What's Age Got to Do With It?

What’s Age Got to Do With It?
Report and Overview by MJ (Greta) Smith and Jill Hightower

An Overview of Silent and Invisible: A Report on Abuse and Violence in the Lives of Older Women in British Columbia and Yukon

Abuse of older women by intimate partners and family members cuts across class, race, religion, income, and social status. It includes physical, emotional, sexual, and financial abuse, and human-rights violations.

Experience and research show that this violence and abuse is a devastating fact in the lives of far too many older women, who remain silent and invisible in our society. Raising awareness about this issue is critical to improving safety, support, and refuge for older abused woman.

Following the advice and experience of Dr. Linda Vinton at Florida State University, we include women as young as 50 in our definition of older women for two groups of reasons. One has to do with generational differences. What girls learned at their mothers’ knees and from their peers in school was different in 1920s, 30s, and 40s than in the 1960s, 70s, and 80s. The other reasons involve the current situations and options facing women of different ages. A woman over 50 is subject to ageist attitudes in the labour force; if married, her most recent work experience may have been some 30 years ago, and she will not receive any pension until she is 60 or 65.

Barriers to Seeking Help
Some abused older women are unable to recognize that they are being abused, because for them it is foreign to think of abuse within a marital relationship as wrong. Others deny that they are ‘abused’ but accept that they ‘have been mistreated,’ referring to years, perhaps decades of serious emotional and physical abuse.

Many older women, though certainly not all, differ from younger women in several important attitudes and beliefs:

They may be more tolerant of abusive behaviour, particularly if it has been a pattern throughout their married lives.
They may have internalized abusers’ messages, such as ‘it’s your fault I have to hit you.’
They were probably raised with the philosophy ‘you made your bed, you lie in it.’
They may have learned by example that abuse within a family is normal.
They take seriously their marriage vows ‘till death do us part’ and to ‘obey’ as well as ‘love and honour.’
As with younger women considering leaving abusive relationships, they remember the ‘good moments.’
If they married young and had only one partner, their ‘good moments’ may cover a long period of time and they may need more time to grieve the bad times and celebrate the good times than younger women.
Like younger women, older women want to protect their children. However, older women’s children are adults, and in some cases are their mothers’ abusers. Although these adult children can be prosecuted for their crimes, they are often the parents of the older women’s young grandchildren, presenting further barriers. Older women tend to have complicated loyalties, creating more barriers to help than younger women experience.
Older women often have more attachment to home, keepsakes, photos, friends, and neighbours who have been part of their lives for many years.
Older women are less likely to know about others who have left abusive relationships and turned their lives around. But it does happen. One woman who had been abused through four decades until her marriage ended said, "I never thought I could be as happy as I am now!"

Women face many difficult choices when deciding to leave or stay with an abusive family member, partner, or husband. For each woman, the issues are different. The unique blend of complicating factors can include finances, health concerns, housing, anticipated reactions of other family members, and the safety of a precious pet. Older women victims are often more vulnerable than younger ones, and generally have good reasons to fear poverty, homelessness, and even being institutionalized if they report abusive behaviour.

Many older women think shelters are only intended for younger women with children.

What We Have Learned From Our Research

Our research into violence and abuse in the lives of older women began in 1998 with a survey of transition houses, which confirmed that few older abused women used these services. We held focus groups with service providers to identify obstacles and difficulties in serving older women. (Hightower, Smith, Hightower, 1999)

We then led a province-wide outreach campaign, which invited older abused women to tell us about their experiences. Sixty-four women shared life stories of abuse with us. What we learned is summarized in Silent and Invisible: A Report on Abuse and Violence in the Lives of Older Women in British Columbia and Yukon. (Hightower, Smith, Ward-Hall, and Hightower, 2001)

Older women tend to have complicated loyalties, which create additional barriers to help.

Perhaps the most important lesson we learned from this research is the importance of taking time to listen and understand each woman’s perceptions and values. We also learned that:

Many older women are unaware of community-based services that may be available to them, particularly transition houses or shelters.
Many older women who are aware of shelters are reluctant to use them because they think they are only intended for younger women with children.
Violence and abuse in the lives of older women are frequently complicated by issues related to aging and health.

In fact, the mandate of shelters for abused women is to provide services to women of all ages, regardless of ethnicity, religious affiliation, financial need, social status, or age. Shelters for abused women are now increasingly reaching out to older women to provide the safety and support they require.

A misunderstanding we have had to address throughout our project comes from confusing gender-based abuse of older women with ‘elder abuse.’ The most common pattern of abuse of older women is a continuation of longstanding patterns of abuse and controlling behaviour by a partner as the partners age. The essence of this kind of abuse is the use of power to isolate and control the victim. When this does start in older age, it is generally early in a new relationship, or it is abuse by an adult child or other relative, or less commonly with the onset of dementia or other psychological changes in the abusive partner. Elder abuse, on the other hand, occurs when someone who is responsible for a frail, dependent person needs help in meeting their responsibilities. Elder abuse within a domestic setting is often an isolated instance, while gender-based violence is an ongoing or recurring pattern of behaviour. (Wisconsin Coalition Against Domestic Violence, 1977)

When service providers mis-identify as caregiver stress a case that is actually domestic abuse in later life, they may put the victim at greater risk. In such cases, service providers may unintentionally reinforce the abuser’s pattern of behaviour by providing support, compassion, and services, while at the same time reinforcing a wrong message to the victim: that she is responsible for her abuser’s behaviour.

Violence and abuse should not happen to any woman. But when it happens to an older woman, it is complicated by factors associated with her age. This presents unique challenges to community-based services that strive to meet the needs of any and all abused women. Yet simply knowing that, sometimes after decades of abuse, a woman can find happiness that she never thought she could experience makes it more than worthwhile.

For some older women, it is foreign to think of abuse within a marital relationship as wrong.

Greta Smith and Jill Hightower are grateful to the women who shared the stories that have informed their work. They acknowledge the support of funders and facilitators too numerous to mention, but in particular the BC/Yukon Society of Transition Houses.

For further information, contact Greta Smith at gretasmith@shaw.ca, Jill Hightower at hightower@dccnet.com, or BC/YSTH at admin@bcysth.ca

References

Hightower, J, Smith, MJ, Ward-Hall, C, and Hightower, HC (1999) "Meeting the Needs of Abused Older Women? A British Columbia and Yukon Transition House Survey," in Journal of Elder Abuse and Neglect, 11 (4) 39-58.

Hightower, J, Smith, MJ, and Hightower, HC (2001) Silent and Invisible: A Report on Abuse and Violence in the Lives of Older Women in British Columbia and Yukon, Vancouver: BC/Yukon Society of Transition Houses. The executive summary and recommendations are available on the web at www.bcysth.ca/projects/exsum.pdf.

Wisconsin Coalition Against Domestic Violence (1977) Developing Services for Older Abused Women, Madison WI: The Coalition.

Please contact EWA for a complete hard copy:
publications@womanabuseprevention.com
Telephone: 416.968.3422 x21