by Dave Alfvin
Domestic abuse can touch anyone, so you should never feel ashamed it is happening to you. People don’t enter relationships knowing it will be abusive. When a relationship crosses the line into abusive behavior, it turns a victim’s world upside down, and often it is not always easy to leave someone…there are a hundred reasons a victim may not want (or be able) to leave. At domestic violence agencies like Mutual Ground, our early focus is on your safety and education.
As one of our clients gratefully said, “I know Mutual Ground is there for me down to a toothbrush.” Our services are designed to help individuals reach a potential they would not otherwise be able to attain without the safety of our building and the tools and guidance provided by our staff. An agency can be the first huge step in helping an abuse victim gain a rebirth of their self-worth and self-determination.
When domestic violence occurs, it never affects just one person. It affects the entire family, friends of the family, neighbors, co-workers, schools, employers, emergency services, social services, criminal justice systems and the general public. Not only does this epidemic affect an incredible amount of people, without intervention and prevention.
We believe the best way to combat domestic violence is with a three-pronged approach:
1) Promote prevention through public awareness and education.
2) Offer victims immediate physical and emotional support, plus safety
3) Hold offenders accountable.
Remember, agencies are always available to help you. We believe you deserve to be safe in your own home. If you do not know the phone number of a women’s shelter near you, call the National Domestic Abuse Hotline at: 1-800-799-SAFE (7233). You’ll be treated with dignity, respect and confidentiality.
The Front Lines: Working Directly with Abusers and Encouraging Results
In this interview, I speak with Maureen Manning-Rosenfeld, counselor at the Community Crisis Center in Elgin, Illinois. In her 35 years at the center, Manning-Rosenfeld has a remarkable track record in helping abusers turn their lives around through self-awareness and closely monitoring their anger.
Alfvin: Thank you for providing this valuable information on how you work directly with domestic abusers.
Rosenfeld: It’s a pleasure to do this.
Alfvin: Can we go through your background just a little bit?
Rosenfeld: Sure. I have a Master’s degree in counseling from Northern Illinois University. I’m an LCPC, a Licensed Clinical Professional Counselor. I’m licensed in the State of Illinois as a CDVP…Certified Domestic Violence Professional and also a CPAIP, a Certified Partner Abuse Intervention Professional. There are a lot of credentials following my name: MS, LCPC, CDVP and CPAIP. (laughs)
Alfvin: How are your additional credentials earned?
Rosenfeld: They’re based on a number of things: actual experience, professional workshops and continued education.
Alfvin: So, out of college, where did you go first?
Rosenfeld: Right to the Community Crisis Center…35 years ago! I came here after I graduated and was working on my Master’s degree. I began my internship as a counselor helping callers, women and their (minor) children at the shelter, walk-ins, everyone, including men. I have seen many things change since then. We had the Illinois Domestic Violence Act passed, and we also have seen greater society awareness of the problem. So it’s all for the good.
Alfvin: So, when an abuser walks through your door for counseling, what’s the first thing that happens?
Rosenfeld: Actually, the first step is when the client calls us on the 24-hour hotline to set up an initial appointment. Then, in that first appointment, we go through a 90-minute assessment of the client to determine whether the client is a good match for the program. So in the beginning, we screen people in and out of the program. (A possible reason to screen out a client might be a pathological issue, e.g. a mental illness, etc. Clients screened out of Rosenfeld’s counseling sessions are referred to the other appropriate professionals) After we determine the client will fit into our program, we schedule them for a minimum 26 sessions, two hours each for 26 weeks. The Illinois standard is 26 weeks. In some states, like California, it’s 52 weeks.
Alfvin: Twenty-six weeks? That’s quite a few sessions…
Rosenfeld: Yes, and I wish it could be longer. We can bring about behavioral changes fairly quickly, but the attitudinal changes, the belief system…this can take a long time to work through that denial and all the special learning, telling him his whole life that he is allowed “behavior plays,” and now we’re telling him a new message: “No, that’s not acceptable. In order to change the way you behave, we need to go back and change the way you think.” It’s a whole new learning system that clients must adopt.
Alfvin: How does counseling begin?
Rosenfeld: The client stops in for an evening session and joins and sits down for the first time in that evening’s group discussion.
Alfvin: Always a group?
Rosenfeld: Yes, always. Groups are the preferred modality in working with partner abusers. The group provides other peer role models for change, and it allows the group to confront others’ behavior, and it also provides help for their struggles.
Alfvin: How does the first night go for the brand new client? How do you make them feel welcome?
Rosenfeld: We shake their hand and say to them, “Thank you for coming here. You’ve done everything you needed to do tonight; you walked through that door. There’s nothing else you need to do. Now, just take a seat and relax. You won’t be on the hot seat tonight…we’re just going to carry on with our group discussion. People in our group will introduce themselves to you and say a few words on how they got here. This way, you won’t feel you’re sitting with a group of strangers. We’ll be talking about some of the things we’ve been working on during the past week. At the end of our night, we’ll have time for questions, so if you have some questions about the program, you’ll have a chance at this time. Next week, you’ll have an opportunity to tell your story and how you got to be here. Then we can see what we need to work on, and then you can evaluate your choices.”
