The Prevalence of Domestic Violence Against Men - Interview with Ann Silvers, MA

In this episode, Robert interviews Ann Silvers, author of the book 'Abuse of Men by Women.' They discuss the prevalence of domestic violence against men, the misconceptions surrounding it, and the reasons behind it. Ann shares that domestic violence is just as common among men as it is among women, with a ratio of 1 in 2 for both genders. However, the issue is often overlooked and underreported. They also discuss the various forms of partner abuse and the tactics used by women to overcome the size disadvantage. The conversation highlights the need for emotional intelligence and coping skills to address domestic violence. False accusations and the devastating impact they have on men are discussed. The conversation highlights the cultural bias towards believing women and disbelieving men, which has led to a fast road for malicious women to get what they want. The conversation also touches on the challenges men face in leaving abusive relationships, including fear of losing their children, economic constraints, and shame and embarrassment. Warning signs of abuse in men are mentioned, and resources for support are provided.

Takeaways

• Domestic violence against men is more common than previously thought, with a ratio of 1 in 2 for both men and women.
• Partner abuse can take various forms, including physical, verbal, sexual, financial, legal, spiritual, and psychological/emotional abuse.
• Women can use tactics such as surprise attacks, false accusations, and object use to overcome the size disadvantage.
• Emotional intelligence and coping skills are crucial in addressing domestic violence.
• Cultural attitudes and media portrayals contribute to the misconception that violence against men is acceptable or humorous. False accusations can have devastating consequences for men, including loss of custody, domestic violence classes, and damage to their reputation.
• The cultural bias of believing women and disbelieving men has created a fast road for malicious women to make false accusations.
• Men may stay in abusive relationships due to fear of losing their children, economic constraints, and shame and embarrassment.
• It is important to take men's stories of abuse seriously and provide support without minimizing their experiences.
• Warning signs of abuse in men include physical injuries, emotional belittlement, and minimizing themselves.
• Resources for support include recording evidence, seeking legal advice, and finding people who can provide declarations of abuse.

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Ann Silvers www.annsilvers.com
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Abuse OF Men BY Women: It Happens, It Hurts, and It's Time to Get Real About It      https://annsilvers.com/collections/books/products/abuse-of-men-by-women-it-happens-it-hurts

Building Skills to Uplevel Life: Silver Lining Emotional Intelligence Workbook https://www.amazon.com/s?k=ann+silvers&s=date-desc-rank&crid=36FDRN2YT1U69&qid=1717372580&sprefix=%2Caps%2C90&ref=sr_st_date-desc-rank&ds=v1%3AdSDgAo%2BbXyqR6ab35oBe3lEQzslBqS5qyklZXUJHwTM

Transcript

Robert (00:01)
Hey everyone and welcome back to the dad to dad's podcast. You know, over the last several months, I've received a lot of messages from listeners asking me to cover domestic violence on men caused by women. And honestly, before the messages, it, it wasn't even on my radar, but as I started doing some research, I realized that it is, unfortunately a lot more common than I previously thought. now,

Throughout my research, as well as from several of the messages, messages I received, one name kept coming up and that name is Ann Silvers. Who actually wrote a book on the subject titled Abuse of Men by Women. It happens, it hurts, and it's time to get real about it. So today I'm really grateful to welcome Ann Silvers to the podcast Ann welcome.

Ann Silvers (00:56)
Thanks for having me. Glad to be here.

Robert (00:57)
I so much appreciate you coming on and look, before we dig into the subject, because I know we talked about it and I've, you know, through my research, it was eye opening. And before we dig into it though, can you provide just a little background about yourself?

Ann Silvers (01:14)
Sure, so my first career was medical lab technology. I specialized in microbiology. Did that for seven years in big hospitals in Canada, a couple of them. And then my second career was being a stay at home mom. And I had the chance to have therapy about my childhood. And that was just so...

groundbreaking for me and life -changing that I decided that when I went back into the paid workforce, I wanted to be a counselor. So then we moved to the US, to Washington State, Seattle area. And when my youngest was in first grade, I went back to school, started over at nothing and did 11 years part -time to get all the degrees to become a counselor.

