When She Controls Everything: Men's Hidden Abuse

By Gildas Garrec, psychotherapist specializing in Cognitive Behavioral Therapy (CBT) in Nantes In 2024, the Ministry of Interior recorded approximately 271,000 victims of domestic violence in France. Among them, 16% are men — roughly 43,500 reported male victims. This figure, already considerable, represents only the visible part of a phenomenon that is massively underreported. The Genesis survey reveals that 1 in 4 men report having suffered psychological violence from a partner. Yet when we speak of domestic violence, the male face of the victim remains almost invisible.

This article is not a pamphlet. It is not a vengeful text. It is a clinical analysis, supported by official data, intended for men suffering in silence — and for those who wish to understand a reality that remains largely unknown.

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A persistent taboo: men are victims too

What the official statistics tell us

The Ministry of Interior's statistics for 2024 are unequivocal: 16% of domestic violence victims recorded by law enforcement are men, approximately 43,500 people.

The National Observatory of Crime and Penal Responses (ONDRP) had already established in 2013 that 149,000 men were victims of psychological, physical or sexual violence from their spouse or ex-spouse each year.

The Genesis survey, conducted on a large scale, drives the point home: 1 in 4 men report having suffered psychological violence from a partner. And 1 in 18 men report having suffered physical or sexual violence in a conjugal context.

More tragically still: a man dies from domestic violence every 14 days in France.

These figures are not activist estimates. They are public data, produced by official institutions.

Massive underreporting

Despite these figures, the phenomenon remains largely invisible. It is estimated that only 1 in 6 domestic violence victims files a complaint — across all victims. And this underreporting is even more pronounced among men, for reasons we will detail.

In other words: the 43,500 reported male victims likely represent only a fraction of the reality experienced.

Why this silence

Several mechanisms converge to keep male victims silent:

Masculinity stereotypes. The social construction of masculinity still largely rests on the idea of strength, control and invulnerability. Admitting that you are manipulated, humiliated or terrorized by your partner amounts, in the collective imagination, to admitting that you are "not a real man." This equation is as false as it is destructive — but it is deeply ingrained. Fear of not being believed. When a man confides — to someone close to him, a doctor, a police officer — the most frequent reaction oscillates between disbelief and minimization.

"But you're stronger than her, aren't you?" "She doesn't physically outweigh you." These reactions, even well-intentioned, send the victim back to silence.

Shame. It is twofold: shame at being a victim, and shame at being a victim as a man. It is a shame that cannot even be formulated internally. Lack of dedicated support structures. Unlike female victims, men have virtually no specialized services available. No emergency shelter. No adapted telephone helpline. The 3919, the national reference number, is open to men — but how many know about it?

Key takeaway: The suffering of men victimized by conjugal manipulation does not compete with that of women. Recognizing one does not diminish the other. It is simply about broadening our perspective so that all victims can be heard.

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Female psychological manipulation: understanding without caricaturing

Pathological narcissism has no gender

The DSM-5, the international reference in psychiatry, defines Narcissistic Personality Disorder (NPD) without gender distinction. While epidemiological studies show a slightly higher prevalence in men, women represent a significant portion of those affected — with modes of expression that may differ.

Narcissistic perversion — a concept developed by Paul-Claude Racamier, then popularized in France by Marie-France Hirigoyen — manifests as systematic instrumentalization of the other in service of one's own psychological equilibrium. This functioning can be enacted by any individual, regardless of gender.

The specific weapons of the female manipulator

If the underlying mechanism is identical (exploitation of the other as a narcissistic object), the modalities can vary. Genevieve Schmit, a recognized specialist in narcissistic perverse manipulation, has identified 20 specific criteria of the female perverse narcissistic manipulator. Among the dynamics most frequently observed in consultation:

Seduction-destruction. The cycle begins with intense idealization: you are the perfect man, the savior, the one she was waiting for. This love-bombing phase creates an extremely powerful attachment bond. Then, gradually, devaluation sets in.

