Safety organized, trauma-informed and solution-focused domestic violence practice in child protection: Engaging families to promote change

Christine MinervaConsultant, National Resource Center for Child Protective Services

Fernando MederosConsultant and Trainer,

Fatherhood, Domestic Violence and Child Welfare

July 16, 2013

Learning objectives• Understand what constitutes a safety

organized, trauma informed, solution focused approach to engaging individual family members in domestic violence (DV) cases in child welfare

• Know the resources available to support continued learning about these approaches and enhance development of DV practice

Webinars in this series• June: Focused on key issues for intake,

assessment and intervention; organizational capacity

Available at www.nrccps.org• TODAY: Focus on engagement of the

children, non-offending parent and DV offender

• August 20, 2013: Focus on safety planning and case planning

Agenda• Overview: Safety organized, trauma

informed, solution focused approaches• Engagement of the non-offending parent

(adult victim of domestic violence)• Engagement of children• Engagement of the DV offender (person

using violence and abuse in the relationship)

Framework for Engagement • Trauma Informed: “Acknowledges and responds

to the varying impact of traumatic stress on children, caregivers, families, and those who have contact with the system.”

• Safety Organized: Ongoing and continuous engagement that explores risks, protective factors, and strategies to create safety.

• Solution Focused: Individualized, case-specific. Utilizes Miracle questions, Exception questions, Coping questions, Scaling questions to generate planning and change.

Domestic Violence

• Domestic violence (DV) is a pattern of coercive and violent behavior used by a person to establish control over an intimate partner.

• May include: physical violence, sexual violence/coercion, economic abuse, verbal/emotional abuse, psychological abuse/threats, using children, using systems such as CPS/courts.

Mothers who have Experienced Domestic Violence

Multi-abuse Trauma

NOP

CPS/ other Systems

Coping Abuse

Active AbuseOppression

Lack of Social

Supports

Trauma Responses

• In response to a danger or perceived risk, a person may experience a Fight- Flight- Freeze Response (National Resource Center on PTSD).

• Survivors may have re-experiencing symptoms, avoidance symptoms, or hyper-arousal symptoms (National Resource Center on PTSD).

• How a survivor acts when triggered or in the context of DV might not make sense to an outsider and may seem counterintuitive.

How Non-Offending Parent May Present

• Laughing or nonchalant• Distraught or flooded with emotion• Indecisive or ambivilant • Collected and calm• Angry• Expressing that the abuse is her fault• Dissociative, numb, or "flat“• May appear to be "lying about abuse"• May appear to be "minimizing abuse"

Goals of Engagement with Non-Offending Parents

• Identify risks, safety strategies/protective factors, and supports.• Understand how DV is impacting the child and

identify what’s helping promote the child’s resiliency. • Partner with NOP around CPS involvement in

order to minimize risks.

Building Rapport with the Non-Offending Parent

• Arrange a safe interview - communicate the message that CPS is concerned about the safety of both the NOP and the children

• Dispel myths about CPS• Explain limits of confidentiality• Acknowledge that CPS involvement may

increase risks• Communicate with empathy and respect

• Avoid asking “Is there domestic violence?” and instead ask open-ended questions about the relationship and the abuse. “Tell me about your relationship. What happens when you disagree?”

• Ask about and listen for behaviors that indicate a pattern of power and control. In order to understand risk, we need to understand more than a snap shot of a DV incident.

Identifying Risks

• Ask specific questions related to frequency, duration, and severity of abuse.

• Ask about and listen for indicators of dangerousness: weapons, strangulation, threats of suicide/homicide.

• Explore what’s helped her to stay safe in the past, what resources she may have used, and any potential barriers she may face.

Identifying Risks & Protective Factors

Assessing Children’s Exposure • Partner with NOP to understand how the

children have been impacted by witnessing DV. Normalize that it can be difficult to talk with children about abuse.

• “What do you think the children understand about the abuse? Did your children ever see or hear the fighting? How do you think this has affected them?”

• Ask about the children’s strengths.

Exploring Protective Strategies• “Moms who are being abused are often doing

many things to keep their kids safe and support them. Can you tell me ways you try to protect your children? How have these strategies worked?”

• Ask about and listen for protective strategies such as encouraging the children to go to a neighbor’s house, stay out of the argument, call 911, or staving off arguments until the children are asleep.

• Explore NOP’s perspective on how CPS should intervene with her partner (what will escalate risk and what will reduce risk).

• Explore NOP’s perspective on how to maintain ongoing contact and how she can safely discuss concerns with you in the future.

• Throughout the case, recognize that CPS involvement may create additional risks for both the NOP and the child.

Safety Organized & Solution Focused CPS Partnership

Children and Youth Exposed to Domestic Violence

• In the past year, 6.6% of US children were exposed to physical IPV, which is more than 5 million children.

• In the past year, 5.7% were exposed to psychological/emotional IPV, or about 4.3 million children.

Futures Without Violence

Children/Youth and DV

Effects of DV on Children/Youth

• Physical• Emotional• Behavioral• Effects on values• Effects on parenting

Children/youth are impacted differently

Overall Impact

of Exposur

e

Presence or Absence of Supports

Opportunities to Build

Self Esteem

Presence of Protective

Factors

Age, GenderFrequency, Severity, & Duration of

AbuseAdditional Traumas or

Lack of

Child’s Coping

Strategies

Access to age-

appropriate information

about abuse

• Children/youth have various reasons for not disclosing abuse or wanting to talk about DV.

• Perspectives are impacted by the dynamic of DV.

• Children may present with disjointed and non-linear reporting, or magical thinking.

• Children and youth, like adults, may have experienced layers of trauma and abuse (multi-abuse trauma).

Trauma Informed Perspective on Interviews

• Build rapport by asking about their likes/dislikes school, pets, friends, etc.