And one of my degrees was a Bachelor of Science in Psychology at the University of Washington. I did a minor in Women's Studies at the same time because at that time I was really eager to help raise up women. And I pictured that when I was a counselor, it would be women that I would be mostly working with. And the last assignment, the last class I took in the minor in Women's Studies was a class on men.

and I didn't get a lot out of the class, but one assignment was choose a book from a list and write, you know, basically write a report about it. And the book I chose was I Don't Want to Talk About It, about male depression, written by Terrence Reel, still out there available. It opened my eyes to men are struggling, boys are struggling, and there's a lack of help.

and a lack of appreciation for those struggles. So I decided, it totally shifted my desire for my focus of my counseling career to, I want to help men. It didn't mean I didn't want to also help women, but I wanted to help men. And didn't know how that would manifest. And over the years, it's shown up in different ways. And one was that,

Robert (03:14)
Right.

Ann Silvers (03:26)
early, like within a couple of years of me starting my private practice, I had a male friend who was telling me his stories about being abused by his wife. And I was minimizing it until it was like, no, this is really happening. This is self -evident.

And that opened my eyes. And it's like when your eyes are open, you then can see something you never saw before. I was always glazing it over. And so I began talking about it. Men came out of the woodwork to tell me their stories. And I had nowhere to send them. The resources were not even not helpful. They were harmful.

Robert (03:55)
Mm -hmm.

Ann Silvers (04:15)
because they would give lip service to, it can happen to men too, but now all the examples are bad man, good woman. And so an abused man who's already confused about what's happening to me is going to look at that and think, yeah, I must be doing something wrong here. Or have that sense of go back into the shadows.

and that isolation and that I must be a freak because this has happened to me but it must not be happening to other men. So I wrote the book.

Robert (04:52)
Okay, so that's what compelled you to write that book. That was going to be one of my questions. And, you know, that book has been such a so life changing to so many people. I mean, I really have. And really, it's one of the you know, somebody had connected us who, who has read the book and also has has gone to you and, you know, the reviews are outstanding on the book as well. So.

I for the men, thank you for doing that. Now tell me this, how has it been received?

Ann Silvers (05:29)
mixed. So I knew when I wrote it. Okay.

Robert (05:30)
But isn't it like a global bestseller, isn't it?

Ann Silvers (05:35)
Well, I don't know about best seller, but I'm definitely internationally known for it. And thank you. I'm pleased with that. And, you know, when I was, I published it in 2014. It took me three years to write it. And by the way, the title is Abuse of Men by Women. Often, so I really, and of I capitalize.

Robert (05:40)
Yeah, that's pretty impressive.

You did, yeah.

Ann Silvers (06:00)
Because even when I was saying the title and I noticed it when when you said it Robert that the abuse of gets slurred together and it sounds like abusive and So I would say abuse of men by women without stressing the of so much and people would think I was talking about abusive abusive men Because that's what we're we're geared towards where he we yeah

Robert (06:22)
Abusive, abusive, okay. Yeah.

That's what we hear.

Ann Silvers (06:30)
Yeah, so I'm internationally known because there's only a handful of, well, it's a good book, but there's also only a handful of books on the topic. But it has grown in the last several years in particular. The topic is grown in popularity. There's more people willing to look at it. There's more men coming forward. And

Robert (06:31)
Wow, that makes sense then.

Obviously.

Ann Silvers (06:59)
I think the Johnny Depp trail had a lot to do with that.

Robert (07:03)
Yeah, I was wondering, I was thinking about that the other day with the Johnny Depp Amber Heard trial. That was, wow, that was interesting. And we were led one way and then once he gets on there, it was like, okay, wow, totally different. I think that maybe opened the doors for some men to feel more comfortable to come out and talk about the abuse and to accept or to recognize that they're actually being abused. So that...

Ann Silvers (07:25)
Most definitely.

Robert (07:30)
in and of itself is what I wanted to ask you. What is considered domestic violence?

Ann Silvers (07:37)
And it's such a great question. I'm really glad that you posed this because I have a frustration over this conflation of partner abuse and domestic violence. So partner abuse, there are seven forms. Let's see if I can name them. Physical, which we talk about very often. Verbal, we talk about that one a lot too.

sexual, financial, legal, or administrative sometimes it's called, spiritual, and psychological slash emotional I call it. So all of those are partner abuse, but not all of them deserve, and all of them happen to men from women, but not all of them should be called domestic violence.

