"Ta mig för det offer som jag är" En kvalitativ intervjustudie om bemötandet av den missbrukande våldsutsatta kvinnan

Sammanfattning: This study is based on interviews with women experienced of substance addiction whilst being the victims of violence. The aim was to examine how these women were treated when they sought aid from help services. We also wanted to investigate how the reproduced notions, by healthcare personnel, of female addicts, victims of violence, can be understood. The results showed that the interviewees feel stigmatized and judged on the basis of their substance abuse firstly, causing them to often continue their substance abuse alongside the dealing of an increased experience of shame. The result also showed that knowledge of the best way for equivalent treatment of the women is lacking, while there is also reason to believe that the knowledge already existing is not adopted by the health service. The interviewees describe treatment by the health care personnel characterized by prejudice, them being compared with the preconception of how a woman should be. Leaving the woman, a victim of violence, with a substance addiction, to care for herself as she is deemed unworthy of help. Furthermore the variable of shame is both a consequence and a catalyst into a deeper process of destructive patterns. The shame leaves the women with a sense of self-stigmatization which, with no other help, leads them further into substance abuse, victimization and abuse.