“Learn about it before you need it.”
—DONNA, parent of a teen in an abusive relationship
Parents have varying experiences of finding out about their son’s or daughter’s abusive relationship. Some find out as soon as the abuse starts—they see the bruises, they witness the verbal or physical attack, or their child tells them. Others don’t find out until the violence has become so severe they are notified of it by their child’s school, a hospital, or the police. Still others don’t find out until after the relationship has ended. But there are a number of warning signs that can help parents recognize if their child is being abused. Although this chapter refers to an abused daughter, it could just as well be an abused son, and it can happen in either a heterosexual relationship or a same-sex relationship.
There are many signs of relationship abuse. The following questions can help you determine if your child is being abused.
Bruises, red marks (as from a slap), a limp, clumps of hair missing, torn clothes, burn or choke marks: These are visible signs of physical violence. Often the teen’s explanation doesn’t match the injury. And by the second or third time, the explanation is no longer plausible. By asking your daughter over and over what is going on, you may uncover the truth.
Peggy, Dana’s mom, describes injuries she noticed:
Dana is athletic, so she’d tell me that she had been injured when playing soccer. She didn’t used to get so many injuries, and she never had so many soccer games either. Finally, I confronted her and asked, “What is going on? Is Jason hitting you?” She denied it at first, but then she couldn’t explain how a soccer ball could have given her a red mark around her neck. She finally told me that Jason had choked her to keep her from leaving his house. This had been going on for months.
Peggy relates an incident she had with Dana in the supermarket:
She went to the market with me the other day, and she began rushing me through the checkout line. Jason had texted her, and she said she had to go home. She seemed to be afraid. I rushed with her and didn’t say anything. I heard Dana talking to Jason. She was explaining, apologizing, trying to calm him down, and telling him, “Don’t come over here! My mom’s here.” After she hung up, we had a long talk. That’s when she told me that Jason keeps interrogating her about where she’s been when he hasn’t been able to reach her.
Ask your teen why she is so jumpy, nervous, or afraid to displease or disagree with her boyfriend. Does she flinch when he lifts his hand to do something? In an outburst of anger, does he hit a wall or break something? Have you heard stories in which your daughter was not threatened directly, but was frightened by his temper or his violence toward someone or something else? These and other expressions of fear are important warning signs.
Peggy talks about signs that Jason was checking up on Dana:
Dana spent all of her time with Jason. She was either with him or they were texting. When they weren’t together, Dana thought his friends were watching her and reporting to him. Sometimes he hung out with our family, and he was really sweet. But after a while it seemed that he was everywhere she went, which confused us.
You may see evidence that your daughter is being watched, followed, checked up on. You may see her boyfriend suddenly showing up everywhere you go. The most common sign is constant texting and tracking of the victim via technology. Your daughter may be afraid not to reply to the constant texts and e-mails. These texts, phone calls, and conversations are often tension-filled and contain repeated explanations and apologies from your daughter, as if she were being interrogated about everything she wears, does, and says. You might find out that your daughter’s boyfriend is calling her siblings or friends to find out where she is or what she is doing, what she is wearing, whom she is interacting with, and so forth.
If he does these things, he is being emotionally abusive. Verbal attacks, talking in a mean and accusing tone of voice, using foul language, name-calling, and constantly criticizing, demeaning, and putting down the victim—these are ways abusers use words to hurt their partners. People often do not recognize this kind of behavior as abusive. Verbal attacks can be especially damaging because they undermine a person’s self-esteem. Verbal attacks are also powerful because they are interspersed with positive, complimentary, or more sensitive ways of talking to the victim. Thus, victims never know what to expect, and when they let their guard down they are open and vulnerable to the impact of suddenly and unexpectedly being accused or attacked, usually without any warning or clue as to the reason. As a parent, it is important for you to know that often the extent of the abuse is worse than what you have witnessed.