So to me, physical and some sexual would be what deserves that DV moniker. But what's happening lately is that people are growing what they're calling DV that'll get you a protection order against you and get you kicked out of your house and unable to see your kids. Things that don't deserve to be in that category of danger, danger are getting thrown in there.

Robert (09:05)
That's interesting. I didn't realize that. That's interesting, though. And hopefully what is considered DV for one is considered for the other. You know, what's considered for a female is considered for the male. And that's probably not always looked at it that way.

Ann Silvers (09:20)
no, no, no, not at all. It should be. Yeah.

Robert (09:23)
It should be, but it's not. So, and we'll go into that in a minute.

Okay, so one of the things I wanted to ask you is how common is it because, you know, when I was looking and I can't remember the site I was looking at, it was something like one in four women will experience it and one in eight men or something like that. It was really, you know, the disproportionate it seemed like, you know, how common is it? Do you believe it's under reported? And if it is,

If you do believe that, why do you believe it is?

Ann Silvers (09:57)
So there are different stats coming out. So 1 in 8, let's talk about that one for a minute. OK, let's imagine that's the minimum for men. Because I believe the number is much bigger than that. But let's imagine 1 in 8 is the minimum. Well, that's still 1 in 8. That's a lot more than nothing. But the reality is it's actually 1 in 2.

lifetime. It's the same number for men as it is for women. And why I say that's the real number is because that's the number when you're looking at general population. And this is the number that the CDC has come out with. So, and this is like,

three reports in a row. First one 2010ish, then 2017. The last one was 2022. And it's based on a national survey, like a crime survey, a crime and violence survey, phone survey where people are gonna be more likely to be truthful on the phone.

And it depends on how the question is asked, what kind of answer you get. And it depends on the population you're going after that is going to greatly infect the stat. So when you see one in eight, that's because the domestic violence community is coming up with that. And that's a closed system that has already declared it really doesn't happen to men. It's happening to women.

And so they're testing their own subset of the population and they come up with that kind of number. Some of them would come up with zero because they don't believe that domestic violence can happen against men. They excuse it away. But they excuse violence against men by women away and don't call it DV.

Robert (12:01)
Well, that definitely answered also my next question, partly, why are men often so overlooked as victims of domestic violence? But I think there's probably a little bit more to that. Are men admitting or recognizing? Do you mind kind of going into that a little bit?

Ann Silvers (12:18)
Yeah. Yeah, I'll go into that and I'll step back and give you some more stats too. Okay. Okay. All right. So, and I'm looking at my cheat sheet here. And this is all from the 2022 CDC report. And so it's one in two men, one in two women for psychological aggression from an intimate partner.

Robert (12:24)
Yeah, I would love stats.

Ann Silvers (12:47)
Physical violence, same ratio, physical violence by an intimate partner. Same ratio for contact sexual violence, physical violence, and or stalking. Same. 50 % lifetime. Now let's look at last 12 months. More men reporting.

Robert (13:00)
So 50%.

Ann Silvers (13:12)
physical violence from an intimate partner in the last 12 months than women. This was 2022's report based on a couple of years earlier survey. This is from CDC. So it was one in 22 women, one in 18 men. The last year.

Robert (13:26)
And this is from CDC? Okay.

Ann Silvers (13:39)
And then people want to excuse it away and say, well, it's not as bad. It's not as severe, but same report, severe physical violence in the last year. One in 33 for men, same for women.

So this is happening.

And then, you know, it's not the only, I've got a blog post about stats and I go into, we've known since the 1980s that it happens to men at about equal rates to women, but they've squashed. There's louder voices saying, don't look over here, look over here. It doesn't fit the narrative, right?

Robert (14:15)
because it doesn't fit the narrative.

Ann Silvers (14:20)
So on annsilvers .com, knowing you on Ann, if you put in, I checked it, if you put in how many men into my search bar, you'll get the post about how many men are abused by women.

Robert (14:33)
What a -

What is behind it? I mean, I guess what is behind all the abuse, all abuse, right? But what is behind if we're talking about our subject is men being abused, being abused by women? What is behind that?

