize that the abuse victim is not simply employing submission as a conscious strategy nor is this only an isolated
self-state along the lines of a traumatic repetition, like a flashback. We must understand that to have a lasting effect
on this internal dynamic, this deep-seated kind of identification feels psychologically essential to these women. To
have a lasting impact on this very basic aspect of attachment style (or identification) requires more than reduction of
trauma symptoms and dissociation. It should prompt a recommendation for an analytic treatment.
6.2 | Conflicts around sexuality and aggression
Each of the cases reflect a well-established denial or inhibition of sexuality in their intimate relationships. The pur-
pose of the relationship is to nurture, and it is the man's sexual needs that seem important to satisfy. Although
these are not asexual women, this is a part of their mental life that has not had priority, in much the way that overt
aggression had also been disallowed. This kind of self-denial can easily result in a sexual servitude once an abusive
coercive context is established. Some women even actively seek out sexually aggressive men, in what is a mani-
festly counterphobic attitude as if to say. “I can take it, and I know how to handle him, and that makes me a real
woman”. Kluft's paper on weaponized sex as an adaptation to an abusive/neglectful childhood is of note in this
context. Dorahy, too, explains the defensive and thus resistant purpose of shame within the context of abusive
relationships.
6.3 | Shame, secrecy, and reality testing
In all three cases, the revelation of the abusive relationship comes out gradually. It does not tend to be the reason
for the initial referral though, in retrospect, it usually is. Many analysts tend to think that most women hide the
details of their abuse or of the extent of their husband's control out of a need to deny, even to themselves, the full
nature of their home life, and at one level, this is of course true. We note, however, that the secrecy and shame
involved are not only a matter of being able to recognize the patterns of coercive control. The experience of shame
that can lead to unnecessary secrecy in a therapeutic context has a deeper purpose. As described by Dorahy (2017),
it can be viewed as a compromise formation – a defense against feeling helpless rage toward the abuser and a way
to ward off the humiliation of defeat and rejection. In addition, shame serves as an obstacle to a mature sense of
reality regarding the nature and sometime danger inherent in this setting. One author has treated a woman who was
the victim of incest, as well as betrayal by multiple authorities throughout her childhood who did not believe that
sexual abuse was occurring. Thus, it was enabled for years. After many years of quite successful treatment, she will
still need to ask, at specific junctures in therapy, “But didn't I ask for it? Wasn't I a perverted child?”
6.4 | Some specific oedipal dynamics
In all three patients described, we note a marked disidentification with a mother who is obeyed, even idealized, but
also secretly considered inferior. At the same time, a childhood longing for a satisfying, joyful relationship with the
father, while avoiding overt competition with a frightening or highly frustrating mother, can result in a special oedipal
compromise or unconscious pact. This has developed not only as a solution to the drama of pre-oedipal female sepa-
ration/individiatuion, but is also a means of gratifying an oedipal wish for the father. Indeed, competitive strivings
towards the mother are effectively avoided. But in all these cases, there is a special kind of oedipal pact to forfeit
“so-called feminine desires” that are staked out as only the mother's territory.
In these cases, it is the domain of “domestic life” that is reserved for the mother and denied to the female child.
This includes desires for a protective spouse, a reciprocal kind of sexuality, and, of course, a partner in child rearing.
In such a compromise, the woman forfeits her passive “domestically oriented” desires, already staked out within the
family as clearly and only the mother's territory. She may instead work hard to please and remain attached to her
father in ways that she discerns will appeal to him, but ordinary passive wishes directed at a man are forbidden. This
kind of oedipal sacrifice may not be obvious until family life is prioritized. As a generalization, it is the ordinary
dependency wishes toward a man in an intimate relationship that are sacrificed as a solution and gratification of the
oedipal conflicts of these women. These are women who function well and who may appear unremarkable as a mat-
ter of stereotypical gendered presentation. This is only a partial forfeiting of “so-called feminine” passive wishes. But
in private life, in intimate relationships, their own wishes for dependency and passive pleasures are foresworn. This
kind of discrepancy in self-regard is usually invisible to the outside world, much like the difference between the pri-
vate and public behavior abusers. In these cases, especially in Case #3, we can see that it is this need to comply with
the father's (and mother's) oedipally based denial of the daughter's more passive desires that pushes these women to
seek the kind of men who will also neglect their basic dependency wishes.
6.5 | Omnipotent responsibility
Lastly, we wish to describe a feature that is prominent in all these cases and present in many abuse victims. That is,
