Interviews with 20 women point to the significance of culturally endorsed constructions of the perfect-love in maintaining women in relationships with men who use violence against them and in silencing them from talking about the violence. Using a form of discourse analysis based on feminist poststructuralism, we identified some of the contradictory portrayals of love that point to discourses of the perfect-love. It is argued that women may be regulated by the positions created for them by perfect-love discourses to remain silent about their partners' violence. These findings have significance for early intervention and prevention strategies.
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