You are no longer up to the task. You are disappointing. You are the problem. The contrast between these two phases creates deep emotional confusion — and relationship addiction.

Reversed victimization. One of the most formidable weapons: the manipulator systematically positions herself as the victim of the relationship. It is she who suffers. It is she who endures. It is she who sacrifices everything. This role reversal makes it nearly impossible for the man to recognize himself as a victim, since that role is already "occupied." Émotional control. The man's emotions are constantly invalidated, ridiculed or instrumentalized. His anger is called violence. His sadness is called weakness. His request for dialogue is called harassment. Gradually, the man learns to feel nothing — or to express nothing. Leveraging children. When the couple has children, they become a major control lever. Threats of séparation with exclusive custody, parental alienation, instrumentalization of the children's emotions: all mechanisms that trap the man in the relationship through guilt and fear of losing his children.

Accusatory reversal: "You're the violent one"

This mechanism deserves separate discussion, as it is so specific and devastating. The manipulator exploits the social gains of the fight against violence against women as a manipulation weapon.

Concretely: the man who tries to defend himself verbally, who raises his voice after months of provocations, or who simply expresses his suffering, is accused of domestic violence. This accusation, in the current social context, has tremendous power to destroy: loss of credibility, estrangement from children, legal proceedings.

It is a form of cynical misuse of a legitimate cause — protecting victimized women — in service of an individual domination strategy.

Gaslighting in the feminine form

Gaslighting — that technique of making the victim doubt their own perception of reality — takes specific forms in this configuration:

• "You're too sensitive" (emotional invalidation)
• "You're making it up, that never happened that way" (reality falsification)
• "No one will believe you" (exploitation of social taboo)
• "You're the one with a problem, not me" (projection)
• "If you talk about it, everyone will know what kind of man you are" (reputational threat)

The power of gaslighting lies in its repetition. A single isolated incident can be identified. But months or years of daily micro-distortions eventually erode the victim's ability to trust their own judgment.

To understand: Understanding the mechanisms of manipulation does not mean generalizing to all women. Narcissistic perverse manipulation is a personality disorder — not a characteristic of gender. The vast majority of women are not manipulative, just as the vast majority of men are not violent. This article describes a specific pathological functioning, not a universal female reality.

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The 10 signs that you are under control

Control is a gradual process. It does not establish itself in a day. It advances quietly, through successive micro-adjustments, until the victim no longer recognizes themselves. Here are the 10 signs most frequently reported by men in therapy.

1. You constantly feel guilty without objective reason

You have a diffuse sense of always being at fault. Whatever you do, it is never enough. Never the right time, never the right way, never the right intention. This chronic guilt is not a sign that you are truly deficient —

it is the result of systematic conditioning. The manipulator has shifted the center of gravity of the relationship: any problem, whatever its origin, ultimately becomes your responsibility.

2. You walk on eggshells permanently

Your daily life is governed by anxious anticipation. Before speaking, you weigh every word. Before acting, you assess the possible reaction. You constantly adjust your behavior to avoid conflict, crisis, reproach. This hypervigilance is exhausting — and it is precisely the sign that you live in a climate of emotional insecurity.

3. She controls your finances while holding you responsible

Financial control can take subtle forms: monitoring expenses, criticizing your purchases, unilateral budget management, organized financial dependence. Paradoxically, it is often the man who is labeled as a "poor manager" or "irresponsible" — even when the partner spends compulsively or controls access to joint accounts.

4. She isolates you from your friends and family

Isolation is the sine qua non condition of control. It can be direct ("I can't stand your mother," "your friends are toxic") or indirect (systematic crises before or after each meeting with your loved ones, guilt-tripping about time spent away from her).

The result is the same: your social circle progressively shrinks until she becomes your only reference point — and thus your only source of validation.

5. She alternates between idealization and devaluation

The idealization-devaluation cycle is the signature of the control relationship. Periods of intense love, tenderness, complicity alternate with phases of rejection, contempt, verbal cruelty.

