Why is it so hard to leave you? Psychodynamic reflections and experiences in a listening centre with battered women

At the end of a participatory experience in a Women's Listening Centre with battered women, the author reflects - through the description of "perverse relationships", pathological addictions and various types of violence - on the reasons that often imprison the woman in her relationship with her partner. Then, through the story of a case, she tells how the path out of violence and pathological dependence can happen. The article concludes with some personal reflections on what is most significant in working with women victims of violence. The author underlines the importance that the therapy is based on sensitivity and "non-judgement". Psychotherapy should therefore create a "relational home", which never reinforces the victim's sense of guilt, but favours good "anticipatory identifications".