Our behaviour change practitioner Amy Luddington provides insight into working with participants on our Challenging Unhealthy Relationship Beliefs and Behaviours (CURBB) programme.

 

I know what it’s like to change unhealthy behaviours. I’ve been sober for 13 years, following addiction. I’ve worked in prisons and with police. What I realised was that unless we help and work with perpetrators, we’re always going to have victims. For the past two and half years I’ve been working as a behaviour change practitioner for Interventions Alliance – and I’m loving it.

What is CURBB?

CURBB is a psychoeducational early intervention that explains the nature of abuse and its impact on both people and their relationships. It helps participants recognise the characteristics of unhealthy relationships, then guides them to understand what healthy relationships look like.

 

The intervention introduces emotional awareness and emotional intelligence, motivating people to make positive changes in their lives. It encourages them to seek out healthier relationships and provides support and resources to help them take positive steps toward meaningful transformation.

 

Participants are usually referred by the police through either an out-of-court resolution or on a conditional caution. They’ve normally committed a first-time domestic abuse offence, like pushing, shoving or throwing things at walls. It could be drinking too much, coming back from a night out and trashing the house.

 

There are six sessions in the programme; the first session is on teams, four follow-up sessions are face-to-face, and then a final session on teams. It usually takes about six to seven weeks to complete.

 

A person needs to complete the six sessions, or they will be referred back to the Crown Prosecution Service and they will be charged for their initial offence.

How does CURBB help?

CURBB is ideal as an early intervention, raising awareness of what constitutes abusive behaviour and motivating participants to change their behaviour before it becomes more entrenched. Some people may initially be resistant to CURBB; but we use vignettes to help them identify abusive behaviours in a non-confrontational way.

 

At times, participants may respond by saying, “That’s not me.” In response, I invite them to describe their own situation. As they recount their actions, I gently ask whether those behaviours are healthy. This process helps them recognise that the vignette mirrors their own behaviour and highlights the negative patterns involved.

 

We use a motivational approach and work with resistance rather than against it. One of the strengths of CURBB is that we do not directly force participants to admit to specific behaviours. Instead, through a strong working alliance and skilled practitioner support, the majority of participants – around 99% – begin to reflect on and take responsibility for their own behaviour, leading to meaningful insight and change.

Engaging participants

CURBB enables people to acknowledge abusive behaviours without feeling judged or condemned, which is key to facilitating genuine and lasting change. Participants become motivated to improve their lives, understanding that while they must put in the work themselves, early intervention helps them recognise their desire to change. They reach a crossroads where they must decide the direction they wish to take, continuing down a path of further consequences or choosing to build healthy relationships.

 

I always emphasise to participants that the change belongs to them. My role is to support and guide them through the programme, but they are the ones who do the work and create the change. By the end of the intervention, participants often rediscover their sense of purpose and can clearly see who they want to become. They leave with the skills, insight, and signposting needed to continue implementing positive change.

 

I have never known a participant to complete CURBB and leave without gaining something meaningful from the programme.

I’ve had people who start on the programme and when they speak to me, it’s one-word answers. What you have to remember is they have been arrested, probably for the first time, they’ve been placed in a prison cell for the evening and they don’t know if their relationship is still there – they’re terrified. They come to me, and they just see me as somebody else who is either going to tell them off or is going to punish them in some way and it’s far from that. I will wait until they are ready to talk to me, to share with me, and I will give them the time that they need.

Addressing harmful behaviours

It’s all about acceptance and it’s difficult, but the fact is – they’re there for a reason, they’ve been arrested. They’re not going to get away with saying to me, “I haven’t done anything,” because they have done something. It’s about being gentle, not being judgemental, giving them time, listening to them. And then finally, it’s like the floodgates open, everything comes out. They explain to me what’s happened, why it’s happened, and then we work together to find solutions. That’s all we’re looking for.

 

Recently, I worked with a participant who was initially dreading the sessions and didn’t believe he needed to change. Over time, I observed him becoming more engaged and positive during the sessions. At the end of CURBB programme, he shared that it had “literally given him his life back” and that he now had the tools to move forward. During this time, he reconnected with support networks he had previously lost, began songwriting again, and accepted the importance of spending time on himself. This type of transformation is not an exception; it is a regular outcome I observe when delivering CURBB.

 

I consistently see an increase in participants’ self-confidence and their ability to recognise that they can make positive changes in their lives and respond to challenges in a non-abusive way when resolving problems. CURBB plants the seed for participants to take control of their lives and feel more empowered to make healthier choices.

What is it like to help people change?

For me, CURBB is a privilege because it means that somebody has the opportunity to turn their life around. Most participants feel seen and heard for the first time during the intervention. They come in and there is so much shame and embarrassment. It takes quite a while for them to actually open up, but once they do, it’s like they are unleashing so much that is caught up inside them that may be the cause of some of the problems.

 

What they tend to unpack is childhood trauma, issues with substance misuse, growing up in a household where there’s been violence previously, financial pressures, struggling with children or simply that they drank too much one night, and suddenly their behaviours have got out of hand.

 

CURBB is hard because they’ve got to own really tough stuff that maybe they’ve done or experienced.

 

Some have said: “Oh my God, I’ve never opened up to anybody. I’ve never spoken about this. ….”

 

That is just incredible.