Are you considering trying to convince your husband to go to therapy? Or making a therapy appointment for your abusive husband? Is your abusive husband’s therapist making things worse? Anne Blythe, M.Ed. covers the 5 things you need to consider before making a decision.

If you need support, attend a Betrayal Trauma Recovery Group Session TODAY.

Many professionals avoid using the word “abuse” and instead use words like “harm” or “mistreat” because they don’t want to hurt the abuser’s feelings. A therapist who uses the word “abuse” holds the perpetrator accountable and acknowledges the very real pain that the victim is experiencing.

5 Thing To Watch For If You’re Condsidering Helping Your Abusive Husband To To Therapy:

1. Did your husband make the appointment without you mentioning that he needs therapy?
2. Think about why you want him to go to therapy. Is it for a basic thing that he should already know how to do, like tell the truth?
3. When an abusive man has appointments set for him by his victim, he uses the therapist to manipulate his victim. Is there a way to determine if he’s abusive before you suggest therapy to him?
4. If he’s abusive, he’ll use the therapy as leverage for more emotional and psychological abuse.
5. Since a therapist is likely to pin the cause of his abuse on common inaccurate reasons like childhood trauma, addiction, or personality disorder, etc, the abuser will be happy to use that “diagnosis” to justify his behavior and continue his lying and manipulation.

Transcript: Your Abusive Husband’s Therapist – 5 Things To Watch For

Anne: It’s just me today. I want to talk about your abusive husband’s therapist. It’s the most natural thing to consider finding a therapist for your husband when he exhibits abusive behaviors like lying, manipulation, basically any unhealthy behavior. Anyone’s going to tell you to go to therapy, right? But at Betrayal Trauma Recovery, we know something therapists don’t know.

We know what women who have been through this know: Abuse happens in the context of our society and the socially acceptable ways that people interact. Men know that to assert control, they’ll need to manage their image. So it was the girlfriend who became his wife. All the people at their church, their clergy and their therapist view him as a particular sort of person. So he has control, and he can maintain that control.

And over time, he’ll chip away at her sense of self and her support system. So she becomes more and more unsure and isolated. He pulls her more and more away from her own internal warning system. These men are smart. Men know that women resist abuse. Men know that women don’t like lies, manipulation and coercion. Only psychologists and therapists think women fail to resist abuse. Men know well that women will resist it.

So they need to do it carefully and very covert ways, because they know that if they get caught, women will resist even more. We know they know this because they don’t act overtly abusive in the beginning. They groom to appear kind, loving, generous, and selfless. Because they know women don’t want to be treated badly. They know how to act appropriately. Men know that women want to be respected. So he acts like he respects you.

Your Abusive Husband’s Therapist Has Misconceptions

Anne: Psychologists are confused because they’re like. “Why would you be with someone who doesn’t respect you?” And you’re like, well, men are smart. They know what women want. And they also know how to get what they want in a way that seems socially acceptable. Through grooming, lying and manipulation.

So when we learn about abuse, it’s important to look at how the abusive husband’s choices can’t be severed, from how the victim resists. And then how society views her resistance and responds to that resistance. Resisting abuse with supportive people who understand it’s abuse is totally different than trying to resist abuse when the abuser has collected a team of helpers to extend his abuse.

Here’s an example of resisting abuse. One member of the Betrayal Trauma Recovery community decided to have lunch with her abusive ex. She was terrified of him, but she was weighing her safety needs. Not consciously, but subconsciously, she was willing to trade her emotional safety for financial safety. To resist his financial abuse, she hoped that if she had lunch with him, he would be more inclined to pay for the kids’ extracurricular activities.

But a therapist might say something like. Why would you meet someone who’s been emotionally and psychologically abusive to you? Because they don’t get it. Despite her willingness to forgo emotional safety for financial safety, the lunch did not go well. When I talked to her, she felt ashamed that she didn’t anticipate how badly the lunch would go.

And she said, Anne, I’m so weak. Why can’t I just say no to him? And I suggested she was resisting the abuse by thinking the lunch may make things better. I helped her realize she’s always been resisting the abuse.

