Q: I am concerned about my daughter’s boyfriend. She is 16. He is 18. She has been fascinated by him and the attention he gives her. I am afraid his attention is really control. She seems to have stopped thinking for herself and just goes along with whatever he wants.
A: Young women can easily be fooled by boyfriends who seem to be wonderfully attentive but who end up being controlling and abusive.
It is hard for parents, since teens often go through a phase when they react negatively to any advice from parents. Check with your library and local service agencies about videos or other material that demonstrates the pattern by which women fall into controlling and often dangerous relationships. If your daughter won’t listen to you, find someone else she will talk with.
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I also highly recommend the following book. Candy Johnson’s Tainted Love is a true story of an abusive marriage. In looking back, she writes that because her boyfriend wanted her to do things he thought were good for her, like quitting smoking or drinking, she first thought it was because he really loved her. She thought the beginnings of his disrespectful behaviour toward her were part of his caring, and she wrote it off as his being under stress. She soon found out that it was part of his strategy to control her.
Her story covers her first husband’s abuse, his affairs and his threat to kill her if she got a divorce. She left him after 10 years of living in fear. It was only after her third child was born that she discovered that her husband had no intention of letting her have an education and life of her own, that she began to rebel against his control. It still took her several years and several attempts before she could leave him
safely.
She later met a kind, sensitive and caring person and married him. Two years later, the first husband murdered him. He avoided facing criminal consequences with a plea of not guilty because of insanity. Because of this, Johnson still lives in hiding for fear of her first husband.
Johnson said her mother pressured her into the first marriage because she was pregnant, and told her to stay with him despite the abuse. Her mother could not stand up to men in her life, and encouraged her children to continue in the path of being controlled and abused. Johnson wrote the book because she believes young women need to hear and be warned by her story. It is available in major bookstores or can be ordered in print form for $20.75 US or electronic book form for $4.95 US from www.authorhouse.com.
Peter Griffiths is a mental health counsellor based in Prince Albert, Sask. His columns are intended as general advice only. His website is www.sasktelwebsite.net/petecope.
