Stop Fighting: A Report into the 30 Families seen by the Child Crisis Team

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    Stop Fighting

    A Report into 30 Families seen by the ChildCrisis Team

    By Rachel Williamson and Jane DrummJuly 2005

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    Acknowledgements

    It is always with great hard work and trepidation that new services are launched and theChild Crisis Team has been no different. While we were always extremely optimistic, at thebeginning we didnt know if the programme would be beneficial to children nor if we couldobtain sufficient funding to make it sustainable. We are now in the happy position of beingconfident that we have made significant positive change in the lives of many children andwe know that funding sources are willing to support us.

    We would like to take this opportunity to acknowledge the wonderful, encouraging peoplewho either contributed to the initial development of the Child Crisis Team, or who havegreatly supported us through these first few years of implementation. Some of the manypeople who have been extremely kind include: Dr Cindy Kiro, the Commissioner for

    Children; Dr Ian Hassall; Siti Mavoa; David Kenkel; Elenore Byrne; Deborah Malcolm; AlbyRean; Sarah Brown; Meike Couling; Annette Presley; Iain Hines; Tim Antric; BettyMacLaren.

    Without the generous financial support of many different funding sources, this new servicewould never have started nor continued to thrive. We would like to acknowledge and giveour extremely grateful thanks to the ASB Charitable Trusts, the Childrens Commission,Accident Compensation Corporation, JR McKenzie Trust, Safer Auckland City, NewZealand Police, Ministry of Justice, NZ Lotteries Grants Board, the Anonymous Trust,Callplus, Perry Foundation, and Catholic Caring Foundation.

    ASB Cha ritab le Trust

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    Introduction

    New Zealand has shameful statistics of child abuse and child deaths. For many abused women,concern for their children figures heavily in their decision to remain with an abusive partner.Unfortunately, however, staying often results in the children being deeply traumatized by their

    childhood experience. Often these children are left to deal with this by themselves, as, effectively,neither of their parents are available to comfort and reassure them. Unlike most people who canescape violence by simply switching off the television, these children cannot turn off the real lifeviolence happening in their own home. Instead, they are subjected to truly horrific experiencesthat nobody, especially not a child, should ever be exposed to.

    These children are silent observers of deeply vicious acts, which are perpetrated by the exactpeople who are meant to love and care for them. Recent research indicates that children exposedto domestic violence do not merely passively witness the abuse, but actively attempt to processand make meaning of the frightening reality they are faced with (Blanchard, 1993; Mullender et al,2000). Dr Bruce Perry of the Child Trauma Academy in Texas, has found that a childs braindevelopment is profoundly influenced by childhood experiences, particularly in the first three orfour years of life. These experiences shape the emotional, social, cognitive and physiological

    potential of the developing brain. The implications of this research for some of the children wework with are extremely disturbing as they point to lasting and serious dysfunction, impacting on allaspects of their lives, unless these children have long term intensive therapy (which is outside thescope of the Child Crisis Team).

    While Preventing Violence in the Home was initially set up to work with adult victims of familyviolence, after having seen many children living in nightmarish realities we now provide a servicespecifically for children, called the Child Crisis Team. We decided that we could not wait anylonger hoping some other organisation would help these children, while they were left to sufferalone with their trauma and fear. It was important to the success of the programme that majorbarriers to using the service were overcome and for this reason, we go to homes at times that suitthe families, which often include weekends. Our programme objectives are to provide immediatesupport to children, give them ways to cope with their situation, support parenting and assist with

    referrals. But the programme also highlights to the childrens custodial parent the serious impactof the abuse on their children. Often when parents realise this, they feel motivated to take actionto protect their children, thereby reducing the time the children are exposed to violence.

    The new child focused service works in tandem with our existing adult focused emergency calloutand advocacy service. Child advocates provide four sessions with the child(ren) in their ownhome, the first one ideally being within 72 hours of the incident being referred to the agency. Inthe initial visit two advocates visit the family, so one is able to speak with the parent whilst theother concentrates on working directly with the children. Thereafter, only the Child Advocate visitsand while they obviously do spend time talking to the childrens parent, the purpose of the visit isto listen to and support the children. In the Auckland City area our community advocates are alsoavailable to work with families and support the work of the Child Advocates. The communityadvocates assist with crisis counselling for the mother, and help to alleviate a range of practicalmatters confronting the family, for instance, housing, arranging for locks to be changed, fasttracking benefit applications, liaising with Court and Police, referring to lawyers etc. The differencein overcoming obstacles to safety and stability between the families who had this support, inaddition to the Child Crisis Team, and families where the community advocacy service does notoperate was noticeable.

    Advocates liaise with any external individuals and organisations working with the family. Theyassess the level of trauma and help children formulate safety plans to keep themselves as safe aspossible during future incidences of violence. When the advocates have completed their first three

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    visits, they write a case report and make referrals for long term assistance where necessary toexternal agencies. A considerable strength of the service is that the advocates assist familiesaccess a range of services which they would not necessarily have been aware was available tothem. They also make this as easy as possible for families by such things as arrangingappointments, helping families fill in application forms which they bring with them and sometimesaccompanying them to initial appointments. We do this because we know that at a time whenpeople are in real crisis, they can not realistically be expected to be able to cope with theadditional burden of something extra to do. A fourth visit occurs some weeks later to assess anyfollow up that may be required.

    In February 2004 a formal evaluation by the University of Aucklands Injury Prevention ResearchCentre, was published. This found that the Child Crisis Team model demonstrates a positiveimpact on improving the health and wellbeing of children who have been exposed to domesticviolence (and that) family/whanau members consider advocates to be supportive, genuinelyempathic, and providing a useful service to children.

