Podcast Season 4: Episode 6 – The impact of domestic abuse on care experienced children and young people

Please note that this transcript is auto-generated and therefore will contain some errors and natural pauses in conversation.

[00:00:00] DAWN: Welcome to the Creative Life Story Work podcast, where we explore how to make life story work better for all care experienced children and young people. Creative life story work is an approach which can improve children and young people’s lives and their relationships with others, both at home and at school.

[00:00:30] It’s based on the Rose model of therapeutic life story work. Every month we’ll explore a different aspect of creative life story work. And we’ll give insights into how you can use this approach to help care experienced children and young people make sense of their past and build a brighter future.

[00:00:50] Today we are exploring the impact of domestic abuse on care experienced children and young people and I’m delighted to welcome to the podcast studio Natalie Wyatt. Natalie is a social worker with 15 years post qualifying experience across a number of national, local government. and third sector organisations.

[00:01:12] She’s a skilled trainer, consultant, and senior leader. Natalie is a training practitioner from Trauma Informed Consultancy Services, which offers an extensive range of training sessions related to all aspects of how we can apply a trauma informed framework to settings, services, and systems. Hello Natalie and a very warm welcome to you and to our podcast studio today.

[00:01:40] NATALIE: Thank you, Dawn. It’s great to be here.

DAWN: I wondered if we could start off by you giving us your definition of domestic abuse so that we can see what it is that we’re going to be talking about today.

[00:01:56] NATALIE: Sure. So there are lots of different kind of definitions of domestic abuse kind of floating around. Of course, the 2021 Domestic Abuse Act gave us a statutory definition for the first time, but that’s quite a lengthy sort of legalistic process.

[00:02:11] So I won’t read that verbatim, but in summary, what we mean when we talk about domestic abuse is any incident or pattern of incidents of coercive, controlling, threatening behavior, violence or abuse between those aged 16 or over, who are or have been intimate partners or other sort of family members and this can happen kind of regardless of gender or sexuality.

[00:02:37] We know that domestic abuse can happen in all different types of relationships and the abuse can encompass but isn’t limited to psychological, physical, sexual abuse, economic abuse and emotional abuse.

[00:02:52] DAWN: A huge list and I hadn’t realised that that had actually been covered in an act as well to set out the parameters of domestic abuse.

[00:03:03] I didn’t know that that was a legal document now.

[00:03:07] NATALIE: It’s quite interesting actually when you look at the various definitions of domestic abuse over the years and how they’ve evolved and where additions were made and language shifts. But I think, yeah, the definition that we’ve arrived at in 2024 is really comprehensive and reflective of what we know about domestic abuse in this day and age.

[00:03:32] DAWN: And for lots of people listening to this podcast who are foster carers or social workers, I’m just wondering what are some of the most common emotional and maybe psychological as well actually impacts of children witnessing or experiencing domestic abuse.

[00:03:52] NATALIE: So it’s a really interesting question Dawn that we know that the data tells us that I think it’s about at least 60 percent of children who are in care have experienced domestic abuse of one sort or another.

[00:04:08] I always think that sounds like quite a conservative figure. I wouldn’t be surprised if it was slightly higher than that. So absolutely it’s a theme, it’s a pattern of behavior that foster carers and those working with looked after children really need to be cognisant of. The impact it can manifest in so many different ways, depending on the age of the child.

[00:04:32] So what we sometimes see in sort of pregnancy and babyhood. So we know that the domestic abuse can have an impact in utero. So it can have an impact on the unborn baby. And we also know that domestic abuse in pregnancy can be associated with an increased risk of miscarriage. of low birth weight with premature birth, so in the child’s most early stages of development it can have a really profound impact and we know that as the baby gets older that baby may experience developmental delay, they might be watchful, they might be hypersensitive to to sound and what’s going on in in the environment.

[00:05:12] With toddlers and preschoolers, we might see emotional dysregulation, less of an ability to self soothe and to contain their emotions. If they’re otherwise dry, we might see them bedwetting, having sort of accidents, disrupted sleep. And then as we go on into sort of middle childhood, we will often see those children, often they’ll be very anxious about younger siblings, so they’ll be worrying about the impact of their brothers and sisters around them.

[00:05:40] They might be distracted in school, they might be under performing academically. We’ll also sometimes see psychosomatic illnesses as well, so the anxious tummy, headaches, that kind of thing. And also they might experience, uh, a sense of kind of guilt, and shame, is what children sometimes tell us.

[00:06:01] And sometimes, depending on the family circumstances, we might see a child within that family or within the sibling unit kind of stepping into the role of protector and wanting to kind of shield the non abusing parent against the abusing parent or shielding their siblings. And then, of course, once we get into adolescence, we might see the young person having difficulty maintaining relationships, maintaining friendships, they may be more prone to impulsive behaviours, and of course that can then lead on to misuse of drugs and alcohol. We’ll sometimes see an increase in risk-taking behaviours. And coupled with that is sometimes that those risk taking behaviours can result in sort of anti social behaviours and criminal behaviours and all of the sort of challenges and intervention that comes with that.

