Please don’t think I’m bad too.” From the other innermost part of him, the secret animal that prowls in some men was a raging wolf ready to kill. The battle line within the man had...

If anyone hits me, they can expect to be hit back, and harder. I never turn the other cheek because in my experience that doesn’t work.

I just can’t seem to do anything right.”At other moments, he sounds wounded and lost, hungering for love and for someone to take care of him. When this side of him emerges, he appears open...

Make sure your fun is not mocking someone’s pain and your enjoyment is not another’s suffering. The melody of your ears must not be the cries of a powerless.

Use the darkness of your past to propel you to a brighter future.

A man’s beliefs about the effects of the substance will largely be borne out. If he believes that alcohol can make him aggressive, it will, as research has shown. On the other hand, if he...

Our society needs criminals like Wolfgang Priklopil in order to give a face to the evil that lives within and to split it off from … It needs the images of cellar dungeons so as...

It is important to note that research has shown that men who have abusive mothers do not tend to develop especially negative attitudes toward females, but men who have abusive fathers do; the disrespect that...

What does a woman feel when she is hit? My mother slapped me when I was a child – on two occasions, to the point of pure hysteria; I never liked it. Those who are...

Leave him.” But she knows it won’t be that easy. He will promise to change. He’ll get friends and relatives to feel sorry for him and pressure her to give him another chance. He’ll get...

These secrets are not secrets per se but are truths hidden from public view. I had to write this book. There had to be a reason I survived to tell this story.

We all know the protocol. But more powerful than our protocol is our grooming to believe in something more.

YOUR ABUSIVE PARTNER DOESN’T HAVE A PROBLEM WITH HIS ANGER; HE HAS A PROBLEM WITH YOUR ANGER.One of the basic human rights he takes away from you is the right to be angry with him....

Even those who drink until blacking out, those who beat women, are not the exception, hopefully not the norm, trapped somewhere in society in a dark place nobody wants to talk about.

normal.” Their minds work logically; they understand cause and effect; they don’t hallucinate. Their perceptions of most life circumstances are reasonably accurate. They get good reports at work; they do well in school or training...

We have this judgmental way of looking at the idea of leaving a home or a family, and our society has reinforced this idea that if we “run away,” we are “running away from our...

When people conclude that anger causes abuse, they are confusing cause and effect. Ray was not abusive because he was angry; he was angry because he was abusive. Abusers carry attitudes that produce fury.

Don’t play his game. Play yours.

I am living in hell from one day to the next. But there is nothing I can do to escape. I don’t know where I would go if I did. I feel utterly powerless, and...

An abuser can seem emotionally needy. You can get caught in a trap of catering to him, trying to fill a bottomless pit. But he’s not so much needy as entitled, so no matter how...

It isn’t very nice to admit, but domestic violence has its uses. So raw and unleashed, it tears away the veil of civilization that comes between us as much as it makes life possible. A...

Although the typical abusive man works to maintain a positive public image, it is true that some women have abusive partners who are nasty or intimidating to everyone. How about that man? Do his problems...

We’d like to believe that by discussing what has occurred will change things. Until now, here’s a mental illness that must be dealt with by going to the root.

He’s mean and crazy, and he’ll never change. All he wants is to hurt you. Leave him now before he does something even worse.” All of these people are trying to help, and they are...

What are you going to do? Are you going to live in the dark, locked in here? Afraid to look out, answer the door, leave? Yes, he’s out there, and he’s clearly not going to...

We are all the product of our past and have to live with our memories and personality they cannot be erased.

crimes of passion.” But what could more thoroughly prove that a man did not love his partner? If a mother were to kill one of her children, would we ever accept the claim that she...

She could just pack up and leave, but she does not visualize what’s beyond ahead.

When we hear these kinds of excuses from a drunk, we assume they are exactly that—excuses. We don’t consider an active alcoholic a reliable source of insight. So why should we let an angry and...

Why Does He Do That? That’s the number one question, isn’t it? Maybe it’s his drinking, you say. Maybe it’s his learning disabilities. It’s his job; he hates it. He’s stressed. I think he’s bipolar....

Has he ever trapped you in a room and not let you out?Has he ever raised a fist as if he were going to hit you?Has he ever thrown an object that hit you or...

It’s not your fault you had an unwanted dick in you.

Marginalised and abused children are often overlooked even today, and risk becoming marginalised and abused adults who may never receive acknowledgment or respect for the immense physical and emotional burden they carry from childhood or...

The central attitudes driving the Drill Sergeant are:I need to control your every move or you will do it wrong.I know the exact way that everything should be done.You shouldn’t have anyone else — or...

It was never the poverty that deterred me, never the disease, unsanitary conditions, bugs or garbage, those things were never even a thought in my head as a reason for not staying. I kept looking...

The abuser does not believe, however, that his level of authority over the children should be in any way connected to his actual level of effort or sacrifice on their behalf, or to how much...

Sounds of depression remembering rejection Hope turns to despair black roses everywhereKeep hearing echoes voices in my mind repeating endless lies evil in disguise

You owe me.” For each ounce he gives, he wants a pound in return. He wants his partner to devote herself fully to catering to him, even if it means that her own needs—or her...

Another reason abusers don’t want to give up the ‘power’ is that they don’t want to give up the power.

Never believe a man’s claim that he has to harm his partner in order to protect her; only abusers think this way.

It’s never ok to hit a girl. Never. Not even if she cheats on you. A girl is not your property. She’s a human being. She is just as important as you. She is your...

NEVER EVER STAY IN AN ABUSIVE RELATIONSHIP FOR THE SAKE OF YOUR CHILDREN. That is the worst thing one can ever do. It is better for a child to live with one Good Parent than...

Clouds of confusionrolled into illusionHe veils perversionforcing her coercionHer body he takeswhile she flies awayunbelievable, she’s invisible

It is fine to commiserate with a man about his bad experience with a previous partner, but the instant he uses her as an excuse to mistreat you, stop believing anything he tells you about...

Thomas was like a drug, so smooth and overwhelming that he took one up a level in their emotions just by watching him and listening to him. He was a natural entertainer, filled with talent...

Violent men, and men in authority over violent men, and the broader public that authorises those men, are not yet shamed by the harm of coercive control over women … Maybe we can rest some...

The central attitudes driving Rambo are:Strength and aggressiveness are good; compassion and conflict resolution are bad.Anything that could be even remotely associated with homosexuality, including walking away from possible violence or showing any fear or...

Suspicion of Abuse gets to your toes before you see it in your face.

If you have survived an abuser, and you tried to make things right… If you forgave, and you struggled, and even if the expression of your grief and your anger tumbled out at times in...

No, Karl, not now. Take it easy. It’s our happy day.”Poul-Erik’s MotherThe Informer by Steen Langstrup