Why Coercive Control Gets Worse During Pregnancy, Childbirth and Breastfeeding
Why Coercive Control Gets Worse During Pregnancy, Childbirth and Breastfeeding
Coercive controllers are dangerous partners and fathers to mothers and babies
Welcome
In this post, I want to discuss why coercive control gets worse during pregnancy, childbirth and breastfeeding.
People who don’t have much knowledge about domestic violence and coercive control often think that having a baby will “soften” a man and make him kinder.
However, this does not happen in cases where the man in question is a coercive controller (an abuser whose abuse is based on their need to have power and control over their target).
Why isn’t having a baby transformative for men who coercively control?
This blog will explore and explain this puzzle — with help from the mothers who have shared the abuse they suffered from coercively controlling men in this article.
Why does having a baby not help solve the problems of a “troubled” (actually: coercively controlling) man?
It is logical to think that having a child to care for might help a “troubled” (actually coercively controlling) man to see the world through new eyes. It seems like common sense that a baby will improve a relationship by making the partners behave in a more committed, selfless manner as they team up to provide the best start in life for the little one.
However, when one party is a coercive controller, this does not happen: The process of the baby’s arrival and care needs tends to make everything much worse.
Bringing issues like these to light helps to raise awareness and understanding of the harms caused by abusers. Please read more on coercive control on this site, and also follow me on my social media channels.
For new readers unfamiliar with how coercive control works, I describe coercive control in my earlier series of blogs on “Explaining Coercive Control to People Who Don’t Quite Get It”:
Coercive control is a highly serious, damaging, potentially life-destroying form of abuse. It involves situations where somebody subjects their target to persistent, wide-ranging controlling behavior over a long period of time, and makes it clear that standing up for themselves against this highly controlling behavior will be punished.
By relentlessly punishing the victim-survivor for non-compliance, the perpetrator intends to keep the victim-survivor in a confused, demoralized and terrorized state.
Coercive control: the perpetrator’s objective and the methods used to achieve that objective
Perpetrators’ use of physical violence can vary:
Some coercive controllers are very physically violent, and may cause injuries that require hospitalization.
Others are violent in less extreme ways; for example, their violence takes the form of slapping, pushing, shoving or hair pulling.
Meanwhile, some are not physically violent at all.
The coercive control perpetrator’s ultimate goal is to completely subordinate the victim-survivor. This is a fixed objective; the only choice is in the use of method:
The fixed objective: Perpetrators want to take away victims’-survivors’ free will and turn them into a kind of puppet on a string who only exists to serve the perpetrator and whom the perpetrator can endlessly exploit.
Highly controlling and violent approach: If the perpetrator judges that being highly controlling and violent is the best way to achieve their goal, this is what they’ll do.
Highly controlling-but-not-violent approach: If they judge that it is best to be highly controlling but not violent at all, then that is what they’ll do.
This blog focuses on cases where men are perpetrators of coercive control. In England and Wales coercive control is a criminal offense, and 97% of convicted perpetrators are men.
This particular blog is about how, through the process of the baby’s arrival and care needs, the perpetrating father’s behavior often becomes much more aggressive and threatening. The victim-survivor mother experiences more harm than ever.
Why does the perpetrating father’s behavior become more aggressive and threatening when a baby has arrived or is arriving? We need to explain why — and it starts with the way the perpetrating father’s self-centered mindset attacks the victim-survivor mother’s mothering.
How the perpetrating father’s self-centered mindset attacks the victim-survivor mother’s mothering
It makes perfect sense that an abuser gets worse during pregnancy, birth and breastfeeding… if you understand the perpetrating father’s mindset. If you are a victim-survivor mother, the perpetrating father wants your life to completely revolve around pleasing them and serving them and their needs. They want themselves to be the absolute center of your life, attention and resources.
The arrival of a newborn baby disturbs this. When a pregnancy happens, and a baby is born and breastfed (if breastfeeding happens), these are major responsibilities for a mother. Here, see my earlier blog about motherhood and the ways that perpetrators exploit the responsibilities of motherhood:
Pregnancy, childbirth and breastfeeding pulls the attention of the victim-survivor mother towards something else (someone else) other than the perpetrating father: the fetus/baby.
