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We usually think of giving away our power in terms of active choice, but it actually occurs in the moments we don’t exercise our power

…in the moments we don’t speak up or say something or assert ourselves or are clear and outraged that a boundary has been violated.

One reason Abuse, Interrupted focuses on the interpersonal (micro) and the nation-state (macro) is that the dynamics of power are mirrors of each other.

Victims believe that truth is its own power

…but what that doesn’t recognize is the premise that the truth only has power over people who give truth that power: people who respect truth and how it defines and renders reality.

The truth is powerful to those who don’t seek to control/change reality but accept what is for what it is, to those who value truth in and of itself, who have integrity and honesty with themselves and reality.

Truth, however, is not power.

Truth does not have the capacity for action. Truth has the capacity to inspire action, but that wholly depends on the audience for that truth. Telling the truth to people who don’t want to hear it doesn’t change anything. Telling the truth to people who don’t want to hear it in front of others may change something.

Victims – of abuse, of oppression, of tyranny – believe that if only people knew, if only people understand their experience, that things would change.

Usually this belief is oriented toward the abuser, the dictator, the tyrant; trying to explain to them just exactly why what they are doing is wrong, and please stop, because good or smart or logical people don’t do this, and the victim is extending them the benefit of the doubt.

Victims depend on the laws themselves to have power.
Victims depend on reason and logic itself to have power.
Victims depend on decency and goodness to itself have power.

The attribute their own perspective to the abuser, the dictator, the tyrant, their own set of beliefs. They believe that the abuser, dictator, tyrant has agreed to the social contract instead of recognizing their behavior as inherently violating that construct.

Truth only has power over someone who gives truth that power.

Believing that the truth is self-evident, that someone will change as a result of being told the truth, assumes:

• they value truth and fact independently of their internal paradigm
• that they will adjust their internal model of the world to incorporate truth/fact
• that they will not exercise cognitive distortion to deny, minimize, or distort truth or facts in their own interest

It is to believe that someone will value facts over their own self-interest.

The truth is that people engage in abusive behaviors because it benefits them.

• The intrinsic satisfaction of power and control.
• Getting their way, especially when it matters to them most.
• Someone to take their problems out on.
• Free labor from the victim; leisure and freedom for the abuser.
• Being the center of attention, with priority given to the abuser’s needs.
• Financial control.
• Ensuring that the abuser’s career, education or other goals are prioritized.
• Public status of partner and/or father/mother without the sacrifices.
• The approval of friends and relatives.
• Double standards.

The truth is that victims of abuse often refrain from exercising their power because they are afraid of it.

They are afraid of responsibility, afraid of being like an abuser/dictator/tyrant, and because believe that others will do the right thing if only they know what the right thing is.

They are also afraid of what other people will think. That other people will see them as an abuser/dictator/tyrant, and this fear becomes controlling.

Instead we must recognize that power is simply a tool. Power in and of itself is not inherently abusive.

To believe otherwise, to never exercise your power, is to give your power away.

To refrain from powerful action due to fear of what other people will think is to give your power away.

To do this is to (unjustly!) carry the burden of shame.

There’s a moment in our stories where the hero is about to triumph, explaining the villain’s own villainy to him or her.

And the villain despairs. Or the protagonist explains just how wrong the antagonist is, and the antagonist experiences shame for just how wrong they have been. Sometimes someone even experiences a change of heart because their eyes have been opened by the truth.

We want to believe so much that the truth is self-evident.

So we get a vicarious thrill by watching an eloquent take-down of someone we disagree with, like a Karen. There’s a reason “The West Wing” and videos like “Liberal DESTROYED by Ben Shapiro” are so popular.

But the truth is that this is all fiction.

There is no monologue, no conversation, no instant logicality that gets someone to realize how they have been wrong.

Not ever.

And the reason this is such an important concept to understand is that abuse victims cling to it so hard. So very hard. That they can monologue at an abuser where the abuser will understand the damage they have caused the victim, and feel shame or remorse. That they can have a conversation with the abuser that will make them realize, and then will be forever changed, and abuse the victim no more.

That there is triumph.
That there is victory.
That there is healing.
That there is justice.