When the new person hears the experiences of the other people in the group, this begins to work through the barriers of resistance, because the new person feels they share the same circumstances.
Alfvin: Are your clients ever counseled one-on-one?
Rosenfeld: Not usually; we tell them to go right to the 24/7 telephone hotline whenever they need to talk with someone for support. It’s there any time they need it…and they can speak with a qualified counselor.
Alfvin: What are some key topics used in your discussion groups?
Rosenfeld: Accountability: We teach what it means to be accountable. There’s no victim blaming, each person must come to an acceptance of his and her partner’s viewpoint regardless of whether they agree or not, not exerting power and coercing the other person who lives in a chronic state of fear. We say, “Nobody made you ‘king’ here. Indentured servitude was outlawed in this country in 1865. You have no right whatsoever to threaten and coerce your partner.” It takes a long time to get these messages across.
Non-violent conflict resolution: Conflict is a part of life, and what has to occur is that we must learn how to not resolve conflict with violence toward our partner. We teach: how to listen to the another person, how to listen to their viewpoint, how to ask clarifying questions, expressing your own viewpoint, showing empathy for the other person’s position, using “I” statements, trying to find win/win solutions instead of a win/lose proposition. Our society has ingrained in many males the idea that in any situation, there is always a winner and a loser. This is simply not true.
Alfvin: Winner take all, eh?
Rosenfeld: Exactly.
The role of men in society: Our society has ingrained in many males the idea that in any situation, there is always a winner and a loser. This is simply not true. Nobody wants the short end of the stick, so-to-speak. To counteract some of these
attitudes, we explore what were some of the messages society put into the heads of our clients that men had a special entitlement and a privilege and the way they get to react with violent anger. We have to evaluate these messages and whether they’re okay or not, and teach the client that these were not beneficial to them at all. The old messages are self-sabotaging.
Many men at the table will say, “My goal has always been to draw my partner closer to me.” However, in effect, their behavior has been to push the partner away from them. So we respond, “I guess your method hasn’t been working out too well, has it? Why not try it our way? Why not ‘give it up’ and use some new concepts and a different way to resolve your conflicts.”
Changing violent behavior: This first must start by changing the way our client thinks. The abuser’s belief system has been infused with an idea that it’s okay to dominate and coerce their partner, so we simply cannot change behavior without going back and changing their mode of thinking. There are many kinds of theories including cognitive behavioral theory, rational emotive behavioral theory, etc. But in order to truly affect change:
1) You must first change cognition, the way a client thinks.
2) Then we work on emotions, not only the clients' emotions, but also their ability to feel the emotions of others, especially their partner’s. This can be a long process because changing a person’s belief system does not happen overnight.
3) Then, our clients perform “self monitoring,” when they’re not with the group. Then we teach them to “step back” when they begin to feel their anger rising and ask themselves, “What emotion am I actually feeling (hurt, feeling left out, embarrassment, etc.), because anger is a reaction, but does not address the true feelings of a person. When clients understand their emotions, they can stay away from their anger component far more effectively.
4) Finally, when clients share their experiences on a weekly basis, this reinforces positive behavior and they see the benefits of their changes.
Substance abuse: I think it’s important to make a distinction between substance abuse and domestic violence. Addiction and partner abuse are two separate issues and they require simultaneous treatment. Over the years, we’ve certainly noticed the correlation between the partner abuse and substance abuse, but I want to be very careful to say that substance abuse is not the causation, but a whole different issue. I can’t tell you how many men have come up to me and said, “I went through AA and they told me that if I just got sober, everything else in my life would be fine. I’ve been sober two years now but I’m still beating my wife, so obviously AA didn’t clear that up for me.” So, my usual reply is, “You’ve got two things going on here, your addiction and your partner abuse problem; you need to come in here and we’ll work on that with you.”
The difference between anger and emotion: We help our clients separate anger from the underlying emotion. Anger is a reaction, not an emotion. By itself, anger says very little. Anger does not provide a clue on how a person actually feels. So we teach clients when they feel angry to ask themselves, “What emotion am I actually feeling or I’m having a thought that something is unfair here.” What’s the thinking that’s contributing to this emotion? So then we ask, “Is it the emotion of anger you want to experience or is it a different emotion?”
We have many men who come into this group, and they only have two “speeds.” Either everything is okay, or I’m angry. They have no other range of emotional experience. So we pass out those “feelings sheets,” sometimes they’re posters with little faces that illustrate different emotions. So when they’re describing something that happened the previous week, we may ask them, “What was the exact emotion that you felt? Were you hurt, or did you feel betrayed, etc. Tell that to your partner.” Example: “I feel hurt when I come home and find you just sold all my tools at a garage sale. I feel hurt; I feel betrayed.”