• Let them know it is okay to talk about what’s happening in their family and in their own relationships.

• Never meet with the child/youth to discuss DV in front of the DV offender.

• Identify risks, safety strategies, resiliency, and supports.

• Safety plan & check-in after the interview.

Tips for Engaging Children/Youth

• Normalize that all families argue. “What happens in your family when grown-ups argue? How do the grown-ups try to keep you safe?”

• ALWAYS TELL CHILDREN/YOUTH THAT THE ABUSE IS NOT THEIR FAULT.

• Explore child’s or youth’s perspective on how his/her parents would react if they knew we were talking about the abuse in the home.

Trauma Informed and Safety Organized Interviews

• “What do you do when grown-ups are arguing? How do you stay safe? How do you know to do that?”

• Listen for protective strategies • If the child/youth discloses that they try to stop

the argument, discuss safety and tell kids that they best way they can help is by staying safe. If child/youth discloses an appropriate safety plan, such as calling 911, reinforce.

Safety Organized Assessment

Trauma Informed Tips for Engaging Children/Youth

• Assess how the child is being impacted by the abuse. “How do you feel when grown-ups are arguing? Do you have any worries about what might happen when grown-ups argue?”

• Identify coping strategies. “What kinds of things make you feel better when you feel (angry, sad, scared…)?”

Solution Focused Engagement with Children/Youth

• Listen for existing supports. “Have you ever talked with anyone about what’s happening in your family? Who takes care of you? How can we help your family?”

• Look for ways to build resiliency. “What are the things that you are most proud of? What kinds of things do you think you are really good at?”

Fathers with a History of Domestic Violence

Part I: Who are these men--CPS

• Low income, men of color• Challenging backgrounds—poverty,

exposure to community violence, trauma in family of origin

• Poor manhood modeling• Positive fatherhood visions• Desire to do better• Have pathways for change

Trauma Bond: Exposure To Community & Family Violence

• Exposure to & involvement w/violence— defensive/aggressive posture—reactivity

• Substance abuse, triggers, depression, rigid manhood

• Shut down, withdrawal, “wearing the mask”/protecting inner world

• Highly sensitive to issues of respect and coercion

Part II: Who are these men--DVMen with history of DV

• Vast range of dangerousness, strengths & capacity to change

• 4070% moderate; can change• 3040% chronic re-assaulters—

jealous, obsessed, sub abusegenerally violent

• 15% potentially lethal—high control, high violence or both

Implications of levels of DV & strengths

• Differential approaches, careful management of safety

• Consider different levels of access to children, levels of supervision

• Always look for strengths as key to positive engagement

• Positive relationships with children can be source of strength

Pathways to engagement

• Positive fatherhood vision• Education on impact of DV on children—

crucial parallel engagement—impact of DV on children=impact of DV on self as child

• Concern for children—opening: “You cannot hurt or disrespect their mother w/out also hurting your kids. You cannot separate this.”

• Modeling issue: sons & daughters, powerful impact, differential

Safety: Things to do…• Speak to the father alone. If the mother is

present, it can escalate things or lead to retaliation.

• Check your feelings. Don’t look for confession or confront him harshly or aggressively.

• Build a relationship with him. If he can feel a sense of respect and interest, it will pay off.

• At the beginning, focus on getting him to reflect on the impact of his behavior on the children.

Safety

• Focus on strengths that may help him in the change process.

• Figure out your approach. Are you moving toward having him engage in services that address DV and some form of safe contact/visitation with his children? Or do you think that his risk level and/or the children’s level of trauma are too high to move toward contact/visitation?

What to Say…• What is your relationship to your children? How do want

them to look back at you 10-15 years from now?• I am concerned about what has happened. Many men don’t

realize it, but knowing that your dad has hurt your mom can scar children. This is not about your intentions, but about your impact. You can change that.

• What was your experience with your father or father figure as a child? What do you carry now?

• Talk about the impact of witnessing DV on children in detail. Differentiate by age groups and by gender. You can say, “When a man hurts his partner, he hurts the children.

• It doesn’t matter what triggered you. You may have felt justified at the moment.

What to say…• (After he’s been violent.) What you do now will be very

important to them… If you don’t change, they will feel you turned your back on them. It’s not just about your partner. Talk about getting help: attending batterer intervention program or other options…

• You are very important to your children. Research indicates boys will get their sense of manhood and fatherhood from you and that girls will develop a sense of what to expect from men. Both of them will get a sense of healthy relationships and of how to resolve conflict from your example. You matter a great deal. If you can change your behavior, it will make a big difference to them.

Resources• National Center on Domestic Violence,

Trauma & Mental Health – practical tipswww.nationalcenterdvtraumamh.org/

• National Resource Center on PTSDwww.ptsd.va.gov

• “Real Tools: Responding to Multi-Abuse Trauma” Edmund and Bland, 2010. Alaska Network and Domestic Violence and Sexual Assault. www.andsva.org

Resources

• Chadwick Trauma-Informed Systems Projectwww.chadwickcenter.org/CTISP/ctisp.htm

• Futures Without Violencewww.futureswithoutviolence.org

• National Resource Center for Domestic Violence

www.nrcdv.org/

Resources

• National Council of Juvenile and Family Court Judges—Family Violence Deptwww.ncjfcj.org

• Culturally specific DV institutes ANDState examples of DV practicesall available at www.nrccps.org/special-initiatives/domestic-violence/

Webinar Recording, PowerPoint Slides and Handouts

• The recording of the webinar, along with the PowerPoint slides used today and all of the featured handouts will be available by the end of the week at the NRCCPS website: http://nrccps.org/peer-networks/slo-support/slo-webinars

• The archived recording of the June webinar and PowerPoint handouts are currently available at the same site.