Fighting for Your Right to Appropriate Treatment

According to the Washington Administrative Code (WAC), there is but one treatment for domestic violence behavior. And that is a psycho-educational modality (part of the Cognitive Behavioral Therapy (CBT) family). That is the only pill being offered to combat domestic violence, more accurately, Intimate Partner Violence.

However, if a person has committed assaultive behavior on a family member, I can tell you there is a plethora of treatments in our communities that adequately treat those in need.

For example, lets consider mental health. I’m not saying that mental health is the cause of DV. Rather, if DV is present, it’s possible that the genesis of that behavior goes way beyond what a domestic violence intervention treatment (DVIT) program has to offer. Thus, many come out of their DV treatment programs better for their efforts, yet at the same time, there are many who re-offend. This can be attributed to treating the behavior but not the underlying cause of that behavior.

If an evaluation uncovers mental health conditions, it is my assertion that these maladies should be treated first. Then have the person re-evaluated for the presence of abusive beliefs.

Consider this example. If someone is treated for an attachment type disorder and the issue is resolved, then it will show on a subsequent DV evaluation. In other words, it’s possible to be charged and convicted of assault/DV, but not possess any of the power and control issues that so many people use to measure the presence or absence of DV behaviors.

This should be considered, so appropriate treatment is recommended, and this is what we seek to accomplish through forensic mental health and domestic violence evaluations.