Five Things To Consider Before Therapy

Anne: So the topic of today, which is your abusive husband’s therapist. If you think getting a therapist for your husband may help, that is a form of resistance to abuse. It just means you’re trying to figure it out, and you’re smart and need help. And so you’re going for help. The problem is that no one teaches victims of abuse that therapy is dangerous in this situation. So here are five things to consider before looking for your abusive husband’s therapist.

1st Thing To Consider: He Hasn’t Acquired Himself A Therapist

Anne: Number one, if your husband was concerned about his behavior, he’d get himself a therapist. If he hasn’t acquired himself a therapist without you demanding it or bringing it up, therapy will not help him. So that’s the number one thing.

2nd Thing To Consider: Think About Why You Want Him To Attend Therapy

Anne: Number two. Think about why you want him to attend therapy. This is an act of resistance to abuse. But think about what you want him to stop doing. Is it to stop lying? Soliciting prostitutes, being manipulative, being very irritable, unkind and demanding. If you’re thinking, I need him to go to therapy so he can stop lying. I get it. You’re resisting the abuse. I did this for a long time.

I spent seven years trying to get my abuser more and more therapy, trying to get therapists to help. Therapy won’t help him, because he already knows the lying is wrong. He already knows. He hears this from all over the place. He’s heard it in church. His parents have told him. Society has told him don’t lie, don’t be manipulative. This is how to be a nice person. He can act that way. He’s acted that way before. He’s able to.

But he has exploitative privilege and doesn’t want to give up the benefits that come from exploitative privilege. So if your aim is to have a therapist teach your husband the basics of decent human behavior. Like the lowest bar, which is don’t lie to your wife. That’s like the lowest bar. If that’s why you want him to go to therapy, think about that. Because therapy’s not going to help if someone has already heard that this is not an okay way to act, and they consistently choose to act this way.

If they didn’t want to act that way, they would already have a different character. They would have made different choices throughout their lives.

3rd Thing To Consider: If You Insist On Therapy, He May Manipulate The Therapist

Anne: If you arrange for your husband to see a therapist, or insist he attend therapy, again, this is you resisting the abuse. This is a safety seeking behavior, and it makes total sense that you’re doing this under the circumstances. Because everybody thinks therapy will be good. What they don’t tell you is that therapy generally increases an abusive man’s abusiveness. And here’s how you can know if it has increased his abusiveness.

So number three, if you arrange for your husband to see a therapist, or insist he attend therapy, if he comes home and claims his therapist wants to meet with you. If he does this, it’s likely that he’s manipulated the therapist into believing that you are the issue. And in this case, he’s going to use therapy to escalate his emotional and psychological abuse with the therapist as his partner in the abuse. The therapist is unaware they’ve been manipulated.

And if you go in, they’re going to start to say, “Hey, he has these needs that he’s worried about. He hasn’t felt safe enough to tell you up until this point.” And then they manipulate you into supporting your abuser. They trap you.

4th Thing To Consider: He May Leverage Therapy To Escalate Abuse

Anne: Number four. If your abusive husband returns home and either manipulates his therapist’s words against you, or lies about what the therapist said in his session, he’s leveraging therapy to escalate his emotional and psychological abuse. So if that’s happening, you know, that therapy is making things worse for you.

5th Thing To Consider: Childhood Issues Don’t Cause Abusive Behavior

Anne: And number five, childhood trauma, stress, shame, attachment issues, and other factors don’t cause abusive behavior. There are lots of people with childhood trauma. They’re not abusers. Everyone I know has felt shame. And not all of them are abusers. I know people with attachment issues, and they’re not abusers. Stress doesn’t cause abuse. When I get stressed, I eat ice cream. I don’t lie to people.

Since therapists don’t recognize abuse as a diagnosable condition. They’re not going to diagnose someone as an abuser. When he goes to therapy, your abusive husband’s therapist will diagnose him with something else, maybe addiction. Maybe an attachment disorder, intimacy anorexia, anxiety, or depression. Maybe he’s going to say his testosterone is too low.

Once that diagnosis has been given, pay attention to its impact on the abuser. Does it motivate him to seek treatment for that specific thing? Or does he just use it as justification? At one point, a therapist suggested to my ex that he had bipolar, and he was like, oh, cool. And that was it. Like, he wasn’t like, oh, really? I need to get some books about bipolar, what can I do to make that better? Like he was like, oh, okay.

