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Coercive Control
What is Coercive Control?
Coercive control is a highly psychologically damaging act or a pattern of acts of emotional assault, threats, humiliation and intimidation or other abuse that is used to harm, punish, or frighten their victim. Often this can be so manipulatively delivered that the victim does not actually know they are being abused until it is far too late to act on the abuse.
Clients are often aware of the terms ‘Covert Narcissist’, ‘Gas lighting’, ‘flying monkeys’ or ‘cognitive dissonance’ but many others will be manipulated and emotionally and physically harmed by a perpetrator while blissfully unaware of the significant impact of the abuse. They may even blame themselves.
The controlling behaviour is designed to make a person dependent by isolating them from support, exploiting them, depriving them of independence and regulating their everyday behaviour.
Coercive control creates invisible chains and a sense of fear that pervades all elements of a victim’s life. It works to limit their human rights by depriving them of their liberty and reducing their ability for action. Experts like Evan Stark liken coercive control to being taken hostage. As he says: “the victim becomes captive in an unreal world created by the abuser, entrapped in a world of confusion, contradiction and fear.”
Coercive control is designed to make the victim emotionally unstable and therefore weak and many clients attend presenting with Complex Post Traumatic Stress Disorder (cPTSD).
It important to realise that men and women are equally vulnerable to prey from a coercive predator. The manipulation is staggeringly clever and insideous.
Coercive controllers study you. In an almost scientific way they pick up on exactly what you crave (mostly validation, love, security) and they mirror it back to you to get what they want. They don’t show up as villains, they show up as everything you ever wanted. That’s why you don’t question it at first.
Invisible shame, confusion and fear are the gifts they leave.
You need suffer no longer. You are not alone and you can recover from this.
Taking control over aspects of your everyday life, such as where you can go, who you can see, what you can wear and when you can sleep
Manipulating situations to make you feel that you are going mad
Making you feel that you do not have a say in your own actions or how you spend your time
Lovebombing and then devaluing you.
Some common examples of coercive behaviour are:
Isolating you from friends and family
Gas lighting you
Depriving you of basic needs, such as food
Criticising you, your job, your clothes
Monitoring your time
Threatening you with suicide
Monitoring you via online communication tools or spyware
Threating you via weponising your children
Removing your sense of self and confidence
Managing your reproductive control
Threatening to reveal private details
You CAN recover from this
Humiliating, degrading or dehumanising you
Controlling your finances
Making threats or intimidating you
Depriving you access to support services, such as medical services, social media
Making you question your sanity
Repeatedly putting you down, such as saying you’re worthless
You CAN recover from this
We are there to support you
You CAN recover from this
Healing from this type of abuse takes a long time and is one of the most beautiful journeys of self discovery that a human can take. You are not alone.
Many have walked before you and see the light.
You will see this light too and have a whole new world presented to you in all of its depth and beauty.
These IS life after abuse.
We are there to support you
We are there to support you
We are there to support you
Research shows thatmen and women who are in or have left an abusive relationship experience a higher than average level of anxiety, depression, panic attacks and post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD). Many people can find it difficult to deal with the emotional and psychological impacts of abuse and the ways in which it can continue to affect their lives and relationships with others over time. Some report finding it very hard to talk to doctors about problems at home.
Sarah Morris Therapy understands this and we can help you.
Call to book a session with us to chat through your needs.
You will go on to thrive
We are there to support you
We are there to support you
Therapy from a therapist who understands the emotional impact of coercive control is crucial to your recovery.
Once you have found the right counsellor for you, and we hope that you will take this decision to journey with us, can be a wonderful experience.
You will go on to have a wonderful life, free from the past and filled with direction and positivity.