Dr. Barbara Steffens on Treatment-Induced Trauma

Clergy, therapists, and others often blame and shame betrayal victims. This is called Treatment-Induced Trauma and if you've experienced it, you're not alone. Dr. Barbara Steffens, author of Your Sexually Addicted Spouse, How Partners Can Cope and Heal, affirms that no woman deserves to be blamed for her partner's abusive behavior. Listen to the free BTR podcast, or read the full transcript below to learn more about what Dr. Steffens has to say to women who have been through this kind of insidious abuse. Treatment-Induced Trauma Harms Victims I was abused by my church leader. That has actually been more traumatizing to me than the actual betrayal because I was going to someone for help and I was being abused by proxy because he believed all of the things that my ex was saying. Anne Blythe, founder of Betrayal Trauma Recovery When women go to a therapist, religious leader, family member, or friend for help and are dismissed, minimized, and/or blamed, they experience secondary trauma. This secondary trauma can be even more painful and devastating than the initial abuse. Why? Dr. Steffens explains it this way: I compare it to a child who is being sexually abused who has the courage to speak up and tell someone and when that person does not believe them or tells them they must have imagined things, or they shouldn't talk like that, the victim pulls away and is even more hurt. When I have worked with abuse survivors, the 'not being believed' they say is worse than the actual abuse. I think for partners there is a level of this that is true as well; not being heard, believed, seen, valued adds to, and in some situations, intensifies the trauma. Dr. Barbara Steffens, author of Your Sexually Addicted Spouse: How Partners Can Cope and Heal Abuse and Addiction Are Not "Couples Issues" When an abusive partner who acts out sexually, or identifies as a "sex addict", harms his partner by his behavior, it is his problem that he has brought into the relationship. Addiction is something in the individual that affects a marriage but a lot of times people try to treat it as a couple's issue. And it's not. Dr. Barbara Steffens, author of Your Sexually Addicted Spouse: How Partners Cope and Heal Why, then, do therapists and clergy so often counsel women to treat his decisions to control, manipulate, and act out sexually, like it's a "couple's problem" by initiating couple's therapy and counseling sessions? Couples Therapy Harms Victims of Emotional Abuse It is harmful for victims to attend couple's therapy or religious counseling with their partners because abusers will usually manipulate therapists and clergy to believe that the abuser is actually the victim, and that the victim is crazy, unstable, or abusive. Often, therapists will seek to identify relational issues, like communication, and tell both partners that they need to "work on it"; rather than correctly identifying abuse in the relationship. I think that therapists are trained to recognize domestic violence physical abuse but they don't have a lot of awareness of emotional, verbal, and especially psychological abuse and manipulation. So again, they are going to see this as a communication issue rather than a power issue, a control issue, or an abuse issue. Dr. Barbara Steffens, author of Your Sexually Addicted Spouse: How Partners Cope and Heal This harms the victim because the longer that the abuse is not called out, the longer the abuser is enabled and she will continue to be harmed. BTR.ORG Is On Your Side At BTR, we do not enable abusive men.