the need to be a caretaker, a “fixer” of their own spouses. We surmise that this need to care for others, no matter
the cost to oneself, is easily detectable and appealing to some abusers. It can be the basis of what we see in some
women who seem drawn like flies to powerful men who demand their attention in authoritarian and exploitative
forms. They may believe at first that they have “won,” claimed his power and strength for their own, and will finally
be cared for, while an onlooker might see that the opposite will happen – or worse. Such women fundamentally need
to repair their partners to care for themselves. This kind of adaptation is described by Wurmser in many of his papers
on sadomasochistic states (Wurmser, 2003a, 2003b, 2007, 2013, 2015).
The essential point here is that as a defensive and pervasive adaptation to an intolerable childhood, often
characterized by neglect and abuse, the child develops not only a defensive sense of “omnipotence” but also a near
delusional belief in their own “omnipotent responsibility”. They feel accountable for everything that happens in
their world. This is not felt as grandiosity as much as a Sisyphean burden that can never end. The effort to cope
with such a huge burden is then covered with a superficial attitude of guilt and shame when one cannot “get” that
parent or eventual partner to be “better.” The more superficial and conscious level of “shame,” that is felt so
deeply, is understood as a reaction, a superego assessment of the failure to meet the standards of “omnipotent
responsibility”.
Wurmser ascribes this early response to trauma or neglect as a central organizing fantasy that is ultimately a
highly deforming development in emerging personality. Paradoxically, the adult becomes a woman who must suffer
for others to feel safe from her own aggression and self-loathing. The vulnerability to accepting a partner who tor-
tures her externalizes this internal dynamic into a formidably tenacious attachment. This kind of internal organizing
fantasy can underlie what we call masochistic behavior, that is, the tendency toward self-denial, self-destructive
behavior, and the need to live a life of suffering.
Wurmser's concepts follow upon and are consonant with the work of the Novicks' on sadomasochistic
development in childhood (Novick, 2008; Novick & Novick, 1991, 1996, 2001). In their writing, they distinguish
between two kinds of “omnipotence”. Best known is that of the baby who will give up his/her grandiosity during the
oedipal phase as an adaptation to basic reality. They distinguish this from a different developmental line in which an
omnipotent fantasy develops in response to an abusive/neglectful home that would otherwise impose states of near
continuous traumatic disorganization on these vulnerable children. The Novicks note that one way of stabilizing such a
disorganizing attachment is for the child to create a magical fantasy of omnipotence. These are children whom we may
see in childhood as having emerging narcissistic characters. They may seem impervious to their repeated self-imposed
failures. Wurmser takes this dynamic one step further by adding the fantasy of “omnipotent responsibility”
(Wurmser, 2003a, 2003b, 2013, 2015). In adults, this leads not to narcissistic grandiosity but rather the opposite – a
persistent state of suffering, born of being unable to mend the broken parent, or later in life, the broken spouse. He
explains this as “the archaic superego in its absoluteness has to serve as primitive affect regulation” (Wurmser, 2003a.
p. 226) to defend against a persistent state of helplessness. It is an effective defense, but at immense cost. The massive
self-condemnation that results is very easily turned from within to without (as in the choice of a partner) and above all
produces self-blame. Wurmser evokes an image of a woman navigating an “abyss” where the threat on one side is mas-
sive shame for being less than omnipotent, versus, massive guilt regarding the intensity of aggression that is bound up
and hidden this way. In our cases, the role of the self-tormentor is externalized onto the sadistic abuser whom these
women must heal. All the above cases involve, at some level of intensity, a need not only to nurture but also a need to
repair the abusive partner – no matter the cost.
As Wurmser and many other authors who work with abuse victims state, persistent change requires more than
the relief of traumatic states and their repetition. The concept of “omnipotent responsibility” is Wursmer's way of
saying this but without relying on attachment theory. He relies instead on an understanding of primitive superego
functioning that is deployed as an early adaptive protective force in the setting of child deprivation to prevent trau-
matic collapse. Wurmser explains that “in severely traumatized patients, a deep sense of shame, of feeling humiliated,
excluded, and expelled and that of worthlessness, play a leading role … but this not just external humiliation, it is a
response to what he calls “soul-blindness” (Wurmser, 2003b:p. 310), that is, the objectification and dehumanization
of a child not seen by a parent – which we call neglect”. The inner world of such children, and later as adults, is so full
of overwhelming and dysregulating affect that it is completely intolerable and unacceptable. That state must be
denied via massive countermeasures of shame, guilt and the need to externalize this internal conflict. Thus, every
