{"id":6010,"date":"2026-08-19T11:36:15","date_gmt":"2026-08-19T09:36:15","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/complicated.life\/blog\/?p=6010"},"modified":"2026-08-19T11:45:27","modified_gmt":"2026-08-19T09:45:27","slug":"response-based-practice-trauma-resistance","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/complicated.life\/blog\/response-based-practice-trauma-resistance\/","title":{"rendered":"Where There Is Violence, There Is Resistance: Rethinking Trauma Through Response-Based Practice"},"content":{"rendered":"

One of the most difficult realities in therapeutic work is witnessing how deeply people blame themselves for violence, oppression or adversity they endured. Again and again, clients come to therapy believing they failed: I should have fought harder. I should have left sooner. I should not be so affected by this.<\/em> Because the violence continued despite their efforts, they often cannot recognise the countless ways they resisted, and are still resisting, in order to preserve safety, dignity, sanity, relationships or life itself. Too often, therapists unintentionally reinforce this self-blame. When we rely only on the language of symptoms, pathology, coping deficits, attachment wounds or emotional dysregulation, we risk obscuring the violence itself and the intelligent responses people developed under coercive conditions.<\/p>\n

Response-Based Practice<\/a> offers another way of seeing. Rather than asking only What did the violence do to you?<\/em>, it asks: What exactly did the perpetrator do, and how did you respond?<\/em> This shift is not simply a compassionate reframe; it is an attempt to describe violence and responses to violence more accurately. Once violence is understood relationally and contextually, resistance becomes visible. And once resistance becomes visible, we can begin to honour, with our clients, the many ways they have struggled to protect themselves, others and their dignity all along.<\/p>\n

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I asked you to stop
I tried to negotiate
I screamed for help
I turned my face away from yours
I crossed my legs<\/p>\n

I stuck out my stomach
I clutched a tree
Then I went limp to avoid the pain
And went to a safe place in my head<\/p>\n

Do you really question my resistance?
The judge decided I consented.<\/p>\n

Nobody asked to be raped.
Stand with us for dignity and non-violence.<\/p>\n

Source: Public Service Announcements, Whitehorse, Yukon, Canada<\/em><\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n

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When Survival Looks Like Failure<\/h2>\n

“I’m such a coward,” she says, dropping into the chair in front of me, tired and exhausted. “I freeze when he floods my phone with messages about our child. I can’t keep up. I either respond for hours and end up exhausted, or I stop replying, but I know he will use that against me in our next mediation session and I’ll be called uncooperative.”<\/p>\n

Since the separation, her ex-partner has turned every exchange into a crisis: endless “concerns” about school lunches, pick-up times, doctor appointments, bedtime routines, holiday planning. Nothing ever gets resolved. Every message pulls her into circular arguments, accusations and self-doubt. Professionals urge her to communicate better, stay calm, engage more collaboratively, without recognising how coercive control<\/a> hides behind the language of co-parenting. Sometimes things go quiet for a while. She starts to breathe again. Until he finds a new way to pull her back in.<\/p>\n

Often when she comes to therapy, she is full of blame for herself: for shutting down, for people-pleasing, for feeling emotionally flooded all the time, for not being able to set a boundary, for being exhausted. But what if these are not signs of weakness or dysfunction? What if the very responses we call symptoms are actually intelligent, life-preserving acts of resistance? Response-Based Practice invites us to see violence differently: not only in terms of harm, but in terms of the countless ways people resist, protect their dignity and survive. Understanding how coercion feels, and honouring the resistance to it, is where her healing begins. Some readers may recognise this pattern from what is sometimes called unnamed trauma<\/a>, where a response makes complete sense in context but is never named as a response to something real.<\/p>\n

The Language That Traps Us<\/h2>\n

“I’m such a coward. I froze when he yelled at me. I should’ve fought back.”<\/p>\n

“I’m so broken. I smiled when they humiliated me. I should’ve said no.”<\/p>\n

“It’s my fault. I agreed to have children with him. I should’ve already left.”<\/p>\n