    The following is a report, which is predominantly qualitative, based on 30 randomly sampled casefiles of families visited between July 2004 and November 2004. No families were contacted anddetails contained in this report were ascertained exclusively from the written files. It should not be

    read as indicative of all other cases, although there are some strong trends which were relevant tomany of the families files.

    Geographical Location

    22 families lived within the Auckland City region 8 families lived outside the Auckland City region

    18 families were already clients of Preventing Violence in the Home

    8 families of the 12 families who had no prior contact with Preventing Violence, lived outside ofthe region the agency provides other crisis services to and were therefore ineligible foradditional community advocacy support.

    The Child Crisis Team is provided to families across the Auckland Region, as there is nothingsimilar in Auckland (or elsewhere). However, the vast majority of the families visited were locatedwithin the Auckland City region. This is due to the fact that Preventing Violence in the Home crisisand advocacy services (with the exception of the Crisisline, which is Auckland wide), operatespecifically within the Auckland City Police District. The agency has a formal protocol with theAuckland police, which ensures that Preventing Violence is contacted every time an arrest is madefor a domestic violence related offence. Family Safety Advocates, or trained volunteers respondimmediately to notification of a reported arrest and visit the victims in their home, at hospital or inanother safe place, to provide support and information. Most of the Child Crisis Team referrals arereceived from police reports, which is the reason why the majority of families who receive the Child

    Crisis service are located within Auckland City and its surrounding areas.

    The remaining eight families lived outside Auckland City and were therefore not referred to theChild Crisis Team by the Auckland City Police. Referrals, in these instances, came from otheragencies, including the Department of Child, Youth and Family Services, North Harbour LivingWithout Violence, and a range of counselling services. Two were self-referrals by mothers madevia the Preventing Violence in the Home regional Crisisline.

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    Ethnicity (by family)

    The ethnicity of families was evenly distributed over four main ethnic groups1:

    8 families were Maori

    8 families were Pakeha 7 families were Indian or Asian

    7 families were Pacific Island

    This equal distribution shows a disproportionate ethnic representation that is not reflective ofnumbers of each ethnicity within the Auckland City population. While Auckland is identified as acity of great cultural diversity, Maori, Pacific Island and Indian/Asian are all over-represented inreferrals to this agency, as victims of domestic violence.

    Children

    A total of 62 children were provided a programme by the Child Crisis Team, with the majority offamilies visited having three or less children in them (with the exceptions being one family of fivechildren and one family of seven children). In addition to these 62 children, an additional 17children were ineligible to receive the service as a result of no longer considering themselves as achild and/or expressing disinterest. The behaviour of very young children was reported to the childadvocate by the mother or other primary caregiver.

    Of the 62 children:

    Three (5%) were under six months

    One (2%) was between seven months and one year

    Three (5%) were between 13 months and 2 years 16 (24%) were between 3 and 5 years

    12 (19%) were between 6 and 8 years

    10 (16%) were between 9 and 11 years

    15 (24%) were 12 years or older

    Trauma symptoms experienced by children notably varied significantly between the various agegroups, manifesting within the childrens body and behaviour differently, although often inaccordance with noted trends between age groups (Margolin, 1998). In general, younger childrenexhibited their stress in the form of sleep disturbances, bed wetting and psycho somatic symptomssuch as stomach aches and headaches. By the time they reached teenage years, their behaviourhad often become extremely difficult and causing considerable stress to other family members.They were very angry and many had become a serious physical threat to their mothers andyounger siblings. Older children had self directed aggressive behaviour (for instance, selfmutilation), problems with their relationships with peers, as well as truancy. Mimicking the abusiveadults behaviour was exhibited across both age ranges, such as bullying, hitting siblings andsaying cruel words to others. It is clear that many need intensive, highly skilled and long termtherapeutic support for them to ever have a chance of a reasonable life outcome and not offendthemselves.

    1 Note, however, that ethnicities were not subdivided into more specific groupings (ie Samoan, Niuean, Thai, Pakistani,

    etc)

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    Gender and the offenders relationship to the family

    Overwhelmingly, the offender was cited as male, with 28 of 30 cases listing a male abuser (94%).For this reason, custodial parents are most referred to as the mother, woman. In only two

    instances (6%), was the primary offender female. It should be noted, however, that in theseexceptions, she was also occasionally a victim of abuse herself. In the first instance, the womanwas subjected to physical, sexual and psychological violence from a plethora of family members,including her father, uncle, sister, husband and various boyfriends. The second female offendersuffered from severe mental health problems and it was significant that her husband had begunattending a mens stopping violence programme for his prior abusive behaviour towards her.

    Of the 30 offenders:

    2 (6%) were the mother of the children

    2 (6%) were the brother of the children

    3 (10%) were the stepfather or boyfriend to the mother of the children

    23 (77%) were the father of the children

    As the offender was most frequently cited as the father of the children, not surprisingly the childrentended to have very confused feelings about him and his place in their lives. During one sessionone child said I get sad when I dont see my dad and also I dont care if I never see him again.Nearly 50% expressed distress and uncertainty regarding him, citing extreme fear of their father,mixed with love and a desire to protect him. In one family visited by the Child Crisis Team, thechildren refused to consider calling the police if they began to feel unsafe, or if their father becameabusive towards either themselves or their mother, due to a desperate wish to keep him out of jail.This was despite the fact that they had witnessed their mother being slapped, or hit on the head atleast daily; had spent time in refuge twice over the past year; and were themselves the victims oftheir fathers violence and humiliating punishments.

    Unfortunately, we have found that children who observe their father being violent towards theirmother often experience conflicted loyalties, which become increasingly pronounced the lessregular their contact with the offender becomes - when I grow up, I wont leave. For instance, ofthe 30 families visited, children from eight separate families reported that they missed and lovedtheir father. In all of these cases the mother had recently separated from the offender.

