The dynamics of any couple are hard to fathom, but conflict can be deceptively subtle, warns relationship expert Kate Figes.
The photographs were indeed shocking. Charles Saatchi's large hand around his wife Nigella Lawson's throat as they sat having an alfresco lunch at Scott's in Mayfair, London. It's the haunting look of deep fear in Lawson's eyes that suggests this is more than just a "playful tiff", as Saatchi subsequently said, hours before receiving a police caution for assault. Lawson, who has moved out of the family home, temporarily at least, is nowhere to be seen.
The media storm surrounding these photos has highlighted what those helping victims of domestic abuse have known for a long time - that it can affect couples of every social stratum, even seemingly confident, successful women who have the means to leave. Domestic violence is one of the most unreported and misunderstood crimes. Two women a week in the UK are killed by someone they know well. Others live silently in fear for years of what their partner might do to them should they leave.
But perhaps what these pictures prove best is our confusion around what domestic violence actually is. In the past few days there have been mountains of speculation around the Saatchi-Lawson marriage: Saatchi's temperament (he's "explosive") and Lawson's troubled past (her mother would "shout and say 'I'm going to hit you till you cry"') have been cited in an attempt to explain what must surely have been an exception rather than the rule.
We don't want to believe otherwise from such a golden couple.
But a celebrity union is no different from any other marriage and just as prone to the wielding of power and control, which is, of course, the substance of most abuse. The black eyes, the woman beaten so badly she is forced to seek refuge with her children in an anonymous safe house, are just the thin end of the wedge.
Within all relationships there is the potential for abuse because it can be so subtle. Most domestic abuse is emotional or psychological long before it becomes physical, chipping away at the other person's sense of self and self-confidence in small but significant ways. Over time, with enough undermining day after day, one makes the other feel so bad about themselves that they believe it when their partner says that nobody else could possibly want them, or love them like they do.
Victims of abuse are often blamed for everything, shamed or humiliated in public. Their partner makes all the decisions or they find themselves increasingly isolated from family, friends or other sources of support. "It's the insidious level of control, the petty enforcement of rules - anything from how you wrap up the cheese when you put it back in the fridge to how you close the car door," one married woman told me for my book, Couples: The Truth. "And you think this is just a small thing - 'okay, I will do that because it doesn't matter'. Now I can see that what I was giving him was power. That was before he started smashing up the furniture when he got angry and then hitting me."
Domestic abuse can be economic or financial as spouses withhold money or credit cards, make their partner account for every penny spent, or prevent them from having a job or pursuing a career. And abuse can be sexual, not just in the form of marital rape or pressuring someone into sexual practices they would rather avoid, but also by withholding sex.
I will never forget one young woman I interviewed whose husband refused to have sex with her for four years. "He has killed my self-confidence because I feel completely unacknowledged as a woman, and humiliated, too, dressing up for him in sexy underwear and still being rejected. If he had been knocking me about for four years that would be acknowledged as unacceptable controlling behaviour, but this isn't."
Affairs, too, are often a form of abuse, taunting a spouse with the evidence but denying that anything is going on. Instead, accusations of paranoia are hurled back at the victim, dismantling their psyche still further.
Abuse builds when one person in a couple consistently tries to exert that dominance, through intimidation, threats, anger and violence against furniture and walls. There are arguments in every relationship. But there is a fine line between healthy, constructive disagreements and destructive rows full of character assassination and blame.
When a strong man has an anger-management problem, women understandably feel compromised about standing up for themselves. Arguing back could make matters worse. Lawson has been quoted as saying about her marriage: "I'll go quiet when he explodes and then I am a nest of horrible festeringness."
No one can really understand what goes on in another person's relationship. One's own is enough of a mystery. But if I were to turn back the clock seven years and write my two books on relationships again, I would probably structure them differently around the subtleties of abuse because of what I now know.
What is clear to me is that we find it so hard to understand the very fine line between common relationship difficulties and abusive patterns of behaviour when we are in love with someone and when there are so many other ties that bind us, such as children, reputation, lack of money and not wanting to be alone.
"Why doesn't she just leave?" is a naive statement and one that won't help Lawson, or any other woman in a relationship with an "explosive" man whom she probably still loves.
Our ignorance about abuse is also compounded by the taboos surrounding relationships and family life. We believe our private lives should be kept private. We shouldn't interfere in other people's problems. People took photographs of Saatchi and Lawson but nobody approached the table to ask if they were all right. And it is this hidden nature of family life that makes abuse harder to live with and talk about. For a successful woman, just admitting that there have been abusive situations is tantamount to failure. And so, so shaming.
I wish them both well. Perhaps the most hopeful legacy from this sorry affair will be greater transparency about how common abuse can be. But I also believe that too many people lack the key tools to help them build their relationships from the inside, which in turn allows abuse to flourish. We can't trust everything to love.
* Our Cheating Hearts - Love & Loyalty; Lust & Lies, by Kate Figes, is published by Virago.
