Betrayal trauma assessments
Partner-impact and trauma-inventory measures: what they capture, when they are repeated, and why no score diagnoses you or judges your relationship.
Clinically reviewed by Roxcy Brown, LMFT-Associate, CCPS-C (supervised by Billy Myers, LMFT-S, Texas license 201183) · 2026-08-23 · Next review 2027-08-23
Assessment exists to answer a question most partners are carrying alone: how much of what is happening to me is trauma, and how bad is it? Structured measures give that question an answer that does not depend on anyone's opinion, including his.
They are clinical instruments used by a clinician. They are not self-diagnosis, and no score determines what you should do about your marriage.
What assessment is actually for
It makes the invisible legible. Partners routinely under-report. You have been managing a household, holding a job, and looking fine to everyone, while sleeping four hours a night and rehearsing intrusive images all day. A structured measure catches what a general conversation does not.
It tells your clinician where to start. Acute symptoms that need stabilizing first look different from a picture that is ready for trauma processing. Assessment is how safety and stabilization gets sequenced correctly rather than guessed at.
It gives you a baseline. Recovery is not linear, and a bad week in month four can feel like everything has come undone. Measures repeated over time show a trajectory that week-to-week experience hides. Partners frequently find this the most useful part.
It counters the pressure to minimize. When family, or he, or your own instinct says you should be over this by now, a documented clinical picture is a fact rather than an argument.
What is used
Partner-impact self-assessment
Covers the breadth of impact — emotional, physical, relational, sexual, financial, and spiritual. Partners often discover in completing it how many areas of life this has reached, having previously thought of it as one problem.
Trauma inventory for partners
Focused on the trauma symptom picture specifically: intrusion, hyperarousal, avoidance, and changes in mood and cognition. Maps onto the symptom cluster and identifies which symptoms are currently loudest.
Broader mental health screening is used alongside these where the picture calls for it — depression, anxiety, and sleep in particular, since all three commonly co-occur and all three are treatable in their own right.
When assessment happens
At intake, at week four, at week eight, and at six-month follow-up. Results are reviewed with you, not filed. You are entitled to know what your own clinical picture says.
What assessment does not do
It does not diagnose you. Betrayal trauma is not a separate diagnosis in the DSM-5-TR or the ICD-11 — see betrayal trauma vs. PTSD. These measures describe severity and pattern; they do not produce a label.
It does not evaluate the relationship. No instrument here scores whether he is trustworthy, whether he is doing his work, or whether you should stay. That question is addressed in should I stay or leave, and it is not a scored one.
It does not measure how much you contributed. Nothing in partner assessment is built on the codependency framework. You are being assessed as a person responding to an injury, not as a participant in a shared disease process.
A score is not a verdict. A high score means you are carrying a great deal, not that you are damaged. A lower score does not mean your experience does not warrant care.
Privacy
Your assessment results are part of your clinical record — separate from his, confidential to you. He does not receive your scores, and completing an assessment does not put anything in front of him.
Nothing here goes to an insurer unless you choose to use your out-of-network benefits, through out-of-network billing or a superbill you submit yourself.
If the assessment surfaces something urgent
Some answers change the sequence immediately — active thoughts of self-harm, escalating substance use, or a safety concern. Your clinician will say so at the time rather than at the next appointment.
If you are in immediate danger or thinking about harming yourself, call or text 988 — the Suicide and Crisis Lifeline, available 24 hours a day — or call 911. If you do not feel physically safe, the National Domestic Violence Hotline is 1-800-799-7233.
How to start
Assessment happens with a clinician, as part of intake into the Partner & Family Program. You have your own intake and your own clinician, and you do not need him to be in treatment or in agreement.
Contact us or call (512) 877-8616. If you are not ready to talk yet, the tools page lists the private resources for partners and for men.
This page is part of the Betrayal Trauma clinical hub.
Frequently asked questions
What is partner assessment for?
To make the invisible legible. Partners routinely under-report — managing a household and looking fine to everyone while sleeping four hours a night. Structured measures catch what a general conversation does not, and they tell your clinician where to start.
Which assessments are used?
A partner-impact self-assessment covering emotional, physical, relational, sexual, financial and spiritual impact, and a trauma inventory focused on intrusion, hyperarousal, avoidance and changes in mood and cognition. Broader mental health screening is used alongside where the picture calls for it.
When does assessment happen?
At intake, at week four, at week eight, and at six-month follow-up. Results are reviewed with you rather than filed — you are entitled to know what your own clinical picture says.
Does a score diagnose me?
No. Betrayal trauma is not a separate diagnosis in the DSM-5-TR or the ICD-11. These measures describe severity and pattern; they do not produce a label, and no score determines what you should do about your marriage.
Will he see my results?
No. Your assessment results are part of your clinical record, separate from his and confidential to you. Completing an assessment does not put anything in front of him.
Does assessment measure how much I contributed?
No. Nothing in partner assessment is built on the codependency framework. You are assessed as a person responding to an injury, not as a participant in a shared disease process.
You do not need his permission to get help.
You are a separate client with your own intake, your own clinician, and your own record. Contacting us commits you to nothing, and it does not go through his file.
Call (512) 877-8616 Request a Confidential Consult
Reading this in the middle of the night? The form is open any time, and calls are answered live Mon–Fri 8am–9pm CT. If you are in immediate danger or thinking about harming yourself, call or text 988 — the Suicide and Crisis Lifeline, 24 hours a day.