Donald Trump's candidacy is a lesson to America on how to spot the signs of abuse

It was shocking, even for Donald Trump, when leaked audio came out featuring him bragging in 2005 about how “you can do anything” to women if you’re famous like he is. Trump is known for making awful comments about women, but this was on another level — an explicit description, and even a celebration, of sexual assault. And soon enough, women started coming forward to accuse Trump of assaulting them in exactly the way he described.

Trump’s comments, and his numerous alleged deeds, are “shocking” in the sense that they are appalling, disgusting, revolting. But to me, and I think to many women, that doesn’t mean they are the least bit surprising.

That’s because to many of us, Trump feels sickeningly familiar. He reminds us of someone we were hoping to forget. He says on TV the things we’re used to hearing privately — the things that sometimes made us doubt our own sanity, and which now seem to be making America feel much the same way.

Trump is often compared to a playground bully. Someone who taunts, who belittles, who calls people names. But while he may seem childish, he is, in fact, a grown man running for president.

And there’s a better word to describe grown men who act this way. They’re not "bullies." In my world, we call them abusers.

Trump uses classic techniques of emotional abuse — and so does his campaign

Through his actions and statements over the years, Donald Trump has displayed an abusive temperament. He has acted in predictably abusive ways towards his political rivals, members of the media, and, allegedly, some of the women in his life.

We need to talk about that and take it seriously. Not just because he has a shot at the highest office in the land — but because the country is full of men like him.

I want to be clear about what I mean when I say “abusive” in this context. Abuse doesn’t always rise to the level of criminal activity, and it isn’t just about physical or sexual violence — it can also be a constant barrage of attempts to manipulate and control. Abuse can happen online or in your living room; it can be impersonal or intimate. Some abusers get criminal convictions. Many of them should but never do. But all of them systematically inflict harm on the people around them.

Some psychiatrists have cautioned against armchair-diagnosing Trump with mental illnesses or personality disorders, and they’re right to do so. But we don’t need to give Trump a diagnosis to recognize and describe his patterns of behavior — or to learn from the experiences of people who have suffered under similar patterns.

Victims of domestic abuse are starting to speak out about how much Trump reminds them of their tormentors. Advocates are pointing out the classic techniques of emotional abuse that Trump uses routinely — even in public, even in settings like presidential debates.

Trump lies and bullies. He demeans and belittles the women who dare to critique him. He seems incapable of accepting responsibility or admitting that he is wrong. What some people call an “I’m rubber, you’re glue” strategy — where Trump accuses Hillary Clinton of the very things his campaign is currently being accused of, from being racist to being insulting — is a tactic that experts on abuse call “projection.”

Trump has spent his entire campaign gaslighting America by denying that he ever said or did things that we have clear video or text evidence that he did, in fact, say or do.

Denying reality and shifting blame are the hallmarks of an emotional abuser, and Trump does both of these things more often, and more rampantly, than any public figure in recent memory.

And these abusive strategies have become central to Trump’s entire presidential campaign.

Trump’s surrogates relentlessly gaslight the American public by pretending that Trump’s worst offenses either didn’t happen, or didn’t mean what they think we mean. During the vice presidential debate, Mike Pence didn’t just lie about Trump’s record — he acted like Kaine was crazy for mentioning real things that Trump did or said. Trump’s defenders didn’t just demean Trump’s accusers by suggesting that they’re lying — they basically redefined the term “sexual assault” so that what Trump did wouldn’t count.

If you feel like Trump’s candidacy is literally driving you crazy, it’s because that’s how abusive techniques work. They defy the normal rules of engagement. They throw you off-balance. They twist reality until you question your own perceptions of it.

This is what Trump is doing to the country.

Trump’s interview with Megyn Kelly provided a case study in how abusive tactics work

For me, watching Trump's interview with Fox News anchor Megyn Kelly in May was the moment that clarified why seeing Trump on TV always made my skin crawl.

Here Trump was, confronting a woman he had relentlessly bullied and sicced his bullying minions on for months. And here he was, acting like that was no big deal. Here he was, using textbook abusive tactics to deny and minimize what he had done to Kelly.

During one of Kelly's many attempts to squeeze even a drop of vulnerability or self-reflection out of Trump, she asked him if he had ever been bullied as a child.