    In 66% of the 30 cases (20), the mother was either separated or divorced from the offender (achild reports this as a temporary situation until daddy forgets about shouting). A further twofamilies were separated from the offender through circumstances rather than choice (in bothinstances, jail). This leaves only eight instances where the mother and offender were still livingtogether. Despite this, offences and abuse continued in almost two thirds of the 30 families visitedby the Child Crisis Team. We have noticed that the level of violence often intensifies afterseparation and many women live in great fear not knowing if their ex-partner is lurking outside.

    Thirteen of these families held current Protection Orders against the offender, with many domesticviolence assaults occurring over the period that the child advocate was meeting with the family.As McMahon and Pence state, separation does not signal the end of the violence but rathermerely signifies that the site of the struggle shifts and the experience of abuse changes (1995,p194).Most mothers want their children to have ongoing relationships with their father and feel very guiltythat separating leads to the children not seeing him as much. Despite this another issue that wasa common thread amongst the stories of families where the parents had separated was problemsresulting from access visits. These varied considerably with examples being:

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    Children returning to their mother smelly and hungry

    Problems with the father turning up unexpectedly wanting access to the children outside ofpre-arranged times

    The father using severe physical discipline and children refusing to stay with him

    The father refusing to use car seats and taking children out of Auckland for extended periodsof time without prior discussion with the mother

    Threats to take the children Parents using drugs or alcohol during access with children

    The parent telling the children threatening things he says he intends to do to their mother

    The children exhibiting disrespectful and disobedient behaviour upon their return

    Frequent breaches of protection order, including at the time of access handover

    Children being frightened about being left alone with their fathers

    Violence between adults experienced by the child

    The vast majority of mothers visited by the Child Crisis Team (73%) identified themselves as beingthe victim of extensive physical abuse at the hands of the offender. One pregnant womansustained severe head injuries, causing her to lose consciousness which required hospitalisationand 20 stitches. Horrifyingly, nearly half of the children spoken to (27 out of 62) were exposed totheir fathers abuse of their mother, consisting of hitting, kicking, strangling or choking, pushing,and being thrown into furniture. One seven year old girl spoke of seeing her father repetitivelypound her mothers head into a wall, while one child recalled her mothers appearance after anincident, with all blood came out of her face.

    Seven offenders made threats to kill either the mother or her children. One father viciously beatup his wife before threatening to slit the childrens throats because theyve mucked up my life.This mother of three children then spent the night awake on the floor outside their bedroom,beaten and covered in blood, to ensure that her husband didnt harm them in order to punish her.

    Five children from separate families reported seeing their (step) father attack, or threaten to attack,their mother with a weapon. In all five instances the weapon was a knife. A teenage girl describedan early memory to a child advocate of standing in the kitchen watching her father sharpen a Fijianknife, to have him then turn to her, a tiny, frightened six year old, and conversationally say, Imgoing to kill your mum tonight. This same girl is now being harassed by her father, who iscurrently writing her emotionally abusive letters in which he claims he will kill himself if he does notsee her. She has been put through appalling ordeals throughout her short life and, notsurprisingly, confessed to experiencing thoughts of committing suicide.

    In addition to the large number of children who had directly observed incidences of domesticviolence in their homes, a further 17 of 62 children had vividly heard abuse, although they may nothave been present at the scene. Virtually always in these cases, the children possessed anexhaustive knowledge of the violence and could recount specific details (unless very young). For

    example, a four year old boy clearly described an incident to a child advocate where daddy hitmummy, mummy called the police. He beat mummy in the face. He had to go the police. He wasnaughty, while an eight year old boy could precisely describe fights, repeating swear words andinsults verbatim. This ability to recount the violence was usually a surprise to the mother whofrequently believed that because the children were in another room, they were safe and unawareof the extent of the abuse occurring (Edelson, 1999; Jaffe, Wolfe and Wilson, 1990; Mullender etal, 2000). Furthermore, children who may not necessarily have been present during an assault,could still be aware of its occurrence through a number of ways, including being woken in the nightby the noise, or seeing bruising on their mothers face and broken furniture in their home.

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    Childs attempts to intervene

    Working with families for so long we know that children know as well as their mothers, when things

    are escalating towards a fight. They frequently are actively involved in the early stages trying tostop the escalation by trying to distract their fathers or telling their mothers to be quiet. However,the extent to which they became involved during an assault is apparent from these files. Of the 62children interviewed, 43 said they had tried to intervene during a domestic incident. The majorityof these attempted to stop the abuse through physical intervention. In these instances, thechildren were usually at least eight and most typically 11 or older. Other means of interveningincluded calling the police, running to the neighbours to get help, or verbally speaking to or yellingat the offender to stop. Instances in which children tried to protect their mother include:

    A two year old boy who ran between his parents in an effort to prevent his father from hittinghis mother. He was hurt in the process.

    A four year old girl who went to her mum during parental fights trying to cuddle her.

    A three year old girl who ran outside the house at midnight and screamed for help. Another three year old who dialled 111 to tell the operator mummy needs help. A 14 month old baby who ran outside shouting stop fighting; no no no no.

    Teenage brothers who deliberately provoked their father in an effort to get him to redirect hisviolence from their mother and onto themselves.

    The behaviour of the remaining 19 children typically consisted of either hiding (in their bedroom,under the table, etc) or freezing. This was particularly common amongst children under the age offive. One mother remarked that her four year old boy used to cry but he doesnt anymore. Henow just stops what he is doing and freezes up. One poor child would have liked to have left theroom, but couldnt as he has a disability and so was forced to sit and watch.

