i think you've covered them pretty well. whenever i think of an individual trait i can see it fitting into a category..however it is late here so i may be wrong :)

Oh i have a question..where would an abuser who always makes it seem like you have the power - the movie, the clothes, the sexual position/practice are all our choice but the catch is that there is in fact a wrong answer. BPA??

The sociopath/psychopathic abuser

You Can't Do Anything Right (Spouse/Sig. Other/parent/parental figure)

Hep and Efrell - Those kind of fall under "Mr. Always Right."

I wish I had a name for it. It's not on your list. Maybe not typical but he can't be the only one.

I need to come back to this

The abuser who blames every abusive act and labels it as your fault. I don't see it as the always right man. More like the ultimate denial abuser. "look what you made me do!" "you make me want to [insert abusive act here]"

i got confused because i thought that if you can get the answer right then they are not always right but i was missing the point...the answer would be correct because they deemed it that way.

Anthem..isn't that how almost every abuser feels even if they don't always verbalise it to their victims? To verbalise it would make it part of their manipulation but i do think that every abuser has a way of making it our fault...just my thoughts :)

Good point. I agree

Are we talking about boyfriends you really don't want to have for your teen book? Or some other context?

I'm not sure I like naming an "abuser type" after a personality disorder. Certain actions and behaviors - absolutely. But if you name the abuser after a disorder, you are really stigmatizing anyone with that diagnosis even if they are trying hard to change.

Maybe these as alternatives:

Mr Madonna-Demoness - one moment you are perfect the next you are hell's spawn, or do you mean something else by this one?
Mr Damned-if-you-do-damned-if-you-don't/ Mr. Catch-22? - sets up impossible situations where if you satisfy criteria A, you violate criteria B.

Another thing: do you think it might be valuable to make a distinction between abusers and "boyfriends you really really don't want to have". To me the list above is a good list of "boyfriends you don't want to have". I wouldn't go so far as to say they are all abusers.

To me, abuse is the actual physical or emotional insults. The items on this list are lousy behavior indeed, but without that extra component of "I'm right so I can insult/hurt you", I don't think things like "I'm always right" could be called abusive. it isn't a hostile act towards another in the same way that an insult, snub or strike is.

Without the "so I can hurt you" part, their power largely comes from our buying into their view to preserve the relationship. Recognizing their power comes from our buying into their mental games points the way to survival when we have no choice but to relate to such difficult people as our own aging parents, the divorced co-parents of our children or co-workers.

I don't mean to minimize here. Mr Always right is a huge emotional drain on anyone that has to live or work with such a person. Nor do I mean to imply that they get a pass for the hurt they cause: we are all responsible for seeing that we act in ways that do not hurt others and making our best efforts not to cause others undue stress. It is very hard to have an intimate relationship with Mr. Always Right because there is no way to connect except by buying in.

A person with such an attitude will at best be an emotional drain, a strong current against which intimates must fight for self-esteem and at worst destructive to self-esteem. That's a good reason for not getting emotionally involved in someone like that. That's a good reason for disengaging if one is already involved. But I don't think it is right to call someone who is difficult in that way an "abuser" unless they make that extra leap to hurtful hostile acts when they don't get their way.

With that caveat, two other people I'd put on the "boyfriends you really don't want to have" list:

Mr Pygmalion - believes it is his personal job to shape his partner into being of his own liking. Problem is, he could care less who she wants to be. He looks like he is building you up until you check in with yourself and say "that's not me" .

Mr. Procustian Bed - slightly different that Mr. Pygmalion. Where as Mr Pygmalion mistakes a woman for clay existing for his own purposes, Mr Procrustian Bed can't bear a woman who is smarter, more active, more influential, or more anything else than he is. He repeatedly gives her advice that encourages her to be "less than" - not to promote her career, not to take on extra responsibilities.

This sort of dude is also tricky because he may hide it under things like "balance" or "take better care of yourself". However his standard of more or less is based on his own needs: more if it makes me feel good, less if it threatens me. Rather than help his partner clarify her own priorities and bolster her where she decides she wants to grow or pull back, he decides when and how she should be long and short like Procrustes chopping off legs or stretching them out to fit people into his bed.

Anthem--that's hard to define as a "type" because it's a trait of perhaps ALL abusers of ANY type. I'd call tat more of a "red flag" than a category.

I added "father figure" (older man with teen girlfriend) to my list, too.

Mr. Madonna-Demon: I used this, but wrote it up as the "Borderline Abuser."

I'm using the word "abuser" here but the term "Bad Boyfriend" in print, so that distinction is pretty much resolved.

Mr. Pygmalion - brilliant example!
In "teen" language, would Mr. Procrustean Bed be our basic "player"? The sexist womanizer? Mythologically, the symbol is of an arbitrary standard that a person is forced to uphold, but the examples you gave suggest a very marked sexism in particular, which (in Bad Boyfriends) typically manifests as "sexual privilege."

I see Procrustean Bed as the insecure guy. The guy that can't handle his own skin so he has to minimize or manipulate the change of his significant other. Regardless whether or not it is because he doesn't want her to be "better" it still comes down to the guy is wicked insecure

How about "Mr cut you down to size"? If a teen doesn't know the story of procrustes, it still gets the point across. Some of the guys who were interested in me before I found my husband fell into this group. They wanted me to be successful, but only if I was less so than them. They'd be interested in my career and then suggest that I do less than I could to pursue it. They'd claim to respect me, but then be clearly ambivalent when I had a success story to tell.

Thinking teen: this would be the boyfriend who changes the subject when his girl friend announces that she won the debate for her schools debating team rather than enthusiastically congratulating her. Or the boyfriend who guilts his girlfriend into going out on a date the night before a major exam when she thinks she should be getting a good night sleep if she's not studying. Its also the guy who ridicules her for thinking so much about her future, implying that she's just a puppet of parental expectations or else nerdy and no fun.


I think a player is a bit different different - a player is someone who treats girls as trophy or points in a competition. Wooing is a game to him like pinball where he tries to turn on as many lights as he can and rack up all the points he can get. Mr Pinball? Mr Scorecard?

Definitely agree with you Anthem. Wicked insecure.

I missed the sexism aspect of your comment : I don't think this is overt sexism in any way. Nearly every guy I've seen would have been very pro-women in the work place. They just seemed to get ansy when that strong ambitious woman was an intimate part of their own lives.

The cutlural issue is there though in that men with self-esteem issues can feel even worse when cultural stereotypes make men feel less manly if a woman is earning more, more professionally ambitious or getting more public honors than her partner. I think it has more to do with the social pressures on men rather than privilege.

One of the most important behaviors to point out is probable showing hostility, reactiveness and offense at friendly rapport with others. This is a figure out a way to cut this guy out of your life immediately type. Do not take this as he really cares about you and wants to be exclusive and loyal. Possessiveness is not loyalty nor love. It's okay and best to say early on that you no longer want to date once that has happened.