Highlights of The Emotionally Destructive Marriage

22 July 2024 by Wes Bredenhof

This book has been recommended to me numerous times.  I finally got around to reading it.  It’s addressed to women caught in emotionally destructive marriages (though the author acknowledges that men can sometimes be on the receiving end of such abuse too).  The book offers a lot of wise, practical guidance.  Let me share some of the parts of this book that I found most helpful, mostly without any further comment.

You might also want to check out the other resources related to this book on Vernick’s website here.

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God does not value men more than women, or the institution of marriage more than the people who are in it. (p.2)

Leslie Vernick asks (rhetorically):

Does a husband have a right to control how his wife spends her free time, what she wears, the friends she chooses, how much time she spends with her family, what she buys, how she thinks, what she feels, the things she needs to work on or change, and ultimately who she should be? Is biblical headship synonymous with taking control over someone else and forcing her to comply when she resists? (p.43)

…if you want control over someone, play mind games with her. Add emotional manipulation. Create confusion of what’s real and what’s true. Isolate her from others. Keep her up late, don’t let her sleep, badger her until she gives in. Threaten to hurt her, her children, her pets, her possessions, her reputation. Tell her God is on your side. Degrade her, humiliate her, and enforce trivial demands. Refuse responsibility and instead blame, accuse, and attack. Control the money so she has no resources and is completely dependent on you for everything…These tactics to gain control over others are used by the military on prisoners of war are so effective that religious cults use them to keep their members compliant. (pp.44-45)

Women feel guilty taking measures to protect themselves, because they’ve been taught it’s unbiblical or ungodly. Perhaps their Christian friends or church leaders have told them they have no biblical right to safety and they must stay in their marital homes, no matter what. They suffer endlessly with verbal battering and even physical abuse, believing that by doing so, they’re being godly martyrs or fulfilling a call to be the sacrificial lamb. Keeping the family together at all costs is seen as God’s highest value. But there are times when keep the family together has an extremely high price for a woman and her children, and it may actually cost them their lives. In addition, staying together regardless of the costs continues to enable the husband to grossly sin against them with no consequences, which is not biblical. (pp.69-70)

I would love to tell you to run to your pastor and church leadership for this kind of help, but, sadly, many women I’ve talked with have found conservative Christian churches give more support to their husbands than to them.  Sometimes it’s the idea of headship and submission that causes leadership to be wary of a woman who decides she must stand up against what’s happening at home.  She’s seen as contentious, unruly, and lacking a gentle and quiet spirit; therefore, what she reports in her home is seen with suspicion or dismissed.  Sometimes it’s because her husband is a good liar and manipulator and has charmed the folks at church.  He easily makes people believe he’s the real victim of abuse, or his wife is exaggerating, lying, or just plain nuts.  The last reason I find that pastors don’t believe a woman is that by the time she finally reaches the end of her rope, she can’t take it anymore.  She’s so fragile that she’s seen as an emotional wreck.  Or she’s so angry, reactive, bitter, and unforgiving that she’s seen as the provoker and cause of their marital problems.  Either way, in these types of situations, her side of the story is suspect and her credibility is diminished. (p.125) 

With regard to the second sentence of this quote, I’d clarify that it’s not the fault of the biblical idea of headship and submission, but a wrong understanding of it, a wrong understanding that makes men always right and women always wrong, men always have a voice and women are always to be silent (and not just in church services).