    Violence exercised against the child

    The direct relationship between partner abuse and child abuse and neglect has been clearlydemonstrated in a number of studies conducted in New Zealand and overseas, with child abuseco-existing alongside family violence in 30-60% of instances (Edelson, 1999). The correlationbetween these two forms of abuse is so high that each could be considered a strong predictor ofthe other (Stark and Flitcraft, 1988; Stacey and Shupe, 1983). Trends from the 30 sampledfamilies strongly support these findings with 21 offenders reported to have been violent towardstheir children as well as their partner. Of these, eight offenders verbally abused their children(typically calling them stupid, ugly, useless, and so forth); one father sexually abused his daughter;and 13 offenders were physically violent towards their children. The impact of this elicited fearful

    statements such as he smacked us he pulled myears (he) always shouts at night time.One very little child said I cry too, cause my dad. Reallyscared of dad when he smack us.

    For many children, violence begins in the utero, as pregnancy often represents the onset ofviolence, or at least a significant risk period. Small infants are also at risk of being dropped orinjured in the crossfire, if their mother is holding them whilst she is assaulted. Assaults onpregnant women, or women holding infants, are a regular feature of referrals to PreventingViolence in the Home, by the police and the hospitals. Of the 30 families in this report, sevenmothers were abused during their pregnancy. This typically consisted of being punched or kicked

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    in the abdomen. Of these seven women, one womans baby was born pre-term. In addition tothis, 10 women cited incidences of domestic violence that occurred whilst they were holding aninfant. Hes hit me at times when I was holding her. She would whimper or get scared. Onebaby was hit by the offender during the assault, while another child was harmed when the offenderpushed the mother into a wall.

    However, most instances in which children were hit were described as incidences of disciplinarypunishment rather than abuse. In accordance with Section 59 of the Crimes Act, which stipulatesthat every parent of a child and every person in the place of a parent of a child is justified inusing force by way of correction towards the child, if the force is reasonable in the circumstances,such punishment is acceptable. The issue, of course, becomes problematic when consideringwhat forms of force are, and are not, justified. As a consequence, certain incidences read morelike child abuse rather than acceptable parental discipline, including:

    a 10 year old boy being beat up like a rugby ball (i.e. placed by his father in a head lock andrepetitively thumped in the face and head)

    two brothers who were hit and then forced to kneel at an alter for 2-3 hours

    a seven year old boy being hit with a jandal until his back was covered in open welts

    a five year old girl frequently covered in bruises from being hit with either a spoon or a belt

    Disturbingly, many children identified this behaviour as appropriate punishment incurred by theirown naughty behaviour or general disobedience.

    Instances of physical violence that were not described as disciplinary were much fewer. Theyincluded seven cases where the children had been inadvertently harmed while the offender wasbeating the mother, and four instances in which the offender exercised an arbitrary violence uponhis children (arbitrary in the sense that there was no cause or supposed justification for theabuse). In 75% of these instances, the abuse was directed at girls, who were hit when the sonwas not. The reasoning behind such discrepant and different treatment was always attributed tothe gender of the child, reflecting the offenders belief that females are of less worth. Oneparticularly terrible example of a child being abused because she was a girl, saw a father hire aprofessional hit-man to kill his wife, whom he suspected of having an affair, and his teenage

    daughter, whom he perceived to be in collusion with his wife because she was also female.

    In total, nine out of 30 offenders subjected one of their children to far more abusive treatment thanthe others. Four of those children who suffered worse were step children as opposed to theoffenders natural birth children; one was the middle son; and four were females, one of whom wasalso being sexually abused by the offender, her father.

    It should be noted that many of these families had been referred to the Department of Child, Youthand Family Services, prior to the involvement of the Child Crisis Team, by the police. This wasusually done at the time when the police were investigating the most recent offence of assault onthe custodial parent.

    Childs relationship to the mother

    An overwhelming proportion of children were purported to be extremely fearful of leaving theirmother alone in the house. Nearly two thirds of the children seen by the Child Crisis Team (38 of62) expressed great distress at leaving her to attend school, stay the night with friends, visit family,or engage in other childhood activities and socialising; sadly, as noted by Herman, the social lives

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    of abused children are profoundly limited (1992, p100). Younger children (pre and primary schoollevel) were frequently very clingy, needing constant physical reassurance and contact.

    One quarter of those who expressed trepidation about leaving the house and their mother alsoexperienced anger directed at her. Their anger most often took the form of mimicking theoffenders behaviour and consisted of extreme jealousy at her spending time with anyone otherthan themselves, extensive questioning of where shes been, who she was with, why she went,and general disrespectful language. These responses, of fear in regards to the mothers safetyand anger at her behaviour, while seemingly at odds with one another, can both be directlyattributed to the childrens exposure to domestic violence and a desperate wish to try and keep hersafe. One child frequently got up during the night to check on her mum. She was awoken bynightmares about her being hurt and begged to be allowed to sleep with her.

    Case Example:

    Adam grew up in an environment marked by violence and terror. He very rarely saw his motherwithout a black eye and was frequently forced to sit and watch his father beat his mother up.While, his dad very rarely hit him, Adam was told that he was stupid, thick and an idiot. When

    he was eight years old he began to wet the bed and suffer horrific nightmares. In punishment, hisfather would strip Adam and make him sleep in his soiled sheets. A year later, Adams mum leftthe violent relationship taking her children with her. This did not, however, mean that the abusebegan to stop.

