Is there a word for that?

We talk a lot about the importance of using the right words around abuse. But what happens when the words we need are difficult to find, poorly understood, or simply don’t exist yet?

We’re launching Is there a word for that? - a new, ongoing series exploring language that can help people make sense of experiences they may have struggled to describe.

Some posts will introduce established terms that deserve to be better known, while others will explore language that exists around an experience but doesn’t quite capture it. And, sometimes, we’ll propose a term ourselves - because gaps in language can leave very real experiences surprisingly difficult to point to.

We’re beginning with ‘choice erosion’, a term for the gradual narrowing of the choices someone feels genuinely able to make because they have learned the consequences attached to them.

An option can exist on paper without feeling safely available in practice. That distinction matters, particularly when the question from the outside is so often: “But why didn’t you just...?”

We’ll keep adding to this vocabulary. And we want you to be part of it. If there’s something you’ve experienced, witnessed, or repeatedly struggled to explain because you’ve never quite had the language for it, tell us.

Perhaps there’s already a word for that.

Perhaps we need one. Let’s create it together.

Name the crime. Point out the perpetrator. Rewrite the blame.