Ann Silvers (14:47)
I have a list of 72 reasons why. They're on my site. And I think you have to look up like, why do women abuse men? And it's basically a parallel similar list for why do men abuse women. There's only a couple of changes where, you know, one,

Robert (14:50)
I'm not gonna ask you to are they are they on your site? Okay

Okay.

Ann Silvers (15:13)
One reason, so the reasons are, it can be a mental illness on the person's part. It could be like anxiety can drive a lot of survival kind of knee -jerk reactions in people that end up violent or abusive.

And when I'm talking about the 72 reasons, I am talking about all forms of partner abuse. And my book talks about all seven forms of partner abuse.

It could be mental illness, it could be the way somebody was raised, maybe somebody's raised, abused, and so they learn that. It could be the opposite. Somebody could be raised and put on a pedestal. So they expect everybody to bow down to them, and they get very angry when a partner doesn't give in to their wins, let's say.

It could be a personality disorder, which is different than a mental illness. So borderline personality disorder, narcissism, those sorts of things. It could be lack of skill. So they don't know how to communicate well and or other kinds of things in that kind of category. It could be physical illness like a

traumatic brain injury. We see that with former football players. They can become violent and we can trace it back to like brain injuries. So that's sort of touching.

Robert (16:49)
It is it you kind of, you know, when you were given the numbers, I want to ask, do you feel like it's increasing and will continue to increase? So I look at, I look at some of the people today and, and I feel like younger generation, I hate to be one of those people that always talks down about the younger generation, but that that's where I am right now. But I feel like the younger generation when I'm around them a lot,

I feel like they don't have a lot of emotional control. You see that, and also coping skills as well.

Ann Silvers (17:29)
Which is, I mean, why I wrote my most recent book, which is called Building Skills to Up -Level Life, and it's emotional relationship skills. And it's a workbook. Because I think that a key to better personal life and relationships and even healthier communities is emotional intelligence. And there's skill to be gained there. And...

It could make a lot of positive changes.

Robert (17:59)
Makes sense. So let me ask you this. So a man is in and this can happen to any man. I mean, it doesn't have to be, you know, some 110 pound weakling. I mean, I know people that have been abused and I know one guy who's six, four, six, five, probably two. Well, when it was happening, he's probably a little bit larger now, but when it was happening, he was in really good shape and was probably about 220.

And the person that was abusing him was maybe five, two one hundred ten pounds, dripping wet. So it can happen to all men.

So.

Ann Silvers (18:36)
Yeah, because there's ways that women can overcome size disadvantage. And I have a blog post about this also, and there's five ways. And of course, I cover it in the book. But one way is that we do a good job of training guys from boyhood don't hit girls.

Robert (18:56)
Right.

Ann Silvers (18:57)
Now unfortunately we're not doing the parallel for girls. We're not teaching girls, don't hit boys, don't hit your partner. And that's what it should be. Don't hit is some teaching, but we girls, females can take advantage of the don't hit girls. And...

And so that can be one reason why a small woman can get away with hitting. I mean, I've worked with lots of big guys who have been pounded on by women kicked, choked, all kinds of things. And they relied on that he won't hit her. One man put his hands in his back pockets so he would not hit back.

He tried to hide one time under the kids bunk beds and couldn't fit underneath trying to trying to get away from her. Another way that they overcome the size disadvantage is surprise attacks. So attacking in their sleep, attacking them when they're inebriated or jumping on one guy, she would jump on his back and scratch his face.

or when they're in a position of not being able to defend themselves, like when they're driving. So she's a passenger, she's in the passenger side, he's driving. She may take advantage of that and hit, try and hit him, or she might take control of the steering wheel and attempt to drive them off the road.

They can use objects to overcome their size disadvantage. So throwing things, you can throw a pop can at a guy's head from a distance and it's gonna hurt. Also, the use of knives or guns, obviously, cars, frying pans, cell phones, yeah. Yeah.

Robert (21:01)
Cell phones. Everybody has a cell phone in their hand.

Ann Silvers (21:06)
Those are the ones that I think that's only three and I know that I have a list of five so I can't remember.

Robert (21:13)
Let me ask you this. This just popped in my head, false accusations.