    At age 13, Adam began to hit his younger sister and his mother. It was also at this time that hestarted to self-mutilate and shortly after attempted to slit his wrists. At age 18, Adams violenceand aggressive behaviour escalated and began to resemble that of his fathers, including repeatinginsults and threats directed at his mother, such as youre hopeless, a stupid bitch and no wonderdad hit you, youre a fucking idiot. However, in spite of this vicious anger, Adam is still veryclingy. At age 18 he is still experiencing nightmares and cannot go to sleep without the televisionon; he has a total lack of confidence in himself and his abilities, and requires his mother to doeverything with him, including attending drivers licence tests, job interviews, Work and Income

    appointments, and doctors visits. It is highly possible that with earlier assistance, Adams futuremay have turned out radically different. As it is, his behaviour has become beyond his mothersability to cope and she took her younger child and left, shortly after our visits to the familyconcluded.

    Trauma Symptoms

    Adams trajectory shares many commonalities with other children who have been subjected toprolonged periods of violence in their home lives. Over half the children interviewed (34 of 62)experienced sleep disturbances. I am scared when I sleep in my bed. Typical of these childrenis an 11 year old who wont go to bed unless his mother lies down with him until he goes to sleep.Of the 34 children, 21 of those consistently had nightmares, including typical childhood baddreams about monsters, but also less common repetitive nightmares about mum being taken awayor baby brothers and sisters dying. One child cried a lot, especially at night and found it difficult tosleep as she was terrified her mother would be injured again in an assault, but this time would notcome home. When mum was in hospital I wasreally scared and worried she might not be alive. Ithought her head was split open really bad.

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    In addition to this, eight children wet the bed, and one young boy had reoccurring night sweatsfrom which he would wake up to sopping wet sheets, duvet and pillows. The majority of thesechildren were 10 years or younger.

    Many children were experiencing problems at school, typically these included acting aggressivelyto others, finding it hard to settle, lack of concentration, over reacting to loud noises such as theteacher yelling, truancy, achieving poorly, finding it hard to make and keep friends and being adisciplinary problem. As an example one child said that he regularly got detention for not finishinghomework which he finds it hard to do because of the fighting at home and finds it generally hardto concentrate. He said that he feels frightened a lot and this feeling of fear didnt go away whenhe was at school.

    Feeling generally unhappy and miserable was unsurprisingly, a common issue identified by almostall of the children visited. 15 children reported crying frequently and feeling overwhelmed bysadness. Several of them were identified as crying in their sleep by their mothers and severalchildren found themselves crying at school. One child cried non-stop throughout the first session achild advocate had with him.

    Nearly one third (20 of 62) of children spoken to, were seen to have become increasingly naughty,

    aggressive and disrespectful. The majority of these were reported by mothers to be mimicking thebehaviour of the abuser, either physically or verbally through threats and insults. One child saidhis head hurt with angry thoughts and required referral for psychological counselling. Siblingstended to become increasingly violent towards one another when fighting amongst themselvesand five of the 20 children had been in trouble for bullying other children at their schools. Otherinstances include:

    A pre-schooler who had begun to kick, bite and punch other children and adults.

    A ten year old boy who told his mother that he would call my dad so hell come over andsmack you up again.

    A seven year old girl and her nine year old brother who would repeatedly use the words,bitch, nigger and mongrel.

    75% of these children who were displaying increased aggression had, to a large extent,normalised the violence they had been exposed to, with one child describing it as a naturalreaction to anger. Another child said he was not scared of anything because his father taught himhow to fight. Disturbingly, he considered his father a hero after seeing him fight and hurt a policeofficer.

    Many children are constantly on alert, hyper-vigilant for some new threat, becoming extremelyanxious when hearing sudden, loud noises. These children can become extremely distressedand/or withdrawn when hearing normal events such as a loud telephone conversation, or theteacher at school reprimanding students or people talking excitedly.

    Trauma symptoms varied accordingly in respect of the age of the child, with much youngerchildren (primary and pre school ages) experiencing somatic complaints of headaches or tummy

    aches. One child bit herself really hard which distressed her mother greatly. Another childsmacked himself as a form of self imposed discipline, when he considered that he had beennaughty. Five of the older teenagers interviewed reported that they self-mutilated. This usuallytook the form of cutting or burning themselves, most commonly on the arms. For instance, a 14year old girl carved FUCK OFF into her arm shortly after an incident in her home. A 13 year oldput pins in his arm, burnt his skin with cigarette lighters and said that it didnt hurt. He would say,My dad can beat me and beat me and it doesnt hurt.

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    In these cases, self-mutilation is usually understood as an attempt to exercise control overuncontrollable circumstances through regulating the bodys response to pain a negative andtemporary solution for these teenagers who have experienced violence, uncertainty and fearthroughout their childhoods.

    Support for the child and mother

    Support for a child who has been exposed to domestic violence plays a pivotal role in maximisingtheir resilience (Jaffe, Wolfe and Wilson, 1990). Unfortunately, 17 of the 30 families reportedhaving only minimal support systems in place. In these instances, the mother was often moreisolated than the children, who were able to draw on her, relatives, or their school for support.Mothers described themselves as frequently struggling to cope with the sole responsibility ofraising the children, and most received very little help with the children, or time out from them. Themajor source of support reported by both mothers and children was their maternal relatives. Formany, this was their only source of support. Other sources include:

    Paternal relatives School

    Church

    Advocates from Preventing Violence in the Home

    Other service providers

    Neighbours

    Family friends

    Work colleagues

    Over half of the children listed their mother as the main support in their life. This is in line withrecent research which stresses the very positive and important role the mother frequently playsthrough her efforts to compensate for the violence her children have experienced (Levendosky,

    Lynch and Graham-Bermann, 2000).

    Intervention

    Child advocates provide assistance in a number of ways, including making safety plans for thechildren and attempting to assuage immediate trauma symptoms, working with the mother todevelop positive parenting strategies, and making referrals to ensure the family receives long-termcounselling and practical assistance if desired, or deemed necessary.

