How to recognize a victim of violence from the ISCP perspective

Due to the frequency of the violence triangle and Stockholm syndrome, it is very difficult to clearly identify the culprit or perpetrator of violence often. Actually, everyone has been a perpetrator of violence at some point – it exists in various elements of the system. People also often think in violent ways with their own comfort in mind.

As a psychotherapist, I really notice how difficult it is often to say unequivocally whether one is dealing with a victim of violence or, at the same time, also with the perpetrator. That’s why you need to use reference points that are fairly constant and easy to recognize. Based on these insights, you can create an interview encouraging examples based on the map below:

• The victim of violence begins to have the belief that he or she deserves the violence,
• The victim of violence feels that he or she does not have an adequate, realistic assessment of the situation. That person also fears that someone will consider her guilty or insane, even mentally ill,
• The victim of violence has the perception that the system is against oneself and the perpetrator is protected (so here the need for support is in choosing a lawyer),
• The victim of violence may have inadequate reactions and behaviors such as sudden crying, tension, distention, anxiety or anger (do not diagnose as a psychotherapist as long as there is a risk of violence on the person),
• The victim of violence learns to ignore experiences such as compassion and pity towards others (her emotional response to other people is blunted),
• The victim of violence is often xobic,
• The victim of violence tries to influence the situation and the perpetrator,creating certain strategies based on the creation of masks, a false self or just maybe Persona (person will be worse than the perpetrator, because he or she comes into contact with aggression and anger in a situation of extreme overstepping of boundaries),
• The victim of violence is afraid of new places, literally checks out what is going on by expressing it, he or she will also try to live in a new environment confronting new realities, maintaining a different approach to threats, which will be incomprehensible to those around her,
• The victim of violence defends himself through various mechanisms – by the fact that violence affects the brain, phenomena such as dissociations, derealizations, depersonalizations, flashbacks, memory disorders, paralysis in the body, sudden fears can appear,
• The victim of violence may be trying to increase his or her range of skills for self-defense or is just maintaining a state of learned helplessness,
• The victim of violence needs a lot of support and time to be able to formulate the range of needs that can be helped to meet (unless she is aware of what is happening – he or she is not always),
• The victim of violence may have low self-esteem because oneselves development was disrupted – person knows that he or she was left behind because he or she made decisions to be able to protect oneself or leave the place where violence was used against oneself,
• The victim of violence may be isolated, says he or she is losing strength and is often helpless,
• The victim of violence tries to avoid the perpetrator (unless there is an element of seduction or perversion in this perpetrator-victim relationship), which in turn can induce feelings of guilt and lack of to quickly come forward for help because they can’t live without the perpetrator or are already surviving on their own as the perpetrator,

• The victim of violence is afraid of becoming an executioner himself (fear of oneselves aggression, vindictiveness and hostility, but also revulsion),
• The victim of violence realistically fears for his or her life and health,
• The victim of violence stops trusting others, becomes hypersensitive to non-verbal messages,
• The victims of violence whose are still under the influence of the perpetrator may exhibit illogical behavior, and may have multiple types of reactions, as do people with a diagnosis of borderline or psychopathy. It is important to separate victims of violence and those with PTSD from those with personality disorders – the mechanisms of those separated from the perpetrator can quickly change),
• The victim of violence fears he or she is losing his or her mind and chance for a normal life.

   

Keep in mind that at the beginning, victims of violence may have misdiagnoses, because they arouse concern in others with their behavior. That’s why it’s important to be patient and extend the consultation-diagnostic stage in a supportive and interventionist direction in order to have a better understanding of the person’s history.

The direction for the psychotherapist is to hear the story and use his or her knowledge, experience and empathy, because the victim also comes with his or her own violence (e.g., manipulative tendencies). Victims may also lie, be like the perpetrator and use some form of violence. Another important moment is naming the victim’s roles, functions and responsibilities (the more roles, responsibilities the better, the faster he or she will figure it out).

Own question scenarios on this basic framework helps a lot. In the case of couple’s psychotherapy, where we won’t get to the bottom of the truth, one can always try to map (attempt to outline the common structure they share) the history of the relationship to some extent. Often, too, people who shout, who speak out directly about what is happening, become abusers if they associate with people who are passive-aggressive, withdrawn, seemingly calm. Factors such as temperament, expectations, past history, mode of communication, aspirations, ambitions, development orientation should be taken into account so as not to hurt anyone with an inadequate diagnosis.

Warmly inviting you,

Paulina Kubś, M.A. 

Cabinet of Interventional Systemic-Cultural Psychotherapy