Is that I'm thinking about an instance where, well, go back, look at the Amber Heard trial, the Amber Heard Johnny Depp trial. Is that common where a female will, you know, when she's guilty of violence to the male, where she'll even threaten false accusations or where she'll follow through with them.

Ann Silvers (21:43)
Yes, both very, very common and probably growing. You asked before about is the number growing. So remind me to come back to false accusations, but I want to also take the opportunity to say I've seen some stat where the DV against females is decreasing and against males is increasing.

And that makes sense to me because I think culturally, we get it. Men should not be hitting women. We get it. We've been talking about this for 50 years. Yeah. So it's also important to train your boys. Don't take it from a woman either. And so then there's a whole plan around what do you do if this happens because you can't just simply fight back.

Robert (22:16)
I've pounded it in my son's head. I mean, they know you don't.

Ann Silvers (22:35)
And but there's things that you need to be able to do. So and we have so much culturally going on that is sending the message, it's okay for women to hit men. It's in our romantic comedies, it's in commercials. When companies are trying to sell a product and they've got violence against men right in the commercial.

And there's a lot of demeaning of males in commercials. Again, they think that that sells their product for a woman to be talking down to a man. There's the whole cultural thing about women get to slap men, they get applauded. It's kind of you go girl kind of stuff. Women get to throw men's stuff out on the lawn and it's all okay and applauded.

Culturally, from my perspective, none of it's okay. None of it should be applauded and it shouldn't be laughed at. It's not funny. If we went back to the 1950s, we'd be able to see shows where, like I think like the Honeymooners, it used to be a whole running gag in the Honeymooners where he was going, Jackie Gleason was going to hit his wife. To the Moon, Alice was this big running gag.

Robert (23:35)
That's not.

Ann Silvers (23:59)
Well, that was violence against women being made fun of. You wouldn't have that anymore. But you'd have the opposite. You have the gag is the woman hitting the man. And not only hitting him, but hurting him. So there's a movie, I appreciate the movie for a lot, except for this piece. And it's called, I don't think I'm gonna remember the name.

Anyway, I'm not gonna remember the name, but what's happening is Kate Hudson hits Matthew McConaughey with a golf club. And you know that her hitting him with the golf club has hurt him badly. But it's funny. I don't find it funny, but it's in there for comedy. Because culturally, that's where we're at. That this is funny.

Robert (24:46)
Mm -hmm.

And I feel so bad because as a guy, I even dismissed that. We've just become so accustomed to it. I overlook that and don't think anything about it, which is wrong.

Let's go back to false accusations.

Ann Silvers (25:15)
Yes, yes. it's, they are devastating to the men that it happens to. There's a lot of buy -in that's quick when a woman...

renders a false accusation. I think we're in a slightly improved place. Again, the Johnny Depp thing. Amber Heard took things so far and was so exposed for her lies in the end that it killed the Me Too movement. The Me Too movement did not start out.

The founders intention was not believe all women, but it got hijacked and that's what it became. And so we went through that long phase and we're not out of it by any stretch, but it is, the cracks are forming. But the idea that we believe all women and we disbelieve all men was a setup for fogs accusations being a fast road for any malicious woman to get what she wants.

and it's been a fast road to get men kicked out of their house, get them to not have time with their children, go through really like what I would actually call brutal domestic violence training classes that are geared around you're a man so you're bad and having to

present like you are remorseful for this DV that you never did. And if you won't say, I'm a bad man and I did this bad thing, you never get out of the loop of having to take the DV class and get to see your kids. I'm sure that there's good DV classes out there. No, I'm hopeful that there's good DV classes out there, but there's also a lot of really bad ones.

Robert (27:16)
Good luck.

Yeah.

Ann Silvers (27:22)
that are shaming men who don't deserve it. And shaming men is not going to be how you get them to change even if they do deserve the label of being a domestic, it was one man called a domestic violencer.

Robert (27:39)
You know, I received a message over the weekend from a gentleman. And he said that his future ex -wife, they're going through the divorce process, and said that his future ex -wife is threatening to say that he had been violent with her, that he had committed domestic violence.

And he was threatening, she was threatening him and so it would help her with custody. And he said, I've never laid a hand on her, never once. Not so much as even held her up against the wall. And he said, but who are they going to believe? They're gonna believe her. What do I do? And I asked him if he had an attorney.