You may notice that your daughter is not doing things she used to enjoy, or is not doing as well in school as she used to. She may be spending so much time with her boyfriend, and be so consumed by the relationship, that she stops paying attention to anything else. Her close friends might be angry with her because they don’t see her anymore. When she tries to see her friends, her boyfriend gets angry, accuses her of cheating on him, or convinces her that they don’t need other friends or time apart. Parents often don’t know how isolated their daughter has become until they happen to talk with one of her friends and hear the friend’s perspective of what is happening.
You may find out that your daughter is having difficulty concentrating in school. Your daughter’s comments or explanations may alert you: “Jason says that only really nerdy kids play soccer. And besides, he wants me to spend all of my time with him. Isn’t that great?” Or: “Jason thinks all my friends are dumb and spoiled. I don’t know. Maybe he’s right.”
Although parents might be unhappy about these kinds of behavioral changes, they may not suspect abuse. These changes are signs of emotional abuse, however, even if there is not physical abuse.
You might notice your daughter apologizing and making excuses when her boyfriend does things to upset her. She may not acknowledge that she feels bad when he hurts her. Instead, she blames herself for his mistreatment and defends him, justifying why he has treated her badly. She is protective of him, seeing him as misunderstood or victimized by others.
You may have noticed that your daughter is having trouble making decisions for herself, doing things for herself, or trusting her own judgment. You might see that her attention is focused exclusively on her abusive partner, and rarely on herself or her family.
A clear sign that your daughter’s boyfriend is or could be violent toward her is if you see his explosive temper or violence toward other people, animals (such as pets), or things. If you witness him throwing things or hitting walls, hurting pets, or punching people when he’s angry, these are clear indications that he does not control his temper. This kind of explosiveness is intimidating, and it is just as frightening as violence directly aimed at your daughter.
As you saw in the last chapter, Dana started to change—she didn’t care about school or her appearance. You may have noticed that your daughter no longer dresses well or pays attention to her appearance. Something is wrong when a daughter who usually spends time each morning fixing her hair, putting on makeup, and carefully selecting outfits to wear to school is suddenly having a hard time getting up in the morning and caring about how she looks. She may be covering bruises with long sleeves and turtlenecks, even in summer. Her boyfriend’s emotional abuse and jealousy may be making her afraid of other guys’ attention. His accusations about how she “comes on” to other guys, and her fear of his violence, may lead her to wear clothes that cover or hide her body. His constant criticisms or erratic violent outbursts, along with her isolation, may affect her self-esteem so badly that she is depressed and therefore not taking care of herself. Neglected appearance is also a major warning sign of sexual abuse or rape.
If your daughter is depressed, she may experience sudden weight loss or gain. Other signs of depression are sleeping too much or too little, inability to concentrate, withdrawing, apathy, showing little pleasure or enjoyment, and expressing thoughts of suicide.
Sometimes behavioral change is caused by substance abuse. Alcohol and drug use is a common factor in abusive teen relationships. Your daughter may be drinking alcohol or using drugs—as a way to cope, as part of the relationship (i.e., they drink or use drugs together), at his insistence, or as a continuation of a problem she had before the relationship that has now become worse. Some parents have found out about dating violence through dealing with their daughter’s substance abuse. Some abusive partners force their victim to drink or do drugs. Drinking and abusing drugs increases the risk for more violence.
One study found that, in junior high and high school, teens who drank alcohol before age thirteen were more likely to be both victims and perpetrators of physical violence in relationships. Another study found that teenage girls in abusive relationships are more likely to abuse drugs and alcohol, have eating disorders, engage in unsafe sexual behaviors, and attempt suicide.7
Although alcohol and drug abuse is often connected to relationship abuse, these substances do not cause it. Not everyone who abuses alcohol or drugs becomes violent, and some people are violent whether they drink or not.
