“He is psychologically strong, he keeps her tied by invisible threads.” A story that seems to come from the Middle Ages.

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Domestic abuse is one of the great dangers in this time that we are experiencing.

Women in this period have reason to worry.

Before the Lockdown caused by the Virus, cases of domestic abuse by often frustrated men were steadily increasing.

It seems absurd that precisely in this new century, in which, according to our imagination of 30-40 years ago, we should travel around the space. We should be living in some new town on the Moon or on Mars, we still find ourselves talking about domestic abuse instead.

We still talking of men who take advantage of their role of power towards women.

Not only has there been an increase in the killings of women, but the emotional and psychological abuse that makes you doubt your right to live as you want as a woman. For some of them, even to be in the world, has increased exponentially tricky.

Each of us knows personal cases, it is not uncommon to speak with friends and occasional interlocutors and hear stories that seem to come from the Middle Ages.

The new trend is now in young men, those who are between 30 and 45 years old, who are starting more close relationships with women who have a stronger character than their mothers in the past. The new woman doesn’t want to be like their mothers, just the ones who take care of the family. 

They want to be part of the Society,  have a vital role in Society and this attitude, they desire to be powerful and influential like a normal human being, unfortunately, is not well digestible by many men.

Lately, I have had a clear example of domestic abuse, not even well attributable to the person concerned in “abuse”, but which in reality was and continues to be even if in a different way.

A young woman, stuck in a new city, living alone, where one of her employers, first fascinates her with roles and freedoms in the workplace, then attracts her by making her believe that he has her own interests. Tries to make her fall in love, makes her imagine a life full of enthusiasm and pleasure and then, once brought into the house and forced to leave her apartment, he begins a psychological work of possession and control that leads her to lose credibility in herself, then her freedom.

She starts to see less her friends, she no longer hears them even on the phone or in social networks, or at least she could manage just away from his eyes because she can’t stand his continuous “control questions”: “who was in the phone?”, “what you were talking about it?”.

She no longer attends her workmates for lunch or during spare times, because he is always more obsesses to question her of what they were talking about it or why she was smiling to another person. Everything becomes very mechanical and automatic. Everything starts to be under serious control.

Even her relatives can no longer hear, and visits are reduced to almost nothing.

Even Christmas passes under his control, and once pleasant visits to your family become an ordeal where you can’t wait for everything to end.

Then the psychological pressure when she finally tries to rebel, when she asks for more space and her attitude to change the course makes him the excuse to be harsher and start to accuse her of being mad, sick, who would need a Doctor, who takes her to someone he knows and who in his presence will explain to the doctor what is wrong with his woman’s mind.

Drive the car at high speed to try to scare her, the abuse is regularly, and every single thing is forward one clear target: keep control on her. 

Peremptory orders to eat and behave as he wishes, the need to have a woman under control. The shadows of his family shortcomings, perhaps the memory of his parents who kept control over him, the clear desire to transfer that reality with his current partner.

He doesn’t have almost any contact with his family, and so he wants the same for her.

He thinks he is right. He thinks this is the way to show love. But in fact, is just the way to be a man that abuses a woman and where love doesn’t exist, but it’s only controlling. Pure mental control.

Leave her alone at home become a routine, continue his life.

No dating in a restaurant, a rare visit to the Cinema or Museum, no travel. No question about what she likes or not.

This is an absolute expression of control and abuse.

It is more terrible than she sees.

She runs away from home, he continues to offend her, advises a Doctor for her head that he considers “sick”.

In fact, she is really sick, because after just four months, she still does not realize the abuse and that she really needs help. But not with him. 

Alone with trusted friends. With his family.

But she still doesn’t open herself, she doesn’t realize the abuse.

He is psychologically intense; he keeps her tied by invisible threads. 

Work, financial dependence, its psychological presence is strong.

She won’t leave the town, but she scares, she refuses herself in silence and the rare time she opens up, she reacts so severely if someone tries to help to make a dangerous move.

She changes, becomes acid, entirely harsh and inflexible, but with others, with those who want to help her. She does not want to see the reality of the facts. She still has relationships with him. 

It’s is no doubt: she is clearly under emotional and domestic abuse.

She is alone, too alone. 

It is challenging to help her because she no longer believes in anything. 

An inner world has been created, a kind of a self-defence in which it stands as a champion of itself. But it shows in this attitude weakness and clearly that the abuse has been violent and that it continues in more subtle forms.

Like her, millions of other women live the same situation, and even the governments of countries considered civilized, always have on the table laws and programs to fight this new scourge of this century.

The new generation, often raised with violent video games and aggressive music, has churned out a generation of frustrated and dangerous “new men” who are attempting to undermine specific achievements that women had 30-35 years ago.

Now everything is in danger for them, young people in their thirties surrounded by peers who are revealing themselves as the monsters of their video games.

Oppressed and oppressive people raised in detached family areas and probably oppressive and violent as a result.

The law can do a lot, especially educating. Still, for existing cases, it is we who can do a lot, not detaching ourselves from these people, but trying to be close to them, even when they want to close the door in our faces, often offending and attacking us.

But they are not attacking us, they are just creating a barrier around themselves, because ‘they are afraid, because’ they understand that something is not bright. Still, if you have experienced psychological abuse in this way, it takes time and patience before these women know where they are and only when everything is evident in their mind, perhaps only then will they be able to try to get out of this experience and take the road to be free and independent again.

One thing is sure: we cannot leave them alone.

If you want to know more about domestic violence, visit the University of Kentucky website, where you will find the 10 signs that will make you understand when domestic and psychological abuse towards weaker people is an act.

©massimousai