Intergenerational patterning: This is a very important subject because we deal with things like “my dad beat mom” or “my stepdad was violent to mom.” Now that I’m a grown man, I want to control my household, I “violence my partner.”
If we’re on this subject, I ask each client to give us the names of his kids, and I write them on the board: Billy and Suzy and Gail. Then I say, “What are the messages you want to convey to your children? Why? Because if you don’t break this…like links in a chain, your four- and six-year-old son (and this is very powerful to them) are going to grow up to be 'future batterers of America.' So, if you don’t stop this cycle, I’m going to see them in another 10 years.”
Or I say to those with daughters, “Your daughter is four years old right now. Now, fast forward 12 years. So now it’s the year 2024 and she’s now 16 years old, in high school, and she’s looking for someone to fall in love with, someone to date, someone to go with to the prom. Who is she going to be attracted to? The message she has received all her life are that men are powerful, men dominate, men control, men tell women what they can and can’t wear, they constantly want to know their whereabouts. Dad treated Mom that way. It’s a weird equation going on in their heads that abuse equals love. Dad loves Mom; Dad abuses Mom. Therefore, when I look for a young man to love me, I’m going to look for someone who’s controlling and coercive and abusive toward me.” And the thought that someone says to our client’s 16-year-old daughter, “You can’t wear that outfit going to school and looking like that,” and slaps her across the face…that thought completely blows their mind. The clients' eyes get really wide and they say, “I can’t tolerate the thought of someone hitting my daughter.” And we say, “Well, your wife is someone’s daughter, too. If you don’t want that for your daughter, then you need to change.”
I’ve had 18-year-olds court-ordered into my group, and they’ll look at me and say, “I remember you…from the shelter. When I was 10, my mom left my dad because he was beating her up all the time. You played Bingo with us every Friday night.” This 18-year-old was simply repeating the chain of violence in his family. We want to break this legacy handed down through generations where men have some kind of privilege to be violent to their partners.
Alfvin: The abuser in this book believed he could bring absolute military rule and standards into the home. Any variance from David Larsen’s rigid set of standards was an act of disloyalty.
Rosenfeld: Sure, do it my way. Do it now. The family is not a war situation. By applying military concepts, you’re not going to be successful. We train our law enforcement and military personnel to be in control, to take charge of situations. But when those folks go home to their families, they need to take off that “persona,” like taking off one hat and putting on a different hat, one that says, “Now I’m in a place where we amicably resolve conflict, live peaceably, and no one is trying to coerce or dominate the other person. We’ve had many veterans come through our group and many “subsets” of veterans. Back when this program started in April of 1982, we had many Vietnam vets in the group. They would bond with each other and tell stories about military training; for instance, out of their peripheral vision, if they saw something move in the corner of their eye, they were trained to strike. “Well, you’re not in a war anymore, we tell them. You’re home from Vietnam now; those rules don’t apply.”
Alfvin: To change the subject, you make abusers feel welcome, or at least comfortable in your weekly sessions. You seem to make them feel they have value obviously…
Rosenfeld: Oh, yes! Our position is: “You are a worthy person, deserving of my respect; however, you have this behavior that’s completely unacceptable, and in some instances criminal. But I can help you to change that.” So we definitely give the client respect, while at the same time we hold their feet to the fire, making them accountable for their actions. We make it very clear that we stand with the rest of society in our stand against domestic violence, and that includes the people of our state that brought these charges against them.
Alfvin: But at the same time, we’re all on the same team…
Ro
senfeld: We are. I tell my clients, “My goal is the same as your goal. I hope you are never ever again in the criminal justice system and brought up on these charges. My goal is that your partner lives safely and not in fear. And my last goal is that you’ve come here to end your violence, not to save your relationship.”
This isn’t marriage counseling; it’s not my goal to work out relationships. My job is to address (and stop) the abuse and violent behavior in my clients and change the way they think. Whether the partner accepts the abuser back is entirely her decision.
In my experience, the percentage of couples that stay together is about 50 percent. When counseling helps an abuser make personal changes and the partner accepts the changes, the relationship can survive. With the other 50 percent of couples that do break up and the woman says, “In spite of your change, I just can’t move forward. My trust has been broken. I can never feel like I can trust you again. What you’ve done has broken the covenant of our relationship, and so it’s forever over for me and I’m leaving now.” For those men, we tell them, “These sessions are not for this relationship, but for your next relationship. You need to end your violence.”
Alfvin: But you also make it clear that your goal is not to break up their marriage. Does that help reduce the apprehension you face from some clients?
Rosenfeld: Yes, very much so. One of the common myths is that “those women’s libbers over at the shelter are just trying to destroy marriages.” That’s not true at all. We’re just trying to promote safety in the family.
Alfvin: That must help. Some men think someone is trying to make their wife “independent again.”
Rosenfeld: Unless that’s what she wants. That’s her choice…it’s not for me, a counselor to decide. When we sit at the table with our clients we say, “She’s not at this table; you are. You’re the only person we’re working with tonight and the only behavior we can change is yours because your partner is free to do anything she needs to do to keep herself safe.