Therapeutic parenting support for adopters and special guardians
We see parents and carers as part of the therapeutic team. Through different parenting methods and specific techniques, parents and carers can help to make a real difference to the situation facing an adoptive/SGO family. However, we know that being a ‘therapeutic parent’ isn’t always easy. That’s why we offer therapeutic parenting support sessions to help parents and carers put into practice a therapeutic approach at home. These sessions also provide support to help with the stress that can come with parenting children with early trauma.
What is therapeutic parenting?
Therapeutic parenting is a research-based approach to help children who have experienced early trauma. The aim is to encourage feelings of safety and connectedness so that the child or young person can begin to deal with their experiences. We understand that this type of ‘special parenting’ can be difficult. Individual therapeutic parenting support sessions help parents and carers put this approach into practice, and provide a safe space for talking about any difficulties they might be experiencing during the process.
Therapeutic parenting support at Gateway
Therapeutic parenting is one of the most important ways of enacting change for a child who has experienced trauma. Depending on the situation, a therapeutic parenting approach might be all that is needed to achieve a positive outcome. We offer standalone parenting support sessions for this reason.
More commonly, our therapeutic parenting support sessions are commissioned as part of a package (for example, as part of the planned therapy or with one of our group interventions).
Parents/carers might find it useful to have 1-to-1 sessions alongside our group therapeutic parenting training course (TR-UST/eTR-UST or A-ABC).
Or, we might see parents/carers individually before or alongside direct therapy work with the child.
The approach we take will usually be determined by the adoption support assessment and the assessment of therapeutic need, in addition to the parent or carer’s wishes.
Therapeutic reparenting training
Therapeutic parenting programmes can be an excellent way to understand the theory behind attachment-focused parenting, along with practical techniques for putting this special way of parenting into practice
Gateway Psychology have a range of therapeutic parenting courses available to help support parents and carers. These include our 8-week TR-UST/eTR-UST course, along with advanced-level courses to further develop specific techniques.