This "hot-cold" creates an emotional dependency comparable, in its neurobiological mechanisms, to addiction. You stay to recover the "good times" — without understanding that these good times are themselves a control tool.

6. She turns every conflict so that YOU become the problem

You enter a discussion to express a legitimate need or discontent. Twenty minutes later, you are the one apologizing. You do not understand how we got here.

This systematic reversal — where the aggressor becomes the victim and the victim becomes the aggressor — is a central mechanism of manipulation. In CBT, we sometimes call it "the reversal trap."

7. She uses children as a control lever

"If you leave, you won't see them anymore." "The children are suffering because of you." "They told me they're afraid of you." Children become instruments in the control strategy.

For a father, this threat is often the strongest chain of control. Many men stay in a destructive relationship solely out of fear of losing their bond with their children.

8. Your loved ones don't recognize you anymore

When your childhood friends, your colleagues or your siblings tell you: "You've changed," "You're not the same," "We don't recognize you anymore" — listen to them.

You may no longer be able to see your own transformation from inside. But those who have known you a long time see what control has done to you. This external signal is often the first trigger for awakening.

9. You have lost your self-esteem

You who were confident, enterprising, funny, social — you now perceive yourself as inadequate, incompetent, unworthy of being loved. This progressive destruction of self-esteem is the central objective of manipulation: a victim who no longer believes in their own worth is a victim who will not leave. It is a victim who thinks they deserve what they are living.

10. You are afraid to leave… but also afraid to stay

This dual movement is characteristic of control. Leaving seems impossible (fear of loneliness, fear of losing children, fear of retaliation, guilt). Staying is unbearable (exhaustion, suffering, loss of self). When you are trapped between these two fears, control has reached an advanced degree. And it is precisely when professional support becomes essential.

Key takeaway: Recognizing these signs in yourself is not an admission of weakness. It is an act of lucidity. Control is a powerful psychological mechanism that can affect anyone, regardless of intelligence, physical strength or social status. The first step toward liberation is naming what is happening.

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The specific trap for male victims

Society doesn't believe them: the double penalty

When a man finally speaks up, he hits a wall of disbelief that adds additional suffering to what he is already experiencing. Friends laugh nervously. Healthcare professionals minimize. Law enforcement is sometimes helpless in the face of a situation that does not match their usual frameworks.

This social disbelief constitutes a double penalty: not only does the man suffer in his relationship, but he also suffers from being unable to talk about it without being judged, doubted or ridiculed. Many end up staying silent, convinced that no one can understand.

The judicial system sometimes instrumentalized

Without generalizing — because the judicial system legitimately protects victims — it must be acknowledged that some manipulators know how to exploit system biases. False accusations of domestic violence, strategic police reports, instrumentalization of custody proceedings: all leverage that, in the hands of a manipulative person, become devastating weapons.

The manipulated man finds himself in a paradoxical position: victim in his relationship, suspect in the eyes of justice. This institutional reversal can trigger major psychological collapse.

Lack of specialized support structures

In France, support structures for domestic violence victims are massively oriented toward women — which is historically justified by the greater proportion of female victims. But this leaves male victims in a near-total void.

A few initiatives exist, like the ATHOBA association based in Tours, specifically dedicated to men victimized by domestic violence. But they remain rare, underfunded and poorly known.

The difficulty in naming

"I'm not beaten, but…" This phrase, heard dozens of times in consultation, summarizes the difficulty male victims have in qualifying their experience. Psychological violence leaves no bruises. Manipulation does not break bones. But it destroys from within, methodically, day after day.

Many men simply do not have the vocabulary to describe what they are experiencing. Control, gaslighting, narcissistic perversion: these terms, increasingly known in the context of violence against women, remain largely unknown when applied to men.

Key takeaway: Naming what you are experiencing is a therapeutic act in itself. Saying "I am a victim of manipulation" is not a stance of weakness — it is the first manifestation of your ability to regain control of your own narrative.

