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Table of Contents
About The Domestic
Violence Unit
Test
Your Relationship
Educational
Info
Order of Protection
Information
Getting Help
Devise a
Safety Plan
Statistics
Why the
Victim Stays
Support
How to Help
Cycle of Violence
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Why Victim Stays
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Of having a failed marriage
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Traditional responsibility for the home rests with the wife
(e.g., if she had been a better cook.)
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Social stigma, "It's not supposed to happen in families like mine!"
- Every time abuser apologizes, the victim wants to believe.
- When abuser isn't being abusive, abuser is nice.
- If victim could be a better spouse or partner, maybe victim could
control abuser's violence.
- Abuser controls the money. The checking account and credit
cards are in abuser's name only.
- The victim may not have a job.
- Abuser gives victim an allowance and demands receipts for
everything spent.
- The more dependent a batterer makes the victim, the less likely
the victim
will leave.
- Batterer may force the victim to give up working outside the home.
- Batterer may not allow the victim to go to school.
- Batterer may sell or disable the victim's car.
- Batterer may isolate the victim from family and friends.
- Batterer may disable or remove phones from the house when
he
is leaving the house.
- The victim wants the children to have two parents.
- The victim both stays and leaves because of children.
- A batterer may threaten or abuse the children as a means of
intimidating and controlling the victim's behavior.
- People who choose not to report violence may not realize that they
risk losing custody of their children.
- Abused children may remain silent out of fear that the batterer
will retaliate and further abuse their mother, themselves, or their
siblings.
- Child welfare agencies and domestic violence services routinely
function along parallel tracks with no coordination. At times they
are in conflict with each other, as child welfare agencies' commitment to
keeping victims safe. In the extreme, victims whose children have
been abused may be taken to court for failing to protect their children,
with no investigation into whether the person may have been abused.
- Victim may stop loving the batterer despite the abuse.
- Battering doesn't usually occur every day. About 1 in 5 women
victimized by their spouse or ex-spouse reported that they had been a
victim of a series of at least 3 assaults in the last 6 months.
- Batterers can at times be very loving and caring, lavishing gifts
on the victim, writing personal notes and poems, or doing other things
that are very romantic.
- Marriage is "for better or for worse."
- Batterers sometimes use scriptures to justify their actions.
- Clergy may be misinformed about the phenomenon of domestic violence
or child abuse and may inadvertently send a signal to abused women and
children that they should endure the abuse to protect another family
member or save the marriage.
- Referral services may be located in towns or cities miles from
home.
- Victims may be reluctant to make long-distance phone calls that
will be listed on the monthly bill.
- Public transportation is scarce.
- Victims may fear that their batterer will check the mileage on
vehicles.
- Police officers are often miles from the scene of abuse, and it may
take hours for them to respond.
- Families residing in rural move less frequently, often staying in
the same county, or even the same house, for generations. Physical
safety means leaving behind family, friends, and all that is familiar.
- Because some adults and children seldom leave the immediate
communities in which they live, they may not know that domestic violence
and child abuse are crimes.
- Close relationships among community members may lead victims and
children to seek assistance from family members or friends rather than
from police, advocates, or other services.
-
Orders of protection may be issued only at courthouses during
limited hours on specified days of the week.
- Circuit-riding prosecutors and judges who try and hear cases
throughout the district or state may only be available periodically.
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