Critical Cause of Danger and Critical Cause of Change (EP. 19)

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Transcript

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In this episode, I'm going to be looking at. Critical causes of danger. And critical causes. Of change. It's going to be a shorter episode than usual, just because of. Personal life circumstances, I've been slightly overwhelmed and had limited ability and capacity to work at the level that I'm typically used to being out to work. And so I'm a little bit later than usual. And upload in this episode. And so I thought it'd be good to do a shorter one. Mainly because I don't have time to do a longer one. Before I get into. This episode's topic. I just wanted to mention. The child protection masterclass series that are be doing. If you're a child protection social worker and you're looking for. Training on practice related. Topics. For example. How to work with children, how to write assessments. Then I'd highly recommend checking out the Basware child protection master class series. If you just type in Google. Basware child protector masterclass. It will come up and you can check those out. The ever. Website. I want to point you to is relational activism. Because we are running a series of webinars over the course of the year. Which are going to be free. And we're hoping to have a brilliant lineup of. Guests for each of those webinars. And so they're, they're worth checking out. And the website is relational activism. So to look at this idea of critical causes. Of concern and critical cause of change. Frequently w. When I was a case holder and social worker, and maybe even now as a social worker who writes parent and assessments, I'm often overwhelmed by the variety and the severity of problems that a parent or a family is experiencing. Drug and alcohol use domestic abuse, poor mental health. Alongside dire housing conditions. Financial difficulties and often children with a host of emotional and behavioral problems. And sometimes. Our response to this can be equally overwhelming. And with the best intentions. We ask parents to access drug and alcohol services, domestic abuse services, mental health support, parenting classes. And sometimes. A raft of other services, which are each designated to address a specific problem. In other words, we regularly ask families often to their frustration and reluctance. To attend range of different courses in different places, with different agencies within the given agencies, predetermined timeframes. And. Sometimes the failure to engage in these services, regardless of how useful or relevant they may seem to a parent. Can lead to a negative judgment being made about that. Willingness to engage their capacity to change, et cetera. And that can lead to an escalation in social work involvement. And I think. Underlying this approach is a belief that each issue. Constitutes a separate entity. That can be divorced from the individual's developmental experiences or their social context. However, in my experience. The issue is often interconnected and represent a manifestation of psychological distress. Or relational impoverishment and social deprivation. Another contributing factor. Seems to derive from the expectation that if the level of concern about the child's safety is such that care proceedings are instigated and permanent removal is considered. Then the local authority has to demonstrate that they've done everything possible. Two. Support the parents. So, for example, when you go to court, Because you're so concerned about a child. And you'll see can remove, or you have to demonstrate you've offered every support provision that's available within your area. And. This is I think an irrefutably sound and indispensable principle. However, in my experience, what happens is the principle is applied. To the quantity of support rather than the quality or appropriateness. And this idea that you have to offer support is. Underpinned by. I think it's called case law. RTBs I might just read that quickly actually, because. If you're not familiar with it, it's really worth. Knowing about. So it's para 28. I'm just going to pull that up. So it right here. The court to assessment of the parent's ability to discharge their responsibilities towards the child must take into account the assistance and support which the authorities would offer. So before making an adoption order, the court must be satisfied that there is no practical way of the authorities. Or others providing the requisite assistance and support. And then. In this piece of case law, they go on to quote. Lady. Sorry. Hail. And. It right here. It will be the duty of everyone to ensure that in those cases where a supervision order is proportionate as a response to the risk presented. Supervision order can be made to work as indeed. The framers of the children act 1989, always hoped it would be made to work. The local authorities must deliver the services that are needed and must secure the other agencies, including the health service also play their part and the parents must cooperate. Fully. So. It goes on to say that the local authority cannot press for a more trusted form of order. Least of all pressed for adoption because it is unable or unwilling to support a less interventionist form of order. And the judges must be alert to the point and must be rigorous in explore and in probe and local authority, thinking in cases where there is any reason to suspect that resource issues may be affecting the local authorities thinking. And when RD BS came out, that it was quite an influential piece of case law in our practice. And. And how we had to demonstrate the kind of support that we offered parents. In any event. Irrespective of the kind of underlying reasons as to why we offer lots of support services. For lots of