Today in Ireland there are uncounted numbers of women who carry the hidden impact of domestic abuse. These are women whose cuts and bruises may have healed. However, still, they resiliently carry themselves and their children through the catalogue of mental health difficulties left behind as the residue upon their psyche by the perpetrators who harmed them.
No discussion on the hidden impact of domestic abuse on women’s mental health can begin without foremost establishing that victims and survivors of domestic abuse are brave and courageous in their own right. Mental health carries untold stigma and many women find themselves pathologised, experiencing the weaponising of their trauma by their abusive ex’s, and even mental health professionals, policing authorities, and courts.
It is important to acknowledge that domestic abuse has a huge toll on women’s mental health, but also, to stand up against the culture of victim shaming and pathologisation which seeks to undermine the strength, courage, and integrity of women and their experiences.
There is a great need for a trauma-informed approach to understanding the impact of domestic abuse on women’s mental health. Women like Dr. Jessica Taylor have done exemplary work in this area, challenging the statistics and predictions such as abused women are more likely to receive acute mental health diagnoses such as schizophrenia or bipolar disorder.
However, there are two sides to this argument. Diagnoses of depression, anxiety or PTSD can go part of the way towards proving and quantifying instances of domestic abuse where there was emotional and mental abuse but no physical violence. In the era of professionals, very often these diagnoses can be the only way of getting the validation many victims and survivors need, especially when their cases go to court.
The other side of the argument is- why should post-traumatic stress be labelled a “disorder”? Why should the anguish, sadness, and emotional and physical exhaustion be labelled as “depression”? Is our culture so far removed from adverse human experiences and the psychology of how the human mind processes abuse, that we cannot understand how normal these responses are?
Labels do something else- they other victims and survivors, placing them in a category outside from “the rest of us”. This in turn facilitates the culture of ignorance, the practice of turning a blind eye, and the idea that we can leave our responsibility to ending the culture of domestic and helping survivors, to the professionals- those who are equipped to help people with labels.
The reality about victims and survivors is that the only difference between “us and them” is their experience of abuse and violence. Anyone else in the same situation would have the same struggles. We all have the same brains, the same emotions, the same heart. We’re all humans who WILL experience complex emotions and reactions when faced with life-threatening situations. Therefore, it becomes paramount that we all do to others as we would have them do to us, and bridge the stigma of trauma responses to compassionately give love and care to those who need it the most.
At the same time, our society and culture need to be humbled by the experiences and struggles of victims and survivors. Their testimonies carry truths which we desperately need to listen to and learn from if we ever want to see a world which is free from violence and abuse. Their courage and strength to get help and leave behind damaging situations are the exact path we all must follow if we want to see our nation set free from the grip of violence against women and girls.