He said no, but that he's "seen" bullying. And it doesn't have to happen when you're a child, he noted; it can happen when you're 55. ("It can happen when you're 45," the 45-year-old Kelly interjected dryly, clearly referring to her own nine-month ordeal of being bullied by Trump and his supporters.)

Then Kelly pressed Trump further on bullying. She asked him how American parents are supposed to "raise their kids to not bully, to not name-call, to not tease, not taunt ... when the frontrunner for the Republican nomination does all of those things?"

Trump's response chilled me to the bone: "You know, I've been saying during this whole campaign that I'm a counterpuncher, you understand that. I'm responding. ... I mean, I respond pretty strongly. But in just about all cases, I've been responding to what they did to me. So it's not a one-way street."

"I've been responding to what they did to me," Trump said when asked about his bullying tactics.

Nearly half of both women and men have experienced some form of psychological aggression from an intimate partner, according to the National Coalition Against Domestic Violence.

And not all abusers are intimate partners. I lived with an emotional abuser once, someone who used to be my best friend until I realized what he was doing. I've spent countless hours hearing the people close to me tell stories about their fathers, their mothers, their siblings, their boyfriends, their spouses, even their bosses or co-workers.

It's the same damn story, over and over again. They are actually pretty boring, these abusers, considering all the drama and heartache they cause. I’ve heard others recall the same boring, horrible script, the same boring, horrible tactics.

There’s the gaslighting — where they scrupulously deny responsibility, and even deny objective reality, enough to make you question your own grip on reality: I never said that. I never did that. It's your fault. I'm the victim here.

In the Kelly interview, Trump’s gaslighting tendencies came out in exchanges like this:

KELLY: Have you made any mistakes in this campaign? You had said publicly you thought the retweet about Heidi Cruz was a mistake. Let me just —

TRUMP: Well, I said I could have done without it, to be exact. I mean, I could have done without it —

KELLY: You said "a mistake." Are you walking that back?

TRUMP: Well, I didn't — no, no, I am not walking it back. But I, but I, I actually didn't say it that way.

Actually, he did.

Another form of gaslighting, and another way of avoiding responsibility, is minimizing: It wasn't that bad. You're just being dramatic. You're being too sensitive.

Trump's most obviously cringeworthy moments came when he tried to tell Kelly that what happened to her wasn't a big deal, because it could have been so much worse (emphasis added):

TRUMP: But when you and I were having our little difficulty, um, you probably had some pretty nasty tweets sent your way. ...

KELLY: But you retweet some of those. It's not just the fans.

TRUMP: Yeah, but not the more nasty ones. You would be amazed at the ones I don't retweet.

A few seconds later, Trump added: "Over your life, Megyn, you've been called a lot worse, is that right, wouldn't you say?"

Yet another classic abuser move is self-justification, when they realize they can't gaslight their way out of this one: I did the right thing here. I know what I'm talking about. It's for your own good. You'll thank me later.

Trump is a master at this. He pivots and deflects with abandon, often resorting to some form of self-aggrandizement. The best self-aggrandizement, the most excellent self-aggrandizement. This interview was no exception.

TRUMP: Uh, absolutely I have regrets. I don't think I want to discuss what the regrets are, but absolutely. ... But overall, I have to be very happy with the outcome. And I think if I didn't conduct myself in the way I've done it, I don't think I would have been successful, actually. If I were soft, if I were, you know, "presidential."

Here's another gem from the discussion of "mistakes" and Heidi Cruz:

KELLY: But it was a mistake, wasn't it? I mean, that — you shouldn't have done that, right?

TRUMP: I, I wish I didn't do it. Although, you know, I guess you could say she's fair game, 'cause she's very much involved with the campaign. But I don't know, she just seems like a nice woman —

KELLY: But that, that tweet mocked her looks —

TRUMP: Well, you know what? I have millions of followers @realdonaldtrump. I have millions of followers.

KELLY: I'm familiar.

At one point, Kelly tried to get Trump to take some responsibility for inciting violence at his campaign rallies. He seemed so close to a mea culpa, but nope:

TRUMP: And when I see the fervor — when I see 25,000 people that have seats, and not one person, during an hour speech, will sit down — I say, "Sit down, everybody, sit down." And they don't sit down. They refuse to sit down. I mean, that's a great compliment. But I do understand the power of the message. There's no question about it.

This was right after Trump denied that he was "powerful" at all, that he was just "fighting for survival" like everybody else.

