Abuse does not end when the abuse stops

This article discusses abuse, trauma, and their longer-term psychological impact. While the discussion is reflective and non-graphic, some readers may find the themes emotionally difficult.

With thanks to our member, Donna Morgan, for this blog.

In my work as a counsellor, I often meet people who come to therapy believing they are dealing with anxiety, panic, low mood or relationship difficulties. Abuse is not usually the reason they give for seeking support. It often sits quietly in the background, unnamed and sometimes unrecognised even by the client themselves.

A phrase I hear again and again is “I thought I was over it”.

There is often confusion and sometimes shame in that sentence. Many clients believed they had dealt with what happened to them, because they built lives, careers, families and identities that appeared stable from the outside. They survived. They coped. They carried on. When distress resurfaces years or even decades later, it can feel like a personal failure, rather than a natural response.

Even after decades in practice, I am still struck by these disclosures at times. I can be working with someone for many sessions, building trust and understanding their present day struggles and then quite unexpectedly, they disclose a shocking experience of historical abuse. It may arrive quietly, almost as an aside or it may spill out, once something finally feels safe enough to be spoken.

These moments stay with me. Not because they are rare, but because they highlight how deeply people bury what they had to survive.

What I have learned over time, is that abuse does not end when the abuse stops. It lives on in the nervous system, in the body and in deeply held beliefs about safety, worth and trust. Healing is not a straight line and it does not work to a timetable.

Clients often arrive at therapy during periods of transition. Menopause, pregnancy, illness, becoming a parent, retirement or caring for ageing parents, can all act as turning points. These stages can lower emotional resilience and disrupt coping strategies that once worked well. When the body changes or feels less predictable, the nervous system can become more alert to threat. For some this opens the door to memories, feelings or bodily sensations linked to earlier abuse.

In recent years, I have also noticed more clients seeking therapy because their own historical abuse has been stirred by what they are seeing in the media. High profile cases and increased reporting of abuse can act as a mirror. For some it is the first time their experience feels recognised or validated. For others, it brings a sudden realisation that what they lived through was not normal and not acceptable.

Despite this, we still live with the message that the past is the past. That time should have healed it. That if someone managed to function, then the impact cannot have been that significant. Many survivors have internalised this belief which makes it even harder to understand why symptoms appear later in life. The nervous system does not work that way.

When abuse occurs especially early in life, the body adapts in order to survive. Hypervigilance, emotional numbing, people pleasing or dissociation may have been essential at the time. These responses can become woven into daily life, long after the danger has passed. Clients may not consciously remember the abuse, yet their bodies continue to respond as though threat is nearby.

This is often when clients say “I do not understand why this is coming up now.”

Part of the therapeutic work is normalising delayed responses to abuse. Trauma is not only about what happened. It is also about what could not be processed at the time. The absence of symptoms does not mean the absence of impact. Functioning does not equal healing.

This is where Eye Movement Desensitisation and Reprocessing can be particularly helpful and why many clients actively request it. 

EMDR works with the way traumatic memories are stored in the brain and body. Rather than relying solely on talking, it supports the nervous system to reprocess experiences that became stuck at the time of the abuse.

My own interest in EMDR grew from working predominantly with trauma and recognising that some clients needed something beyond talking alone. I was drawn to the training, because it offered a different way of working with experiences that felt stuck or inaccessible through words. During the training, I was repeatedly struck by how effective it could be. I watched clients process memories that had held significant emotional weight for years and begin to experience a shift that felt both contained and profound. 

What stood out for me, was not just the reduction in distress, but the sense of relief clients described when their bodies finally seemed to register that the danger was over.

Clients often describe knowing something happened, but feeling as though it still lives in the present. EMDR helps the brain recognise that the event is over, even when the body has not yet caught up. The memory does not disappear, but it loses its emotional charge. What once felt overwhelming, becomes something that can be remembered without being relived.

There are often signs that trauma based work may be appropriate. I listen for clients who describe strong bodily reactions, panic responses that feel out of proportion or a sense of being emotionally hijacked. I notice when someone understands their story logically, but feels unchanged emotionally. I pay attention to freeze responses, dissociation, sudden shutdown or long standing patterns of shame and self blame.

Just as importantly, I notice when a client minimises what happened to them. Phrases such as “it was not that bad” or “others had it worse” often sit alongside significant distress. These are not contradictions. They are survival strategies.

As counsellors, we are often the first people to gently hold the possibility that past abuse is still shaping the present. That requires sensitivity, patience and respect for a client’s pace. Disclosure may come through symptoms, rather than stories. It may emerge through the body rather than words. Sometimes it arrives much later than expected.

What matters is that we hold curiosity rather than surprise and compassion, rather than urgency. When abuse surfaces later in life, it is not because someone failed to heal properly, but because they finally feel safe enough to listen to what their body has been holding. 

Working in this way has shaped my understanding of abuse as a long term experience, with echoes across the lifespan and deepened my respect for the resilience of survivors. Healing is rarely about erasing the past. It is about making sense of it in the present.