Hate To Love You: Stockholm Syndrome In Domestic Violence Relationships

One summer morning in 1973, safe-cracker Jan-Erik Olsson strolled into Stockholm's Sveriges Kreditbanken, fired a submachine gun at the ceiling, and yelled, in English, "The Party has just begun!" It marked the odd start to a surreal story. After injuring a policeman and taking four bank employees hostage, Olsson demanded that Clark Olofsson, a dangerous criminal he wanted for his accomplice, be released from prison — and had his wish granted. 

The authorities didn't give him the safe passage with his hostages in tow that he wanted, though. What followed was a six-day ordeal during which the four, three women and a man, had dynamite strapped to their bodies.

The victims had, as it turned out, become deeply emotionally attached to their captors. The male hostage went as far as to say that he saw Olsson as "an emergency God". Though these victims had been taken hostage, and though their lives had been put in danger, their captors had shown them some basic human kindness. They were both villain and savior. A lot can happen in just six days. 

It was this curious episode that led to the term "Stockholm Syndrome". When we hear the term, we immediately conjure up images of prisoners of war, concentration camp victims, cult members, and hostages of criminals — situations in which nobody is expected to feel any positive feelings towards their tormentors. It's not difficult to understand how those feelings can arise, though. Expecting only the worst, every incident of seeming kindness can mean the world, and confuse the brain, or rather, perhaps, allow it to go on. 

READ Another Kind Of Domestic Violence: Signs Of Emotional Abuse In Women

Stockholm Syndrome In Domestic Violence Situations 

People may develop Stockholm Syndrome towards any person who has an eerie degree of power over them, including people they have interpersonal relationships with — husbands, wives, partners, parents, grandparents, children. The syndrome is built on a foundation of fear, threats, and isolation, and is generally believed to require victims' belief that they can't escape the situation they're in. The next magical ingredient is "small acts of kindness" on the part of the abuser, real or perceived. In all that grim darkness, the abuser's own actions are looked towards as a source of the flame of something to live for.

That's not to say that abusive partners consciously create Stockholm Syndrome in their victims (though some would). Rather, every person who has stayed in an abusive relationship any length of time is familiar with the honeymoon period after episodes of terror, which always seems to add a self-doubt-inducing ray of light to the prospect of trying to escape the relationship. "He still loves me."