    Safety Plans

    The unfortunate reality for these children is that their homes are not safe havens, but the site ofuncertainty and fear. Both they and their mothers are at risk of physical injury and both adults andchildren suffer from extreme trauma. In the circumstances the most critical thing that we could dois to help these children feel and become safer. Therefore, safety plans were devised and taughtto every child the Child Crisis Team met with, as a way of ensuring their immediate safety duringan incident of domestic violence. Advocates found that many children already practised a type of

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    safety plan by removing themselves and their younger siblings from the scene. For instance, theoldest child in one family, would take the younger ones out to a shed during a fight where theywould hug each other and cry until they felt able to come back inside.

    Keeping away from the scene of the fighting was always encouraged by the child advocates andwas made part of the safety plan of 22 families. Children most commonly found a safe placewithin their own home, such as their bedroom, but were also directed to run to a nearbyneighbours, friends or relatives house providing safety permitted (ie they were old to leave thehouse). Mothers were happy at the idea of the children being taught to remove themselves fromthe scene, as they couldnt protect them and were usually very upset about the children beingpresent.

    The children often met the idea of removing themselves with initial resistance, born out of areluctance to leave their mother in a dangerous situation. What if mum needs me? As aconsequence, advocates spent time talking with the children about the importance of keepingthemselves safe and better helping their mother by calling 111 from a safe location. However, onechild needed reassurance from the advocate and his mother as he was worried to use the phoneas they might get angry with me and give me a smack. A number of children had a mobile phonewhich they carried around with them. Several children had a phone line installed in their

    bedrooms, arranged by their mothers. In total, 19 families were taught how to dial 111 to ask forassistance, including asking the operator to be put through to the police, stating clearing what washappening and their name and address. Many children did not know their address. The remainingthird were excluded from this based on reasons pertaining to their circumstances; for example,several families did not have a phone in the house, or it was unsafe to access during an incident.

    Another issue for older children to deal with was what to do about their younger siblings. Manychildren who were the oldest in their families (regardless of their own age) felt very responsible forlooking after their younger brothers and sisters and were distressed at any plan that involvedleaving them behind. This is always respected by the advocates and so as far as possible, theplan would always include all the children remaining together and leaving the scene. Someexceptions were agreed to in families where there were many children and also where there weresmall babies. Generally, it was thought best for babies to be put in their cots rather than be carried

    away, particularly by young oldest children. Mothers were always encouraged to put their childdown in a safe place, rather than risk holding them whilst they were being assaulted.

    The advocates make their initial three visits in quick succession, usually a week apart. The final,fourth visit is then made a month to six weeks later. This last visit is to reinforce previous workdone with the family, assist with any new problems which have arisen and ensure that referralswhich were arranged have proceeded without problem. Notably, only five families were unable torecall the details of their safety plan, leaving 25 who remembered it effectively, eight of whom hadused it. One of these children, a three year old, now also goes to her room and shuts her door ifher mother or anyone else is annoyed which her mother commented actually defuses manysituations. This child has also told her mother that this home is a no hitting home, which hersurprised and proud mother is accepting. Another child, aged five, immediately picks up the babyand leaves the house if the parents so much as raise their voices. He has also rung the police

    each time which has had a huge positive effect on his parents!

    Parenting Strategies

    Discussions concerning parenting strategies differed significantly between families due to the factthat advocates tried to cater specifically to the very distinctive needs of individuals, and also to thevarying degrees of successful parenting already being demonstrated. I needed assistance andreassurance especially as I didnt have any other support. It has also helped a lot with parenting.

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    A recurring trend that can be noted in the advocates reports, is the vast amount of information thatchildren have concerning adult matters. This often tended to be a result of overhearing fights andviolence, although it could also be a consequence of the mothers own lack of support from othersources and her mounting reliance on the child due to their increased maturity and desire to helpher. In these instances, the advocate recommended an increase in play time between the motherand the children; monitoring more carefully what is said in front of the children (mothers wereoverwhelmingly surprised at the extent of knowledge their children possessed regarding theviolence); and giving the child fewer responsibilities.

    In one family a seven year old boy had taken on the role of protector, or man of the house, as dadis in jail and his teenage sister has gone to live with grandma. He was very protective and caringof his little sisters, but the pressure of this self-imposed responsibility was onerous for such ayoung child. The Child Advocate recommended that his mum tell her son that he is boy in thefamily and its lovely that he is so caring towards his sisters, but that it is mums job to support thefamily and be the boss/protector and a boys job to be carefree.

    Advocates discussed disciplinary techniques to help mothers whose children were exhibitingincreased aggression and disruptive behaviour. This discussion also occurred in families wherephysical punishment was the main form of discipline adopted. Alternatives talked about included

    practicing time out, consequences, and developing clear rules and boundaries. In cases wherethe mother reported herself as having lost itat times, she was almost always very remorseful andreceptive to learning new parenting strategies, or attending a parenting programme.

    Other conversations with mothers focussed on practical parenting issues, such as the need forprioritising prenatal care (for a pregnant woman) and techniques for coping with stress. Manymothers saw the advocates visits as an opportunity to discuss issues concerning them such as:their childrens lack of a good male role model; how to accept that her daughter doesnt want tosee her father any more; sleeping strategies for children who have trouble sleeping; importance ofroutines and structures, for instance a bed time routine which never varied - story, bath, teethcleaning, bed etc.