And so that would be, I thought that would be the best step. But I also told him that you and I were speaking in a few days and that our episode would be out soon. And so maybe you can kind of provide advice for somebody in that situation.

Ann Silvers (28:53)
It is brutal. It's brutal because the false accusations get taken too seriously. It's brutal because they're getting you right at your values. Men, good men, don't want to be in that category of hurting women. It goes against their core. And to be accused of that falsely is hurting you to your core.

And then there's all those repercussions of potentially not getting to see your kids and that leads to more and more devastation. The suicide rate.

Robert (29:34)
And Ann, let me interrupt you for a minute. One of the things he had said that I can't believe I left this out, he said, and she's regularly violent with me every time she doesn't get her way.

Ann Silvers (29:44)
Right.

Robert (29:44)
He said I've had scratches on my face, I've been hit, I've been bruised. I can't remember what he said. What do you guys use for curling your hair? With like a curling iron, I don't think that's what he called it. But anyway, that she's chased him with that and tried to hit him with that.

Ann Silvers (29:57)
curling iron.

Yeah.

Robert (30:06)
And he said, which is horrible.

Ann Silvers (30:09)
It's horrible, it's horrible. And the same person then that abused him is going to take this other form of abuse. So this is called a legislate, not legislative.

Legal, I call it legal abuse in my book. I've seen more recently the title, administrative abuse. So it's extending the arm of the abuser by engaging the justice system in that further abuse. And it works way too often. I want to mention that...

while the suicide rate for all men is terrible. So it's one in four suicides are male. No, no, no, no, I got that wrong. Three out of four, three out of four suicides are male.

So 80 % of suicides are male in the US, in Canada, in English speaking countries, in a large part of the world. This has been going on for a long, long time that most suicides are male.

the suicide rate for divorced dads is it's way higher, way higher than divorced moms. And so,

Robert (31:30)
It's it's tremendous. I have the facts.

Also have a cheat sheet

Ann Silvers (31:35)
Do you have it for divorced moms and divorced dads?

Robert (31:37)
And I usually know that or can recite that, but it is tremendously higher for divorced dads than anybody else in the population. Or then for divorced moms.

Ann Silvers (31:46)
Yeah.

Yeah, and right. So in terms of what somebody should do in that situation, if you're in a state that is a single person can give the okay for recording,

Robert (31:52)
So.

Right.

Ann Silvers (32:08)
Definitely attempt to record that person because that would be gold if you had it in in your case if you are a two -person consent or two -party consent state then check in with a lawyer because I think there's exceptions to that Like if somebody is trying to pull fraud over you I think that you can get around the two -person consent, but I'm not sure I'm not giving legal advice. So that's something to look into can you record it?

And try to see if there's people who will write declarations for you. That might help. And I have to tell you that it's tough. It's very, very tough to win these things.

Robert (32:55)
Yeah, it's a lot harder for a man to prove than a female.

Ann Silvers (32:59)
Very much so, because the cultural leaning is women tell the truth, men lie. Also the cultural leaning is kids need their mom and they don't need their dad so much, which is wrong, and statistics say it's wrong. That's the sort of thing you probably talked about before, but yeah.

Robert (33:24)
So let me ask you this, why do men stay in these relationships if they're getting abused?

Ann Silvers (33:31)
Well, when we're looking at one and two, a lot of those people aren't staying, right? So a lot of those relationships they are getting out of. And so that's good. And it'd be good to get out of these relationships early, especially like if you're a guy and you're getting hit and you don't have any kids, move on, get out. Because once you've got kids, you're in a whole different ballgame.

Robert (33:35)
Mm -hmm.

Ann Silvers (34:00)
And just like you're the person you spoke to, I think you said on the weekend, who now these false accusations and the threat that, you know, that I think if I remember correctly, it involved kids. So you're this, this woman who has proved herself to be abusive physically.

can also be likely to abuse you legally, to abuse you financially, and all these other ways because it's like that wall has been broken down. And...

why do they stay? Okay, so the ones that do stay, there's a long list, again, it's not one reason, and it's a similar list for why women stay as why men stay, and then there's some things that are particular.

to men or women. So why anybody stays, you might stay because of fear, fear of losing a relationship with your kids or fear of leaving your kids with that partner and not being around. It could be economics, feeling like, you know, we can't afford a two household family.

