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Stories of Hope and Inspiration After Violence Response from a Therpaist1. What are Bill’s greatest needs at this time in his life? Bill has made very significant positive changes in his life as indicated by abstaining from alcohol and drugs, insight into his abusive behavior, and a sense of hope and determination to change. However maintaining these changes over time will be Bill’s greatest challenge and set-backs will occur. Bill will need to learn how to recover from his set-backs rather than spiral back into substance dependence and aggression. In other words, given Bill’s stage on the road to recovery, an effective relapse prevention strategy is Bill’s most critical need at this time. 2. What might a local congregation offer to a man in Bill’s situation? Actually a faith community could become an integral part of Bill’s relapse prevention strategy. Bill could join a men’s small group where he could feel a sense of acceptance. A men’s group would provide accountability, monitoring and it would (hopefully) model a non-violent approach to dealing with life stresses and difficulties. Later Bill can become part of a mixed gender small group Bible Study, although this should be introduced cautiously and only after a long period of remission. Bill could be encouraged to attend the weekly worship service where he could feel a part of a larger community. Finally Bill could be encouraged to participate in volunteer outreach ministries that do not involve women or children. This would provide Bill with opportunities of service to others which will help challenge his self-centeredness. 3. How might pastoral care dovetail with support offered by the faith-based batterer intervention program? There are a number of way’s pastoral care could be built into Bill’s relapse prevention program. Fairly regular individual pastoral counseling sessions should be provided that focus on accountability, monitoring and the provision of spiritual enrichment counseling. The pastor should ask Bill for instances in the past two weeks of slippage in terms of alcohol/drug abuse and anger/frustration or controlling episodes. Working with Bill to apply spiritual principles to his daily interactions with others and his struggle against cravings would be an important part of the counseling. However, to be effective the pastor must have Bill’s written consent to contact his primary therapist and the pastor should make contact on an occasional basis. Also it should be made clear to Bill that the Pastor will inform the primary therapist of any crisis or concerns that arise during a pastoral counseling session. 4. What does Bill’s life help us to understand about the nature of hope? There are three things we can learn from Bill’s experience. First hope is critical to real change. If you don’t think you can change, if you don’t expect change to be possible, you will never begin the recovery process. So some form of hope is involved in the first steps to therapeutic change. Second there is no end point to change. There is always the possibility of relapse, returning to a life of addictions and violence. So an emphasis on relapse prevention is always necessary no matter how much the person seems to have changed at the time. And thirdly, expect set-backs. The road to recovery will be filled with many potholes, even road blocks. The person dependent on drugs or alcohol will succumb to intoxication or getting high; the angry or violent individual will fall into an uncontrolled rage or other controlling behaviour. The important point is to have a plan for recovery. Instead of one binge leading to months of uncontrolled drinking, what is the plan for responding to a binge? Is there a relapse prevention and recovery program in place, ready to spring into action? Is Bill aware of this program and are all the members of the treatment team on board? This is a critical component of any intervention program for domestic violence. David A. Clark, Ph.D. |