Perpetrating fathers tend to become more abusive at this time.
This is because the perpetrating father is self-centered:
They want the victim-survivor mother to continue to be completely devoted to pleasing them and serving them and their needs.
They therefore try to scare, confuse and overwhelm the victim-survivor mother into continuing to center them.
This means that the attention and resources of the victim-survivor mother are diverted from the fetus/baby back onto the perpetrating father.
Strategic reasons why the perpetrating father’s behavior gets worse around pregnancy, childbirth and breastfeeding — and the impacts on mothering
The behavior of the perpetrating father gets worse at this time as they attempt to maintain control. They will be escalating their punishments to new levels of severity.
This is for two significant strategic reasons:
1. By the time a victim-survivor mother is pregnant with a child that is half the perpetrating father’s, they are more locked into the relationship than ever before.
This means that the barriers to the victim-survivor mother leaving the perpetrator are very high. These barriers can include psychological, physical, economic, cultural, religious and legal barriers. The victim-survivor mother is largely entrapped. Perpetrating fathers know this, and they calculate that they can now get away with higher levels of abuse.
2. Perpetrating fathers need to counter the pregnant victim-survivor mother’s instinct – an instinct that is very strong – to prioritize the pregnancy and the baby.
Countering that instinct requires an upping of the abuse, because nothing less than that will have the impact that the perpetrating father is seeking.
When did the abuse start? Not the pregnancy: DAY ONE OF THE RELATIONSHIP
Because of how perpetrating fathers escalate their abuse at this time, victim-survivor mothers who are looking back on this point in their lives from years later often say that this was when the abuse “started”.
Importantly though, this isn’t actually accurate. This was probably the time when the abuse reached a level of severity where it seemed justifiable to apply the label of “abuse”.
The abuse will have actually started the day the relationship began.
The first act of abuse carried out by the perpetrating father was right at the beginning of the relationship.
What was this abusive act?
Pretending to be an attentive, caring and generous person, when that is not what they were at all. This was abusive. It was manipulative. At the point of origin in the relationship, the perpetrating father had been deceiving the victim-survivor mother, to invest in building a relationship with them under false pretenses.
The perpetrating father abusing the victim-survivor mother during and shortly after childbirth
Perpetrating fathers often drive home their message that they must be prioritized over the baby by being particularly abusive while the victim-survivor mother is giving birth and soon after:
They might complain that her labor is taking too long and pressure her to hurry up.
They might tell the victim-survivor mother that only a baby of a certain sex is acceptable (usually a boy) and state this while she is giving birth.
They might unpredictably come and go from the hospital during labor, causing the victim-survivor mother emotional distress.
They may refuse to visit her or the baby in hospital after she has given birth, claiming they are “too busy”.
Trigger warning on this next paragraph for rape:
Very soon after the mother has given birth, the perpetrating father may rape the mother. What more brutal and distressing way is there to tell her that nothing about her pregnancy or motherhood is more important than meeting the perpetrating father’s demands — including their sexual demands?
The perpetrating father’s double whammy: Obstructing mothering and weaponizing perceived mothering “failure”
Because of the perpetrating father’s insistence that they, not the baby, are put first, it is harder for the victim-survivor mother to meet expectations of being a “good mother” once the baby is born.
Victim-survivor mothers will then feel really bad about themselves: something that perpetrating fathers will then exploit as a tactic of emotional abuse. They will weaponize the very situation they have so cruelly created to regularly say to the victim-survivor mother “you are such a useless mom” (or similar insults).
The perpetrating father has a DOUBLE WHAMMY:
They ruthlessly coerced the victim-survivor mother into compromising on her care for the baby;
AND because of this they have the opportunity to complain that the victim-survivor mother is “incompetent” in her mothering.
Remember this: that if any victim-survivor mother is being prevented from being the mother that she wants to be, then it is all-too easy to brand her as a terrible parent. But of course she’s not a terrible parent; she’s being prevented from being the excellent parent that she would be if she were in a state of freedom and could actually do as she wished.
