The meaning of growth in light of invisible trauma: Exploring women’s lived experience of self-reported growth in relation to emotional abuse in same-sex relationships

The experience of trauma is manually defined across the psychology profession. This study offers a relational approach to trauma, exploring the subjective experience of growth. Intimate partner violence (IPV) is recognised as a substantial public health concern within LGBTQ+ relationships, however much of the research is heterocentric in nature, which creates invisibility within research, services and society. This is the first study to look at experiences of growth in relation to same-sex IPV (SSIPV). It explores women’s lived experience of growth and emotionally abusive trauma, using Interpretative Phenomenological Analysis. Three super-ordinate themes were revealed through analysis of the data, which offer a journey across the participants’ experiences; ‘Living for the partner’, ‘Finding solid ground again’, ‘Living for the Self’. Several themes are reminiscent of existential concepts, which reflect the existential-phenomenological underpinnings of counselling psychology (CoP) and can be useful for practitioners developing a pluralistic understanding of trauma and sexuality. Generally, the findings echo research evidence on heterosexual IPV, with growth present across similar relational life domains. However, unique differences were reported through a socio-political lens, related to being embedded within a heteronormative society. These findings have implications for professionals, including how victims/survivors of SSIPV interpret their experience, relate to others and access help across services and support networks. This not only has implications for growth, but also for recovery and could keep individuals in abusive contexts for longer. Overall it is concluded the experience of growth is ongoing, embodied and intertwined with distress and the process of becoming. Growth is experienced across all existential life domains, also supporting previous research into post-traumatic growth. This study offers ways in which counselling psychologists can approach working with victims/survivors of SSIPV, with particular attention to diversity, context and subjectivity, in line with CoP values