When the news about Harvey Weinstein hit the headlines, one of the first things I was curious about was his children. I always go there, wondering about the family of people like him. I also wondered about his wife. How was she in the relationship? How was she as a mother? Did she know about the things he was up to? Or if I’m honest about the phrasing of the last question, how could she not have known?
The children of families like that are often the elusive shadow. As adults we tend to keep a low profile because of our shame. There’s also not much written about us. Either there’s an assumption that we were shielded from his dark side. That despite his misdemeanours, he loved his wife and his children. Or if we weren’t spared, then our circumstances can be explained under the banner of domestic violence. Yet the unique dynamics of our parent’s pathological relationship meant our mothers are the least likely of any type of abuse victim to seek help in any form. We therefore fly completely under the radar.
While literature about domestic violence helped explain the behaviours my father used to exert power and control, it never fully explained the relationship between my mother and father. Nor did it explain my mother’s relationship with her children. It largely treats mothers as a homogenous group, whose foremost concern is protecting her children. Situations where a mother fails to properly do this are seen to be due to her fear, or to the father’s control. And once she ends the relationship, she will then become a better parent.
It wasn’t until I began reading about co-dependance and pathological relationships that I gained greater insight into my experiences. In a pathological relationship one (or both) of the partnership has a Cluster B personality disorder. This includes the “Dark Triad” of conditions – borderline, narcissism and anti-social personality disorders (which includes sociopaths and psychopaths). In essence, people in the Dark Triad category appear to have little or no conscience and be incapable of love. The general belief is that no matter how much support or rehabilitation they receive, they can or will not change.
Unfortunately having parents who are in a pathological love relationship is not that rare. It’s estimated that 1%-6% of the general population has a Cluster B personality disorder.[2] While there are cases where the mother, or both parents have a dark disorder, I use the term “him” for the disordered person and “her” for his partner as this is the most common dynamic.
There’s a multitude of books and blogs devoted to helping women avoid getting into a relationship with a “Dark” person or to heal from the complicated aftermath symptoms if she was unlucky enough to do so. Sometimes we (the children of parents in a pathological relationship) get a mention. But this is usually in passing; as in the fact that they had children. There’s little recognition or insight, into how these relationships impacted on us.
One of the most enlightening books I’ve come across is Sandra L. Brown’s Women Who Love Psychopaths, Inside the Relationships of Inevitable Harm with Psychopaths, Sociopaths and Narcissists. Brown explains the mind control techniques he uses that sees the relationship full of paradoxes. For example, he buys her flowers and says he loves her, yet he cheats and lies. In essence, he messes with her mind which sees her develop cognitive dissonance; the holding of inconsistent thoughts and beliefs. She’s likely to feel an intense love for him and yet loathe him at the same time. According to Brown, it is this cognitive dissonance that is the most distressing of her trauma symptoms. Often her problem is not flashbacks about his abuse. It’s doubting her own reality when bombarded with memories of his “kindness”.
Brown also discusses how she “normalises” his behaviours. In doing so, she takes on his values and begins to see the world from his point of view. In essence, she becomes his enabler. Giving her children to her ex-partner is provided as an example. One of the key points she makes is, even if she’s no longer in the relationship, she needs professional help. This is to support her recovery, in particular to address her high levels of stress and “disordered” thinking. If she doesn’t receive this help, then she is at risk of returning to him. She is also at risk of getting into another unhealthy relationship.
Like Brown, Hennessey (in his book The Mind of the Intimate Male Abuser; How he gets inside her head), discusses his ability to“play” her, as well as the system. He refers to repeat intimate partner abusers (as opposed to situational abusers) as conmen and psychephiles. As do paedophiles, they use tactics to groom and get inside the head of their “target”. Through his years of work in the field of domestic violence, he’s come to conclude that the intention of the repeat abuser is always to pull the wool over other’s eyes. He never wants to be exposed. Her wants her to seem irrational.
Hennessy believes that, contrary to popular belief, anger management courses are completely ineffective. That’s because his problem isn’t losing control. It’s having too much control and a sense of entitlement. While he may sometimes fly into fits of rage, he’s always aware of himself and his impact on her. In fact, any type of rehabilitation programme is pointless as he’s not interested in changing and has little or no conscience. Instead, the focus needs to shift to protecting her (both physically and mentally) and sanctioning him. At a societal level, he advocates for raising awareness about the underlying tactics of the psychephile. He also advocates for increasingly challenging the tolerance of male priority.
Brown explains that while those with a “Dark” disorder come from all walks of life, they often exist within the higher echelons. Along with having the gift of the gab, they often also have the money to “play’ the system. While some with a “Dark Triad” disorder get caught, and the high profile and extreme characters such as Harvey Weinstein make the news and grab our attention, most go undetected. Those with “Dark” disorder have a specific skill – pretending they are what they’re not. While sexual deviance may be one of the array of their risk taking behaviours, they’re likely to be up to a wide range of dodginess such as white collar crime and other forms of fraud. In relationships, while their tactics may involve hands-on physical violence, their prowess with psychological warfare is enough to undermine their partners sense of self.
While I agree with Brown and Hennessey about the trickiness and destructiveness of his character, I am uncomfortable with their black and white stance that he is bad and that she is good. It’s convenient and simplistic to believe that he is ‘other worldly’. It’s a way of separating ourselves from him and from the idea that he’s been shaped by societal forces. When I hear statements like he turned out “bad” even though he came from a normal family and had a happy childhood, I always wonder what else might have gone on. On all accounts, unless you had an insider’s view, you would have thought mine was a “normal” family.
In terms of my father, you could say that societal attitudes to women, along with being raised by a single mother who was religious, righteous, and overbearing to the point of being abusive, was the breeding ground for a budding sociopath misogynist. Given my father’s past I doubt he could ever be ‘cured’. But if he had of been checked and sanctioned, and had received some form of support, he may not have evolved into the tyrant he became.
My mother too was shaped by forces. The most notable being married to a controlling and abusive man who tightly controlled her access to finances, and by societal norms. This included the views of her church that saw her stick with her man, and take the submissive and deferential role of women to the extreme. She became indifferent to his physical, psychological and sexual abuse of her own children.
The amount of pathology and intensity in the relationship, I believe, results in less focus on the children’s needs. The lack of awareness about this type of relationship means our stories remain unheard and unvalidated, both by our parents and by society. If more light is shed onto the profound impacts on her children, it might give her more impetus to leave. Hopefully, it will also highlight the importance or providing her with the education and psychological support that she needs.
Further note: An Aug 2024 news article about a marriage with all the hallmarks of a pathological relationship that ended in tragedy.
[1] Larsen, Rasmus. (2019). Psychopathy Treatment and the Stigma of Yesterday’s Research. Kennedy Institute of Ethics Journal. 29. 243-272. 10.1353/ken.2019.0024.
[2] Cailhol, Lionel et al. “Prevalence, Mortality, and Health Care Use among Patients with Cluster B Personality Disorders Clinically Diagnosed in Quebec: A Provincial Cohort Study, 2001-2012.” Canadian journal of psychiatry