Domestic Abuse 101

Despite a 30-year inquiry into the subject, many people remain uninformed about the true nature of one of the biggest social issues facing America today. A witness offers a quick look that reveals some implications and solutions for all of us.

If a jet liner with 300 passengers went down every day, it would be on the news every night. How is it that 80,000 health care visits every day due to interpersonal abuse doesn’t make the news? Abuse veteran, anthropologist and writer, Anna Moss connects the dots for the uninitiated to show how this subject touches everyone.

“Women in abusive households suffer post traumatic stress just like veterans of war. Think about that for a moment. I believe the public is uninvolved because it is uninformed. That can change; in fact, we are very close to the tipping point. Many abused women can be made whole again and the sooner, the better because this country needs them,” says author Anna Moss.

RELATIONSHIP RED FLAGS takes readers inside the abuse experience, which starts with the creation of a human being who is driven to harm others to gratify himself. To be able to see the big picture, you must first understand that abusers are made, not born. Some basic facts and findings about domestic abuse include the following: • The primary cause of domestic abuse is poor parenting. Babies and toddlers subjected to abuse, neglect and trauma suffer permanent brain damage. • This brain damage begins to show in childhood and increases with age. The textbook behaviors include bullying, juvenile delinquency, substance abuse, animal cruelty and sexual immorality. • The brain-damaged adult displays a marked incapacity for empathy and compassion. This adult pursues gratification with little or no internal braking from conscience. • This adult typically gravitates toward one or more of the following pathologies, the rate of recidivism for which is nearly 100 precent: pedophilia, substance abuse, serial rape, serial murder, spousal abuse. • The adult abuser gets worse with time because it takes more and more to gratify him. Drugs, surgery and therapy do not repair the pathology. • Children who grow up in abusive homes, repeat the abuse in their households.

As these facts suggest, the cause and effect relationship is generational. The tragedy is that once brain damage has occurred, the child is largely beyond help. However, the adult targets of abuse can be helped.