different. Difficulties that the family may be experiencing. That's this quote. In raising parents, which is a book by Patricia Crittenden. And she writes too many goals and too many professionals working towards the goals. Are likely to distract parents attention. Generate anxiety about performance in change. And obscure the critical aspect of treatment. And. In her book, she outlines an idea. That I have found incredibly useful. Which is referred to as critical causes. And critical causes. Is divided into two element. There's two elements. The first element is the critical cause of danger. And then the second element is the critical cause of change. So let's just explore those two elements. The critical cause of danger is that, which in the past caused the development of. A psychological self protective strategy. For example. A parent may have been required to learn ways of coping, to deal with. Violence parental substance misuse, sexual abuse, neglect in their childhood. And. The ways in which they learn to deal with those experiences led to the development of a strategy. That's now being carried forward into that adulthood. But it can also be danger in the present. So it could be things such as a domestically abusive partner. Current substance misuse. And, or frat perceived all reel of social care, remove in their children. So these current dangers can deny parents the psychological safety necessary to explore past. Adaptations that is the coping strategies they developed. To pass danger. So there's these two elements where there's the current danger. Substance misuse. Being in a domestically abusive relationship, but then there's also. These past dangers they've often experienced and the ways that they've learned to cope with those. And so that's the critical cause of danger. And the critical cause of change refers to that, which if changed. Would instigate a cascade of changes that would ultimately resolve other concern in aspects of the family's functioning. And as an attachment theorist. Patricia Crittendon argues that attachment is often a critical cause of change. Because attachment constitutes the development of a self protective coping strategy. And crucially the underlying psychological processing. The underpins such as strategy. And I think. Conceptualize this way. Our role. I should be there for organized around understanding and reducing danger, current and past. And identify in the critical cause of change. So, what does that mean for practice? Cause I'm aware. It's probably sounded quite academic and. Technical so far. I think firstly. It would require narrowing the definition of the problem. As already indicated, attempted to provide a service for each problem. And every consequence of each problem is unlikely to succeed and will probably just overwhelm the family and us as social workers. So I'll give two examples. When a parent's experiences growing up have been characterized by exposure to. Trauma or neglect and abuse. Then they may struggle with their. Thoughts and feelings and the way that they manage their relationships. And that can lead to one or a combination of difficulties such as conflictual relationships, poor mental health. Or a reliance on drugs and alcohol. Consequently, these issues can undermine their parenting ability. And so a lot to cool. Albeit false. Inference from this. Is that the parent should attend a parenting course. However difficulties in parent tin. Difficulties in parenting. Are usually a symptom of an underlying issue. Rather than the cause of difficulties for children per se. So the difficulties. That the parents we work with have in managing their children is often a symptom of an underlying issue. Rather than the causes of difficulties. And so if we address the underlying issue, Most of the parenting concerns would automatically diminish. At least to a degree that doesn't warrant social care involvement. In in the 12, 13 years that I've been a social worker. I've yet to encounter a family who were able to address their issues by attending a parenting course. But attendance, a parenting course featured on most support plants. That's not to say that there isn't a value in parenting courses. And that they don't help a lot of people. But I just haven't come across parents. Or children who've been on a child protection plan where the fundamental concerns and risks. Have been addressed by the parent attending a parenting program. Another example. Which might be a little bit more concrete. The use of drugs and alcohol by parents can often lead to chaotic home routines. Inconsistent parenting. Financial problems, including accumulating lots of debt. Poor mental health and conflict in the relationship. Now, if we were to ask the parent to address their drug and alcohol use. There are a few avenues in which to do this. One-on-one. And group work through community drug and alcohol services. Alcoholics anonymous or rehab. And so I think that should be our primary focus. Helping them access the community drug and alcohol service. Or helping them get access to our colleagues anonymous by asking the family support worker to take them. Or liaise in and Lincoln in with the drug and alcohol service to think about. Whether there be they would be eligible for access in a drug and alcohol rehab center. Yeah, more often than not. We asked parents to engage in support to address that drug and alcohol use. And. And attend a parenting course for inconsistent parenting. Engage in one-to-one family support to improve routines. Attend the GP and access mental health support. And engaged in domestic abuse services. And I think if parents were able to gain a better understanding. Of the function of that substance misuse, they would be supported to develop. Alternative coping strategies. And that would make it more likely that they would reduce their substance