Why Does He Do That?: Inside the Minds of Angry and Controlling Men (45 page)

T
HE
A
BUSER
P
ROGRAM

Bringing about change in an abuser generally requires four elements:(1) consequences, (2) education, (3) confrontation, and (4) accountability. Consequences, the first item on the list, are manifested primarily through the abuser’s experience of losing his relationship (at least temporarily if not permanently), or through the legal system if he has committed any abuse-related crimes, such as threats or assaults. He may also experience consequences in the form of ciriticism or disapproval from other people in his life.

The abuser program has responsibility for items two and three, providing the abusive man with education about abuse and confronting him with his attitudes and excuses. A high-quality abuser program is entirely different from therapy. The critical distinctions include:

At the same time, an abuser program possesses no more magic than anyone else. The man who makes major life changes as a result of attending an abuser program is the one who
chooses to work the program,
not the one who sits back and waits for the program to “help” him, expecting service as he usually does. The successful client neither fights his counselors every step of the way, telling them what ignorant idiots they are, nor kisses up to them unctuously while claiming that the program has caused him to see the light. Rather, he comes weekly with a seriousness of purpose, practices what he is told, and tries to face up to the damage he has done.

I regret to say that a majority of abusers choose not to do the work. It isn’t that they
can’t
change (any abuser who doesn’t have a major mental illness can change) but that they decide they don’t wish to. They run a sort of cost-benefit analysis in their heads and decide that the rewards of remaining in control of their partners outweigh the costs. They decide that to consider seriously the perspective their counselors are presenting to them is just too uncomfortable and difficult and offends their arrogant sense of certainty about everything—at least, about everything having to do with relationships and the particular women they are with.

Later in this chapter I offer some suggestions on how you can increase the likelihood that your partner will be among those who do overcome their abusiveness. Bear in mind, though, that the ultimate choice is his; the saying “You can lead a horse to water but you can’t make him drink” applies particularly well here.

H
OW
D
O
I K
NOW
I
F
H
IS
A
BUSER
P
ROGRAM
I
S A
G
OOD
O
NE?

The first test of the quality of an abuser program is whether the main goal of the staff members appears to be helping
you
or helping
him.
In a responsible program the abused woman is considered the primary client. The only “assistance” they should be offering to the man is to educate and challenge him about his abusive attitudes and behaviors.
He,
on the other hand, may have numerous other goals—to get back together with you, to get more visitation with the children or reduce his child support payments, to escape criminal charges—but the program has no business assisting him with any of these; the last thing an abused woman needs is more people helping her abuser to work against her.

Those in charge of an abuser program
should
do the following:

• Contact you quickly after your partner enters the program. In this call, they should ask you to give a history of his abusive behavior and of any substance abuse, and tell you where to go for abused women’s services.
  
• Warn you that only a minority of abusers make lasting changes and that a few actually get
  worse
  from participating in an abuser program.
  
• Tell you the rules he has to follow to be in the program.
  
• Describe to you the topics that will be covered in his group meetings and give you as much detail about those sessions as you request.
  
• Give you any information you request about his attendance and the attitudes he expresses in the program, and about
  any specific statements he makes in group
  that you would like to know. They should not be promising him any confidentiality
  with respect to you.
  
• Devote most sessions at the program to discussing the core attitudinal and behavioral issues of abuse (as covered in Chapter 3).
  

Furthermore, you should be given a copy of any written reports generated by the program about the abuser, such as court reports. These reports should include:

• A full description of all the abuse that your partner has admitted to while in the program, including psychological abuse, sexual coercion, or violence
  
• Any steps toward change that he has failed to make (see the box earlier in this chapter)
  

There are various signs you can watch for that indicate an abuser program is
ineffective
:

• Counselors fail to contact you or to tell you the limitations of what counseling is likely to accomplish.
  
• They tell you that they think he is really changing and that he is doing very well in the program. (They should know that what
  you
  see is what matters, not what
  they
  see; lots of abusers put on a good show at the abuser program.)
  
• They try to involve you in couples counseling, suggest that you drop your restraining order, encourage you to communicate with your partner, or advocate for his interests in any way.
  
• They relay messages to you from him.
  
• Their group meetings seem to spend too much time teaching him to identify his feelings, to apply conflict-resolution skills, to manage his anger better, or to deal with other issues that do not affect his underlying beliefs.
  
