A woman may stay in an abusive relationship longer than is necessary for the following reasons:
- To avoid the stigma of divorce. Many societies in the developing world consider divorce a cultural taboo; because of this, some women will rather endure abusive relationships than leave the marriage.
- She keeps hoping the husband would change his attitude. Because feeling remorseful often accompanies domestic violence, some women keep hoping their partner’s attitude will change for good.
- She has probably developed the battered personality. ICD9 Code 995.81 describes it as any person who because of constant and domestic violence usually involving physical abuse by a partner becomes depressed and unable to take any independent action that would allow her to escape the abuse and believe that the abuse is their fault. Such persons usually refuse to press criminal charges against their abuser and refuse all offers of help, often becoming aggressive or abusive to others who attempt to offer assistance. Often sufferers will seek out their very abuser for comfort shortly after an incident of abuse. The battered woman syndrome was described by Lenore Walker in the late 1970s and it results from a cycle of violence leading to learned helplessness.
- Economic dependency. A poor and uneducated woman with low earning power may feel she cannot earn enough to take care of her self if she leaves the marriage.
- Ignorance of her legal rights. Some women do not know the law is on their side if they press charges against an abusive husband and so they continue to endure the abuse.
- Because of the husband’s threat to harm the children if she leaves.
- Habouring an illusion that they would save their husband from his abusive behaviour.
- Trivializing the violence and saying it was not serious enough for her to leave the man.
- She might assume responsibility for the violence by claiming she was nagging him
10. She might attribute the violence to an external force such as the devil in which case the man is blameless.
11. If she has religious beliefs that consider marriage as indissoluble and which also teaches that she stands the risk of incurring of the wrath of God if she leaves the marriage.
12. Her mother endured an abusive relation so she too would stay put in her marriage.
13. If she is unwilling to go through the tedious and expensive court proceedings of divorce
14. If she is from a broken home, she would not want history to repeat itself if her marriage breaks up
15. She might deny that she has any other options but to stay since violence is not a scriptural ground for divorce.
16. Women with abusive parents feel it is normal to get hurt by the person you love and so may not want to leave the relationship.
This article was written by Dr Francis Edo Olotu, Physician, Family Counselor, Author, Conference Speaker and host of the Blog Empowering Dads.
