CARACTERÍSTICAS Y PRINCIPIOS DE UN BUEN FEEDBACK

Disengaging involves identifying as an abused women and increased help-seeking efforts, which culminate in ending the relationship. According to Landenburger (1989), there may be a breaking point that acts as a catalyst for change. Thoughts of kill or be killed are more dominant. Towards the end of this stage the victim will use whatever energy she can muster, often fuelled by anger, to leave the relationship. A growing sense that her very survival is being compromised, accompanied by a strong feeling of being trapped is often a marker of the transition to disengaging. She begins to realise that she will not survive if she stays but she cannot see any possible way out. A heightened awareness of her situation is reached as she increasingly feels more and more trapped.

4.3.3.1 Seeking long-term safety

Some victims sought police assistance at the crucial time of transitioning to the disengaging phase. They had not actually made any decision about needing to leave the relationship before police intervention but had recognised the need for some sort of change and were open to the options police presented. Jenny was in transition when she first contacted police. She was emotionally disengaged, and did not feel any love for her husband at all but still felt trapped. She did not believe she could ever leave him but realised her management strategies were failing and her ability to avoid serious injury was diminishing. She described an intense fear of him

accompanied by an even stronger fear of leaving but also a bourgeoning sense of needing help as the following extracts show.

Kim: How important do you think it was for you to try and stay in that relationship?

122

Jenny: Well it was important only from the point of view that he said that if I ever left him, he‘d come and find me, threatened me that I wasn‘t to leave him. So from a physical point of view, from a safety point of view, it was important to stay in the relationship. But apart from that, if he had gone and wrapped himself around a tree, I wouldn‘t have worried about it…..I don‘t know, at some points I was thinking I hope I die really young just so I can get away from him. You know that‘s a horrible thing to think, that‘s a horrible thing.

Several days after a particularly brutal attack she initiated a cold call vaguely search for options (described in 4.2.3.1). However, her reflection on this particular

interaction with police indicated what she actually needed was firstly for the abuse to be named and not tolerated. Secondly, she needed direction, support and

facilitation. She needed police to assist her in safely bringing about a change in her situation.

Kim: So what do you think of what happened at the SOCA unit?

Jenny: I wish she had of helped me a bit more. I wish she had of turned around and said there‘s really some things that you can do and these are the things that you need to look at, these are some support services that you can contact. I wish there had been something like that. It was more me saying, look I think my decision is that I don‘t want to infuriate him. And she just said well fair enough. Police shouldn‘t be there to just say oh fair enough, that‘s your decision. I wish she had turned around and said, no it‘s actually not okay and these are the sort of support services that you can start

accessing now and start figuring out what you can do. Even if police

officially couldn‘t act at that point, I don‘t know what they can and can‘t do. I don‘t know where their boundaries are but I sort of felt like I could have had a bit more info at that point.

A month later she made a crisis call (described in 4.2.2) to stop an attack and prevent her husband from carrying out his threat to kill her. During this event, her fear of leaving was outweighed by her fear of staying; an immediate and permanent change was needed. When the police started suggesting options, she realised she wanted him to be removed. However, she had no thoughts about getting an intervention order and lacked the knowledge and capacity to seek such solutions. She was, therefore, also seeking ego support. She needed police to lead her through the necessary processes. The police facilitated an intervention order application and the removal of her husband, followed with criminal charges.

Jenny: Then I got a really, really cold feeling because I thought, he went from zero to I‘m going to kill you, he went to that in a very, very, very short

123

space of time. And I‘m thinking, I can‘t let him ever do this again, he‘s already told me how I‘m going to die, he‘s already got it planned out. I thought. I can‘t ever let him get near me again.

Jenny: They started saying, is there anywhere that you can go? Can you go to your mum‘s? We can get a refuge for you. And I said, I‘m not going to take two kids out at this time of night. This is my house. This is where I live. I‘m not going anywhere. And mum can‘t look after me, she‘s nearly 80 years old. And they said, so you want us to take him away and I said, yes

Prior to the point of police intervention she had thought ending the relationship was too dangerous. The intervention became a catalyst and she progressed from

transition to disengaging to recovery in the space of one night. Her resolve to end the relationship became firm in subsequent days.

Other victims had moved further into the disengaging process. They had recognised the futility of short-term escape and were seeking permanent change and freedom from abuse. Some had already made the decision to end the relationship before seeking police assistance, although there was usually a trigger event resulting in police intervention. In this stage, victims sought long-term safety by having him removed from the home or prevented from returning if he had already left, or by leaving themselves and seeking refuge, as Chelsea described

.

Chelsea: He assaulted me again, another head butting in the eye. That‘s when I called the police again. They came round and I was hysterical again. At this stage he‘d taken my daughter down the street with his ex-girlfriend to go and have coffee or whatever. And you know, I was screaming, I want my daughter back. And they said just leave him; just let things calm down. And I said to them I want to go to a refuge. Because I had spoken to my doctor, and she‘d said, you can go to a refuge. And I said please, I want to go to a refuge. And the policeman said well it doesn‘t look to me like you're in crisis. And I said I am; I‘ve had years of this and I can‘t take it anymore. I want to go to a refuge. And they said sorry, places are limited and it‘s only for people in real crisis.

