Domestic Partner Abuse in the Documentary The Private Violence

Domestic Partner Abuse
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Domestic Partner Abuse
The Private Violence (Hill, 2014) film depicts the aspects of domestic violence and how they affect not only the primary victims but also social workers and advocates. The documentary covers the story of Deanna Walters, Kit Gruelle, and other women who have undergone abuse and violence at the hands of their spouses. Naturally, a spouse is meant to love, care for, and protect, but this is not the case for Kit Gruelle, a North Carolina woman who endured years of physical and emotional violence from her spouse. She later escapes the abusive relationship and becomes a defender and an advocate for women in a similar situation. Deanna Walters and her two-year-old daughter were kidnapped by her abusive husband and drove across states while enduring hours of abuse. Additionally, the latter occasionally terrorized his young daughter. Walter’s husband intended to remove her from the support network she had to treat her the way he wanted.
Throughout the film, Gruelle encounters many challenges as an advocate and defender of abused women. She explains that thousands of females in the U.S. have been murdered by their spouses even after reporting the domestic abuse to local authorities. Advocates and defenders of women in abusive relationships encounter psychological difficulties that impact their daily lives and personal relationships. This condition is known as compassion fatigue or vicarious trauma (Mathieu, 2012). Vicarious trauma occurs when a person takes on the burden of another person’s pain and suffering. Since most support persons who work with victims and survivors of domestic violence are survivors themselves, they are often reminded of their past experiences. Some of the symptoms of vicarious trauma and compassion fatigue include the feeling of not being or doing enough. For instance, despite the e...