If you think that your daughter is in a relationship with a gang member or at risk for being in a gang, it is important to be aware that relationship abuse is common within gang culture. The violence may be more visible and public than in non-gang cultures. The main reasons a child joins a gang are to belong and to feel protected. But being part of a gang and being in a relationship with a gang member carries a high risk for relationship violence. Men dominating women is pervasive in gang culture. Girls have also reported that the way their boyfriends related to them in private was more reasonable (“softer”) than the way they behaved in front of other gang members, when they were rough and abusive with the girls to prove their status.
Surveillance, checking up, and threats are especially frightening for victims whose boyfriends are in gangs, because threats can come not only from the boyfriend but from the whole gang as well.
Consider the possibility that your child may be in a same-sex relationship. Adolescence is a period of sexual exploration and experimentation. Parents are often in denial about whether their child is dating or in a committed relationship, even a heterosexual one. It is even more common for parents to be unaware that their child’s “best friend” relationships might be more intimate than that. This is because many same-sex relationships are kept secret.
The dynamics of same-sex relationships are very similar to those of heterosexual relationships, and so are the warning signs. The major difference is that often parents don’t know about the relationship unless the teen is open about it. It is also more difficult to identify who is the abuser and who is the abuse victim if parents assume that the abuser is always male and the victim is always female. See chapter 19 for more information about this.
Trauma results from stressful events that are prolonged, overwhelming, or unpredictable. These events are out of the victims’ control. According to child psychologist Bruce Perry, nature equips us all to react to stress in one of two different ways: hypoarousal or hyperarousal. Indicators of hypoarousal are withdrawal, defiance, depression, and resistance. Signs of hyperarousal are hyperactivity, inattention, vigilance, and aggression. When someone experiences trauma, both reactions become heightened and more extreme. Stress causes confused and distorted thinking and suppresses short-term memory. When teens are stressed, they do not think clearly and their memory is impaired. When teens are traumatized, memory and thinking problems become worse. Trauma creates a heightened stress receptor within the brain. In this manner, traumatized teens are often anxious, nervous, and fearful, and subsequently are more aggressive or withdrawn.8 They disconnect from their own emotions and from others who are usually close to them. Their attempts to disconnect can be seen in some of the ways they try to cope with trauma (e.g., cutting school, smoking, drinking, and staying busy).
These responses are normal reactions to abnormal circumstances or experiences, such as relationship abuse. Teens reacting to trauma are doing their best to cope with being overwhelmed or frightened, and having a nervous system that is overstimulated. These reactions cause parents to worry because their child isn’t behaving the way he or she usually does.
Common symptoms of trauma include an inability to relax or sleep, or sleeping a lot more than usual; overeating or an inability to eat; agitation; impatience and irritability; fear or panic reactions; “freeze” responses such as being immobilized or unable to act or make decisions; hypervigilance; inability to concentrate or focus; and somatic reactions such as back or stomach pain or headaches. Parents can also develop symptoms of trauma as a reaction to what is happening to their teen. They may experience hypervigilance, physical stress responses, nightmares, panic/anxiety, inability to concentrate, or an obsessive focus on their child or on the abuser.
“Regulation” and “dysregulation” are terms used to describe the physical reactions to stress and the ability to tolerate stress. Regulation is the ability to experience and maintain stress within one’s window of tolerance, generally described as being calm. Dysregulation is the experience of stress outside of one’s window of tolerance. This state is commonly referred to as being “stressed out” or in a state of distress.9
Parents who are aware of their children’s trauma symptoms as well as their own are better able to understand the seemingly extreme and changing behaviors associated with trauma. This makes it clear to parents that they must address their own need for help to become calm and more “regulated” before they can begin to solve their children’s problems.
It is important to ask teens thought-provoking questions that help them to recognize warning signs of abuse—in their own relationships as well as in those of their friends. You can start a discussion at any time. Examples of good conversation starters are the following:
Use the information about warning signs in this chapter to think of your own conversation starters. It is very important to have these conversations many times. Assure your teen that if they ever need to talk about anything happening in their relationships, you are available to listen.