The trauma of parenting traumatised children
This article explores the impact of abandonment abuse and neglect, not only on children but, centrally, on the foster carers, adopters and kinship carers who parent children where it has been deemed that a return home to birth parents is not in their interests. (For purposes of simplicity we will refer to these carers as ‘parenting figures’.) In doing this we aim to provide parenting figures with support and understanding as well as reducing the feelings of isolation that is often integral to parenting ‘looked after’ children.