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Healing: the therapeutic approach

Naming the control: the first decisive step

In therapy, the moment when the patient manages to say the words — "I am under control," "I am being manipulated," "my partner is toxic" — often constitutes a turning point. It is not a mere semantic exercise.

It is a cognitive reconfiguration: the patient shifts from the status of "failing husband who cannot satisfy his wife" to that of "person victimized by an identifiable pathological functioning." This change in perspective changes everything.

CBT: identifying the patterns that maintain control

Cognitive Behavioral Thérapies (CBT) are particularly well-suited to supporting victims of manipulation, as they allow for identification and modification of cognitive and behavioral patterns that keep the person in the toxic relationship.

Among the patterns most frequently observed in male victims:

Excessive tolerance. "In a couple, you have to know how to accept." This belief, healthy on the surface, becomes pathological when it leads to tolerating the intolerable. In CBT, we work to redefine the boundary between healthy compromise and submission. Limiting beliefs about masculinity. "A man must protect his family, even at the cost of himself." "Asking for help is weakness." "If my wife is unhappy, it means I'm not doing what I should." These rigid beliefs constitute the soil in which control takes root. The self-sacrifice pattern. Some men learned from childhood that their value depends on their ability to devote themselves to others. The manipulator exploits this pattern by demanding ever more — and always complaining that you are not giving enough.

Cognitive restructuring: "Enduring is not being strong"

One of the central axes of therapeutic work consists of deconstructing the equation "endurance = strength." In our culture, the man who "holds on," who "doesn't give up," who "endures without flinching" is valued. But enduring a control relationship is not strength — it is submission to a system of domination.

True strength resides in the ability to:

– Recognize your suffering without shame

– Set clear boundaries

– Leave a situation that is destroying you, even if it is familiar

– Ask for help without seeing it as a failure

Working on childhood wounds

In clinical practice, it is frequent to observe that male victims of manipulation carry childhood wounds that made them vulnerable to control.

An absent father (see our article on the wounds of absent fatherhood), a mother who was herself manipulative, a family environment where emotions were forbidden: all terrains that predispose one to accept, as an adult, what should never have been tolerated.

Work on these early wounds is not a quest for blame ("it's my parents' fault") but a process of understanding: understanding why this relationship seemed "normal" to you for so long. This awareness is often a key moment in the therapeutic process.

This connection between childhood wounds and vulnerability to control is also at the heart of the issue of emotional dependence, which often constitutes an aggravating factor in control relationships.

Rebuilding self-esteem

After months or years of systematic devaluation, self-esteem lies in ruins. Rebuilding it takes time, patience and a secure therapeutic framework. In CBT, this work involves:

• Identification of cognitive distortions: "I am worthless," "No one will want me," "It's my fault it didn't work out"
• Confrontation with reality: gathering concrete evidence of your own worth (professional achievements, qualities recognized by loved ones, parenting competencies)
• Progressive exposure: resuming activities and relationships that nourish self-esteem
• Work on relational patterns: understanding the avoidant attachment style that contributed to vulnerability and developing more secure attachment

Key takeaway: Healing after a control relationship is not a linear path. There are advances and setbacks, moments of clarity and moments of doubt. What matters is not the speed, but the direction. And in finding and maintaining that direction, a specialized therapist can help you.

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Resources and first steps

If you recognize yourself in this article, here are the resources you can turn to:

ATHOBA (Association for Battered Men) — Tours

Association specifically dedicated to men victimized by domestic violence. Support, guidance, accompaniment.

The 3919 — Violences Femmes Info (also open to men)

National reference number for victims of domestic violence. Free, anonymous, accessible to men despite its historical name.

Consult a therapist specializing in toxic relationships

A psychotherapist trained in control and manipulation issues can offer you a secure space to understand what you are experiencing, name your suffering and begin a healing process.

If you are in the Nantes region, my practice offers CBT support adapted to victims of conjugal manipulation, with an approach that takes into account the specificities of the male experience.

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Frequently asked questions

Can a man really be a victim of his wife?

