Intimate Partner Violence (IPV): The Gestalt Therapist as Third Party. Part One

ABSTRACT Violence in intimate relationships can generate situations where both union, in the sense of respectful contact with the other, and separation, that is, accepting that paths can diverge and lead to new experiences, are no longer an ongoing process but frozen and blocked. This two-part article seeks to retrace the phenomenology of experiences where such blocks occur in a deafening and icy way so that they can turn energy and excitement into violence. It examines cases of women who experience physical or sexual violence, or both, by an intimate partner in their lifetime. All the episodes involve a power imbalance between women and men, which implicates the social background. This first part begins by looking at television series (Law & Order) to explore experiences of violence in intimate relationships and convey their complexity. The effects and movements of patriarchy are then considered, starting from a focus on (intimate) relationships and the individual person. (The social aspect is addressed in the second part of the article, which follows in this issue.) Finally, the authors address the problematic construction of masculinity and the density of its consequences, considering how other social agents are defined and measured in relation to man.