There may be those things. But not because of a triumphant monologue. Not because of a conversation.

Because an abuser doesn’t respect the person they are victimizing.

They may ‘love’ the victim, but without respect for them, they cannot respect the victim’s assertions. The fact that what the victim is saying might be true is irrelevant because it is coming from the victim.

There can be no realization without self-awareness.

And if an abuser were self-aware, they wouldn’t be abusing in the first place. Or they would move heaven and earth to protect the vulnerable person or people in their care, while they figure out a way to get help.

There’s a concept in religion that I have been thinking about recently, and that is the idea that you can tell what someone actually believes by their actions.

I think it’s called ‘works follow faith’. Basically, that our actions reveal our beliefs because if we believe or know that a stove top is hot, we won’t touch it and we won’t let our children go near it, until they can also understand that a stove top is hot.

Victims of abuse keep attributing beliefs to abusers that are not borne out by their actions.

And victims of abuse believe that an abuser loves them, or that the abuser is rational, or even shares the same belief system as the victim. But how can they?

Their belief system is that they deserve what they want.

No matter what justification they use, an abuser feels entitled to power over the victim, at the victims expense, for the abuser’s benefit, because they deserve what they want.

And the kicker is that it is far easier to slip into this belief system than anyone understands, because I see victims harming other people and feeling righteous about it.

The person who was stalking me and trying to punish me by going after my boss – I guarantee – feels or felt absolutely entitled to do so and that she was justified. She. runs. a. subreddit. here. on. Reddit. A mental health-oriented one.

I tried once to convince her, and not only did she mock and belittle me, but no one watching the conversation understood that I was desperately trying to get this person to stop.

They just thought it was some ‘drama’. She acted like it was entertainment.

There was no truth. There was no justice. There was no understanding or self-awareness. And it honestly shook me for a very long time. Because this person, who is a mental health professional, is someone I had talked with about abuse concepts, who literally counsels clients and people here on Reddit about unsafe and abusive behaviors. She was absolutely blind to the wrongness of her own actions. Not only that, but she felt entitled and justified.

And I realized that I have not seen ONE explanation from a victim of abuse where they confronted the abuser and the abuser understood and had remorse for their actions.

They might have had remorse, but only because they were experiencing consequences for their behavior. They might have had understanding, but that evaporates the next time there is something they believe they are entitled to.

The problem with abuse isn’t their actions, but their beliefs that lead them to take those actions.

‘Works follow faith’, in a sense. That’s why people quote Maya Angelou all. the. time. When someone shows you who they are, believe it.

Their actions aren’t just showing you who they are, they are showing you what they believe.

I can’t speak absolutely definitively, maybe there is an abuser who was confronted by their actions in a great monologue by the victim and changed, but I haven’t seen it.

The only place that seems to exist is fiction.

Paul glanced at Halleck, took in the defensive positions of his guards, looked at the banker until the man lowered the water flagon. He said: “Once on Caladan, I saw the body of a drowned fisherman recovered. He–“

“Drowned?” It was the stillsuit manufacturer’s daughter.

Paul hesitated, then: “Yes. Immersed in water until dead. Drowned.”

“What an interesting way to die,” she murmered.

Paul’s smile became brittle. He returned his attention to the banker. “The interesting thing about his man was the wounds on his shoulders –made by another fisherman’s claw-boots. This fisherman was one of several in a boat — a craft for traveling on water — that foundered . . . sank beneath the water. Another fisherman helping recover the body said he’d seen marks like this man’s wounds several times. They meant another drowning fisherman had tried to stand on this poor fellow’s shoulders in the attempt to reach up to the surface to reach air.”

–Frank Herbert, “Dune”

The healed and healthy version of my father would not want me to sacrifice myself to his mental health challenges or his mental disorder. He would want me to be happy and healthy. That’s how I feel about my son, and would want for him if it was me.

This is why healing needs to be active and not passive.

It is not a normal breakup. You need to rewire your own brain to trust itself, to validate yourself. Otherwise even in their absence, you will still be beholden to their games.

