"Vi som överlevt helvetet" : Kvinnor i missbruk berättar om våld

Sammanfattning: Violence against women with experience of substance abuse is a complex issue where both violence and substance abuse aggravate each other, creating social situations difficult to break up from. Social services tend only to categorise these women as substance abusers, concealing their status as victims of violence and leading to inadequate support. To further understand these women’s experiences of violence, this study aimed to understand how exposure to violence is described within narratives by women with experience of substance abuse. A thematic narrative analysis was conducted on published stories where female substance abusers share their experience of exposure to violence. Narratives published by two Swedish organisations formed empirical data and were collected through purposeful and criterion sampling. The study’s theoretical framework consisted of a radical feminist perspective on violence combined with intersectionality where the Breaking Up Stairs (BUS) was used to visualize difficulties faced by the target group. The study focused on how these women describe their experiences of violence and interactions with society’s support and legal systems, as well as their experiences of telling their stories about violence. The study’s results showed descriptions of violence normalization and double dependency from BUS. The manifestation of substances in combination with violence were described such as involuntary injections as a type of violence. Experiences with society’s support and legal systems were reported as mainly negative with lack of rights being a central issue. Further belonging to disadvantaged categories was described to complicate access to good support. Narrating personal stories of violence in substance abuse was described as challenging when encountering previous experiences. Sharing their stories contributed to positive effects such as getting new perspectives on their experiences of violence exposure and reducing self-blame.