• Their written reports are vague, do not address the steps to change (see the box earlier in this chapter), or give an overly rosy image of his prospects for change without describing the steps he still has left to take.
  

I know how hard it is for a woman to get her partner to attend an abuser program. After she’s finally succeeded in that campaign, I wish I could tell her that a cure is sure to follow, but it isn’t. A large proportion of abusers would rather stay stuck in their old ruts. I consider myself an excellent counselor for abusive men; I am patient with them, approaching them as an educator rather than as a harsh critic. At the same time, I can detect manipulation; I know what their issues are, and I don’t allow them to fool me. I have worked with colleagues whom I believe to be even more skilled than I, and from whom I have learned volumes. But even the very best counselors give the same report: It is more common for abusers to stay the same or get worse than it is for them to make the kinds of changes that bring qualitative improvements in the lives of their partners and children. A responsible abuser program encourages clients who are doing serious work but always mixes caution with its optimism.

If your partner or ex-partner joins an abuser program, I recommend that you examine the program’s literature carefully, ask lots of questions, and advocate for yourself to make sure the program does the kind of work with the man that you know needs to be done. At the same time, keep your own life moving forward, focusing on your own healing process,
not
on the man’s process of change. Waiting around for him to get serious about developing respect for you could be a long stall in your own growth and development. Don’t sell yourself short.

C
REATING A
C
ONTEXT FOR
C
HANGE

An abuser doesn’t change because he feels guilty or gets sober or finds God. He doesn’t change after seeing the fear in his children’s eyes or feeling them drift away from him. It doesn’t suddenly dawn on him that his partner deserves better treatment. Because of his self-focus, combined with the many rewards he gets from controlling you, an abuser changes only when he feels he has to, so the most important element in creating a context for change in an abuser is placing him in a situation where he has no other choice. Otherwise, it is highly unlikely that he will ever change his abusive behavior.

Once an abuser has made substantial improvements, his motivation to
sustain
those changes sometimes does become more internal. But the initial impetus is always external. Either his partner demands change and threatens to leave him or a court demands change and threatens to jail him. I have never seen a client make a serious effort to confront his abusiveness unless somebody required him to do the work. The abuser who truly enters counseling voluntarily, with no one holding anything over his head, quits within a few sessions, unless he finds a counselor he can manipulate.

Creating a context for change also involves these elements:

1. Establishing
   consequences
   for him for continued abusiveness. You may be able to use the legal system to impose sanctions if your partner’s style of abuse is physically violent or threatening, or involves sexual assaults. Leaving him is another good consequence for him, perhaps even better than legal intervention, depending on who he is and how well the police and courts work where you live.
   To get an abuser to change, you have to either prepare to leave him—if you can do so safely—or use the police and courts, or both.
   
2. Making clear to him what your
   expectations
   are for his treatment of you, including specifically what you are willing to live with and what you are not.
   
3. Focusing on your own healing and strength, so that he senses that he if he doesn’t change, you are ready to move on.
   

You cannot, I am sorry to say, get an abuser to work on himself by pleading, soothing, gently leading, getting friends to persuade him, or using any other nonconfrontational method. I have watched hundreds of women attempt such an approach without success. The way you can help him change is to demand that he do so, and settle for nothing less.

It is also impossible to persuade an abusive man to change by convincing him that
he
would benefit, because he perceives the benefits of controlling his partner as vastly outweighing the losses. This is part of why so many men initially take steps to change their abusive behavior but then return to their old ways. There is another reason why appealing to his self-interest doesn’t work: The abusive man’s belief that his own needs should come ahead of his partner’s is at the core of his problem. Therefore when anyone, including therapists, tells an abusive man that he should change because that’s what’s best for
him,
they are inadvertently feeding his selfish focus on himself:
You can’t simultaneously contribute to a problem and solve it.
Those abusive men who make lasting changes are the ones who do so because they realize how badly they are hurting their partners and children—in other words, because they learn to care about what is good for
others
in the family and develop empathy, instead of caring only about themselves.

L
EAVING AN
A
BUSER AS A
W
AY TO
P
ROMOTE
C
HANGE

Breaking up with an abusive man, or even deciding to take some time apart, needs to be done with caution, as I discussed in “Leaving an Abuser Safely” in Chapter 9. But if you feel you can leave, doing so may help provide the impetus your partner needs to look at his behavior. If you are separating with the hope that you might get back together in the future, consider the following suggestions: