What makes a strong relationship between parents and children so important when dealing with a teen’s abusive relationship? Abuse often involves patterns of secrecy and isolation that further endanger the victim after the abuse has started. The more teens keep the emotional, sexual, and physical abuse secret from family and friends, the more ashamed they become. The more ashamed teens become, the more isolated and the more protective of their abusers they become.
If, in addition, an abusive boyfriend threatens his girlfriend with more severe violence or even death, then she becomes increasingly isolated and terrified. The abuser may also isolate her through jealousy, restrictiveness, excessive criticism, and humiliation. This pattern often results in the alienation of the victim from her parents and other people who had been important to her. The more the abuser succeeds in isolating his victim from her family and friends, the less protection she has from both the physical violence and the effects of the brainwashing or emotional abuse. As isolation increases, violence tends to become more frequent and more severe. As a parent, by maintaining your communication and connection with your child, you may be able to interfere with these attempts to isolate her.
Tanisha and Tyrone’s story illustrates the importance of maintaining communication and connection with your child.
Tanisha met Tyrone when she was seventeen, in her last year of high school. Tyrone was nineteen and working as a mechanic. Barbara, Tanisha’s mother, describes their relationship and the family’s way of dealing with it:
Tyrone seemed like a nice guy. He was certainly devoted to Tanisha. He was calling and coming over all the time. Then one Sunday we were going to church, and Tanisha was wearing sunglasses and a big hat that hid her face. I saw bruises on her ankles, and I asked her what happened. She said, “Don’t worry, we were just in a little car accident last night.” She showed me her black eye, and I said to myself, “This girl is not telling the truth.” After denying it, she finally admitted that Tyrone drank too much at a party the night before. He beat her up because he thought she was looking at another guy.
Later, we talked some more, and it turned out that Tyrone drinks a lot. He is also very jealous, and there had been other instances of his getting out of control. Tanisha is a girl who stands up for herself. She’s outspoken.
But around Tyrone, she loses her voice. I told her, “You deserve better. What are you going to do about this?” She said, “I won’t put up with this. It’ll never happen again.”
Well, over the next two years, it happened again and again. She moved in with him. She’d still come around because we’re a close family. She’d cry to me and ask my advice. I’d say to her, “You need to find the strength to get out.” I’d tell her to pray. She knew she could come to me. I understood what she was going through.
I prayed a lot; I was so worried about her. I was glad she also had her grandma to talk to. She’s her favorite. We had family meetings. Tanisha’s younger brother and sister, her uncle, her grandma, and I would talk about what to do. Tanisha was always welcome in our home, but Tyrone wasn’t. Tanisha wanted us to at least be civil to Tyrone. We all disagreed about what to do. Her uncle refused to speak to either one of them. But I got everyone to realize that Tanisha is making her own choices, and we have to accept that. She’s made her bed, and she’s going to have to lie in it until she decides she doesn’t want to anymore. My mother said, “You can’t tell people what to do because they won’t listen. She knows we don’t like this, that we’re scared for her.” We, as a family, will never turn our back on her. Having family discussions helped us get through it.
After two years, Tanisha realized she was going home to her family more and more often, and finally ended her relationship with Tyrone.
Witnessing a teen or young adult go through the ups and downs of an abusive relationship often means helplessly watching as she makes foolish, even dangerous choices. It may mean watching the effects of being treated badly for a long time: serious signs of stress, lack of confidence and self-respect, clinging to scraps of kindness from her boyfriend, sacrificing herself while he seems to thrive. It may mean seeing her feeling powerful and ready to take charge one moment, and defeated or beaten down the next.
As she goes through this, other people tend to withdraw from her, depriving her of the one thing she needs more than anything else: connection to people other than her boyfriend. While the abuser is trying to keep her away from other close relationships, her connections with healthy people who support her strengths become more important.
Children sometimes make choices that are contrary to their parents’ values and what their parents have taught them. In situations like this, parents have a valuable position in their teen’s life, even as the person who abuses her becomes more and more important to her. Parents don’t want to cut off their connection to a teen who is going through this, or stop their willingness to listen, hear her out, and acknowledge her perspectives, even if parents disagree with those perspectives. This may mean parents hold back, not saying what they think, in order to pay attention to what their child is telling them.
By doing these things, parents maintain the connection and make it possible to have some impact. Parents are a resource, and a teen in an abusive situation must see his or her parents (or another adult) as people to turn to. By acknowledging and supporting their teen’s autonomy and the independence that their teen has, whether or not they think their child is ready for it, parents are acknowledging reality and dealing with what is rather than how they would like things to be. This is a challenge! But no one wants to lose the connection with his or her child to the power of an abusive relationship.
Parents can ask their teen about her point of view, her feelings, and her opinions, as well as tell her their own. This can be done in such a way that they are exchanging and sharing perspectives without one party being proven right and the other wrong.
When parents are thinking about how to deal with the violence, they should include the teen in the conversation: “How can we deal with this together?” She may be doing the best that she can at that moment; an effective approach must take that into account and build on what else she can do. Parents can aim to help their teen make her own decisions rather than make decisions for her and risk pushing her away. It is important to problem-solve, brainstorm, and make safety plans together, helping her see that she doesn’t have to go through this alone.
Parents may not be able to use this approach if their teen is so isolated and trapped that she is beyond the point of allowing anyone to talk with her about her relationship. Even so, it is usually possible to find some way to show acceptance, caring, and appreciation of her strengths. It is also possible to help her find another adult to talk to if she doesn’t want to talk to a parent.
It is important to find all possible ways to build on a teen’s strengths: to notice and appreciate what is working well for her, and to encourage her to focus on aspects of and activities in her life besides the relationship—especially areas that have not yet begun to deteriorate, such as school, after-school activities, sports, lessons, hobbies, or other friendships. If she can do this, she can become strong enough to be free of the grip of the battering relationship.
Valerie, mother of a teenage daughter, had this to say:
My fifteen-year-old daughter, Jessica, is a dancer, and when she was seeing Bruce, she began to give up her dancing. I reminded her how much she loves to dance and how strong it makes her feel. I encouraged her to continue dancing. She did, and after the relationship ended, she was relieved to be able to dance without any restrictions imposed by Bruce.
Parents can notice healthy and positive ways their teen is coping with the stress and resisting being controlled. It is empowering to teens when a parent acknowledges how difficult things are under these circumstances and that they appreciate how she is trying her best. Parents must recognize and appreciate the ways in which she handles tension, conflict, fear, and restricted options. For example, parents could say the following:
Parents can strengthen their relationships with their teens by spending time with them or having conversations that have nothing to do with the battering relationship. It can be a relief for teens to have the kinds of parent-child interactions they used to have before the abuse. The family might actually have some fun together—watching TV, going to a movie, or shopping. These activities let an abused teen know that the family values the time together. If parents can do this without having a fight about her boyfriend, they will be allowing room for their parent-child relationship to be free of his interference.
If a teen only hears negative comments or criticism from parents, their bond with her will weaken, and she will be less able to resist the abuse. When parents keep their resentment under control so that it doesn’t inhabit every corner of their relationship with their teen, it strengthens the parent-teen relationship. In the long run, supporting her abilities and strengthening the relationship between parents and teens can go a long way toward helping a battering victim believe in herself and get away from the violence.
It is very important to keep the paths of communication as open as possible. In addition, what parents say and how they say it is key to maintaining strong relationships with teens.
Tanisha’s boyfriend Tyrone picked a fight with her every time she went to her family’s house for Sunday dinner. Tanisha’s mother said, “We knew that he was trying to get her to stop seeing her family. We kept encouraging her to come. I knew that you have to keep the door open or your child will be lost.”
Abuse can lead to emotionally charged interactions between parents and children that make it easy for communication to be cut off. When both a parent and a teen are afraid of their temper or of becoming overwhelmingly upset, the conversation can stop. Sometimes a situation that could be handled in a straightforward manner becomes a crisis because of a parent’s over-reaction. One parent’s advice to other parents is, “Don’t yell. Hold your tongue. Suck it up.”
Because such intense feelings and reactions are involved when dealing with violence, extra efforts to initiate and sustain communication are often required of parents. Rosa, eighteen years old, said, “I can see my mom trying not to yell at me, like she did when he gave me a black eye. I get it—I’d also be upset if that happened to my daughter. But I then just tried to keep her from finding out what was going on. Then she tried harder to talk to me. Now she talks to me, she hears me, she gives me advice, and she tells me, ‘I know the way you feel.’”
Even under the best of circumstances, teens often keep their feelings or details about their intimate relationships from their parents. Once a teen knows her parents disapprove of her boyfriend, she will assume that she cannot tell them anything about him or what is going on between them. She may be afraid of her parents’ emotional outbursts about her relationship, or their interference, or that her freedom will be restricted. No matter what parents do, there is no guarantee that their daughter will talk to them about her relationship in general, or about the violence in particular. But to be an effective support for a teen’s safety and for her getting free from the violence, parents need to know what she is dealing with, and she needs to know that her parents can help. Communication between parents and their daughter is essential for her safety.
In day-to-day interactions with teens, there are many opportunities to invite them to talk about what is going on. Parents can ask their teen about feelings and problems she is experiencing as well as information about her safety. It isn’t necessary to focus on the specifics of her relationship to get a picture of how it is affecting her. According to Thomas Gordon in Parent Effectiveness Training:
One of the most effective and constructive ways of responding to children’s feelings is the ‘door-opener’ or ‘invitation to say more.’ These door-openers keep your own feelings and thoughts out of the communication process. Young people feel encouraged to open up, pour out their feelings and ideas. These door-openers also convey acceptance of the child and respect for [her] as a person.36
What Gordon refers to as door-openers are noncommittal responses or explicit invitations to say more in response to something a child says. Examples of door-openers are “I see,” “Really?” “Tell me more,” and “I’d like to hear about it.”
Your attitude makes a difference when inviting a teen to talk to you. Without a receptive attitude, efforts to communicate will be ineffective. For example, parents must want to hear what the teen has to say. If they don’t have time, or if they really don’t want to hear it, it is better to say so, or to arrange to talk at another time. Parents should avoid inviting their teen to talk, then stopping her with judgments, telling her what to do, or over-reacting to what she says. They must also be aware of when their tone of voice and facial expressions may contradict their words. For example, there is a difference between asking, “How did you get the bruise on your arm?” with concern (inviting an open response) and asking the same question with anger and blame (triggering a defensive response to your accusation).
Parents must also want to be helpful, and feel empathic about the teen’s struggles. They must be able to accept her feelings, even if those feelings are completely different from their own or from what they think she should feel. This is especially difficult to do, and may take time to develop. It also requires parents to let go of their need to control her, and to acknowledge that although they might help and support her, she is the one who must actively work on decisions and solutions to the problems she is facing.
There are times when it is important to advise or instruct teens, or to let them know what you, as their parent, think or how you feel. But the most important tool in communicating with teens is effective listening. And a teen who is truly listened to is more likely to listen when you express yourself as well.
Effective listening means using open responses that acknowledge a child’s feelings, as well as the child’s perceptions of his or her problems. Open responses allow expression of feelings, understanding, and clarification. Open responses are nonjudgmental and empathic. They are nonverbal as well as verbal. Effective listening means noticing nonverbal cues (“You look upset” or “You’re shrugging and rolling your eyes. You don’t agree?”). Effective listening is a first step in problem solving.
Lucinda has been going with Robert for two years. Even though her parents are distressed about Robert’s violence, she says that her friends envy the way she can talk to her parents.
Lucinda: “I have had it with Robert. I told him we’re finished, and I don’t want him to come around here anymore.”
Father: “What happened?”
Lucinda: “He’s been calling me from jail trying to control everything I do. He gets mad if I’m not home when he calls. He has his friends watching me.”
Father: “He has? I thought we didn’t have to worry with him in jail! So he’s still trying to control you.”
Lucinda: “Yes, and I saw a girl on the news who got shot by her boyfriend. I don’t want to see Robert anymore.”
Father: “Oh, my God. Shot! You think Robert could do that to you?”
Lucinda: “His friends followed me today, and he called and he said, ‘I saw you, I was watching you, I know everything you do.’”
Father: “No wonder you’re so afraid of him. This frightens me too.”
Lucinda: “I never want to see him again.”
Mother: “Do you really believe this in your heart?”
Lucinda (in tears): “I really love him. I’m afraid I’ll go back to him. But I never stood up to Robert before today. I can’t live like this anymore.”
Mother: “I’m afraid too. How will you get through this, breaking up with Robert, getting away from his friends and his threats, but loving him and missing him?”
Lucinda: “I don’t know.”
Father: “It’s hard to do what you did today. Maybe you’re afraid of what he’ll do to get back at you, but you should also be proud of yourself.”
Lucinda: “Maybe I can do this. Do you think I have to move away? What should I do?”
Lucinda’s parents listened without jumping in with too many of their own reactions. They clarified what was happening to her, and acknowledged her feelings. They recognized the change in her response to Robert and supported it. By the end of this conversation, Lucinda and her parents were ready to problem-solve. They all understood that the problem was twofold: how to get away from Robert, and how to deal with the fact that Lucinda still loves him and might feel like going back to him.
Parents often react to a conversation like this by thinking, “This is all fine and well in a book, but that isn’t really the way people talk!” But this example is based on an actual dialogue in a real family. Such a dialogue really is possible for any family. Each person will find their own way to communicate and can use these ideas to add to their effectiveness in a way that is comfortable for them.
Some teens resist advice from parents and respond better to a problem-solving process in which parents refrain from telling them what to do. As parents, you can reflect on your past experiences: How does your child respond when you offer advice? Your child might respond better when advice is offered rather than imposed. For example, you can preface advice by saying, “My way of doing this is… Would that work for you?” or “I have a suggestion.”
It is often helpful to acknowledge the fact that your teen’s problems create problems for you too, and for other members of the family. While at times it is better to set such feelings aside and listen to a teen, there are also times when parents need to express their own feelings. A teen must know that his or her parents are affected as well. Parents can think about how to express feelings in a way that does not close down communication among family members.
Lucinda’s parents reacted to what Lucinda was telling them. They expressed their feelings and asked about hers. Some experts have recommended using “I-statements” to let children know that there are consequences to their behavior without blaming, accusing, punishing, or using other approaches that make children stop listening or become defensive. An “I-statement” consists of an observation about one’s own response to something that someone else is doing and, if it fits, a request for the other person to change what they are doing. For example:
It is often challenging to find ways to give teens information so that they are open to hearing it. Sometimes teens respond when parents share their own experiences. If a parent has had a similar experience—for example, with a relationship breaking up, or having been abused—telling a teen about it might convey understanding and empathy. It is a way of saying, “I know what you’re going through.” It also conveys the message that it takes strength to get through these experiences, and that the parent appreciates the teen’s strengths.
Parents may have a long-term perspective of a teen’s experiences that they can share with her. This can be especially true if they have been in an abusive relationship. A parent can tell their teen, “I’ve been there, and it was hard. But I’ve dealt with it. I’ve gotten out of it.” What makes the difference is how this is presented. Parents can ask themselves, “What, specifically, is similar between my experience and my daughter’s?” Usually the details are not similar, and teens are interested in hearing about what is most relevant to them. If you aim to tell your teen to “do as I did,” you are bound to fail. Your teen will be quick to say that the situations are not the same. What’s more, it is important for teens not to be the same as their parents.
Parents can also encourage their children to communicate with others besides them. While most parents might like teens to come directly to them to talk about any issue, this is not realistic. Teens need others to talk to as well, and they are safer talking with other adults who are helpful and supportive rather than not talking to anyone at all. It also broadens a teen’s safety net if others know what is going on in an abusive relationship and are available to help.
Parents can be supportive of their teen by acknowledging that she may want to talk to another adult besides them, especially about dating, and they can help her to identify someone. Teens might be able to seek out an older sister or brother, a grandmother, a friend’s mother, a school counselor, or a neighbor who is approachable and can be trusted. They may even find out that after sharing things with someone else, they find that they are less reluctant to actually talk to their parents. The message to a teen is still the same: Open communication is important.
Parents often feel responsible for what happens to their children. Of course, parents want to protect their children from harm and help them to be happy. It is important that parents recognize these feelings and how such feelings can lead them to act in a controlling manner. Fear, helplessness, and anger—at the loss of control over a teen’s and the family’s well-being—these are feelings that lead most parents to want to control the people or events that are causing them. Parents can “talk” to themselves, saying things like this:
Acknowledge your fear. Allow yourself to feel that you are terrified that your teen is in serious danger. Accept that you feel frustrated that she “allows herself” to be treated badly. Prepare yourself for the deep sense of powerlessness that comes when you acknowledge that you have no control over your child’s choices.
It is difficult for any parent to see their teen in danger and have only very limited ways to protect her. Parents actually have no control over the ways in which her choices affect her future or put her in danger. By acknowledging all of this, by being prepared to tolerate these very strong feelings, and by becoming aware of the impulse to control the teen, parents can avoid power struggles. The Serenity Prayer can be helpful:
God, grant me the serenity to accept the things I cannot change, courage to change the things I can, and wisdom to know the difference.
Even though parents feel helpless about having an impact on the situation, they are still an important influence and resource for teens. When engaging with teens about their behavior, parents influence them to make changes themselves. Even when it doesn’t look like teens are listening, they usually struggle within themselves, and do have their parents’ points of view in mind as they make choices.
Parents must remember that they have had—and do still have—an important place in their children’s lives, and this will continue to be true. Their relationships with their children are more important and longer lasting than the abusive relationship. Most teens want to maintain their relationships with their parents, even if they want it on their own terms. They seek out their parents, especially if they can trust that their parents will listen to them and will not do battle with them or challenge their autonomy. Often parents have such an important place in the lives of their children that even if a rift occurs, children eventually want to restore the relationship.
Of course, some parents are able to control their children by making their children afraid of them. Fear that a parent might over-react or react violently can make children careful not to report or do anything that will set the parent off, or make them lie or keep a situation secret. This fear does not help children learn to make positive choices or to change their behavior, except to avoid conflict or violence. In fact, it makes it more likely that they won’t be able to think clearly and will become frozen or paralyzed by conflict, control, or abuse in their relationships. A more effective approach is one that actually encourages children to learn how to think about options, risks, and consequences for themselves, and make good choices. Janeece said:
I was afraid to tell my parents the truth about what was going on with John. When they found out, I was amazed that they could listen to me without freaking out.
Teens need information in order to understand what is happening to them and to make decisions, and parents can help them get this information. Parents can learn facts about dating violence/abuse and share what they learn or help teens find it for themselves. Sometimes teens will be more likely to accept this information from other sources, even if what they find out is similar to what a parent has been telling them.
A great deal of information is easily accessible to teens, especially on the Internet. Sometimes teens will authoritatively share something they read online that their parents already told them about. Parents can be appreciative when this happens—this is evidence of their influence.
Another way to have influence with teens is to be a safe harbor for them. When teens are distressed, they are most likely to seek comfort from their abusive partners. When that doesn’t work, however, they will often seek nurturing from their parents. Parents may just sit with their teen, listen if the teen needs to talk, show quiet affection, or do something together to take a break from the distress.
Many teens are defiant and refuse to cooperate or to work out solutions to their problems. Sometimes it takes time and repeated efforts on a parent’s part to try new approaches that avoid power struggles before a teen changes old ways of reacting. Sometimes the influence of the batterer makes a victim hostile toward her parents, no matter what approach parents use. It is important to keep trying, because at some point the batterer’s influence may weaken.
Sometimes other factors are affecting your teen’s behavior, such as alcohol or drugs, or perhaps she was defiant, sullen, or hostile even before the battering relationship began. Liz had been using crack and alcohol, but her mother, Peggy, didn’t know about it. “I thought her wild behavior came from an attitude problem,” said Peggy. Attending a support group for parents of teens, such as Al-Anon, can be useful in situations such as this to help you change ways in which you respond to your child so that you become more steady and effective.
While parents are horrified to see their teen’s abuser control and threaten her, punish her, restrict her movements, and criticize her, it may come as a surprise when they realize they are using these same tactics. Parents can find themselves in a battle for control over the teen—a battle between them and the abuser. Parents who use ultimatums (“It’s either him or me!” or “If you continue to see Tim, you’ll have to move out!”) create or worsen a power struggle.
Jennifer said, “My mom told me if I continued to be with him, she didn’t want me in the house anymore. So I ran away to my cousin’s house.”
Imposing one’s power and trying to control teens generally backfires. The outcome is usually that the teen is not motivated to carry out the imposed solution; the teen is resentful of the parent; the parent has difficulty enforcing the solution; and/or the teen has no opportunity to experience the consequences of his or her choices. Power struggles consume energy and escalate tension—they don’t solve the problems.
Using parental power and control does not work in abusive situations in particular. The abused teen feels caught between her parent and her batterer, feeling that she has to choose between them, or that she is controlled by both. Power struggles with parents make it even more difficult for a teen to make decisions and to act on what is best for her. These struggles undermine her strength and ability to think for herself. Power struggles with a parent may align a teen more firmly with the abuser. The bond between victim and abuser can become stronger as the parent becomes the enemy they have in common. The abused teen may experience all of these difficulties even if parents do not engage in power struggles about the abusive relationship. The teen’s own struggles in the relationship with her boyfriend become that much harder for her if she is caught in a battle for control with her parents.
There are many ways in which parents get hooked into power struggles over abusive relationships. When parents give ultimatums, they are often doing what the controlling boyfriend does. Abusers also tell their partners that they can’t do things they want to do, “or else.” They may say, “It’s them or me—your parents want to keep you from being happy, and don’t understand what we have together.”
Ask yourself the following questions:
A controlling boyfriend does these same things, constantly criticizing what his girlfriend says and does, what she wears, and how she looks. He may criticize her relationship with her family members, especially her parents, perhaps telling her she is stupid to believe that her parents have her best interests in mind. He may be constantly suspicious and accuse her of lying. She may be afraid to say anything to her boyfriend because she is afraid to start arguments. She may feel the same about talking with her parents, especially about her relationship.
How can parents avoid power struggles with battered teens? They can do this by accepting the reality that they actually cannot control their teens, but they can influence them. They can recognize their own feelings, manage their own reactions, and act as a supportive resource.
When a conflict is about to escalate into a power struggle, parents can disengage. This means they set aside their own feelings so they can listen and respond to their teen. They do not have to take their teen’s actions, reactions, or behavior personally. She is not doing anything “to them.” When parents disengage, they don’t get hooked and say things they don’t mean. They can sort out their feelings after resolving the conflict with their teen, when their feelings won’t interfere.
So many things surrounding the abusive relationship can consume parents’ attention: their daughter, her attitude, the emotional rollercoaster everyone is on, the threat of violence, the fear for their daughter’s safety and well-being. It is important for parents to acknowledge how overwhelming this can be. Most parents find they have to set limits to how much they let their time, attention, and emotions be taken over by the abusive relationship. Setting limits and boundaries can help to avoid power struggles. Parents can also make sure they get enough rest so that they can be discerning about which battles and worries to focus on.
Another way parents can avoid power struggles and defuse escalating tension is by listening calmly and reflectively to their teen, and clarifying what the teen feels, thinks, or wants. They can ask questions to clear up misunderstandings or miscommunication. These questions can clarify everyone’s perspectives of the conflict. For example:
Teen: “Bob and I are going out tonight. See you later.”
Parent: “Where are you and Bob going?”
Teen: “You always have to know everything I do. I can’t go anywhere! You’re trying to control me. You treat me like a child! Bob’s right. He says you just can’t face it—your little girl is grown up.”
Parent: “You feel that I am treating you like a child when I ask where you are going?”
Teen: “You don’t trust me.”
Parent: “I think you are very capable and sensible. It doesn’t matter how old you are, I think it is safer for someone to know where you are going. That’s why I often tell you where I’m going.”
Teen: “Well, I don’t like all your questions and rules. And I know you don’t trust Bob. But everything’s okay now.”
Parent: “You’re right. I don’t trust Bob. I know you like him a lot, and that you are happy to be getting along well now. I’m glad to see you happy. But ever since he hit you, I’ve been afraid. I think you still have to be careful when you go out with him. Do you understand how I feel?”
Teen: “I’m not so afraid of him anymore. He’s changed.”
Parent: “Can we work out a way I can feel more reassured by you and you can feel more trusted by me? I will feel more reassured if I know where you are and what time to expect you home.”
Teen: “Do you trust me?”
Parent: “Yes, I trust you when I know that you are thinking about your own safety.”
What we are saying may seem contradictory. While we are saying that it is most effective to respect our children’s choices, we are also saying that your child may be in a dangerous situation and that you must respond. We recommend an attitude that reflects your actual lack of control as well as your acceptance of your child’s situation at the moment. This approach enables effective interventions, not power- or control-motivated interventions.