kind of overexcitement and overstimulation leads to a collapse into “mortifying disappointment”. Therefore, all plea-
sure must be avoided (Wurmser, 2003b: p. 311). Or in the words of his own book title Nothing Good Is Allowed to
Stand (2013). It is easy to see how a relationship with an abuser can satisfy and perpetuate this system via externali-
zation. Thus, “omnipotent responsibility” is an integral and organizing part of the sadomasochistic need to suffer.
Thus, in some cases of women living in abusive settings, no matter what a clinician may offer, this kind of object tie,
with a person who causes suffering, may win out.
7 | C O N CL U S I O N
In this paper, we have reviewed the interdisciplinary literature on domestic violence and coercive control. We have
familiarized the reader with these concepts, with a focus on acquainting psychoanalytic practitioners with this
dynamic. As with patterns that reflect external, interpersonal, and systemic dynamics, our field has been late to the
game in incorporating this knowledge into theory and practice. The reasons for this reflect the history of psy-
choanalysis but also the pervasive impact of misogyny in our culture. Recognizing “coercive control” in plain
sight can challenge our most basic ideas about intimate relationships. Blindness to the gendered and dangerous
nature of domestic violence therefore perpetuates a willingness to minimize and even ignore the fundamental
assault on the most basic liberties and rights of female personhood. Given that domestic violence is at epidemic
levels, and especially so in the people who seek our help, it is long overdue that we correct this deficit in our
theory and our training.
Although, coercive control is not a concept one finds in the psychoanalytic literature, there are authors we have
cited whose contributions provide important insight into the susceptibility of some women, such as our patients,
who are vulnerable to being entrapped.
Frenkel's understanding of identification with the aggressor is an essential formulation we can use to
understand the adhesiveness and “characterological” basis of some women’s susceptibility to the seductive
approach of an abusive man. His concept extends past trauma theory or attachment theory to provide more of an
understanding of the need for self-denial, self-doubt, and lack of agency that is the basic ego ideal frequently seen
in this population.
Leon Wurmser's contributions to our understanding of sadomasochistic traits, and the need to avoid plea-
sure, and turn instead to pain, are nothing short of revolutionary. They are not based on “old school” misogynis-
tic notions of female sexuality or of feminity, but rather reflect his extraordinarily compassionate, almost heroic
willingness to engage with some of the most difficult cases we see. His understanding of the effects of abuse
and of neglect and the need to develop a specific magical fantasy of “omnipotent responsibility” that in effect
perpetuates and invites abuse is an extremely important internal dynamic one must recognize when working
with abused women like our patients. We must really understand that this Sisyphean torment, externalized into
the abusive relationship, is nothing short of what feels like safety or ultimate moral obligation for these
women.
As Bancroft states, it is quite common for clinicians who work in this area to express frustration and anger at
these women when they will not leave their abusers. At times, clinicians can take this out on these women. In fact, it
is almost inevitable to feel impatient, frustrated, and helpless, much like these women do. Having some supervision
at these times is highly recommended as the regressive pull toward enactments with traumatized women, who will
not rescue themselves, can be extremely hard to resist.
That said, Bancroft notes that it is a mistake to measure the success of a treatment on whether that woman
leaves, as that is our agenda and may not be realistically possible. As he puts it, a better measure is how well we
have respected that woman's right to run her life and (thereby) increase her physical and psychological safety
(Bancroft, 2002: p. 908).
From the experience of many clinicians in this area, sometimes one must simply observe and suffer with the
patient until there is movement toward the light. In the experience of most of us, this evolution towards agency and
the ability to extricate oneself from abuse tends to occur more easily on behalf of a child. It is not yet understood
why or how it is possible for victimized woman so lacking in self-worth, so entrapped herself can suddenly find the
means to mobilize and escape when her child's life may be in danger. It is a question worthy of study. Why can an
abused woman act with fierce protectiveness on behalf of a child, but not herself?
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How to cite this article: Brandt S, Rudden M. A psychoanalytic perspective on victims of domestic violence
and coercive control. Int J Appl Psychoanal Studies. 2020;17:215–231. https://doi.org/10.1002/aps.1671

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DOI: 10.1002/aps.

A psychoanalytic perspective on victims

Stephanie Brandt MD1,2 | Marie Rudden1,3

domestic violence, coercive control, trauma, revictimization,

6.1 | Identification with the aggressor

6.2 | Conflicts around sexuality and aggression

6.3 | Shame, secrecy, and reality testing

6.4 | Some specific oedipal dynamics

6.5 | Omnipotent responsibility

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