[00:06:53] Sometimes we see a slightly gendered response at the age of sort of 16 plus. So where is the bias? Boys will sometimes have quite externalising behaviours, like the risk taking behaviours that I mentioned. Sometimes what we will see with girls is more kind of internalised behaviours, so self harm and disordered eating and that kind of thing.

[00:07:13] So it can really have a profound impact across the entirety of childhood.

[00:07:18] DAWN: One of the things that you mentioned there was relationships, and one of the things that we think a lot about at Blue Cabin is strengthening and developing relationships. And I’m just wondering about how domestic abuse influences the way that care experienced children form relationships.

[00:07:37] And I’m thinking that I’ve got Richard Rose on my shoulder thinking about trust and attachment and what’s the extra considerations about forming a relationship?

[00:07:50] NATALIE: So absolutely, care experienced children who’ve experienced domestic abuse, they’re likely, you know, if their early attachments aren’t necessarily safe and nurturing because of an abusive dynamic or because of a perpetrator interrupting those attachments, that can leave the child very vulnerable and distrusting of adult relationships.

[00:08:15] And, of course, that can then have an impact in the bonding with their alternative carer, whether that’s a professional foster carer, kinship carer, or a special guardian. That can have a kind of lasting impact on their trust in adults and their trust that their needs will be met.

[00:08:36] DAWN: And again, just thinking of some of the other conversations that we’ve been having in Blue Cabin, how important then Is trauma informed care when working with children who’ve been exposed to domestic abuse?

[00:08:50] NATALIE: Trauma informed care is absolutely central, crucial, to the caregiving relationship between care experienced young people and those adults trusted with looking after them. When we think about how the perpetrator or abusive behaviours can interrupt those early attachment relationships, it can leave the child feeling fundamentally vulnerable with a lack of kind of adult protection around them and I say that without judgment or without, you know, I don’t want to sound like I’m criticizing the primary caregiver, typically the mother, but you know it’s very much when we see those attachment behaviors being interrupted that is very much the responsibility of the abusing parent.

[00:09:35] But the reality is that that can then be experienced by the child as complex trauma or relational trauma. So they’re left with this pervasive sense that the adults around them are not safe and that their needs will not be met. That can of course, pose real challenges in their relationships with, with alternative caregivers.

[00:09:55] But of course, through applying that kind of trauma lens and working in a sort of really trauma informed way, that is one of the ways I’d suggest to strengthen the bond and relationship. Okay. between the carer and the young person.

[00:10:09] DAWN: Let’s take a short break now so that you can hear all about our Creative Life Story Work membership offer.

[00:10:17] Trailer: We want people to gain more of an understanding about what it’s like to be care experienced and to have a better understanding of what it actually means. Could Creative Life Story Work make a difference to the care experienced children and young people you work with? Maybe you’re a social worker. I think we forget at our peril that actually telling a child the story of their early life is one of the most profound uses of social work power that we could ever operate. Perhaps you’re a foster carer. You know, when they say it’s all about the child, it’s not because our experiences, it’s about the carer and the child. And it just gives a new angle to our relationship because we’re learning about each other together.

[00:11:01] A Creative Life Story Work membership will give you or your whole team a new perspective. Access to resources, including activities you can use in direct work with children and young people. Training with life story work experts, and lots more. And I think a lot of our children are looking for meaning, looking for, you know, well why is it I feel this way when my You know, my friends don’t. Why is it I get angry eternally and my friends don’t?

[00:11:27] The greatest thing we see is when we are able to say to young people, this is your story, this is about who you are. And then children towards the end say, it’s not my fault that these things happened, but it is something that I can do something about. And once we have that, then we know we can move forward.

[00:11:42] Find out about our membership for individuals and for organisations on our website creativelifestorywork.com.

[00:11:54] DAWN: What role do you think social workers, foster carers or other professionals can play in helping care experienced children heal from the trauma of domestic abuse?

[00:12:06] NATALIE: So healing and recovery is a a really important skill set that requires a lot of knowledge and expertise. So I’d say first things first, keeping yourself up to date with contemporary research, training, accessing as many materials as you can just so that you’re really skilled up and knowledgeable about what it is that our young people have experienced.

[00:12:29] I would also say really keeping a close eye on the child’s safety. And I would. particularly encourage social workers to think carefully about family time arrangements even once the child is removed from that abusive dynamic. Sometimes what we see is children placed with alternative carers and so suddenly it’s seen as oh well the risk’s removed now the child’s safe they’re with the foster carer or whoever and the family time is supervised so everything’s AOK.

[00:13:04] But of course what we know about the sort of the insidious behavior of domestic abuse, particularly if there’s been coercive control, if that was the nature of the abuse, that sometimes that can continue to play out during family time through, again, those kind of subtle insidious comments, behaviours.

[00:13:24] You might find the abusing parent trying to coax information out of the child or trying to kind of use their contact for the purpose of surveillance. So trying to get a sense of, well, what’s mummy up to now? Has she got a new boyfriend? Or perhaps trying to find out the address of the placement, that kind of thing.

