Clear from Control→The method

The CARE framework × Narrative Regulation Therapy

Relationship trauma isn't one stage. It's five.

Trauma training tells therapists to start at stage 4. Most survivors of coercive control are at stage 2 or 3 when they walk in.

This model gives you the recognition and sequencing skill that closes the gap - and a structured language for clinical formulation in active-control contexts.

Last reviewed October 2026.

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Framework
CARE
Therapy
NRT
Stages
5
Published
BACP · 2025
The five-stage recovery framework

Five stages, two diagnostic gaps.

Stages of survivor recovery, not therapist activities. The diagnostic gap the pathway closes: most clients arrive at stages 2–3, while standard trauma training tells therapists to start at stage 4.

Five-stage recovery framework. Most clients arrive at stages 2–3; standard trauma training tells therapists to start at stage 4. A diagram of the five-stage recovery framework: stage 1 escaping domestic abuse, stage 2 escaping victimhood, stage 3 resolving victimhood, stage 4 resolving survivorship, stage 5 resolved survivorship. Two diagnostic captions show that most clients arrive in therapy at stages 2 or 3, while standard trauma training tells therapists to start at stage 4 - the gap the pathway closes. Recovery is not linear; survivors can move backwards. Most clients arrive here Standard trauma training starts here The work the training teaches: walking your client from stages 2–3 up to here, where trauma processing can land. I Escaping domestic abuse Still in the relationship II Escaping victimhood Out, but still under threat III Resolving victimhood Negative contact continues IV Resolving survivorship Trauma processing possible V Resolved survivorship Wound processed
  1. I
    Escaping domestic abuse
    Still in the relationship. Growing awareness, no clear escape plan.
  2. Most clients arrive hereII
    Escaping victimhood
    Physically left. High risk of return. Ongoing post-relational coercion.
  3. III
    Resolving victimhood
    Won't return - but negative contact continues through court, co-parenting, finances.
  4. Standard trauma training starts hereIV
    Resolving survivorship
    Abuser's influence reduced. Trauma-processing interventions become appropriate.
  5. The work the training teaches: walking your client from stages 2–3 up to here, where trauma processing can land.
  6. V
    Resolved survivorship
    The relational wound is processed. Broader mental-health work, if needed.
Trauma training tells you to start at stage 4. Your client is usually at stage 2 or 3. The pathway teaches the recognition skill that trauma training doesn't cover - and how to walk them through to where stage-4 work can land.
Recovery is not linear. Survivors can move backwards - pulled from stage 5 to stage 3 by family pressure to maintain contact, or from stage 4 to stage 2 by a new family-court application. The model is a recognition tool, not a timeline.
Selected publications

Peer-reviewed and practitioner-facing.

2026

Continuous relationship trauma - the clients our models can't see

The Psychologist (British Psychological Society) · July 2026 · Why "post-traumatic" is the wrong tense for many survivors of domestic abuse, and what applied psychologists can do about it.

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2025

Domestic abuse - a model for recovery

Healthcare Counselling and Psychotherapy Journal (BACP) · July 2025 · The CARE framework and recovery-stage model.

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2024

Why businesses shouldn't ignore domestic abuse in the lives of staff

People Management (CIPD) · 2024 · Practitioner-facing piece on workplace impact and employer response.

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2024

Staff abused at home - what employers need to know

People Management (CIPD) · 2024 · Recognising and responding to abuse presenting in the workplace.

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CARE

The stabilisation framework.

Four moves a clinician can make when the client is still inside the dynamic - or thinks they've left it but the system hasn't.

C
Check-in
Open every session with a structured safety and threat read.
A
Anchor
Establish an internal and relational anchor that holds across sessions.
R
Reflect
Make sense of the dynamic without re-entering it.
E
Empower
Rebuild agency on protected ground, in steps the system supports.
What makes NRT different

A formulation framework, not just a trauma protocol.

NRT runs across all five stages as a way of mapping attachment dynamics, abuser narrative, and ongoing external influences. Trauma-processing interventions become appropriate at stage 4 - but the framework starts at stage 1.

Conventional trauma therapy assumes

  • ×The threat has ended.
  • ×The narrative is broken but recoverable.
  • ×Stabilisation precedes processing in a straight line.
  • ×Client and clinician share a clear "before / after."

NRT works when

  • ✓The threat is ongoing - court, contact, workplace.
  • ✓The narrative is still being actively rewritten by another party.
  • ✓Stabilisation and processing must interleave, not stack.
  • ✓"Post" is a misleading prefix.
Narrative Regulation Therapy

Processing trauma that previously refused to move.

NRT is the trauma-processing protocol that sits across stages III–V of the arc. It treats the narrative itself as the regulation target - not as raw material to reprocess, but as the structure that holds regulation in place.

It draws on attachment theory, narrative therapy, and trauma-focused CBT, but the move is distinct: regulate the story to regulate the system. When the threat is ongoing, this is often the only protocol that lands.

  1. i
    Locate the narrative break - not "what happened," but where the story snapped.
  2. ii
    Stabilise the unbroken portions - what the client still has access to.
  3. iii
    Reconstruct attachment. Self-to-self before self-to-other.
  4. iv
    Re-author with constraints. Honest about ongoing risk; not falsely resolved.
  5. v
    Theory-driven, practice-compatible language. Designed to map onto what you already do that works.

See the protocols in practice.

Start with the screening tool to see how the lens lands on a current case, then choose the entry point that matches your caseload.

See courses → Stabilisation and emotional safety Get the screening tool →