By Kate Figes
Twenty years ago, when I first started working on violence against women as a trainee doctor, colleagues told me I was wasting my time. Gender-based violence was a social problem, not a health issue, they said.
In those days awareness about violence against women was generally pretty low, particularly in medical circles. On the rare occasion that this kind of violence did surface in a clinical setting, it was treated as something unusual and something to turn away from. Violence against women, by a husband, boyfriend or what we have come to term an "intimate partner," or by anyone else, for that matter, was rarely considered a women's health issue, much less a public health problem.
Today, June 20, we are launching
a new report on the global prevalence and the health effects of violence against women by intimate partners and non-partners, which shows that one in three women worldwide will experience some form of physical or sexual violence in her lifetime. We find that intimate partner violence is the most common type of violence against women, affecting 30 per cent of women globally. We also discovered that 7 per cent of women worldwide will report sexual assault by a non-partner at some point in their lives.
We learned that women who experience violence are twice as likely to be depressed or have problems with alcohol. They are one and a half times more likely to have HIV or a sexually transmitted infection. They have a 16 per cent higher risk of having a low birth weight baby.
If violence against women were a sudden new disease outbreak, it would make headline news. Nevertheless, today's report highlights the fact that violence against women represents a major public health issue: "a global health problem of epidemic proportions," says Dr. Margaret Chan, the Director General of the World Health Organization.
This report, released by the World Health Organization in partnership with the South African Medical Research Council and the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine, places each and every one of us face-to-face with violence against women.
Looking at the shocking numbers, it is obvious that even if you have not experienced this directly yourself, you certainly know someone who has. And it is everywhere; there is no region or demographic that can claim that violence against women isn't a problem and, in most parts of the world, a problem on a horrifying scale.
This report is the first systematic review of global data on the extent of this violence. It is also the first time that the World Health Organization is issuing a set of guidelines and policy recommendations on how health systems can provide the services to treat both the physical and mental consequences of violence. They suggest ways that health-care workers individually can help women who have experienced -- and in many cases are still experiencing -- this kind of violence.
Most women are reluctant to talk about their experience of violence. Sometimes they feel shame; sometimes they feel that it is something they have caused; and often they fear repercussions. Too often, they will be afraid that instead of helping them, health workers will judge them. The guidelines emphasize the importance of creating an understanding and supportive environment in which women can ask for, and receive, the support they need. This means that training programs for doctors, nurses, midwives and other health workers must include dealing with violence against women. How else can they know what to do?
We have come a long way since I did my medical training. We have gone from sweeping violence against women under the carpet to elevating it to the global arena.
We have gone from having to prove that this is a problem in the first place to countries acknowledging that this is a problem that needs urgent action. (Just last month, seven countries met during the World Health Assembly, WHO's annual meeting of member states, and agreed to work to put violence against women on the agenda of next year's World Health Assembly.) We have gone from not knowing much about the extent of the problem to having global data and looking at what works to prevent it.
As the UN Commission on the Status of Women recently agreed, it is time for the world to act. A life free of violence is a basic human right, one that every woman, man and child deserves.
At the same time, too many women still continue to suffer, silently. It is one thing to acknowledge that violence is a global problem. It remains much harder to admit that it is something that affects you as an individual.
Dr. Claudia Garcia Moreno Esteva
Domestic violence and abuse are used for one purpose and one purpose only: to gain and maintain total control over you. An abuser doesn’t “play fair.” Abusers use fear, guilt, shame, and intimidation to wear you down and keep you under his or her thumb. Your abuser may also threaten you, hurt you, or hurt those around you.
Domestic violence and abuse does not discriminate. It happens among heterosexual couples and in same-sex partnerships. It occurs within all age ranges, ethnic backgrounds, and economic levels. And while women are more commonly victimized, men are also abused—especially verbally and emotionally, although sometimes even physically as well. The bottom line is that abusive behavior is never acceptable, whether it’s coming from a man, a woman, a teenager, or an older adult. You deserve to feel valued, respected, and safe.
There are many signs of an abusive relationship. The most telling sign is fear of your partner. If you feel like you have to walk on eggshells around your partner—constantly watching what you say and do in order to avoid a blow-up—chances are your relationship is unhealthy and abusive. Other signs that you may be in an abusive relationship include a partner who belittles you or tries to control you, and feelings of self-loathing, helplessness, and desperation.
To determine whether your relationship is abusive, answer the questions below. The more “yes” answers, the more likely it is that you’re in an abusive relationship.
When people talk about domestic violence, they are often referring to the physical abuse of a spouse or intimate partner. Physical abuse is the use of physical force against someone in a way that injures or endangers that person. Physical assault or battering is a crime, whether it occurs inside or outside of the family. The police have the power and authority to protect you from physical attack.
Any situation in which you are forced to participate in unwanted, unsafe, or degrading sexual activity is sexual abuse. Forced sex, even by a spouse or intimate partner with whom you also have consensual sex, is an act of aggression and violence. Furthermore, people whose partners abuse them physically and sexually are at a higher risk of being seriously injured or killed.
