ABSTRACT
This chapter describes the characteristics of violent relationships and the destructive power of morbid jealousy. It explains how emotional abuse, physical abuse and the desperate wish for protection combine to keep people trapped in highly destructive relationships. The chapter discusses the dynamics of extreme coercion, control and abuse, and their manifestations in sexual and physical violence. It illustrates typical patterns of intimate partner violence (IPV) that fall predominantly into the category of 'intimate terrorism' as defined by Michael Johnson and that involve humiliation, physical and psychological abuse, sexual tyranny and the subjugation of one partner to the needs of the other. The chapter explores the complex and painful area of unconscious choices and the 'repetition compulsion', describing how these destructive relationships have an addictive and compulsive quality which makes them powerful and, at times, impossible to leave. It discusses countertransference feelings in the therapist when working with someone who has left a violent relationship, but soon forms another one.
