What is Coercive Control?
I really wanted to step back and bring you something light. A bit of a breather.
Instead, God met me on the beach.
I went for a walk and came face to face with a storm building in the southwest. The wind had begun carving ripples across the water while lifting dry sand into a low sandstorm that relentlessly pelted my legs as I made my way toward the shoreline. I didn't mind it. I knew that once I reached the water's edge, the sand would settle. I actually enjoy walking into the resistance. I've learned to begin my walk against the wind so that if I become tired, it carries me home instead of forcing me to fight it in exhaustion. I love the solitude of storm walks. The tourists leave. The sea becomes wild and alive, roaring louder than the wind itself.
Most importantly, I've learned to watch the wildlife. If the birds are still fishing, chattering, and circling overhead, there is no immediate danger. But when the birds suddenly disappear... when the shoreline grows strangely quiet... that silence becomes the loudest warning of all. If the birds and even the sharks begin moving away from the same dark horizon, I don't question them. I simply go the direction they're going. I've learned to read the room.
Why do I feel like I’m going crazy?
There came a point in my marriage when I could feel that same static in the air. I couldn't explain it. Nothing looked dramatic enough from the outside. There wasn't always yelling. There wasn't always obvious conflict. There was simply a constant, growing awareness that something was profoundly wrong.
At the same time, I was receiving another message: Forgive. Be patient. Work on your marriage. In a healthy marriage, those are beautiful biblical principles.
But sustained coercive control is not a healthy marriage.
The problem wasn't Scripture. The problem was that someone actively using manipulation and coercive control often becomes very convincing to the very people trying to save the marriage. Most pastors, counselors, friends, and even courts are trained to help reconcile conflict. They are not trained to recognize sustained coercive control. Those are two very different situations.
I spent years feeling angry that no one seemed to understand what I was living. Today, I have far more compassion. How could they understand something they had never been taught to recognize? How could I? It sounded unbelievable, even to me.
Most of it happened behind closed doors. Occasionally there would be a public crack in the mask. Even today, when I witness one of those moments, I freeze. Other people tilt their heads, think, "That seemed a little odd," and move on. I don't. My body remembers a story they never lived.
How do you explain years of instability without sounding like you're nitpicking every conversation? You can't, because it isn't one conversation. It's every day, not just one incident. It's the cumulative effect of living inside an environment where your nervous system never truly rests.
This is why I don't want to focus on the tactics. Every person who uses coercive control employs different combinations of behaviors. It might be anger, guilt, religion, finances, children, silence, charm. The tactics vary. The effect is remarkably consistent. Coercive control is not defined by what another person does. It is revealed by what prolonged exposure slowly does to you.
Signs of covert emotional abuse:
Forget your spouse for just a moment. Look at yourself. Compared to a few years ago:
Are you calmer or more anxious?
Do you apologize constantly, even when you don't know what you did wrong?
Do you replay conversations in your mind trying to figure out how you could have prevented them from becoming upset?
Have you begun hiding perfectly harmless things simply to avoid a reaction?
Do you feel like you're always waiting for the next emotional storm?
Have you become isolated or scatterbrained?
Are you chronically exhausted, hypervigilant, depressed, or anxious?
Do you feel as though you're drowning without anyone noticing?
Do you feel as though you live in a constant state of entrapment, a loss of equality, or a diminished state?
Do you find that your personal space or independent choices are routinely disrespected?
Do you no longer recognize the person you used to be?
If someone had described your life exactly as it is today five years ago... would you have believed them?
Like the frog placed into slowly warming water, we rarely notice the temperature rising while we're busy trying to survive. Often, this transition happens gradually through subtle autonomy loss (sometimes called boundary shifting) rather than an abrupt shift, making it difficult to recognize from the inside. Instead, we assume we must be the problem. Maybe if I loved better, forgave more, became more patient, finally changed enough…
Friend, if you are responsible for your choices, your self-control, and your character—so are they.
No amount of your patience can produce another person's self-control. No amount of your forgiveness can force another person's repentance. No amount of your love can make someone choose integrity. Those choices belong to them. God never calls us to become responsible for another person's choices.
If you feel deep confusion... if you feel isolated... if you find yourself living in constant hypervigilance... if your body keeps telling you something is terribly wrong while your mind keeps talking you out of it... don't ignore what your mind and body are consistently trying to tell you.
God designed them to recognize danger long before your words can fully explain it. The birds don't argue with the weather. They respond to it. They don't wait for lightning to prove the storm is real.
Enjoying the deep dive? Read the companion pieces:
To untangle how to set boundaries without guilt, read Responsibility vs. Ownership.
To understand the public vs. private persona, read What is a Mask?.
