I had a meeting today with residential staff who feel they have younger children that would greatly benefit from Cedar as they have histories of domestic abuse. However, in many cases there is no contact whatsoever with their mother: due to bereavement, prison etc. I wondered whether Cedar had the potential to work with these children, with carers being given the information about sessions in advance that mothers would usually receive? Some materials would have to be adapted of course however the residential staff have said they would be able to help with this. Do any other projects have experience of similar? As Cedar has such a focus on building the relationship between mother and child, I’m not sure whether it would be the appropriate intervention although the issues identified by residential staff are very similar to those addressed by the project: breaking the silence, dealing with anger, understanding abuse etc.
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Sasha says
January 9, 2014 at 9:14 amHi Sarah,
Thanks for your question. There is absolutely scope for Cedar to work with primary care givers when, for whatever reason, the mother is not able to engage with Cedar. It is really important that someone is informed of the child or young persons experience of Cedar and able to provide a space outwith of group to support that CYP. This could be a foster parent, teacher, key worker. Other projects have also asked this question and worked in this way. I will circulate your inquiry so that other projects may respond about how this works in practice.
Cedar West Dunbartonshire says
January 9, 2014 at 9:38 amHi Sarah,
In West dunbartonshire we have had children attend CEDAR who have adopted and kinship parents/carers. these parents were not suitable to attend a group but I did offer all parents a 1.5 to 2 hr session 6 times over the 12 week period. I adapted the materials to include dynamics of domestic abuse, impact on women and children, then pretty much followed the mothers pack with a bit of tweeking. As the sessions are one to one it is possible to cover two topics per session. I felt these session along with a full assessment beforehand was beneficial to each carer and the feedback at the end of group was very positive.
Regards
Carol Young – mother’s co-ordinator