Coercive control is all about putting the target in a cage, taking away their choices and autonomy — which can severely impact the parenting that they are able to do. And the blame for this lies with the perpetrator.
The perpetrating father’s harmful message: focus on ME
When perpetrating fathers escalate their punishments, they have got a specific message that they are trying to send to the victim-survivor mother (often very successfully). The message that they are communicating with their violence or abuse is that:
“I am the center of your world. You must be continually pleasing and serving me.”
“Don’t you dare put the baby above me.”
“If you do put the baby above me, you or the baby are going to be punished really badly.”
Their objective is to really scare and browbeat the victim-survivor mother out of caring for the baby as they would like to. The perpetrating father wants to grind the victim-survivor mother down until her focus is as much on them as they can possibly make it, and not on the baby.
These are incredibly harmful and sinister behaviors from the perpetrating father. They put the victim-survivor mother in such fear or under such stress that she alters her behavior in ways that benefit the perpetrating father:
Cleaning and tidying
Rather than spend quality time with their baby, the victim-survivor mother is running around keeping the house as clean and tidy as possible.
‘I think while you’re in the relationship you tend to be working extra hard to […] make sure there’s not too much baby mess around, make sure there’s not this or not that.’ (Kay, victim-survivor mother)
Keeping the baby quiet
Rather than letting the baby behave in a natural manner, the victim-survivor mother is desperate to keep the baby as quiet as possible.
‘I was so terrified because […] Angus (the baby) was in the house with him, a 4 or 5 week old baby. I was just terrified that […] if he woke up and (Angus) was crying that he wouldn’t deal with it [i.e. that he would behave in an abusive way].’ (Tanya, victim-survivor mother)
Keeping the baby from inconveniencing the perpetrating father
The victim-survivor mother knows that if the perpetrating father decides that she has failed to keep the baby from inconveniencing him, she or the baby will be punished in some way.
‘That whole thing of egg shells and not knowing how far he would go, I was frightened of that.’ (Tanya, victim-survivor mother)
The threat of punishment can extend to the perpetrating father threatening to kill the baby (although many perpetrators are not so obvious in their threats):
‘I knew his father would hurt him (baby) […] and he goes “If you go out the door I’ll kill him” and I had to go; “I love you, I was only joking” you know, trying to calm him down.’ (Hilda, victim-survivor mother)
Why perpetrating fathers do not truly care about the baby: They see it as a rival for attention that must be suppressed
I know this is a very hard thing to face up to, but coercive controllers don’t care about their babies. They will harm the baby in many different ways in order to drive home their point that they are the center of the universe and the victim-survivor mother must continue to obey and please them.
They will take away many of the baby’s opportunities to receive love, care, attention and consistency from the victim-survivor mother. They will force the baby to live in a home filled with tension, unpredictability and fear.
When the baby is born, the perpetrating father will make it clear that the baby’s needs are NEVER to be prioritized over their needs.
In particular, a perpetrating father will start sabotaging the victim-survivor mother’s efforts to breastfeed the baby, because that’s something that means that the survivor mother can’t be at their continual service.
Breastfeeding is an abuse flashpoint for a perpetrating father, because they see it as a sign that the victim-survivor mother is giving her energy to something other than them.
What will perpetrating fathers do to stop the victim-survivor mother from showing attention to the baby?
Perpetrating fathers have many ways of stopping the victim-survivor mother from showing attention to the baby:
Sometimes it is really obvious and violent:
They do things like beat and kick the victim-survivor mother’s baby bump, or throw her down the stairs, while she is pregnant.
They might attack her while she is holding the baby.
They might deprive the victim-survivor mother of food or support while she is breastfeeding, harming her and the baby.
Sometimes, however, it’s a lot harder to detect:
The perpetrating father will come up with excuses why the victim-survivor mother can’t look after the baby the way she wants to, perhaps ordering her to ignore its cries and its need to be comforted, or coming up with excuses why she should stop breastfeeding.
They may tell the victim-survivor mother that she is being “too soft” and that they (the perpetrating father) know better how the baby should be treated.
