| Despite the Indonesian Government's commitment to the elimination of all forms of violence, non-government organizations which work with women survivors of domestic violence have found an increasing incidence of domestic violence throughout the country. Domestic violence occurs in different forms including physical, psychological, sexual and economic violence. Domestic violence has severe impact on women's and their children's physical and mental health, in the short term and longer term; bruises, head injuries, miscarriages, sexual transmitted diseases, depressions and post-traumatic stress disorders. This thesis is derived by my curiosity to understand the lived experiences of women survivors of domestic violence and my passion to offer assistance to women by exploring the potential application of a specific counselling approach, namely logotherapy. The study used a combination of qualitative and quantitative methods. Qualitative methods included in-depth interviews with participants and observation. Semi-structure interview guidelines provided me with the flexibility to explore certain topics and to generate narratives from women into generalizable themes. In-depth interviews were used to identify the socio-cultural, religious, legal and political context of Indonesia, in order to understand the dynamics of domestic violence experienced by women. Quantifiable data were gathered by using a number of instruments: the Impact of Event Scale (Horowitz, Wilner and Alvarez, 1979), the Hamilton Depression Rating Scale (Hamilton, 1960) and the Life Purpose Questionnaire (Hutzell, 1986), to asses current subjective distress of women, depression level and women's perceptions of meaning and purpose in life. Fifty women were recruitment from two crisis centres in Jakarta . The first crisis centre was based on the public hospital, Central Jakarta and the second centre was located in an NGO which work with women survivors of domestic violence in East Jakarta. Interviewing time was arranged with women after the social workers assessed the interests of individual women to participate in my study. At the time of interviews, women's marital status was assessed, and only those who were married, regardless their decision of the relationship, were included in the research. The majority of women suffered from polygamy as a very common form of psychological abuse. Other women suffered multiple forms of abuse; ranging from physical, verbal, sexual and economic abuse. Based on women's responses on the IES, women indicated that they had a high level of intensity of the stressful event (i.e domestic violence). The HRSD score also indicated that moderate depression due to experiences of domestic violence was the norm in. Women reported that violence in their homes impacted on their children either as witnesses or direct targets, and they suffered from various behavioural, emotional and cognitive problems. Norms of male dominance, practised within the family as internalized from a patriarchal society and misinterpretations of religious teachings, reinforced that women were subordinate , and adherence to these norms was a risk factor for domestic violence. Women also identified history of violence from their husbands' family of origin, poor community response to such violence and lack of legal enforcement, as other risk factors. These factors influenced women's response to violence. Traditional values that emphasize the role of women maintaining family harmony discouraged women from disclosing episodes of violence. Economic hardship also appears to be an important factor for women, that inhibited them to leave their abusive husbands or rendered them powerless to fight for their rights, including as the first wife in prohibiting the husband to contract a second marriage or to receive their rights as a divorcee. Irrespective of the ir decision to leave or stay with the relationship, majority of women had begun their recovery process. However, some remained |