    Women living in a state of fear resulting from violence from their (ex)partner, tend to lead socially

    isolated lives, with little support and the families visited frequently have attendant problems of poorhousing, poverty, lack of basic household resources and sometimes food. In these circumstances,when just getting through the day can be a struggle, naughty or distressed children can add totheir burden. Despite this, almost all of the custodial parents expressed the desire to be a goodparent and were eager for assistance and advice. The Advocates raised a number of issues withparents such as the importance of not giving children too much information about adult matters.Every parent was aghast at the impact the violence had had on her children, most had thoughttheir children knew very little of what was going on, were too little to understand to be affected, orthat their childrens feelings of distress would be transitory. The Child Advocates helped theparent understand her childrens sometimes difficult or distressing behaviour was the result of thetrauma they have experienced, which saw her becoming less angry with them. The Advocatesalso talked about ways to encourage the childs social independence and confidence, suggestinglots more physical affection, cuddles etc. Many parents responded well to the idea of pro-actively

    scheduling a fun activity with their children every week sometimes activities which they hadimagined they would do routinely when they had previously looked forward to parenthood, such asvisits to a park, had just never happened.

    Referrals

    A key function of the Child Crisis Team is to provide an immediate and pro-active interventionservice focused around trauma reduction, risk and needs assessment and safety planning.However, a critical part of the service is also to help the family find out about other services

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    available to them and facilitate easy access to these. Most of the referrals were made to helpfamilies obtain long-term assistance, counselling or other support. Of the 30 families:

    14 were referred to a Domestic Violence Act approved womens or childrens programme

    10 were referred to other forms of counselling

    Four were referred to the Ministry of Educations Group Special Education, for instance to

    psychologists Three were referred to the Preventing Violence in the Home advocacy team (18 were already

    clients)

    Three were referred to a mens stopping violence programme

    Six were referred to a parenting programme

    Three were referred to the Department of Child, Youth and Family Services

    16 were referred to other services, including lawyers, community health services, Work andIncome, Housing New Zealand, Al-Anon, Accident Compensation Corporation (the mothercant work as a result of a severe head injury), Police Communications Centre (the advocatefiled a special situation report on behalf of a family in extreme danger)

    19 families took up all or some of the referrals made. Three families chose not to follow up on therecommendations made by the Child Crisis Team, while five families were declined assistance by

    the provider approached, usually due to a lack of resources. All three of the referrals made to theDepartment of Child, Youth and Family Services were not followed up by that department.

    Effect of intervention and relief from trauma symptoms

    Positively, 74% of the families visited noticed improvements in their children. 50% of familiesnoted a very significant improvement in the behaviour of the children visited by the Child CrisisTeam. Trauma symptoms were largely alleviated through the coping techniques and strategies

    advocates practised with children. Many children who were experiencing sleeping difficulties,nightmares and bedwetting reported an alleviation of these problems. Several rated theirhappiness as much higher than in the earlier visits, with feelings of sadness and anger decreasingdramatically. One child thanked an advocate for teaching meabout safety and how not to letanger take over me, while another said, I havent been angry atall since you visited.

    Many children said that they felt so much better after having the opportunity to discuss what hadbeen happening in their family and their anger and confusion about this. Mothers confirmed thesetrends having also observed a general decrease in aggression and behaviour that resembled thatof the offender. Children attributed this largely to changes occurring in their mothers behaviour,noting, for example, her efforts to increase play time or practise alternative methods of disciplinefrom physical punishment. This led a six year old girl to happily state that talking is better thanfighting and another said since you came, Ive been getting help for everything that I was being

    naughty for.

    Other families had followed suggestions to extend their social contacts and children reportedfeeling happier having made new friends and visiting neighbours and the homes of friends.Several children joined sports teams and enjoyed being involved in activities outside the home.One child told the Advocate how much had improved for him since her visits and that he was nowgetting good grades at school, had joined a soccer team and has cell phone.

    Another seven families (23%) said that the effects of the intervention were mixed. Two familiesreported noticeable improvements in the behaviour in one child but at the expense of negative

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    deteriorations in another. In both instances, the child who was displaying the more overt traumasymptoms was seen to have made significant positive developments (i.e. sleeping better, makingfewer threats), while the behaviour of the quieter child, who was initially perceived to have beenless affected by the violence, began to worsen. In these two cases, one child began to havenightmares and extreme difficulty sleeping and the other exhibited increased physical aggressionand crude language.

    The remaining five families found that the Advocates intervention had alleviated the specificproblems addressed, but that new ones had taken their place. For example, a teenage girl hadgiven up taking drugs and alcohol, although she had significantly increased the amount she self-mutilated. Similarly, a nine year old boy had ceased wetting the bed but had begun directing hugeamounts of anger at his mother instead, holding her directly responsible for making dad angry andputting him in jail.

    The final 26% of families (eight of the 30 families), reported the behaviour of the children to be thesame or worse since the Child Crisis Team visits, marked by worse nightmares, the onset ofbedwetting and increased aggression and misbehaviour. Boys in these families continued tobehave badly after returning from access visits to their fathers.

    Case Example:

    Five year old Poppy is the eldest of three siblings. She and her two brothers have been exposedto extensive violence between her mother and her father, and her mother is a high risk client ofPreventing Violence in the Home. With support from the agencys advocates, Poppys motherobtained a Protection Order and left the offender a year ago. Not understanding the fullcircumstances and reasons behind their parents separation, the children worried obsessively thatsomething would happen to their mum and she would leave them suddenly like their dad did.

    Four months ago, Poppy began to wet the bed. She started having more dreams, both good andbad, and her mother reported her to frequently complain of stomach and arm aches. Her littlebrother was very easily agitated and cried frequently. Poppy was usually the one to give him

    cuddles when he got upset. She appeared as a very sober little girl who had also becomeobsessively tidy, arranging all her toys into rows with as many right angles as possible. When thehouse got messy, Poppy became very angry or overanxious that her attempt to exercise somecontrol in her life had failed.

