How Do Memories of Having Been Parented Relate to the Parenting-Experience of Fathers in Treatment for Intimate Partner
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ORIGINAL ARTICLE
How Do Memories of Having Been Parented Relate to the Parenting-Experience of Fathers in Treatment for Intimate Partner Violence? A Phenomenological Analysis Henning Mohaupt 1,2,3
&
Fanny Duckert 1,2 & Ingunn Rangul Askeland 3,4
Accepted: 30 September 2020 # The Author(s) 2020
Abstract Few studies have examined how men who use intimate partner violence (IPV) experience being a parent. This study describes how Norwegian men in treatment for IPV reflect upon the impact of their childhood experiences on their fathering. We interviewed 11 men in treatment for IPV regarding their fathering experience, and their memories of having been parented. We performed a descriptive phenomenological analysis of the data. We identified two superordinate themes that described the participants’ fathering experience: being a benign versus being a detrimental force in the child’s life and having the intention of not repeating and the actual repetition of harmful parenting. The participants described being conflicted regarding being potentially damaging for their child’s development. They generally described a lack of stable positive relationships, both early in life and in the present. Partner-violent men’s meaning making of their fathering seems to be influenced by their early-life experiences with their parents in several problematic ways. Fathers who use IPV may both accept and reject that they have been harmed by the parenting they received as children. Similarly, they may both acknowledge and discard that their use of violence harms their children. We suggest that therapy should explore these themes and their consequences for the father - child relationship. Keywords Father-child relations . Intimate partner violence . Parenting representations . Phenomenology
Many men in treatment for intimate partner violence (IPV) are fathers and have contact with their children (Askeland and Heir 2014). Their use of partner-violence exposes their children to an unsafe environment and impairs the protective function of the mother (Levendovsky et al. 2018). Often, they
Electronic supplementary material The online version of this article (https://doi.org/10.1007/s10896-020-00210-z) contains supplementary material, which is available to authorized users. * Henning Mohaupt [email protected] 1
Department of Psychology, University of Oslo, Oslo, Norway
2
Alcohol and Drug Research Western Norway (KORFOR), Stavanger University Hospital, Stavanger, Norway
3
Alternative to Violence, Oslo, Norway
4
Norwegian Centre for Violence and Traumatic Stress Studies (NKVTS), Oslo, Norway
continue to threaten and control their children’s mother after separation, also through contact with their children (Humphreys et al. 2019). Their use of coercive control may create a climate of chronic tension and vigilance in the family and infringe children’s sense of safety, and social development. Furthermore, fathers who use violence against their female partner often show little empathy toward their children (Fox and Benson 2004
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