[00:13:43] So I think just really keeping our risk assessment up to date and recognizing that as a dynamic process is really important. The risk doesn’t change just because the child is living in an alternative placement. I would also say of course, there’s a really crucial role for professionals around healing and recovery.

[00:14:06] There’s a lovely book. I think it’s, I’ve written it down somewhere. I think it’s by Cathy Humphreys. There’s a lovely activity book that’s full of different worksheets that practitioners can use with the mother and child together just to start kind of facilitating some of the conversations about family life, about any harm that the child may have experienced and ultimately what the child needs from that parent moving forwards.

[00:14:32] DAWN: And just because I know of your background of working in courts, I wondered what role you think the justice system plays in supporting or further traumatising care experienced children in domestic abuse cases?

[00:14:47] NATALIE: So there was a really seminal report that was published in 2020. It was published by the Ministry of Justice, but it was carried out by some independent experts in the field.

[00:14:59] And what they found was that whilst there are many kind of skilled, well intended professionals in the system, that actually the, the sort of adversarial nature of the family courts and the whole kind of structure of the family justice system could be really kind of re traumatizing for survivors of domestic abuse.

[00:15:22] including children and young people. Obviously that was a few years ago and now I was involved in an improvement board that was established off the back of what was called the harm panel report and have delivered lots of training and done lots of learning and development work with hundreds of young people.

[00:15:41] social workers up and down the country since then. So I think there’s a real appetite in the system to want to improve our work with children who’ve experienced domestic abuse and to bring more of that trauma informed lens to the work as well.

[00:15:56] DAWN: In your experience talking to some of the children, What are, what are their biggest challenges or fears related to domestic abuse?

[00:16:08] NATALIE: So often, in my experience, I think some of the biggest anxieties that the children that I’ve worked with, some of the biggest anxieties that they carry with them, is the unknown. So, whether that’s a child that’s still living in their family home, when they are then in school, or around their friend’s house, they will be imagining all sorts of strange things, sorts of scenarios about what’s going on back in the family home. Likewise, if you’re a care experienced young person who’s been removed from the family home, oftentimes that child will be anxious about what’s going on for the non abusing parent. Are they still being victimized by their, their partner?

[00:16:53] Is mum in a new relationship with a different partner? So there’s something about really keeping open channels of communication with the child, and not just assuming that because they’ve been removed from the situation, that’s the end of the story for, for them, you know, they need to be assured as much as is possible, that there are protective people working with the non abusing parent, just kind of allay their fears, if possible.

[00:17:21] We often know, don’t we, that, that children will fill in the blanks, if you’re not keeping them well informed about what’s going on. the sort of family dynamics that they will imagine their own scenarios.

[00:17:32] DAWN: And my final question for you today, and it’s quite a big one. Thinking ahead for the next 10, 20, 30 years, what changes or improvements would you like to see in the care system to better support care experienced children who’ve been affected by domestic abuse? You can wave your magic wand. Money is no object. What would you say?

[00:17:57] NATALIE: You know, it’s a really timely question, Dawn, because, and I’d be really interested to come back and to listen to this again in a few years time to see if I’m right, but I do think we are at the slight start of a shift in how domestic abuse is understood and acted on, certainly in the child protection system.

[00:18:18] So historically, And you’ll have heard this phrase before, I’m sure, we talk a lot about the mother’s failure to protect or her capacity to protect, which puts all of the onus on, on her as the non abusing parent to, to somehow manage the behavior of the abusing parent, which is not a fair situation to place a victim survivor in.

[00:18:41] And there’s a lot of literature kind of coming out of the U. S., the work of David Mandel and the Safe and Together model, which I know has been adopted by quite a few different local authorities now in the U.K., I think up in Scotland and, and England. And the message of that model, it kind of really emphasises the importance of approaching domestic abuse with the ambition of keeping the child safe and together with the non abusing parent, which again, actually fits in with that book that I mentioned before by Cathy Humphreys.

[00:19:15] This idea that children fare best and recover and thrive from domestic abuse when they are supported to safely maintain a relationship with a non abusing parent and to kind of go through that journey of healing and recovery together.

[00:19:33] DAWN: I’m really delighted that we finish our conversation on a a sea change where there’s some hope as well after covering all of those topics today.

[00:19:45] Thank you for your generosity in your time today. Thank you for your compassion and thank you for the clarity with which you’ve covered our whole topic of domestic abuse this afternoon.

[00:19:58] NATALIE: Thank you, Dawn. My pleasure.

[00:20:02] DAWN: If you’re interested in finding out more, you can join Natalie in our upcoming live classroom.

[00:20:09] You can find out more about it on our website, creativelifestorywork.com. Whether you’re a foster carer, or someone who has experience with the care system or you work with children and young people. We hope this episode has given you an insight into how we can make life story work better for young people and how you can use it in your own practice.

[00:20:31] Find us on LinkedIn and x at creativeLSW. Please do get in touch there with any comments or questions as we’d really love to hear from you. If your podcast app allows you to, please do leave us a review as it really helps others to find our show. So until next month, bye for now.