    Through the intervention offered by a child advocate Poppys situation improved drastically. Hermother began to set aside special play time with the children and made sure that the responsibilityof caring for her younger brother was lifted from Poppy. Poppy quickly became less serious andworried and no longer keeps her toys in rigid order. She still has very vivid dreams andnightmares but wets the bed far less regularly. Ultimately, with the support of her mother, theChild Crisis Team gave Poppy permission to be a normal five year old girl.

    Parents impact of intervention

    The impact of the programme on parents was profound for most of them, with many makingsignificant changes which they felt noticeably improved their situation. This is very pleasing as

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    the timeframe between the violent incident that prompted the Child Crisis Team becoming involvedand the last visit (the last recorded information on these files) was at most two and half months.Five women seemed to use this as a catalyst to build a new life for themselves and their childrenby setting themselves major life goals such as obtaining a drivers licence, moving to a nicer rentalor buying a house, becoming confident enough to apply for better paying employment andcommencing tertiary study.

    Many women told the advocates that they had implemented the parenting strategies suggestedand had noticed a big improvement. One woman said she was really trying hard to only saypositive things about their dad to her children, despite him saying mean things about her. Forseveral there was much less stress now that their children were going to bed with no fuss.Parents were particularly relieved in families where nightmares and bedwetting had been aproblem and now they were occurring less frequently.

    More consistent and confident parenting was clearly being undertaken by many parents and theirinitial success trying new ways to interact with their children reinforced this feeling of being moreon top of things. One woman, who had been extremely anxious about leaving her husbandbecause of the loss to her child of his father not being around, arranged for him to spend time witha positive male role model. Another woman introduced weekly family meetings which were used

    as a time for the family to talk together about how things were going. She also used this as anopportunity to congratulate her children on positive changes about behaviour she noticed.

    Parents reported being much more aware of the impact of the violence on the children and werebeing more gentle, patient and understanding with parenting. One woman said that she had feltso concerned about how much her children needed her that she has cut her working hours so shecan spend more time with them. Another woman said that her children were much happier andshe was now proactively expanding their social network by enrolling them in music lessons andattending church etc.

    When parents separate, particularly when the circumstances are as stressful as those experiencedby these families, access arrangements frequently become a source of ongoing stress andconfrontation. Several women noted that access arrangements were constantly breached by the

    childrens father and in one case, the father had just obtained access and the children were veryfrightened and didnt want to go. She said that there was a lot of physical discipline at their dadshouse and that their behaviour upon their return to her was very naughty. Another woman hadseen her lawyer and stopped all access as her children were so distressed about having to go.

    More positively, many mothers reported that with the support of the advocates, accessarrangements were now working well. One said that her child can now choose when to stay withdad and that her ex-partner is being more civil to her. Another said that her ex-partner was nowcalling before visiting and that there was now far better communication with her.

    Things had not turned out so positively for every family. Many women found the poverty,loneliness and struggle to parent by themselves very demoralising and hoped that they could havea new start with their partners. Five women had either taken their partners back or were

    considering it. Another said that she felt extremely lonely and her husband promised her he wouldchange and so she took him back when he started attending a stopping violence programme.However, he gave up this up immediately and within a few days of moving back into the house hadassaulted her again. This woman said that although she threw him out, she feels weak for givinginto loneliness and giving him another chance.

    Eight women had experienced a further assault during the period of the programme. Some ofthese women are still living in extreme fear and depending on their circumstances are either ableto function and get on with lives, or are simply focussing on trying to remain safe. One decided tomove in with relatives for protection and another moved suburbs in an unsuccessful attempt to get

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    away from her husband. One was experiencing a lot of pressure from her husbands family andwas only just able to maintain an unconvincing faade with the advocate that all was going well.Another woman appeared to be severely depressed, looked terrible and had quit her job.

    Unfortunately, two women left their teenage children, feeling unable to cope with their behaviourany longer. One of these actually left the country, taking the two youngest with her overseas, toensure the older children couldnt join them.

    Conclusion

    It is clear from the formal evaluation and from this study, that the Child Crisis Team is providing aservice which is needed by families in crisis as a result of violence in their homes. By the time wehave become involved, the violence has often been an ever present feature of some childrenswhole lives. It was shocking to the writers to find that around 75% of the children have beenexposed to episodes of extreme violence and the same percentage have actively tried to intervene

    including a 14 month old baby. This is even more horrible when considered that in 66% of thecases, the parents had separated, but still mothers and children were being subjected to violenceand were not able to get on with their lives in peace. However, it is important to be aware of thestage at which the Child Crisis Team provides it service to families. This is during a period whenthe violence is still currently occurring, and we know that in time, for most of these families, theviolence will stop and with our support will conclude more rapidly.

    Children have to rely on their parents to look after them and love them domestic violencecompletely disrupts a parents ability to parent properly - even those with the best of intentions.These children typically have overwhelming levels of emotional distress caused by their feelingsabout their mothers and fathers. They often love and miss their father, whilst greatly fearing himand being severely traumatised by his violence to their mothers and often themselves. They needconstant reassurance and enormous amounts of emotional support from their mothers, and are

    terrified to let her out of their sight in case something happens to her but are also angry with her,blaming her for being the cause of the fights, leaving dad, staying with dad, not being able to stopthe violence.

    Sadly, the reality is that we cannot always immediately stop the violence from happening in thesechildrens lives. What we can do, however, is give these children ways to protect themselves andto help them understand what is happening. We have to help them by building their resilience toendure the intolerable. We can help mothers by letting them know how the violence is impactingon their children and by teaching them alternative parenting strategies to help their children cope.By implementing an intervention strategy that prioritizes child safety, we believe we have a veryreal chance at protecting children and interrupting the intergenerational cycle of violence fromoccurring.

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