femfree
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Stalking the Soul by Marie-France Hirigoyen
Stalking the Soul by Marie-France Hirigoyen
http://www.amazon.com/Stalking-Soul-Marie-France-Hirigoyen/dp/188558699X/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1225991883&sr=1-1
Book Review
http://www.webheights.net/GrowingbeyondEmotionalAbuse/hirigoyen/sts.htm
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"The only protective mechanism for child victims of emotional abuse is to cut themselves off from the situation; subsequently, their identity erodes, the deep core of their soul dies. Everything left over from childhood is perpetually reenacted as an adult."
"Even if all abused children don't become abusive parents, a destructive cycle has been created. Each one of us can act out our inner violence on someone else. Alice Miller shows us how over time, children or victims of control forget the violence they suffered -- the will to know must be erased -- but the syndrome either reoccurs in them or is taken out on others."
"While some employers treat their personnel like children, others treat them like things -- to be used at will....[W]here creativity is involved, the attack on the person is even more direct: any initiative or innovation on their part is destroyed. Employers try to prevent the departure of useful or indispensable employees; they mustn't be allowed to think the situation through or feel capable of working somewhere else. They must be led to believe they're only worth their present job. If they resist, they're isolated. They are denied any kind of contact: eye contact, greeting in the hall, or a deaf ear turned to their suggestions. Hurtful and unkind remarks come next, and if these prove insufficient, emotional violence appears.
"Outright hostility later replaces latent ill-will or malevolence if the victim reacts and tries to rebel. This is the phase of emotional abuse that has been called 'psychoterror.' At this stage, any means or methods will be used, sometimes including physical violence, to destroy the designated victim. This can lead to psychical annihilation or suicide. The attacker has now lost sight of any potential benefits to the company and focuses only on his victim's downfall."
"During the emotionally abusive attack, there is an attempt to shake the other's foundations, to make her doubt her thoughts and feelings. The victim loses her sense of identity. She cannot think or comprehend. The goal is to deny her existence by paralyzing her and eroding her identity in order to prevent any emergence of conflict. One can attack without losing her altogether, but she remains at her abuser's disposal.
"This is all accomplished by twin constraints: something is said verbally and its opposite is expressed non-verbally. The paradoxical message is composed of an explicit signal and an innuendo, which the abuser does not acknowledge. It's a highly effective way to destabilize.
"The ultimate weapon for the abusive individual is the refusal to communicate directly
"To keep his own head above water, the abuser needs to submerge the other. In order to accomplish this, he proceeds with tiny destabilizing moves, preferably in public; he'll begin with an innocuous, sometimes intimate incident exaggeratedly described, selecting an ally from the company."
"It's not unusual for the abuser to invite those close to the situation to participate willy-nilly in his demolition enterprise."
"Embarrassing the other becomes the goal. You sense the hostility but are uinsure it's not humor. The abuser seems to tease, but in reality he is attacking weak points."
"There is also an element of gamesmanship in these verbal attacks, this mockery and cynicism: it's the pleasure of a quarrel and of pushing the other into opposition. The abusive narcissist, as we have said, loves controversy. He is capable of espousing a point of view one day and defending it's opposite the next just to reanimate the discussion or to deliberately shock."
"The details of abuse, taken separately, can seem harmless, but added together, they show a destructive process. The victim is swept along in this deadly game and will sometimes resort to an abusive mode of behavior because this kind of defense tactic can be used by anyone. This line of conduct can lead to wrongfully accusing the victim of becoming an accomplice to the abuser."
"I have seen, in the course of my clinical practice, how the same abusive individuals tend to replicate destructive conduct in all areas of life; at work, in their marriage, with their children. It is this behavioral continuity that I would like to emphasize. There are individuals whose road through life is strewn with people they have wounded or irreparably damaged. This doesn't prevent them from fooling most people and from seeming to be totally adjusted social beings."
"Emotional abuse in couples is often denied or made light of by reducing it to a simple question of dominance. A psychoanalytical simplification of the phenomenon would consist in representing the partner as an accomplice to, or even responsible for, the abusive relationship. This denies the dimension of control in the equation that paralyzes the victim and prevents her from self-defense; it also denies the violence of these attacks and the far-reaching psychological consequences of abuse. Because the aggression is so subtle, leaving no tangible traces, witnesses tend to interpret as simple conflicts what are in fact attempts to morally or even physically destroy another person."
"Because of their early childhood history, abusive narcissists have not matured and come into their own and they jealously observe those who have. Faced with their own emptiness, they try to destroy the happiness around them. Prisoners of their own inflexible defense system, they can't bear to see freedom in others. They undermine simple relationships because of cynicism and their incapacity to love. Abusive narcissists need to triumph over and annihilate someone else in order to feel superior and accept themselves. They must destroy to find affirmation."
“The attacker, unable to restrain his unwholesome morbidity, transfers the hatred from the loathed partner onto the children who, in turn, become the target to be destroyed”
“The abusive narcissist excels in the art of pitting people against each other and provoking jealousies and rivalries. It can be done allusively in the following manner (1) by insinuating doubt “Don’t you find that so and so is such and such?” (2) by revealing what one person says about another “Your brother told me he thought you behaved badly” or (3) by lying to incite people to become adversarial. The greatest pleasure for an abuser lies in the destruction of one individual by another and watching the battle from which both will emerge weakened; This result will ultimately reinforce his omnipotence.……..Provoking jealousy is also a way for an abuser to stay above it all, above anger and hate. It’s what happens between the partner and his rival. He keeps score and doesn’t “dirty his hands.” By making the other jealous, the abuser who is basically envious brings his victim down to his level, insinuating that “you and I are alike.“ The victim doesn’t dare to directly attack her abuser. She avoids confrontation by becoming jealous and continues to protect the abuser. It’s easier to deal with the third party that the abuser dangles as prey.
"Having the upper hand in a verbal exchange is paramount, but an overtly direct approach would lead the partner to denounce the abuser's authoritarianism. These allusive techniques, on the contrary, destabilize and erode the other's identity, leading her to doubt the reality of what has actually occurred."
"The partner doesn't exist as a person but as a prop for a quality the abuser wishes to appropriate. Abusers receive nourishment from the life energy of those who fall under their spell. By invading the psychic space of the other, they try to take possession of this gratifying sustenance."
Additional (excellent!) excerpts from member bondgirl
http://www.runboard.com/bnarcissisticabuserecovery.f1.t1902
DO NOT COPY THIS PAGE
Graphic BBWMisty Fotko.com
Last edited by femfree, Mar/8/2009, 11:18 am
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Children? They don't want presents, they just want to see your face light up when they come in the room.
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