Safeguarding Babies and Very Young Children from Abuse and Neglect by Rebecca Brown David Westlake Harriet Ward

Author:Rebecca Brown, David Westlake, Harriet Ward [Rebecca Brown, David Westlake, Harriet Ward]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: Social Science, Social Work, Political Science, Public Policy, Social Services & Welfare, Family & Relationships, Abuse, Child Abuse
ISBN: 9780857004819
Google: EDfJT7ImWXAC
Publisher: Jessica Kingsley Publishers
Published: 2012-02-15T05:09:40+00:00

Removal of older children

Prior to the birth of the index child, a large proportion of parents had had long-standing involvement with children’s social care, either through having been abused themselves as children and/or through having already experienced the removal of older children, two factors which were inter-related.

About the same proportion of parents in both the sufficient and insufficient change groups had experienced the removal of an older child: five out of 14 (36%) in the former compared with nine out of 23 (39%) in the latter.2 There is, however, a more marked difference if the parents in the insufficient change group who continued to look after their children are compared with those who were separated from them. Six (6/12: 50%) of the former group had experienced the removal of an older child, in contrast with three (3/11: 27%) of the latter. This finding should be tested out with a larger database, for if it proves to be valid it would have important implications. It is counter-intuitive, and may represent a tendency to give parents who have already been separated from one child every opportunity to prevent the loss of a second. It may also be indicative of professionals’ variable perceptions of the quality of parenting. In families where older children have been removed, the required distance travelled between parents’ starting points to them adequately meeting a child’s needs is greater. However, professionals may perceive any small steps achieved as greater progress than might be considered to be the case with other families. Without further monitoring and support, and in some cases more intrusive action by children’s social care, this can place children at greater risk of being abused or neglected.

Parents who had experienced the removal of an older child had displayed adverse behaviour patterns that were extremely difficult to overcome. There were also indications that, in some circumstances, these were reinforced by the experience of losing a child, so that, for instance, those whose alcoholism had precipitated the separation then drank more to dull the pain (see also Neil et al. 2010).

Because I’d lost the boys and everything I went through a bit of a bad stage, and I started drinking a little bit…it was just me that screwed up obviously because of what had been going on with the boys. (Mother of Ava: medium risk of harm at identification; high risk, living with birth parent but not safeguarded at age three)

In order to break free of the adverse behaviour patterns that had led to the removal of an older child, parents first had both to become reconciled to the loss and to acknowledge the part that their own behaviour had played in the decision. Only a very few were able to achieve this; where they did so, their ability to confront the presenting problems was indicative of them developing the insight and maturity needed to provide a nurturing home for the index child. There was very little evidence that parents who had experienced the removal of an older child

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