Domestic Abuse

When you think about domestic abuse, violence or coercion and control what comes to mind? When you think about the victims or survivors what do you think of? My guess is that you automatically think of a woman being abused by a man. People do not instantly jump to a man being the “victim” or the survivor.

There are so many stereotypes around what men should be. They should be the provider, strong and in charge. They are taught to not cry or show emotion unless that emotion is anger. We seem to be indifferent and don't really question when men are angry or lash out. It is almost as if it is an expectation of them due to gender but if someone female presenting did the same they would be seen as hormonal, emotional or unstable. Boys are brought up from a young age that you do not cry, you have to be tough or you protect others such as siblings, this has such an impact on them as adults not just as individuals but in terms of the types of relationships they get into and behaviour that they accept.

There are so many barriers that mean men do not speak out when they end up in this type of situation. What would people say? Would they be believed? Especially in situations where they are potentially taller, stronger or more knowledgeable such as trained in martial arts. They have been brought up that you do not hit a woman so it seems to get to a stage where they do not even defend themselves any more. They are told that the woman will tell people that they caused the bruises and be believed. We live in a society where women are more likely for their story of events to be believed because there is such a focus on how women should come forward when something bad is happening. We have signs in toilets that remind us what to do if we don't feel safe, who to ask for or where we can get advice from. I would be interested to know if the same can be said for men's toilets. Do they have anything at all in there or is the expectation that they just would not need the support.

During the recent training I attended on this subject there were so many stories shown either from survivors or people who knew someone who did not survive this type of situation. People who were so broken and had nothing left that they felt that they had no other option but to end their life. The signs that we recognise so easily when we notice them towards women being missed because it is not what we expect.

When we hear about someone calling multiple times in a short period when there was not an emergency it is brushed off as the man being whipped, under the thumb or the wife/girlfriend being a nag. If we saw the same the opposite way round it would be seen as controlling or abusive. We see someone being told what to wear as the woman trying to “help” the man dress better or improve himself. We view him seeing his family and friends less or not at all as him being hen pecked or being a wimp, it doesn't necessarily cross people's minds that they are all the signs of abuse. It is the women systematically destroying self esteem, support networks and eventually spirit. It is the fear that we do not see because it is well hidden that is the issue. It is the bravado that is put on when around others because you cannot be seen to be weak. You have to be the strong one and it is easy to excuse behaviour because you do not want to admit that you are in a situation that is damaging or toxic.

I would imagine that men experiencing this would ask themselves a lot of questions internally but be too scared to ask them out loud. What did I do to deserve this? What do I need to change to stop this happening? Is this my fault? Is this normal? How do you establish what is normal if you are too scared to ask others around you for fear of being mocked, taken the mick out of or just not believed. Who do you check in with to find out what you need to do next when you have realised a situation is not safe or okay. Where is the information that you would need to try and leave. This becomes even more difficult if there are children involved because you do not want to stop seeing your children because their mother has told someone that you are abusive or spun the story using bruises that happened in self defence as evidence.

It has such long term effects on people that you can see some of the after effects multiple years, even decades after the experience. Still feeling uncomfortable when a situation is dealt with healthily because it is so unfamiliar. Feeling like things that go wrong in day to day life are their fault somehow and that they deserve to be shouted at or punished for things completely out of their control.