Emotional manipulation
EMOTIONAL abuse — the cunning and insidious brother of domestic violence. While you have to be slightly unhinged to beat your partner into submission, men and women who corner their other halves using emotional blackmail possess a special kind of psychosis because normally the control has been premeditated and is systemically implemented over time.
Lets talk about groomers. What better way to explain the term than to give you a story about one.
His name is James and he lives in his family home with his folks, his wife Rosie, and their infant son.
James works in a hotel bar and comes home most mornings yarning casually to Rosie at breakfast as she feeds baby about the number of women who come on to him with their holiday bods and ready cash.
How any other man would not pass up the opportunity to be a holiday fling, expenses paid.
When Rosie shows signs of discomfort he assures her that his eyes are solely for her, no matter how much motherhood has changed her body.
James sounds like a funny old thing, right?
A bit naïve, mayhap, but at least his heart is in the right place?
Well, what if I told you that when Rosie displeases James or his family, he does not return
home immediately after work. He instead stays out for hours and offering no other explanation than that he was “out”.
For the rest of the day James will walk around buoyant, smiling at his phone when he knows she can see him.
The reality is James is actually manipulating and grooming his wife to feel insecurity, so that she clings to him for reassurance and love.
In this way, he knows that she will go the extra mile not to anger or upset him because he could so easily and readily have his pick of women.
Rosie knows there’s something wrong because how can she explain this without it sounding a bit like...female hysterics?
When Rosie begins to feel the gross unbalance in her marriage and calls him out on it, he tells her that she is just making things up in her head because of her insecurity and paranoia.
Now, this is called gaslighting. It is done for the sole purpose of making someone question their sanity, reactions and memory.
We are visual creatures, by nature.
Our perception is often determined by what we see in front of us. For example, if a person who claims to be ill has no signs of illness to show for it, i.e runny nose, puffy eyes etc, we would be fooled into thinking that that person were fit to work.
Similarly, a person having a difficult time in their relationship would find sympathy or help in short supply if he or she lacked the visible scars. And it doesn’t help if their partner were outwardly caring, attentive and generous.
“At least he/she doesn’t hit / drink/cheat on you”
“You’re lucky madaga that he goes to work and feeds the kids, unlike some men — kua ni vaqara drama tiko”
While there is no such thing as a perfect relationship, it might do some good to do some self analysis regarding emotional manipulation.
And unlike domestic violence and it’s majority of male perpetrators, I reckon an equal number of men and women use emotional abuse to seek control over their partners.
An acquaintance would be a mess at work, calling his wife several times a day to check in on her.
Every time he went to drink kava at his family home, the following day would be spent trying to placate his wife as she would drop hints about how fed up she was of their child, deliberately making him believe that their child’s safety was not her paramount concern.
He found that it was easier to just stay in and began to isolate himself from family events.
Parents are also guilty of using emotional abuse with their children.
Punishing kids for being affectionate to their partner when they are having a dispute and directing their personal dissatisfaction at their offspring, blaming kids for opportunities lost. This does a tonne of damage with children causing them to take those underdeveloped cognitive, psychological and social impairments with them into their adult relationships.
With my own relationship, I expect there to be rainy days, and by golly there are, but I personally believe that some disagreement and mutual space is necessary for growth.
I learned long ago the hard way about trying to manipulate someone using emotions.
You don’t always get the result you want and sometimes it can turn into something ugly and angry.
I am always reminding myself that when I have impossible expectations I am setting myself up for disappointment. This doesn’t work for everybody, this is what usually works for me.
The bottom line of emotional abuse is control. While both partners flourish under mutual respect and understanding, making allowances and coming to healthy compromises for issues that make the other uncomfortable, a one sided relationship is exactly that.
Room for only one person while the other stays in the dark.
The need for control is rooted in immaturity and insecurity.
Yesterday a woman posted on her Facebook that she had been married for 31 years and invited people to ask her anything regarding marriage.
She answered most of the questions by saying: “try to be as understanding and loving as possible, keep an open dialogue, have alone time and date nights, don’t bring up past issues during disputes and recognise when your ego is at play.”
Does our ego not have so much to do with everything?
With finance for example. Often we feel that we have more power in a relationship based on the cut of bacon that we bring to the table.
I’ve heard stories of partners being locked out of their homes for going shopping for the day, disallowing the kids to open the door for their parent, and belittling or constantly yelling at a spouse because they are “useless” for not having a job.
For the person being told that they are imagining things and not even knowing how to voice their issues, it becomes dangerous. After all, emotional abuse is to mess with the mind. When the mind finally breaks and suicide, murder and violence occurs, the person is considered weak and mental.
The abuser hardly ever gets his (dark) day in the sun because groomers have usually laid the groundwork to families and friends to make themselves seem innocent.
Emotional manipulation — it’s real and it counts as abuse even though we can’t see the scars.
Many will relate to what I am sharing and just as many will choose to remain silent for various reasons.
In my humble opinion, it’s about time we start speaking up.
■ These are the views of the author.