Countless variations of this kind of self-blame appear in the room. Many clients have been victims of physical or sexualised violence, assault, severe neglect, coercive control<\/a>, stalking, workplace harassment and other forms of systemic or colonial oppression. They have internalised the belief that they are the problem, and that if they were not so broken these things would not happen to them or affect them the way they do. When trauma is understood mainly through its neurobiological effects, the focus easily shifts toward what violence did to the victim rather than how the person responded to survive it. It also conceals that the deliberate choice to use violence or control against someone includes breaking their very resistance. Many clients are then left blaming themselves for not being able to simply “get over it.”<\/p>\n

Linda Coates and Allan Wade distinguish four discursive operations that make this misrepresentation possible in the context of interpersonal, systemic or colonial violence. Language is used to:<\/p>\n

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  1. conceal violence<\/li>\n
  2. mitigate perpetrator responsibility<\/li>\n
  3. conceal resistance<\/li>\n
  4. blame victims<\/li>\n<\/ol>\n

    In the example above, this language becomes painfully visible in the way it erases agency and responsibility. It leads institutions and professional practices to participate in coercive control, even unintentionally, precisely because they fail to recognise it. Practices framed as neutral, such as mediation, co-parenting communication requirements or expectations of “collaboration”, can become extensions of abuse when power, fear and coercion are ignored.<\/p>\n

    1. Concealing the violence.<\/strong> The abuse is framed as a “high-conflict co-parenting dispute” rather than coercive control. His relentless messaging is described as “concerns about the children”, “communication difficulties” or “poor boundaries”, which disguises the pattern of surveillance, intimidation and domination underneath. Because the violence is psychological and administrative rather than physical, it becomes normalised as ordinary post-separation conflict. The cumulative impact on the victim, hypervigilance, exhaustion, inability to think clearly, is rendered invisible and later pathologised.<\/p>\n

    2. Mitigating perpetrator responsibility.<\/strong> His behaviour is interpreted in charitable terms: he is “trying to stay involved”, “anxious about the children”, or “struggling with the separation”. Professionals may encourage both parties to improve communication equally, implying mutual responsibility. The coercive pattern disappears into neutral language about “miscommunication” or “relationship breakdown”. Even the endless barrage of messages can be reframed as evidence that he is an “engaged father”, rather than someone feeling entitled to, and strategically consuming, her time, attention and emotional energy. This same reframing pattern shows up in other contexts too, including narcissistic dynamics in relationships<\/a>, where a partner’s controlling behaviour is repeatedly explained away rather than named.<\/p>\n

    3. Concealing resistance.<\/strong> Her responses are often seen only as symptoms or deficits. Freezing, delayed replies, emotional shutdown, carefully worded messages or limiting contact may be interpreted as avoidance, instability or poor co-parenting. Yet from a Response-Based perspective, these are acts of resistance and self-protection. She may spend hours crafting neutral responses to avoid escalation, document interactions meticulously, silence notifications to preserve sleep, or strategically disengage from circular arguments. These are skilled, deliberate actions taken under conditions of coercion, but they are rarely recognised as resistance because they do not resemble dramatic confrontation.<\/p>\n

    4. Blaming the victim.<\/strong> Once resistance is concealed, responsibility shifts onto her. If she replies emotionally, she is “reactive”. If she does not respond quickly enough, she is “uncooperative”. If she becomes exhausted or dysregulated, her distress itself is treated as evidence that she is the problem. Mediation processes can intensify this dynamic by assuming equal power and mutual capacity for negotiation. The focus moves from his coercive conduct<\/em> to her communication style<\/em>. She begins internalising these judgements, asking herself: Why can’t I just handle this better?<\/em> In this way, institutional discourse can reproduce the abuser’s narrative while appearing neutral and professional.<\/p>\n

    Response-Based Practice: Violence, Resistance and Dignity<\/h2>\n

    Response-Based Practice challenges these discursive operations by asking different questions. It moves from What’s wrong with you that this happens to you?<\/em> to What exactly did he do? How did you respond? What values and dignity were present in those responses? How did, and do, you survive what is happening to you?<\/em> The shift is subtle but profound. Instead of viewing her as passive, pathological or failing, we begin to see a person actively responding to ongoing coercion while trying to protect herself and her child in a context that repeatedly undermines those efforts.<\/p>\n

    RBP operates through three assumptions:<\/p>\n