Why Does He Do That?: Inside the Minds of Angry and Controlling Men (17 page)

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He does favors for you that you don’t want or puts on such a show of generosity that it makes you uncomfortable.

These can be signs of a man who is attempting to create a sense of indebtedness. My client Alan, for example, spent much of his first two years with Tory helping her brother fix his car, helping her sister paint her new apartment, and transporting her father to medical appointments. When Tory’s family started to become upset about how Alan was treating her, Alan was able to convince her that her relatives had taken advantage of him and were now turning against him unfairly. He said, “Now that they don’t need my help anymore they want to get me out of the way so they can have you to themselves.” Alan succeeded in getting Tory to feel sorry for him, thereby driving a wedge between her and her family that endured for years until she saw through Alan’s manipulation.

A man named Robert combined these first two warning signs: He told Lana that his ex-wife had falsely accused him of violence in order to keep him from seeing his boys. He said, “If a woman tells the family court that she wants the father’s visits to be supervised, they give it to her automatically.” Lana’s heart naturally went out to him. But two things happened that made her uneasy. First, Robert called after a snowstorm and offered to shovel her driveway. She said, “Oh, please don’t,” because she wasn’t sure how serious she felt about him and didn’t want to lead him on. When she got off the train from work that afternoon, she found her driveway completely cleared. Second, Lana happened by coincidence to have a female friend who was divorcing an abuser, and she learned from her friend that the family court required extensive evidence of violence in order to consider imposing supervised visitation on the father. She found herself wondering what Robert’s ex-wife might have to say.

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He is controlling.

At first it can be exciting to be with a man who takes charge. Here’s a typical story from the partner of one of my clients:

Control usually begins in subtle ways, far from anything you would call abuse. He drops comments about your clothes or your looks (too sexy or not sexy enough); is a little negative about your family or one of your good friends; starts to pressure you to spend more time with him or to quit your job or to get a better job that pays more; starts to give too much advice about how you should manage your own life and shows a hint of impatience when you resist his recommendations; or begins to act bothered that you don’t share all of his opinions about politics, personal relationships, music, or other tastes.

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He is possessive.

Jealous behavior is one of the surest signs that abuse is down the road. Possessiveness masquerades as love. A man may say: “I’m sorry I got so bent out of shape about you talking to your ex-boyfriend, but I’ve never been so crazy about a woman before. I just can’t stand thinking of you with another man.” He may call five times a day keeping track of what you are doing all the time or insist on spending every evening with you. His feelings for you probably
are
powerful, but that’s not why he wants constant contact; he is keeping tabs on you, essentially establishing that you are his domain. Depending on what kind of friends he has, he also may be trying to impress them with how well he has you under his thumb. All of these behaviors are about
ownership,
not love.

Jealous
feelings
are not the same as behaviors. A man with some insecurities may naturally feel anxious about your associations with other men, especially ex-partners, and might want some reassurance. But if he indicates that he expects you to give up your freedom to accommodate his jealousy, control is creeping up. Your social life shouldn’t have to change because of his insecurities.

A man’s jealousy can be flattering. It feels great that he is wildly in love with you, that he wants you so badly. But a man can be crazy about you without being jealous. Possessiveness shows that he doesn’t love you as an independent human being but rather as a guarded treasure. After a while, you will feel suffocated by his constant vigilance.

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Nothing is ever his fault.

He blames something or someone for anything that goes wrong. As time goes by, the target of his blame increasingly becomes you. This style of man also tends to make promises that he doesn’t keep, coming up with a steady stream of excuses for disappointing you or behaving irresponsibly, and perhaps taking serious economic advantage of you in the process.

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He is self-centered.

In the first few months of a relationship, the abuser’s self-centeredness is not always apparent, but there are symptoms you can watch for. Notice whether he does a lot more than his share of the talking, listens poorly when you speak, and chronically shifts the topic of conversation back to himself. Self-centeredness is a personality characteristic that is highly resistant to change, as it has deep roots in either profound entitlement (in abusers) or to severe early emotional injuries (in nonabusers), or both (in narcissistic abusers).

•
He abuses drugs or alcohol.

Be especially careful if he pressures you to participate in substance use with him. Although substances do not cause partner abuse, they often go hand in hand. He may try to hook you into believing that you can help him get clean and sober; substance abusers are often “just about” to quit.

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He pressures you for sex.

This warning sign is always important, but even more so for teenagers and young adult men. Not respecting your wishes or feelings regarding sex speaks of exploitativeness, which in turn goes with abuse. It also is a sign of seeing women as sex objects rather than human beings. If he says you need to have sex with him to prove that you truly love and care for him, give him his walking papers.

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He gets serious too quickly about the relationship.

Because so many men are commitment-phobic, a woman can feel relieved to find a partner who isn’t afraid to talk about marriage and family. But watch out if he jumps too soon into planning your future together without taking enough time to get to know you and grow close, because it can mean that he’s trying to wrap you up tightly into a package that he can own. Take steps to slow things down a little. If he won’t respect your wishes in this regard, there is probably trouble ahead.

