BATTERED WOMAN SYNDROME: PHASES, SYMPTOMS, TREATMENT - ECONOMÍA - 2025

The battered woman defense is a pathological adjustment disorder that occurs in women who are victims of gender violence as a result of continued abuse. Normally the victims who live in this type of abusive and terrifying relationships, usually hide it for a long time, either out of fear, terror, shame, their children, etc.

This syndrome is associated with post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD), and is used in court cases when the woman has killed her abuser. Although at first the evidence of this syndrome was not admitted, it is increasingly recognized despite doubts about its validity as a psychological disorder.

Domestic or family violence are all those acts of physical or emotional abuse, normally produced within the home by an individual belonging to the family and causing fear, isolation, guilt, fear or humiliation in the victim.

Cycle of violence

Lenore Walker was the one who defined the cycle of biolence based on her research with women. It is currently the most accepted and used by professionals.

The cycle of violence according to the mistreatment cycle theory consists of three stages:

Accumulated voltage phase

In this phase, the victim tries to calm his aggressor by trying to help him reason to calm him down.

She is already distancing herself from her support group as friends and family. The victim tries to be nice to her aggressor and tries to please her as best she can. Tension begins to escalate with loud voices and verbal abuse.

Acute abuse phase

From this moment it is when the accumulated tension provokes a state of rage with episodes of physical and sexual abuse. The aggressor mistreats his partner by insulting, humiliating, yelling, using force, etc.

Calm and reconciliation phase

It is also known as a "honeymoon." It is characterized by the absence of tension or violence, which acquires a positive value.

It is here when the aggressor perceives the loss of confidence of the victim. For fear of losing his ego, he blames the woman for what happened and excuses himself, even changing his attitude towards the victim, making him believe that it will not happen again and that everything will be fine.

But this only lasts until the stresses appear again, starting the cycle again.

Phases of battered woman syndrome

Trigger

When the first mistreatments occur, they already break the security that the partner should play and in whom the woman has placed her trust and expectations. What leads to disorientation, loss of references, even being able to suffer from depression.

Reorientation

In this phase, the woman begins to look for new references, but her social networks are already very depleted and therefore she is alone. With her perception of reality already distorted, she blames herself for the situation and enters a state of defenselessness and passive resistance.

Coping

Here he already assumes the mental model of his partner, trying to handle the traumatic situation without success.

Adaptation

The woman projects the guilt towards others, towards the outside, and the syndrome of learned helplessness is consolidated through a process of identification.

Psychological stages

Denial

The woman steadfastly refuses to admit, even to herself, that she has been abused or that there is a problem in her marriage. She often makes excuses for her husband's violence and firmly believes that it will not happen again.

Guilt

At this stage, she already recognizes that there is a problem, but the error comes from considering her responsible for it. Likewise, she feels that she "deserves" to be treated that way well because of her shortcomings, or because she understands that she does not live up to her husband's expectations.

Illustration

During this phase, the woman no longer assumes responsibility for the abusive treatment she suffers. She is finally beginning to recognize that no one deserves to be mistreated. In this phase she stays with her husband because she still thinks or hopes that the problems can be solved.

Responsibility

Finally, it is time to accept that her husband cannot or does not want to eliminate his violent behaviors, and it is here that she becomes aware of starting a new life.

Symptomatology

-Given the continuous nature of abuse by her abuser, the woman's ability to respond decreases, so that her personality becomes passive, and submissive with low self-esteem.

-These women tend to have mixed feelings because, although they hate being attacked, sometimes they also think they deserve it because they consider themselves the cause of the problem.

-They live in complete guilt.

-They are considered failures.

-They suffer from anxiety, moodiness, depression, feeling of helplessness, suicide attempts and insomnia.

-Drug abuse and eating disorders.

-Suffer abdominal pain, headache, fatigue, etc.

-They suffer states of fear, even panic, before any change in their daily life.

-They have no control over their life.

-Loss of ability to perceive some success.

-Their emotional well-being is quite affected, which can lead to the development of depression and anxiety.

-They tend to have cognitive distortions, such as minimization, dissociation, or denial.

-They show difficulties in interpersonal relationships.

-They have concentration problems or irritability.

-They can even suffer sexual dysfunctions.

Treatment

The majority of battered women do not respond to cognitive and affective techniques initially, although both eventually become part of the treatment plan.

As cognitive clarity develops, attention, concentration, and memory will improve. An abused woman is often so anxious during the initial interview that she may not remember much of what has been said.

Thus, repetition of the areas discussed in the interview can be important, especially until the woman regains her attention and concentration.

It is often useful to recommend that you participate in more and different types of activities with other people, so that you can put social and communication skills into practice.

Such activities help many women to come out of the isolation in which they live because of their attackers. She has to understand that she may still be in danger, even if her partner has completed a treatment program.

Treatment of battered woman syndrome also includes a combination of feminist therapy and trauma therapy.

Feminist Therapy

Feminist therapy recognizes that in psychotherapy, the relationship between client and therapist is also part of the intervention.

Recognizing the lack of equality that still exists in society between men and women will help her accept that she can try to change some of the factors that she can control.

On the other hand, there would be legal action, so that the woman can make use of it, either to obtain a restraining or protection order, as well as to be able to exert pressure so that her aggressor is arrested.

Trauma therapy

Regarding trauma therapy, it helps the woman understand that she is not "crazy" and that she is not the only one who has to deal with the psychological symptoms that come from exposure to trauma.

It is clear that without the use of trauma-specific therapy techniques, a woman may be unable to move the barriers that make her situation more difficult.

Therefore, it is necessary to focus on the external triggers to the "trauma", rather than your own internal problems, as this will help mitigate the symptoms of battered woman syndrome.

As for typical trauma triggers, these include: swearing, yelling, a particular phrase you use to humiliate or even the shaving lotion you use or other odors you give off during abuse.

Behavioral techniques

We can also make use of behavioral techniques. These include relaxation training, guided imagery, and the successive approach with high arousal incidents. These behavioral and cognitive-behavioral techniques can help women develop cognitive clarity over time.

Finally, symptoms such as the startle response and hypervigilance will be the last to extinguish.

Although in many women these triggering signs or traumas never completely disappear, it is necessary that when starting a new relationship with another person, you must be patient and understanding, as long as it is not an abusive relationship.

Despite the myth that women often go from one abusive relationship to another, data suggests that less than 10% of all battered women do so again.

STEP program

Finally, another type of program is STEP, which is a combination of feminist therapy and trauma.

This 12-unit program is empirically validated with clinical and prison populations, and is useful for both women who abuse substances and people with interpersonal violence problems.

In clinics and private practice, each step unit can be developed over several sessions.

Warning signs of psychological abuse

• He wants to be with you constantly.
• He texts you or calls you frequently throughout the day.
• Show strange behaviors like checking your car's mileage or asking friends to spy on you.
• He requires you to give him your passwords for your email account or your social networks.
• He has your time or makes plans without including or consulting you.
• Act as if you don't have the ability to make good decisions.
• He constantly asks you what are you doing, who are you talking to, where are you going…
• It requires you to ask for permission to do anything.
• It tells you that you are the only person who can make him feel this way.
• Push to commit.
• Hope you are perfect.
• He says things like: “I am all you need. You are what I need"
• Try to isolate yourself from friends, family, support resources.
• Insult all people.
• Your friends are criticized, and / or accused of cheating with them.
• Take control of your relationship with your family.
• He tells you that they don't really love you like he does.
• He blames you for everything that goes wrong in the relationship.
• He constantly insults you, devaluing you, assuring you that you are useless or worthless.