The literature consistently reports a lack of support for birth mothers following their child being taken into care or adopted (

Living on a knife edge: The responses of people with physical health conditions to changes in disability benefits. Disability and Society.

There is very little published literature on 'what works' in terms of support for birth mothers following the loss of their children to compulsory adoption or foster care. The aim of this paper is to raise the voices of a group of birth mothers, an historically stigmatised, powerless and neglected group, with substantial experience of such counselling. A user of services and expert by experience was recruited to join the research team and was consulted at all stages of the research process. Five birth mothers were interviewed regarding their experiences of counselling with a counselling service for birth relatives post-child removal. These interviews were systematically analysed using an IPA methodology through the lens of the research question: What are the experiences of birth mothers who engage in person-centred counselling following the loss of a child or children to compulsory adoption or foster care? Three master themes were constructed from the data, namely From feeling alone, judged and let down…to feeling part of a special relationship, "The Healing Process" and "My Children are my world". The clinical invitations extended by these findings are discussed.

Background: There has been an abundance of studies that have employed quantitative methods to research obsessive compulsive disorder (OCD) and its neurobiology and neurochemistry. However, there appears to be a paucity of research investigating how OCD is experienced by those living with the diagnosis, particularly young people. Method: A qualitative cross-sectional semistructured interview design was used to address this lack of research. Ten young people, aged 14-17 years old, with a diagnosis of OCD were recruited from Child and Adolescent Mental Health Services in the United Kingdom. Thematic analysis was used to analyse the data. Results: Four themes were identified: 'Traumatic and stressful life events', 'Responses to signs of OCD', 'The battle of living with OCD' and 'Ambivalent relationship to help'. Young people reported experiencing stressful or traumatic life events prior to obsessive and compulsive behaviour. OCD behaviours were misunderstood by the young people and others, leading to delays in finding help. A sense of shame among the young people led them to keep their OCD secret due to feeling 'crazy'. The all-encompassing nature of OCD led the young people to withdraw socially. Most of the young people experienced an inner conflict between fighting and giving in to the compulsions. Conclusions: Traumatic experiences may be an important factor in the development of OCD for young people, which might indicate a direction for prevention. The sense of shame and stigma needs addressing if young people are to access help earlier. Education of the public, medical professionals and educators should be a priority. Key Practitioner Message• Where young people are given a diagnosis of obsessive compulsive disorder (OCD), formulations of their difficulties should attend to previous traumatic or stressful life events and addressing these should form a central part of therapy.• Interventions that help young people with an OCD diagnosis to connect with other young people with similar difficulties should be given priority. This could include support groups, and also leaflets, booklets and videos developed by or in collaboration with experts by experience.• A family-based approach to therapy should be offered where clinicians and family members can help guide exposure therapy in a graded and supportive manner in the young person's everyday settings outside of the therapy room. Intervention should also include psycho-education for family members.• Training sessions for school staff involved in the schooling of a young person with an OCD diagnosis as part of a therapy plan could help teachers understand the young person's difficulties and how to respond to it and best support the young person. Clinicians could also contribute to awareness-raising in schools to combat stigma.• Further qualitative research with young people who experience obsessive and compulsive behaviour can increase our understanding of their lived experiences, the impact of their difficulties on their lives and relationships and what they find helpf...

This grounded theory study explored parents' experiences of responding to their children's need for understanding parental mental health concerns. Fifteen parents with severe and enduring mental health difficulties participated in the study. The findings suggest four main social processes that influence parents' talk with their children about parental mental health issues, namely “Protecting and being protected,” “Responding to children's search for understanding,” “Prioritizing family life,” and “Relating to others.” Implications of the findings for clinical practice and future research are considered. In particular, the need for more family‐orientated services where parents experience parental mental health problems is highlighted.

The mental health of refugees has been an increasingly-researched area, but has been criticised for having an individualised and symptom-focused approach to understanding the experience of forced migration. This paper attempts to respond to calls to address this culturally limited and incomplete way of conceptualising responses to experiences of persecution and terror bound up within global hegemony and power inequalities. Interpretative phenomenological analysis (IPA) was employed to analyse semi-structured interviews undertaken with six refugee mothers, with the aim of exploring how participants made sense of, and created meaning around parenting and family life in the UK. Three main themes emerged from the data analysis (a) loss as a constant companion to parenting; (b) a shifting view of the self as a mother; and (c) taking the good with the bad in family life. Methodological limitations, as well as implications for future research and clinical practice are discussed.

The death of a child can be seen as one of the most devastating experiences for parents, which can result in a unique and enduring grief. Parents with surviving children face the task of navigating their own grief while continuing to parent. This narrative inquiry explores bereaved parents' stories of their emotional relationship with their surviving children.Parents told stories of emotional connection and disconnection with surviving children, influenced by the competing and potentially incompatible tasks of 'parenting' and 'grieving'.The need for a relational focus to bereavement research and practice is highlighted. The findings demonstrate the need for clinicians to provide i) parents an opportunity to explore their sometimes contradicting and troubling experiences of grief and parenting and ii) children with support to make sense of their experiences in relation to the parent-child relationship.

White is a colour too: engaging actively with the risks, challenges and rewards of cross-cultural family therapy training and practice Lizette Nolte