Trump has also been credibly accused of sexual abuse

Photo by Dennis Clark/Getty Images

We cannot ignore that Trump hasn't just said countless boorish things about women in public — he has also been credibly accused of sexual harassment, sexual assault, and rape.

Dozens of women who worked with or for Trump have given interviews about being objectified or sexually harassed by Trump — encounters that could constitute a “hostile work environment.”

Since the “grab ‘em by the pussy” tape came out, nine women have come forward to accuse Trump of groping or kissing them against their will — which is sexual assault.

Trump has also, three times, been formally accused in court of rape and sexual assault. While there are some fishy circumstances surrounding one case involving the alleged rape of a 13-year-old girl, the other two cases are far more credible. Trump has been accused, in sworn statements, of a brutal 1989 rape by his ex-wife Ivana, and of sexual assault by another woman, Jill Harth.

Ivana doesn’t talk about this publicly, and she explicitly denounced a recent news story about it. But despite backpedaling on whether what happened to her was “rape” in the “criminal sense,” she has never actually recanted the details of her original testimony during divorce proceedings.

Harth dropped her original 1997 lawsuit, but she says she stands by her allegations — that Trump groped her under the table one night at dinner, and that he later tried to rape her in his daughter’s bedroom. She used to be reluctant to talk about it publicly, but now she’s started doing so.

Trump has flatly denied all of this, either personally or through spokespeople. Trump flatly denies a lot of things, though.

But one thing it seems he will always deny, as he showed in his interview with Kelly, is any hint of weakness or regret.

"Make a mistake, you go forward, and you — you know, you can correct a mistake," Trump said, asked about offensive comments he made about John McCain and Carly Fiorina. "But to look back and say, 'Gee whiz, I wish I didn't do this or that,' I don't think that's good. I don't even think — in a certain way, I don't even think that's healthy."

I can't stop thinking about Ivana's story in particular. I know she walked back her story — from calling it "rape" during their divorce to saying that she had merely "felt violated" when a book featuring her testimony came out in 1993 to then calling reporter Tim Mak's 2015 story about it in the Daily Beast "totally without merit," even though she didn't dispute any specific aspect of the story.

I know she doesn't want people to talk about it, so I want to apologize to her for doing so now. But I also want to tell her: Lady, I get it. I've been there. When the guy who raped me asked me to meet for breakfast the next day like nothing was wrong, I accepted, like nothing was wrong. It's so much easier that way. Just like smiling long enough can actually make you happier, sometimes acting like nothing is wrong makes it feel just a little less wrong, makes you feel just a little less violated. Only a little, though, in the end.

But as Ivana said in her 2015 statement, she and Donald have raised three kids together, and they are the "best of friends" now. I believe her when she says this. These things are complicated.

I also can't stop thinking about Ivana's story because (warning, this next part is pretty graphic) of the details she related during her testimony. If true, they're horrifying — Donald, raging and in pain after scalp reduction surgery (which he later denied having had), bending Ivana over the bed and forcing himself inside her for the first time in 16 months, ripping out chunks of her hair to make her feel the same pain he felt. The story continues the next morning, when she dared to come back into the bedroom and Donald asked her coldly: "Did it hurt?"

But it's not just that the details Ivana described are so shocking. It's that they ring so true to me, and that they tell me so much about the kind of person Trump could very well be.

It reminds me of the stories my fiancé has told me about his own hideously abusive father — whom I've thankfully never met, and never plan to. The most violent his dad ever got, my fiancé told me, was while he was recovering from a painful inner ear surgery. He told me that his dad could never stand to be seen as weak or vulnerable, and so his most vulnerable times were always the most violent times for their family.

But for my fiancé, the rages weren't always the worst thing. Sometimes the worst was the gaslighting, the denial, the coldness. My fiancé recalls confronting his father about the worst offenses — and his father literally wouldn't remember them, or at least not admit to remembering them. Or if he did remember them, he'd say things like, "You have to understand, I was just trying to get something done."

He also seems, from the stories I've heard, like the kind of guy who compensated for his insecurities with material extravagance (whether or not he could actually afford it) and with constant boasting about his greatness.

While I was watching that Kelly interview, my fiancé came home in the middle of it. He listened for a bit, then went into the bedroom, then came back out to the couch. He was quiet for a while.

Then he said, sort of joking but not really: "My father is running for president."

"Yeah," I said. "I know."

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