So number five includes that if he uses something that the therapist tells him as an excuse or remains active after receiving the therapist’s diagnosis. It’s a sign that he wasn’t interested in changing, despite what he told you. So keep those things in mind, as you’re resisting the abuse and thinking that therapy might help the situation. Part of the reason women resist abuse by trying to get their husband in therapy is her financial and physical safety depends on him.

The Importance Of Dignity

Anne: Similarly, the importance of dignity isn’t widely recognized. A therapist will likely interpret incorrectly the actions she’s taken to preserve her dignity in the face of abuse. The therapist will say you’re part of the problem because you’re sending your husband mixed signals. You might take action to preserve your dignity. And the therapist will say, well, you couldn’t have been scared of him because you stayed in the house. But often they’re missing that part about dignity.

It’s so clear when you understand that women resist abuse by demanding dignity. A woman refuses to leave her home, even if she’s scared. Because she demands dignity. She loves her home. She’s lived in that neighborhood for years. Her kids can walk to school. She’s carefully tended the garden. She’s worked hard to make her home comfortable and nice. And that’s why she’s not going to leave, even if she’s scared. Because to her, that home represents her dignity.

Your Husband’s Abusive Therapist Misinterprets Actions

Anne: So your abusive husband’s therapist could mistakenly look at emotional and psychological abuse and tell the victim, or even the abuser, it’s her fault because she wouldn’t leave. Or that she didn’t communicate her needs clearly. If she’d just write them down, maybe he could do it. The abuser will tell a therapist. She isn’t willing to be open and transparent, or she’s belligerent.

In other words, everything he’ll say about his wife would lead someone to think, “Oh, I get it. Yeah, she just keeps doing this. It’s just not the smartest.” But we are the smartest sisters. We’re trying to resist abuse in any way we can. So what therapists continually miss is the complete picture of how abuse works. You need to think about the action of the abuser, and then the resistance of the victim.

Here’s an example. He lied to her about his pornography use and masturbation. The way he presented himself very much made her think that he’s kind, loving and considerate. She observed his actions and felt safe with him. It’s not like he seemed unsafe at the time, he was being kind and considerate. Then she expressly told him she didn’t want to marry someone who used pornography or have sex with a man who used pornography.

And he lied to her about his past and present pornography use. Then she expressly told him that she wanted a monogamous relationship, and he lied to her because he wasn’t sure that’s what he wanted, but he knew that telling her. “I don’t know if I want that.” Would cause her to distrust him.

Your Abusive Husband’s Therapist Is Unaware Of The Pattern of Control & Manipulation

Anne: They attended church every week together. She wanted to resist abuse by having a strong family. to attend church, study scripture, pray to stay close to God and avoid pornography and infidelity. And he always acted as if he agreed with the sermons and that he was totally in line. You can see that deception and manipulation are constant. He makes choice after choice to withhold key information. An attachment disorder or personality disorder doesn’t cause this.

He didn’t just get so that he couldn’t control himself. When you start to see that it wasn’t just one act of deceit, but a pattern of control and manipulation. This wasn’t just one moment. Or he happened to make a mistake. He decided to lie to her over and over again. And every time she resisted, he overpowered her with more lies and more manipulation.

If after this episode, you still think you want your abusive husband to go to therapy, and you convince your abusive husband to get a therapist, or you set up an appointment for him. Your abusive husband’s therapist isn’t going to get this long form fact pattern in terms of his actions and your resistance over time.

Instead, they’ll focus on why he feels the way he feels, what his goals are, and your abusive husband will take that opportunity to talk about his feelings, which revolve around you, the victims, perceived weaknesses and failings. The therapist will not interpret his actions as overt choices. And the abuser will certainly not share with a therapist all the ways you resisted this at every point, and all the ways he got around it.

Your Abusive Husband’s Therapist Focuses On Feelings Over Actions

Anne: Your abusive husband’s therapist won’t even ask to get the full picture of the systematic ways your emotionally and psychologically abusive husband has undermined you and overpowered your resistance at every turn. At Betrayal Trauma Recovery, we consistently recognize how victims like you resist abuse. This insight allows us to anticipate the various tactics your abusive husband might use to overcome your resistance to his abuse.