misuse or even better abstain. Completely. And in that context where we simply focused on the drug and alcohol use. And they were able to bring about a resolution in that area of their life. The rest of the services would probably be redundant. And even if I'm going to support was needed after they'd reduced their substance misuse or abstained. Then they could more likely focus on access in the help. That would enable them to. Repair the past harm caused in the relationship with their children and strengthen their parenting capacity. And then I think once we've narrowed and better understood the problem. Then we can focus on addressing the identified danger. For example, risk-taking behavior, drug, and alcohol use domestic abuse, isolation, or poverty. And I think once. The immediate and current Dane dangerous been removed or substantially reduced. Including the danger that children's services represents to many families. Then we can embark upon a compassionate inquiry into the underlying issues that contribute to and maintain the behavior and or relationships that undermined a parent's ability to protect their children from harmful experiences. And I think we should probably aspire to meet parents from where they are and not where we think they should be or expect them to be. And I think from that position, We can function as what Crittendon refers to as transition and attachment figures. And collaboratively slowly and incrementally. Facilitate parents' abilities to make long-term changes. Whilst recognizing that participate in, in a reciprocal process of change. Often reveals, revealing some aspects of the self, which can be really frightening. Or, or heart horrible or shameful. And so. Critical cause of danger. Requires us to narrow down the problem. And focus on what's the key problem here. What's the key problem that if we were to address it would instigate a cascade of changes that would ultimately resolve a lot of the other aspects of the family's functioning. And I mentioned the example of the drug and alcohol use. If you resolve the drug and alcohol use. Y, which you'd have to look at the underlying reasons for the drug and alcohol use. But it would also. Resolve a lot of the other problems potentially around the power and tin and the routine and the finances. And the poor mental health. And so. Just to kind of wrap this up. I think we're often guided in our work to. Improve the experience of children in their parents' care and prevent where possible significant harm that's fundamentally our role. And we can observe children with quite significant emotional and behavioral problems, or they might have an anxious attachment and we try to resolve this sometimes by. Sending the parent on an array of courses. In many cases, we will also try and provide an intervention for the child. One of the things that Kristen them points out. However is that. Anxious attachment is not the problem. Danger is the problem. Change the danger, not the child. So that's a quote by Crittendon. Anxious attachment is not the problem. Danger is the problem. Change the danger, not the child. And. Because there is a risk that if you. For children, they develop a way of coping with their care giving context. And so for some children, for example, It's adaptive is helpful for them. If they're hypervigilant, if that anxious. Because if they live in an, an, an omen. An unpredictable environment because there's violence or there's drug and alcohol use. Then they can be quick to see what's happening. And respond either by hiding or running away. And just keeping themselves alert. In school, that kind of strategy. It doesn't play itself out say, well, because they're kind of, they're hypervigilant and they're looking for cues, the frat and danger. And that can sometimes make it difficult for them to concentrate in school, or it might make them predisposed to responding aggressively to the cues and communication of other people. Because if you're looking for danger everywhere. It will help you see danger when it's there, but it also might lead you to see in it when it isn't there. And so. That that strategy helped that child cope with the environment. So if you try and make the child. Last anxious. Last hypervigilant. Then you're taken away the strategy that protects them in their home. And in that particular caregiving context. So what crit Kristen didn't advocate in for here? Is changed the environment. Make the environment less predictable, unsafe. Less dangerous, less unpredictable. And then the child won't feel so compelled to be so anxious or insecure. So how do we do this? I suppose that's the question. Primarily we help parents. And we avoid multiple solutions for multiple problems. And instead identifying address the essential issues, the critical cause of danger. And then ideally we would invoke the use of a transitional attachment figure. The functions like a parent and helping each person to address the problem from which they can learn. Without being overwhelmed. By the complexity of the entire. Problem. So that's a brief overview of this idea. That's had quite profound. Impact on my practice and my development. And that is from raising parents. A book by Patricia Crittendon. Which has probably. One of the most influential books that I've read. If you're interested in learning about the dynamic maturational model. I would highly recommend checking out Rebecca Carr Hopkins. She provides the most brilliant and engaging and informative training on this topic. And it will massively change your perspective and ability to help children and families. So. I'm going to leave it there for now. If you found today's podcast. What episode useful Please do leave a review and please don't hesitate to get in touch if you have any questions or queries or topics that you would like me to explore Bye for now