Is your child beginning to understand that they have been a victim of a Coercive Controlling, Narcissistic, Abusive parent?
View this video to learn more about the impact of coercive control on young people.
The experiences of adult victims and survivors who have been coercively controlled may be very traumatizing, however perhaps the worst part of this abuse is when the children are used as pawns in the domestic abuse. Historically we have said that children are “exposed to” or “witnesses of” domestic abuse, however in reality a child living in a home where any type of abuse is occurring between partners, physical or otherwise, is a child who is a victim of abuse. Additionally, we know that children in these homes are at greater risk of being physically abused themselves.
Domestic abuse and child abuse are NOT siloed issues and should not be treated as such. Research continues to show us that the trauma experienced by adult victims is very much duplicated with children living in the home. Much of the research that demonstrates the overlap of risks for children is directed toward physical abuse or neglect. Yet, we know that this use of the children is a psychological maltreatment not readily researched or understood. I believe that in each and every one of these situations’ children are at the very least victims of psychological maltreatment by the abuser. Add in that the abuser often will use the following tactics to harm his/her child and it seems to me that no child should be forced to live with an abuser.
Rejecting: An active process of refusing to acknowledge a child’s worth or the legitimacy of his or her needs. These behaviors send the message that the child is unloved and unwanted.
Isolating: Preventing a child from taking advantage of social or educational opportunities for growth. These behaviors send the message that the child is alone and unprotected in the world.
Ignoring: A passive state of being psychologically unavailable to a child and unwilling to respond to his or her behavior. Like rejecting behaviors, ignoring behaviors send the message that the child is unwanted and unworthy of love.
Terrorizing: Stimulating intense fear and creating a climate of unpredictable threat in a child’s life. These behaviors send the message that the world is random and unjust and that people cannot be trusted.
Corrupting: Missocializing a child—directly or by example—into harmful or antisocial patterns of behavior. Corrupting behaviors send the message that aggressive, sexually exploitive, substance-abusing, and other dangerous and immoral behaviors are acceptable and appropriate. (Garbarino, et al., 1986, p. 218-219).
Degrading: Depriving a child of a personal sense of dignity and self-respect. These behaviors send the message that the child is inadequate, lowly, and inferior compared to other like-aged children (Hart & Brassard, 1987, p. 17).
Metaphorically, children are always in the scene even when off stage, since they are deeply impacted by the coercive control that occurs around them. Having two distinct categories of “domestic violence” and “child abuse” rather than one category that explicitly encompasses adult and child victims seems to compound the difficulty in connecting research. Partner abuse is a child protection issue.
Children of Coercive Control extends Evan Stark’s path-breaking analysis of interpersonal violence to children, showing that coercive control is the most important cause and context of child abuse and child homicide outside a war zone, as well as of the sexual abuse, denigration, exploitation, isolation and subordination of children. The book provides a working model of the coercive control of children and illustrates its dynamics and consequences with dramatic cases drawn from the headlines and Dr. Stark’s forensic practice. The cases include those in which the coercive control of children runs in tandem with the coercive control of women, where children are “weaponized” in the coercive control of their mother and cases where abused mothers harm their children to survive or protect them from worse.