They might stop the victim-survivor mother getting the baby medical care, demanding that she conforms to irrational views that they (the perpetrating father) hold about medical treatments.
They might insist that the baby is subjected to practices that the victim-survivor mother finds harmful, drawing on their (the perpetrating father’s) beliefs, culture or religion as a justification for these practices.
These harder to detect tactics leave the victim-survivor mother confused about whether what is going on is right or wrong.
Victim-survivor mothers’ perceptions of what’s going on
If you are speaking with or working with a victim-survivor mother who is going through this kind of abuse, what you are likely to find is that they are in a state of confusion, concern and self-blame.
Depending on how much they trust you, they may put on a front and behave as though all is well, or they may confide in you to some extent about their concerns.
If they do confide in you, they may find it very hard to put into words what is going on in their relationship. They may use terms such as “stress” or “problems” that minimize the severity of the situation. They may present the situation as though they themselves are wholly or partly to blame. They may show signs of depression and anxiety.
All of this is totally understandable. What we need to realize here is that the perpetrating father is being exceptionally manipulative in convincing the victim-survivor mother that what is going on is all her fault, and that it isn’t abuse. The perpetrating father presents each incident as isolated and minor, and tries to divert the victim-survivor away from recognizing that the perpetrating father has a pattern of abusive behavior.
Victim-survivor mothers need sensitive support to help them realize that the perpetrating father’s version of reality isn’t the true one.
Perpetrating fathers using these tactics in post-separation abuse
The perpetrating father’s manipulative attempts to prevent the victim-survivor mother from caring for and protecting the baby may also occur as part of post-separation abuse. (See my earlier blog: “Post-Separation Abuse and the Devastation It Causes”.)
Here are a couple of ways that the perpetrating father stops the victim-survivor mother from caring for or protecting the baby that may occur as part of post-separation abuse:
If the victim-survivor mother has left the perpetrating father during the pregnancy or soon after birth because of their abusiveness, the perpetrating father may take the victim-survivor mother to family court and demand 50/50 time (or more) with the baby.
This may mean that the victim-survivor mother is forced to stop breastfeeding because she is separated from the baby for too much time to continue.
A perpetrating father who has shown little positive interest in the pregnancy or the baby before the victim-survivor mother left, may now, once she has left, insist that they want to look after the baby as much as possible. However, when the baby is in their care, they may be abusive or neglectful of the baby. They might hand the baby over to someone else (e.g. the perpetrating father’s own mother), so they are not actually caring for the baby as they insisted they wanted to.
These are tactics used by the perpetrating father to upset and control the victim-survivor mother as part of their post-separation abuse.
Our societies are currently extremely poor at preventing post-separation abuse, and major changes are needed in this area. If you don’t know much about family courts, you might be thinking right now “surely the family courts wouldn’t let this sort of thing happen?”. Unfortunately, family courts DO frequently let this happen.
Finally; let’s give all our respect and support to victim-survivor mothers experiencing these attacks
It is important to stress here that victims-survivor mothers who are experiencing these attacks on their motherhood should be praised for any efforts that they are able to make to care for their children.
They deserve all the respect and support that can be given. (See my earlier blog: “Why Domestic and Abuse Victims and Survivors Deserve All Our Respect and Support: They Are Soldiers Fighting a War They Did Not Choose. They Are Heroes”.)
Instead of being critical of victim-survivor mothers, societies need to start focusing on perpetrating fathers’ actions towards both the victim-survivor mother and the children. These perpetrating fathers have repeatedly proven through their abusive actions that they are highly harmful parents.
Goodbye for now
Thank you for reading this post. As always, I hope you have found this message illuminating and validating. Feel free to share this blog far and wide so more victims and survivors and those who work with them can read it.
I will be back soon with another post. Please continue exploring Decoding Coercive Control with Dr Emma Katz.
Wow! This explains so much of my experience. Thank you for existing and sharing this research, it's so needed and necessary. This is so validating for me, truly, thank you.
I believe we need to speak up , make public debate about it. The focus is too often made on the the victim survivor critically on her ability to parent, be a mother and not on her support system to create an ideal environment for it to take place.