Would love some advice on handling a friend going through a DV situation.

[quesadilla]

A friend is in a situation with a bloke involving DV. Not sure how bad or how frequent at the moment. The relationship is on and off, currently officially off but I know they are seeing each other. He has hit her in the past badly enough for the police to have been called and for there to have been talk of going to court, although that never happened. There's also been talk of him having counselling, working through it etc, but it has still happened badly at least twice, probably more, so clearly very worrying. Friend and bloke both have moderate to severe drinking problems which is obviously a factor too.

The problem with all this is I only know this second hand. Said friend has never told me herself, in fact officially speaking I don't even know she is in a relationship with this guy, although they hang out together a lot and he's even been to my place, which made me feel very uncomfortable. I'm not a super close friend but see this person regularly it feels really uncomfortable when she talks about this guy to me, not knowing that I know he's a violent lowlife. I would like to be able to support her and help and would also like to be able to stop the charade of pretending I don't know. But another friend has told me in confidence (because she's worried) and this friend has been sworn to secrecy.

I realize all of this is marginal in the context of the friend's attempts to get through this situation. But I'd really like to hear from other people who have had friends in DV situations how they dealt with it. Is it better to be absolute zero tolerance about the bloke and be really direct? or is it better to tolerate the self-deceit which seems to go on and the emotional shades of grey in order to preserve a friend's dignity?

[queenrollo]

you know there is no black and white answer to this.

My best friend was in DV relationship for years, and in the last couple of years I cleaned her up after incidents, actually witnessed two - the last one when he actually tried to kill her.

I was really direct in the beginning and soon came to realise that she suffered the consequences for me standing up to him and being blunt with her that she should leave. So I faded into the background somewhat, always being there for her and trying to boost her self-esteem, self-worth and confidence in subtle ways. I became more vocal and blunt again after the incident when he tried to kill her. I have to admit that i'd been scared of him (all known each other since 15, and we were in our mid 20's by this point), and he had physically threatened me in the past, once with a knife.
I reached a point where i just didn't care anymore, possibly because there was now a child involved. Those last months were hell.....utter hell.....

She eventually left him, and admitted that my constant friendship is what got her through at times - and she would never have found the strength to do it without knowing I would back her up.
For me I was very close to her/them and knew many of the finer details of their life together so was able to judge how to deal with it. It's not so easy to do that when you are not close.

I have to say that it would have to be someone very, very important to me for me to put myself through all of that again - at such close quarters anyway.
I'd like to think that I would always help a woman in this situation but I can't honestly say I could cope with the emotional toll it had on me.......and I do feel awful for feeling that way.

[quesadilla]

thanks. This isn't that close a friend: she is someone I've known socially for a long time and have had a fair bit of one on one time with, respect and like but I'm far from being a bosom buddy of. But it disturbs me that she's going through this -- she's outwardly a strong and together person who has had a fair bit of shit thrown at her in her life of various kinds and has handled it all fairly well until now. If I knew her really well, like it sounds like you knew the woman in this situation, I'd know how far I could go. At the moment I don't. My feeling at the moment is that a direct approach wouldn't be welcome so I'm standing on the sidelines. I guess unless she asks for help directly or it gets bad enough that standing by is no longer an option I have to carry on like this.

[TeachMySelfBalance]

I supported my sister by giving her books to read. Walking on Eggshells, Why Does He Do That?, Verbally Abusive Relationship...and others.
Just say you thought this might be helpful to her in identifying the dynamic, which is different from telling her what to do, iyswim.

My sister is working through her relationship. She has told him she doesn't care about keeping the house as he'd get half and that was a turning point. He was holding that over her head as leverage. She has given him 6 months to 'reform' how he treats her-as it is his choice how he treats her-and he is changing for the better. His next 'blow up' is due in Aug/Sept so we'll see...

Good luck. Try not to judge, and maybe read the books too so you can discuss them.