Describes the dynamics of relationships after an abuser gets a "new partner".

"Perhaps his new partner really is a mean, hostile woman, but there is an equally good chance she isn't. Look through her eyes for a moment. The abuser is re-creating the same dynamic he set-up with you, beginning with loving, attentive treatment in the early months of dating. He speaks to her with downcast eyes that well up with tears as he recounts how mean and unreasonable you were and how you called him abusive whenever he refused to bow to your control. If you have children with him, his girlfriend's heart is bleeding because he cries in front of her about how much he misses them and says that you are keeping them away from him out of pure vindictiveness or out of a desire to turn them over to another man to be their dad. His girlfriend sees a kind, loving parent whose desire to maintain a relationship with his children is being thwarted; how could she not hate you? He may remain on good behavior with his new girlfriend even longer than he did with you because he is motivated by his campaign against you. Of course, his other side will slip out sooner or later, but by that time he can blame it all on how badly you have hurt him. His girlfriend thus gets sucked into breaking her back trying to prove that she's a good woman-unlike you. She hopes that if she demonstrates her loyalty to him, he'll become loving and available to her once again, as he was at the beginning. So she wants to show him she is really there for him by joining with-or even outdoing-his hostility toward and blaming of you. By the time his selfish and abusive side finally gets so bad that his new girlfriend can't rationalize it away anymore, she's in pretty deep. She may even have married him by that time. For her to accept that he is an abuser, she would have to face what a terrible wrong she did to you, and that would be quite a bitter pill to swallow. So what tends to happen instead is that his new partner becomes angrier and angrier at you for the way she is being treated by him, believing that you "made him this way" by hurting him so badly...ANYONE WHO CHOOSES TO GO TO BAT FOR A MAN ACCUSED OF ABUSE HAS A RESPONSIBILITY TO GET ALL THE FACTS AND NOT JUST THE VIEW THAT HE PROMOTES...When people take a neutral stance between you and your abusive partner, they are in effect supporting him and abandoning you, no matter how much they may claim otherwise. People cannot claim to be opposed to partner abuse while assisting their own son, brother, friend, or partner in his abusiveness toward a woman. Everyone should be very, very cautious in accepting a man's claim that he has been wrongly accused of abuse or violence. The great majority of allegations of abuse-though not all-are substantially accurate. And an abuser almost never "seems like the type." The argument that "he is a human being, too, and he deserves emotional support" should not be used as an excuse to support a man's abusiveness. Our society should not buy into the abusive man's claim that holding him accountable is an act of cruelty."-Lundy Bancroft, "Why Does He Do That? Inside the Minds of Angry and Controlling Men". Bancroft was the co-director of Emerge(please google) and has 15 years of experience counseling thousands of batterers and their partners. He has written this book to bring to light patterns that he has seen repeat over and over again. An abusive man's first step is to admit what he has done openly and fully. The next step is to enter into a program such as Emerge and complete it. It is this author's hope that partners who read this will confront the abusive man with his mistreatment of an ex-partner and will get all the facts by seeking her out to get her side of the story. Otherwise, history is doomed to repeat itself only the next time, it will be the new partner who will be taking her children and running to protect all of them from his abusiveness!