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He intimidates you when he’s angry.

Intimidation, even if it appears unintentional, is a sign that emotional abuse is on the way—or has already begun—and is a warning flag that physical violence may eventually follow. Any of the following behaviors should put you on alert:

• He gets too close to you when he’s angry, puts a finger in your face, pokes you, pushes you, blocks your way, or restrains you.
  
• He tells you that he is “just trying to make you listen.”
  
• He raises a fist, towers over you, shouts you down, or behaves in any other way that makes you flinch or feel afraid.
  
• He makes vaguely threatening comments, such as, “You don’t want to see me mad” or “You don’t know who you’re messing with.”
  
• He drives recklessly or speeds up when he’s angry.
  
• He punches walls or kicks doors.
  
• He throws things around, even if they don’t hit you.
  

The more deeply involved you become with an intimidating man, the more difficult it will be to get out of the relationship. Unfortunately, many women believe just the opposite: They think,
Well, he does scare me a little sometimes, but I’ll wait and see if it gets worse, and I’ll leave him if it does.
But getting away from someone who has become frightening is much more complicated than most people realize, and it gets harder with each day that passes. Don’t wait around to see.

He has double standards.

Beware of the man who has a different set of rules for his behavior than for yours. Double standards are an important aspect of life with an abuser, as we will see in Chapter 6.

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He has negative attitudes toward women.

A man may claim early in a relationship that he views you in a light different from that in which he sees women in general, but the distinction won’t last. If you are a woman, why be involved with someone who sees women as inferior, stupid, conniving, or only good for sex? He isn’t going to forget for long that you’re a woman.

Stereotyped beliefs about women’s sex roles also contribute to the risk of abuse. His conviction that women should take care of the home, or that a man’s career is more important than a woman’s, can become a serious problem, because he may punish you when you start refusing to live in his box. Women sometimes find it challenging to meet men who
don’t
have restrictive beliefs about women’s roles, particularly within certain cultural or national groups, but the effort to meet such men is an important one.

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He treats you differently around other people.

Adult abusers tend to put on a show of treating their partners like gold when anyone is watching, reserving most of their abuse for times when no one else will see. In teenage abusers the opposite is often true. He may be rude and cold with her in front of other people to impress his friends with how “in control” and “cool” he is but be somewhat nicer when they are alone together.

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He appears to be attracted to vulnerability.

One way that this warning sign manifests itself is in cases of men who are attracted to women (or girls) who are much younger than they are. Why, for example, does a twenty-two-year-old man pursue a sixteen-year-old adolescent? Because he is stimulated and challenged by her? Obviously not. They are at completely different developmental points in life with a dramatic imbalance in their levels of knowledge and experience. He is attracted to
power
and seeks a partner who will look up to him with awe and allow him to lead her. Of course, he usually tells her the opposite, insisting that he wants to be with her because of how unusually mature and sophisticated she is for her age. He may even compliment her on her sexual prowess and say how much power she has over
him,
setting up the young victim so that she won’t recognize what is happening to her. Even without a chronological age difference, some abusive men are drawn to women who have less life experience, knowledge, or self-confidence, and who will look up to the man as a teacher or mentor.

I have had quite a number of clients over the years who are attracted to women who are vulnerable because of recent traumatic experiences in their lives, including many who have started relationships by helping a woman break away from an abusive partner and then start to control or abuse her themselves. Some abusive men seek out a woman who comes from a troubled or abusive childhood, who has health problems, or who has suffered a recent severe loss, and present themselves as rescuers. Be alert for the man who seems to be attracted to power imbalances.

At the same time, I have observed that there are plenty of abusive men who are
not
particularly attracted to vulnerability or neediness in women and who are more drawn to tougher or more successful women. This style of abuser appears to feel that he has caught a bigger fish if he can reel in an accomplished, self-confident woman to dominate.

No single one of the warning signs above is a sure sign of an abusive man, with the exception of physical intimidation. Many nonabusive men may exhibit a number of these behaviors to a limited degree. What, then, should a woman do to protect herself from having a relationship turn abusive?

Although there is no foolproof solution, the best plan is:

1. Make it clear to him
   as soon as possible
   which behaviors or attitudes are unacceptable to you and that you cannot be in a relationship with him if they continue.
   
2. If it happens again, stop seeing him for a substantial period of time.
   Don’t
   keep seeing him with the warning that this time you “really mean it,” because he will probably interpret that to mean that you don’t.
   
3. If it happens a third time, or if he switches to other behaviors that are warning flags, chances are great that he has an abuse problem. If you give him too many chances, you are likely to regret it later. For further suggestions, see “Leaving an Abuser as a Way to Promote Change” in Chapter 14.
   

Finally, be aware that as an abuser begins his slide into abuse, he believes that
you
are the one who is changing. His perceptions work this way because he feels so justified in his actions that he can’t imagine the problem might be with him. All he notices is that you don’t seem to be living up to his image of the perfect, all-giving, deferential woman.