Women might stay because they're not the earner, but men might stay because they are the earner and they feel like they can't manage two households with their finances. Or they might even be not the earner or not the higher earner and they can't see their way out economically.

It can be cultural in terms of, first of all, guys thinking, this is not really happening to me. The culture's telling me this doesn't happen, so this is not really happening. The guy that I mentioned who would put his hands in his back pockets to not hit his wife who was beating on him and would kick him and do all kinds of physical things.

He'd been enduring that for years. And he went to work one day with a black eye. And a coworker asked him about it. And he made up an excuse like people do when they have bruises on their face from DV. And the coworker said, no, I'm not buying it. And then.

The guy said, well, my wife hit me. And the coworker said, you're an abused man. And until that coworker, another guy, said to him, you're an abused man, it never crossed his mind that that's what was happening to him.

He was, you know, you go numb. That's another thing. You go numb when you've got all of this to deal with. And it's not a stretch for men to go numb because part of male training is don't feel. And that's another thing that in particular keeps men there.

Robert (36:53)
Yeah.

Right.

Ann Silvers (37:08)
They can also potentially stay because they're overly focused on some qualities that are good in, there's a healthy zone of good, but then there's a too much position that they're in. So they may be overly forgiving, overly compassionate, overly perseverant, and overly tolerant and accepting of bad behavior. So that's some.

Robert (37:34)
What about shame or embarrassment? What about shame or embarrassment?

Ann Silvers (37:38)
Definitely shame and embarrassment. Yeah. So a lot of guys stay because of that and particularly guys. So women who are abused might stay for the same reason, but men have this extra thing about you're a guy, you're supposed to be able to fix things. Why can't you fix this? You're a guy, you're bigger. How can this be happening to you? And if it is, it can't possibly hurt, which again is wrong.

Robert (37:42)
You know.

Ann Silvers (38:07)
It hurts to be hit. And lots of women can hit their partner with force. And I describe how they get away with that. Definitely, shame and embarrassment is a factor.

Robert (38:21)
You know, since our initial conversation about a week ago, I reached out to somebody that I knew who had been in a relationship like this. And I asked him, why did you stay? And he said, he said through the shame and embarrassment. And I asked him, I said, hey, can you tell me a little bit more about that? They're not together anymore. But I said, can you tell me a little bit more about that?

And, he said that while it was happening and if he got upset or telling her to stop that she, he said, it was very emasculating that she would call him names and what you're a man, you can't take this. I'm, I'm a female, this can't be hurting. And you know, things like that. He said, and so I was embarrassed, you know, I, you know, just shame.

for even admitting that now they didn't get divorced for that reason. They ended up it was another reason they ended up getting divorced. but I imagine the imagine that plays a good bit into it as well. The shame embarrassment admitting it.

Ann Silvers (39:27)
So that's why this is so important. Why it was important for me to write the book, why it's important for you to have this conversation talked about, because we have to get it out there that this is common and the guys that this is happening to, they're not freaks, you're not less than because this is happening to you. It's something to do with what's going on for her.

Robert (39:50)
So let me ask you this, warning signs. You talked about, for those of us that are maybe outside of that, are there warning signs, you mentioned a black eye, are there things that we can look for that somebody else, that another male might be getting abused?

Ann Silvers (40:09)
that's a great question. I would say the first thing is take their stories seriously. Now I'm not gonna say believe all men because I don't think you should just believe everybody, but your friends with somebody or you're a relative to somebody, you know them, don't discount their stories because men are likely to just put their toe in the water and tell a little bit something.

So when you've educated yourself about abuse of men by women happens, you can be more likely to not shut that person down. So for example, one interview I did was on radio and the radio guy said that his brother had come to him multiple times over a span of years.

about his wife beating him up. And the brother, the radio guy, discounted it every time until finally, the last time, and I don't remember what made the difference for him, finally he heard him. And he was being beaten by his wife.

So as guys, it's really important to be educated about this so you can be supportive of other men who this is happening to and not just discount them and minimize it.

Robert (41:42)
That is really good because just, as we were talking about, I think we do discount things and we don't listen. And as a man, when we do open up, it is, as you said, we stick our toe in the water. And if we're not heard, we pull it back.