Yes, absolutely. Official data confirms it: the Ministry of Interior counts 16% of men among reported domestic violence victims, the ONDRP estimates 149,000 men victimized each year, and the Genesis survey indicates that 1 in 4 men has suffered psychological violence from a partner.

Domestic violence is not a matter of gender but of power dynamics and pathological relationship functioning. Physical strength does not protect against psychological manipulation, emotional blackmail or control. A man can be physically stronger than his partner and be completely helpless against a methodical strategy of psychological destruction.

How do you distinguish between a difficult couple and manipulation?

The boundary is essential to identify. In a difficult couple, both partners suffer from relationship dysfunctions, but each remains capable of empathy, self-reflection and sincère dialogue. Even intense conflicts are symmetrical: both partners have their share of responsibility and can acknowledge it.

In a manipulation relationship, the pattern is fundamentally asymmetrical: one dominates, the other submits. The manipulator never genuinely questions themselves. Conflicts always follow the same pattern (you systematically end up apologizing).

Authentic dialogue is impossible. And most importantly: your psychological state deteriorates progressively — loss of confidence, chronic anxiety, sense of unreality — while your partner seems perfectly functional on the outside.

Can you be under control without physical violence?

Absolutely. Psychological violence is in fact the most frequent form of violence in control relationships — and the most difficult to identify, precisely because it leaves no visible traces.

Gaslighting, daily devaluation, social isolation, financial control, emotional blackmail, accusatory reversal: all forms of violence that destroy as surely as blows, sometimes more so.

French law recognizes psychological violence within a couple as a crime since 2010 (law of July 9, 2010). It is subject to 3 years imprisonment and 75,000 euros in fines. The difficulty lies in proof — but legal recognition exists.

As a practitioner, I observe that the psychological consequences of chronic manipulation (anxiety disorders, dépression, post-traumatic stress syndrome, reactive personality disorders) are often more sévère and longer to treat than those of episodic physical violence.

How do I explain my situation to loved ones without appearing weak?

This is one of the most frequent questions in consultation, and it reveals how much masculinity stereotypes weigh on male victims. Here are some concrete approaches:

Choose your listener carefully. Don't start with the most skeptical person in your circle. Identify a friend, family member or colleague who you know is capable of listening and nuance. Use clinical terms. "I am living in a situation of conjugal manipulation" is easier to hear than "my wife is abusing me." Clinical terms depersonalize the subject and make it more audible. Ground yourself in facts. Rather than describing your emotions (which risk being minimized), describe concrete and repeated situations. Facts are harder to contest than feelings. Accept that some won't understand. And that's not your problem. Your priority is not to convince the world — it is to find the few resource people who will support you in your exit process. Consult a professional. A therapist is, by définition, a space where you don't have to prove your suffering. You can speak freely there, without fear of judgment, without need to justify yourself.

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Taking action: support programs

If this article resonated with your experience, it may be time to take action. Acknowledge that what you are living is not normal, and that you deserve better.

Narcissistic Perversion Program — Structured CBT support to understand the mechanisms of narcissistic perversion, break free from control and protect yourself psychologically. Freedom Program — Leaving a Toxic Relationship — A therapeutic pathway to reclaim control of your life, rebuild your self-esteem and establish the foundations of healthy relationships. Schedule an appointment — An initial conversation to assess your situation and define adapted support. Office in Nantes, online consultations available.

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Gildas Garrec is a psychotherapist specializing in Cognitive Behavioral Therapy (CBT) in Nantes. He supports men and women victimized by conjugal manipulation, emotional dependence and disorders related to attachment wounds. His approach combines clinical rigor, empathy and therapeutic pragmatism. This article was written with a focus on information and awareness. It is not a substitute for individual diagnosis or therapeutic support.

Also read

• Healing after a toxic relationship: the complete reconstruction guide
• Gaslighting: 7 psychological manipulation techniques and how to break free (CBT Guide)
• Love bombing: 10 signs to distinguish genuine love from manipulation (Complete Guide)
• Do I need a therapist? 10 unmistakable signs

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