The same thing with advice on childrearing; when children are being encouraged to treat their mother disrespectfully, the regular techniques don’t always work!
I’d like to recommend several books that give applicable advice for these situations. 1) The Gaslight Effect by Dr. Robin Stern (on the kinds of abuse meant to make the other person feel like they’re going to lose their minds); 2) Divorce Poison (P.A.S.) by Dr. Robert Warshak; 3) I’m So Confused, Am I Being Abused? by Dr. Lisa Twerski.
One of the gravest of the methodical isolation tactics that most abusive husbands use is this: With matters that many other women may be experiencing, you are told that you are the only one. You’re the freak, you’re the problem; nobody else does this or has this issue but you. And since you hardly ever get out and mingle with people long enough to have a real social life, you never find out that you’re not the only one at all.
And for the same reasons: When you ARE the only one going through something, and your situation IS unusually cruel or dysfunctional, you assume that what you’re enduring is part and parcel of being a wife or busy mother.
Humbled but Strengthened
To be cont’d…