Ann Silvers (41:59)
Exactly.

And then another thing I want to mention is that also often abused men are in the state of minimizing themselves. And so be a little bit cautious about getting ahead of them. And so again, you're kind of putting your toe in the water on what can they handle because they may completely back away from you if...

Robert (42:00)
And go ahead.

Ann Silvers (42:29)
you're saying, hey man, this is not good what's happening to you. And he might minimize it. And so if he's there minimizing it, just be careful. You might have to hang in there with him. It can be hard to be around somebody you care about who's being abused right in front of you. I mean, it can be the way she talks down to him or belittles him or something like that.

and you make decisions about, can I be around them when they're present as a couple? And sometimes it takes a while for the awakening and then it's great if you cannot take it too personally if they didn't believe you when you were trying to help them earlier and they weren't ready for the help. Have an open door when they come around and they're like, I get it now.

Robert (43:21)
No, that's great. That's great advice. What have we what have we missed? What else? I know we've missed a lot. We just kind of we've covered it kind of 30 ,000 feet but

Ann Silvers (43:31)
Yeah, well there's a lot more to be said and that's why the book made it to like 350 pages. And people can poke around on my website. There's lots and lots of posts on there.

Robert (43:43)
That's what I was gonna ask you. How can, your website is full of information. Your book, again, is Abuse of Men by Women. It happens, it hurts, it's time to get real about it. But how else can people find you?

Ann Silvers (44:05)
So on my website, annsilvers .com, no E on Ann. I used to be really active in Twitter. I'm there, at Annsilvers, and I'll keep dabbling in it, but.

Robert (44:20)
You're also on Instagram as well, correct?

Ann Silvers (44:23)
I am, I'm not that active, but I'll get more active on there probably. So it wouldn't be a bad idea to.

Robert (44:30)
And I'll tag, I will, for anybody listening, I will put your website information on there. I will also tag you with Instagram as well so people can find a way to reach out to you. Now, let me ask you this about your practice. It's not just face to face. Like you can work with people all over, correct?

Ann Silvers (44:41)
Great.

Yes, so I do video chat and I do voice mail, not voice calls. Now out of Washington state is people have to recognize I'm only licensed in Washington state. So I need to be very upfront about that and people have to know that.

And I also recognize that there are not many people, I mean, there's no one in the country that I have to turn to say, no, I can refer you to this person. So I think that that gives me some protection with like licensing boards and ethics to be able to say, you know, if you've got this niche need, then you can reach out to me.

and there's a contact form on my website, so that's a good way to reach me.

Robert (45:49)
And again, I'll post the link as well with this. And I so much appreciate you coming on and talking about this very important subject that it was eye opening to me. I mean, it truly was. And when you start talking the numbers, the stats, it's sad, really. But it's extremely eye opening. It's something I never would have imagined.

But I appreciate you taking time out of your day coming on. And I thank you for the book as well, because obviously it has had a huge impact on numerous people out there. And I get messages, and I also think that there's several that don't even message me about that, that are experiencing this. And for your book, your name, and your book to continue to come up, I thank you for writing that. I really do. And for -

bringing a spotlight to this subject.

Ann Silvers (46:45)
Well I appreciate the thanks because I do need some pats on the back every once in a while to overcome the people who don't like that I'm talking about this. So that's really appreciated.

Robert (46:59)
I know. I look, I get it all the time and, people thinking that I'm anti mother. And so on a lot of podcasts, I always make the disclaimer, you know, I'm very pro mom. you know, I have a great relationship with my mom. I think moms are extremely important, but I also think dads are important as well. And, but yes, I get the, I get the hate messages and hate emails and all that, with that, but.

Look, thank you and thank you so much for coming on and I really do appreciate that. And again, I will post your information for anybody that wants to get in touch with you and the website again is ann silvers .com and that's ann without an E and that's Silvers's with the S at the end of it. So, but again, I'll post that. So, and thank you for coming on and spending some time with us and.

Thank you all for listening to the Daddy Dats podcast. You can find us on Spotify or Apple podcast as well as on YouTube and Instagram. And don't forget to hit that like and subscribe button so you don't miss any future episodes and we'll see you all next time.