Over time they degraded your self esteem and worth since the abuser has essentially led you to believe your own thoughts are unreliable.

Your brain has been conditioned to not trust itself, and that leaks into your other relationships, your work and more. That’s why it’s like poison to other areas of your life.

–u/CPTSDcrapper, excerpted and adapted

Healing from disorganized attachment requires a secure relationship with a functional person, otherwise the insecurely attached person is often trapped in the cycle of needs and attachment, particularly when trying to ‘attach’ to an object or process. Additionally, attempting to attach to a non-functional person with insecure attachment style can lead to abuse, existential pain, and co-dependency. Failing to attach, even insecurely, can lead to depression, self-abuse, and existential pain.

And sometimes it’s not depression, or not just depression, but shame.

There are drawbacks in attempting to heal via attaching to a secure person.

• Research shows that an anxious or avoidant who enters a long-term relationship with a secure, can be “raised up” to the level of the secure over an extended period of time. Unfortunately, an anxious or avoidant is also capable of “bringing down” a secure to their level of insecurity if they’re not careful. Also, extreme negative life events, such a divorce, death of child, serious accident, etc., can cause a secure attachment type to fall into a more insecure attachment type. – Mark Manson, citing Why does attachment style change? (study)

• Relational Healing in Complex PTSD discusses “earned secure attachment” via a secure relationship with a therapist. (This article is therapist-oriented, and discusses how therapists can fail their patients by not providing a secure attachment for the patient.)

It is important to note that starting a secure relationship with a functional person is healing. Even starting a ‘secure’ relationship with an animal, and experiencing unconditional love through that relationship, can contribute to that healing. It will be traumatizing, however, if the relationship with the animal triggers abusive behavior on the part of the insecurely attached. While a pet can provide unconditional love, they cannot meet any other needs for the human, and require that the human meet their needs, much in the way a child does.

Sometime people have children will the subconscious motivation of creating a secure relationships for themselves, then find that their needs – as with animals – are not met by the child, and may lash out at the child for not providing what the parent believes they need/are entitled to.

Healing from insecure attachment requires three ‘secure’ relationships: therapeutic, with another, and WITH THE SELF

When I finally came to the realization that (1) my parents didn’t meet my needs, (2) it is not reasonable to expect others to meet your needs in the way a parent should, that I realized that I would have to meet my own needs.

People with traumatic experiences often look to others to become their everything, then their world falls apart when the friendship or romance falls apart. It took me a long time to realize that people who grew up in a functional, healthy home environment don’t expect others to meet all of their emotional needs and don’t expect those people to be perfect. People who grew up in functional, healthy home environments had parents, and those children were able to move through each stage of development.

This occurs in different ways throughout the life of the child. The foundation for everything, however, is love, compassion, and trust.

One way to parent yourself is to work through Erikson’s Stages of Development

• Trust. Develop the ability to trust yourself the way you should have been able to trust your parents as a baby. Practice self-care, and meet your needs…for food, for sleep, for gentle touch.
• Autonomy. Work on verbalizing and exercising your will; it’s okay to take control of your experience and environment. Honor your word, and also don’t commit to things you will find a way not to do. How can you create your world so it better sees you in it.
• Initiative. Don’t be afraid to take action. As Ms. Frizzle would say, “Take chances! Make mistakes! Get messy!” and support yourself no matter the outcome. People are so quick to take responsibility for every negative, appropriately or not, but shy away from taking credit for the positive.
• Competence. Develop competence, and thereby confidence in yourself and in your skills/abilities.
• Identity. Explore who you are in and of yourself, away from friends, family, co-workers. What do you think? How do you feel? What are your interests? Allow yourself to become yourself. Grow stronger in your self-identity. Who are you? Strip away context and relationships, and see where you are driven. What can you not not do? What do you do no matter what? What does that say about your values?
• Intimacy. Learn to love yourself and others healthfully, with appropriate boundaries and expectations.
• Purpose. Find something that gives your life meaning to you.
• Ego integrity. Be content in who you are, how you have grown, and what you have done.

Parenting yourself is treating yourself the way you should have been treated as a child.

With understanding, with appropriate expectations, with love first, with calm and support. With the knowledge that who and what you are is enough. Parents know that a child is not a robot, a child is a person who sometimes has bad days like anyone else. Parents know that mistakes are not mistakes because they are the trying part of the learning process. Parents know that being able to do something once doesn’t mean you can do it every time thereafter, and on command. Parents understand that a child grows into having their own boundaries, and that this is important and healthy and function.

Parents let their child be…and become.

Your children are not your children.
They are the sons and daughters of Life’s longing for itself.
They come through you but not from you,
And though they are with you yet they belong not to you.
You may give them your love but not your thoughts,
For they have their own thoughts.
You may house their bodies but not their souls,
For their souls dwell in the house of tomorrow,
which you cannot visit, not even in your dreams.
You may strive to be like them,
but seek not to make them like you.
For life goes not backward nor tarries with yesterday.

-Excerpted from “The Prophet” by Kahlil Gibran

The most important part of re-parenting yourself is to realize that your internal monologue, your self talk, may not be your voice.

Children, particularly in the toddler years, internalize their parent’s voice and, not only is it incorporated into their ‘inner voice’, but it is also the foundation for their core beliefs.

Once you realize that your internal voice has been programmed, that it may not be telling you the truth, and that it is a part of the abuse cycle, you can step back from abusing yourself with it.

The importance of a therapeutic relationship

Many people attempt to transform their friendships into therapeutic relationships, which may or may not have some level of success. (It was not successful for me, and backfired either by pushing them away or by inviting non-optimal behavior toward me.)

What worked for me was a combination of building a therapeutic relationship with myself via metacognition, reading and researching on abuse and healing, as well as writing about my experience and in general. I also gained a lot of self-compassion through working on a crisis line and have become a fervent advocate for crisis lines.

The importance of a compassionate, non-judgmental listener in healing cannot be understated.

Who exhibits attentive, compassionate non-judgment?

Mister Rogers. Bob Ross.

They are my touchstones for caring relationships founded on respect and unconditional love. I recommend finding something in your own life that represents this for you, that you can connect with.

The important message to take away is that there is such thing as “earned secure attachment.”

People with disorganized attachment can heal by making sense of their story and forming a coherent narrative. Writing a coherent narrative helps people understand how their childhood experiences are still affecting them in their lives today. Through this process, they can find healthier ways to deal with unresolved trauma and loss by facing and feeling the full pain of their experiences. Hiding from their past or trying to bury their emotions doesn’t work, as painful feelings will be triggered in moments of stress.

Getting help to resolve early trauma can come in many forms. Most important is to form a healthy relationship that exists over time with a romantic partner, a friend or a therapist, which allows a person to develop trust and resolve his or her issues with attachment. This can help a person to break the cycle often perpetuated by the formation of a disorganized attachment. (source)

Healing is not a straightforward, linear process; and, while it can be facilitated, it cannot be forced. To do so creates additional harm to the victim, invalidates their experience, and prioritizes someone else’s expectations over the victim’s needs. It is abusive.

I’ve, in turn, conceptualized healing as a spectrum – a victim organically moving from one end to the other, the stages overlapping; as a hierarchy of needs; as stages of development – each step is the foundation for the next, the next cannot be completed without the prior; as ripples from a rock thrown in a pond; but I think the more accurate metaphor is a puzzle.

You can start a puzzle from any piece, but certain puzzle pieces – corner and edge pieces – help frame the puzzle, help put it in perspective, provides the space needed. Each piece links to certain other pieces which link to each other. You might discover that one piece was similar, close, to the piece needed, but doesn’t fit in context of the larger puzzle. Solving a puzzle is adaptive.

Here are the pieces of the healing puzzle, in roughly chronological order:

• harm ends
• harm acknowledged by victim
• harm acknowledged by others (validation)
• victim receives support
• processes experience
• learns about and from experience
• accepts the reality of their experience
• letting go
• forgives (optional as fuck, if a victim decides to maintain a relationship or the memory of that relationship)

Certain pieces will not build on each other – e.g. attempting to ‘let go’ while still being harmed, receiving ‘support’ from family/friends when your experience hasn’t been validated by them, et cetera – and it will be clear because the result will be pain and anguish, not resolution or completeness.

That’s jamming two puzzle pieces together that do not belong.

It is also important to remember that, unlike a physical puzzle, the internal is not fixed. Being and becoming are evolving processes; learning is not static, and learning often takes practice. We also might learn the fundamental, but practice mastery. We might learn to see the lesson in different forms. We might learn the lesson as our future self with future concerns and future stresses.

Or, as u/GreenLizardHands emphasized, a victim may ‘relapse’ or go back to the beginning, and that is normal, expected, and human nature.

While watching this video on the impacts of climate change, this point on systems jumped out at me:

One piece of evidence comes from a 2023 paper that looked at temperature fluctuations in the Atlantic. The idea is that if the AMOC gets closer to collapsing, deviations from average get more extreme and they show correlations between each other. This is a general behaviour of systems near a critical point which has also been observed, for example, in stock markets close to a crash, or in Bose einstein condensates near the critical temperature, and so on.

and Sabine Hossenfelder made me realize something about abusive relationship dynamics: this systems theory applies to abuse dynamics.

An abuse dynamic reaches ‘near a critical point’ as it oscillates more between relationship extremes.

So while victims of abuse are looking at abuse/violence as an aberration – as something atypical to the relationship – the increasing abuse/violence is a “deviation from the average” that gets more extreme as the relationship reaches the point where it no longer practically functions as a relationship at all.

When someone is being abused, they often see each violent incident as an unusual event – something that’s “not normal” for their relationship.

And they might justify or overlook the bad because of the good. But in reality, these violent outbursts are getting worse and more extreme as the relationship moves closer to failing as an actual relationship. But the good may seem to increase in extremes at first…however, the honeymoon part of the abuse cycle eventually disappears.

The escalating abuse shows the relationship (the system) is intrinsically unstable.

Just as with a ‘system’ collapse, a relationship collapse due to abuse is marked by increasing intensity, with events happening closer and closer together.

And the 7 signs/patterns of abusive thinking are intrinsically de-stabilizing to a relationship:

1. their feelings (‘needs’/wants) always take priority
2. they feel that being right is more important than anything else
3. they justify their (problematic/abusive) actions because ‘they’re right’
4. image management (controlling the narrative and how others see them) because of how they acted in ‘being right’
5. trying to control/change your thoughts/feelings/beliefs/actions
6. antagonistic relational paradigm (it’s them v. you, you v. them, them v. others, others v. them – even if you don’t know about it until they are angry)
7. inability see anything from someone else’s perspective (they don’t have to agree, but they should still be able to understand their perspective) this means they don’t have a model of other people as fully realized human beings

Abusers always end up destabilizing relationships through their abuse, because their abuse turns their partner into a puppet, and therefore no relationship can exist.

For a relationship to exist, two people have to be in relation to each other. The abuser erases the other – slowly at first – escalating as the dynamic is more entrenched, the victim more trapped, and the abuser has more emotional blackmail against the victim.

Abuse destroys the very possibility of what it claims to be: a relationship.

When one person erases the humanity of another through escalating abuse and emotional blackmail, they’re not creating a relationship – they’re creating a hostage situation.

And so the relationship ‘system’ has escalating ‘deviations from the average’ that become more extreme as the abuser escalates in their abuse.

And the honeymoon phase of the cycle completely disappears.

It has to be self-sustaining:

• it can’t sacrifice or eat its own to maintain it, but it can convince its own to sacrifice and be eaten;
• it can sacrifice or eat others outside the system as long as the system never becomes dependent on doing so, for then it is no longer self-sustaining;
• it can’t been seen or known to violate its social contract

A “functional” system is, essentially, a system that serves itself wholly, or a system that is seen to do so. If the system only serves part, it will eventually cede governing the whole system. And a system that doesn’t govern entirely is a failure.

From what I’ve seen, a primary source of pain, anguish, and anger occurs when what the system does is not the same as what the system says it does or says it is or is purported to do.

Lies, gaslighting, and other cognitive manipulations are efforts to disconnect and redirect someone’s assessment of reality from reality.