Lauren‟s third contact with police was during the disengaging phase. A heated incident, during which she was assaulted, was followed by a week of brooding until her partner left her to go to his mother‟s house, which she recognised as part of his pattern of psychological abuse. Rather than accepting it and waiting for him to return and reconcile as she usually did, she decided to go to the police station to report his recent assault and seek an intervention order. Her aim was to get an

124 intervention order to keep him out. She also recognised that such formal action would set a boundary which prevented her from making contact with him. She was seeking to end the recurring pattern of their combined behaviour.

Lauren: Christmas Eve, similar blow-up. The hole in the wall was from throwing a melon at me over there. New Year‘s day he left. So I thought well bugger you and I went to the police and I explained the situation. And I insisted they take out an interim order. They didn‘t want to but I really didn‘t want him back in the house. I thought, no this is too much. I‘m not putting up with this anymore……

Kim: Had it continued for that week?

Lauren: No. No, no, no, it was just this quiet brooding. Then New Years Eve he sat down and told my eldest, all my faults and why it was my fault and he had to look after the family, just general abuse towards him as well, bringing a child into the situation, making it his problem. I‘m really thinking I don‘t want him hurting the kids anymore, hurting me anymore, trying to wreck the house anymore. He damaged the house as well…. he had grabbed me and shaken me and chased me upstairs. I went into my son‘s room and locked myself in there.

Kim: Alright, so you waited until he had left and you decided…

Lauren: He‘s not coming back. That was what triggered me. He‘d left again as a form of sort of control. I‘ve thought bugger you mate, you want to leave, you can stay out.

4.3.3.2 Ego support

Help-seeking aspirations focus on long-term safety during the disengaging phase. However, due to victims‟ diminished ego-strength and capacity to take action, they have underlying needs that must also be met. Therefore, they also seek ego-support from police to facilitate leaving and sustain them through the process.

Antoinette had given up hope that her husband would change his violent and controlling behaviour. She realised she needed to get him out of her life but she lacked agency. As the following extracts demonstrate, she knew about intervention orders but had no idea how the process worked and she had no confidence that she would be believed.

At an earlier encounter with police, the officer had told her she should leave her husband.

125

Antoinette: I was confused again. Thinking, what should I do? How can I leave here? The refuge is hard for me to go there and the intervention order would also be hard to get. What should I do?

Kim: So you‘re sort of thinking, well he‘s telling me I should leave, I know I need to leave but nobody‘s telling me how to do it?

Antoinette: Yes, yes, exactly. Yes. I was confused about going to court. What will I tell them? Will they trust me? Maybe they will think that she just wants to leave her husband and wants to you know, get the intervention order from him.

Kim: So you were worried that the courts would actually…..

Antoinette: Not support me because he would be there and he would be lying, my husband

At a subsequent encounter she pleaded for help.

Antoinette: Then he came to me and he struck me in the face and everything went dark in my eyes, and I fell….my whole head was numb and my ears were hurting me. I went inside to call the police. He followed me, and grabbed my hair and then his brother ran inside the house and he was separating him and we were arguing….He went and I called the police straight away and I told them that I was assaulted by my husband and I want the intervention order now against him so he never sees my son and me. I was really, you know, I made my decision. So the police came…..He looked at me. He said, you have no bruises, nothing at all. There‘s nothing I can do. I cannot make any intervention order now. I said, look, he assaulted my son yesterday. He assaulted me today. It happened before, it‘s going to happen again. I want him out of my life. Please I need your help.

The officer made an appointment for her to come to the station three days later to make an application by summons. In the interim, her husband returned; she felt defeated and depressed, and lost her resolve. Eventually the assistant principal from her children‟s school gave her the support she needed; she made enquiries from several sources and accompanied her to Court where an interim order was granted.

4.3.3.3 Seeking justice

Seeking justice during the disengaging phase primarily focuses on the victim‟s right to leave the relationship. When police obtain an intervention order, they are not only enabling her to end the relationship, they are formalising her right to do so safely.

126 Maria‟s concern for her children‟s welfare had initially been a major barrier to leaving her partner but eventually she realised the abuse was affecting the way she interacted with her children; she needed to look after herself in order to look after them, and the only way to do that was to end the relationship. When she tried to make her partner leave, he became violent and threatened to put her in hospital. In the following extracts, Maria described trying to assert her right to leave him. Maria was seeking safety but she also needed a powerful ally to uphold her right to end the relationship.

Maria: I was getting the courage to tell him that things weren‘t working out. But I was afraid and then he tried to hurt me. He threw things on the wall. You can see the scratch mark there. He threw things and he nearly hit my face…. he grabbed me and pushed me against the wall and I got very scared and I called the police.

Kim: So what was your main reason for calling them?

Maria: Because he threatened me; he said to me, I don‘t care if you go to the police I‘m gonna hit you. I‘m gonna leave in a way that nobody‘s ever done it. And, if I‘m gonna hit you, I‘m gonna do it the right way. I‘m gonna send you to hospital.

When she told him she was calling the police he was dismissive and taunted her. She wanted to demonstrate her resolve.

Maria: I‘m like, that‘s not right. You can‘t tell a young kid like that, your mum is a slut. You‘ve got to call her a slut. You don‘t say those things to children. And the things he was saying to me, I just said no that‘s it. You either leave or I‘ll call the police. And he said no, I‘m not leaving and if you keep behaving that way, I‘m going to hit you. And then when he grabbed me, I was terrified…….And he said no, you wouldn‘t do it. And then I said yeah, I don‘t care even if you hit me or anything. And I wanted him to hit me to end the whole thing. And he said to me, I don‘t care whether you go to the police, whether you send me to jail. I‘ll do it if I have to. And he didn‘t think that I was going to call.