We know this because we know he’s making deliberate choices at each step. Understanding this helps us empower victims like you, like us, with strategies to ensure our safety, without relying on him to get therapy. I teach these strategies in The Living Free Workshop. Especially when there’s a high chance that he’s going to exploit that situation. Your abusive husband’s therapist could help overpower your resistance.

Since your abusive husband always attempts to conceal his true intentions, any effort you make to expose or reveal the truth will be perceived by him as an act of resistance. And he will inevitably strive to overpower it. Because we can see that pattern, we can help you see it.

It’s important to see this, because an abusive husband always anticipates his wife’s resistance, takes that into account, and makes a plan about how he’s going to overpower it.

Here’s an example: Cyber crime hackers don’t just send random emails, hoping for success. They plan, and they use sophisticated malware. And they create convincing phishing attempts. They anticipate security measures and develop strategies to bypass them.

It’s unlikely they’re targeting major tech companies with robust cybersecurity. Instead, they’re going to focus on businesses with weaker defenses. So they often target individuals who might use simple passwords or outdated software, making them easy targets. Abusive men show this same type of anticipation of resistance.

Your Abusive Husband’s Therapist Can Be Manipulated

Anne: Abusive men plan their actions, demonstrate deliberation and skill. They manipulate social perceptions and overpower victim resistance, maintaining control even in seemingly impulsive incidents. Like when I see some of the things these men do, I’m so surprised at how smart they seem, even though what they’re doing is wrong, so baffling that it works so well. They know exactly what they’re doing.

So back to therapy, and your abusive husband’s therapist. Men are a vast majority of mental health professionals. And they have been socialized to prefer to believe a man when he gives excuses for his actions. These abusive husbands are skilled at behaving appropriately in professional or public settings. And all the practice they have every day at work and other professional settings enables them to manipulate therapists. Because that’s a similarly professional setting.

In a therapy session, they know that if they don’t admit some faults, they’re going to look strange. So they’re going to admit some faults. They’re going to mention they have an abusive father, or mention some kind of childhood trauma. They’re going to express regret. They’ll discuss concerns about their wife’s mental health struggles, and claim they want to support their wife. He’ll sound convincing when he tells his therapist, “I just wish she’d let me support her. I love her so much.”

Contrast this with the research Patricia O’Connor conducted. She visited U.S. prisons and interviewed inmates serving life sentences. She asked them, how did you get here, and recorded their responses. And remarkably, these men often reflected candidly on their own personal responsibility, as they had nothing to hide given their life sentences.

Men Have Control Over Their Actions

Anne: Her research shows these men knew their actions were wrong and chose to do it anyway. However, with your abusive husband’s therapist, he is often encouraged to discuss feelings or reasons, rather than focus on actions and choices. Consequently, therapy can unintentionally allow men to mask their harmful behavior toward their wife with socially acceptable responses.

I find it reassuring for victims to realize that men have full control over their actions. I find it reassuring that we can know that they choose to lie, deceive and manipulate that they’re not unintelligent oafs. Nor are they mentally ill. Nothing is wrong with them. They’re just simply abusers. They are men who are okay with lying, cheating, stealing and exploiting people.

Knowing that you can treat your husband like a responsible adult, because he is one, even if he’s trying hard to convince you otherwise. Thinking that he needs therapy will trap you, because he doesn’t need therapy. He knows exactly what to do. He just wants you to believe he doesn’t, and if he gets into therapy, he can use that situation to manipulate you more.

Next Steps If Your Abusive Husband’s Therapist Is Making Things Worse

Anne: So if your abusive husband’s therapist is making things worse for you, I am so sorry. I know that you did this as an act of resistance. Your efforts to get to safety are brave, and you have the right intentions and are on the right track.

Rather than convince him he needs therapy or find a therapist for him, consider enrolling in the Betrayal Trauma Recovery Living Free Workshop. The workshop outlines exactly what he is doing, why he’s doing it, so that you can start anticipating the ways he’s going to try to overpower your resistance to his abuse. It teaches women how to get to safety without the risk of being abused by a therapist or abused by their abusive husband’s therapist.