1st Edition
Mothers Accused and Abused Addressing Complex Psychological Needs
Mothers Accused and Abused: Addressing Complex Psychological Needs brings together stories about mothers who are accused of harming, and in some cases killing, their children, children who subsequently harm or kill others and the challenges to professionals who work with them.
Contributors consider the deeply rooted cycles of neglect and abuse manifested in the childhoods of mothers, who only come to our attention when their extreme distress is expressed through their actions. By recognising the long-standing, unmet dependency needs of abused and neglected women, the book argues that longer term engagement can prevent a seemingly endless repetition of court hearings and imprisonment, and thereby address cycles of neglect.
With sections on mothers in prison and interventions following child care proceedings, Mothers Accused and Abused will be a valuable resource to those working in the criminal and civil justice systems, social work and mental health as well as others who, in a professional or personal capacity, encounter troubled mothers and their children.
List of contributors
Acknowledgements
Introduction
Angela Foster
PART ONE
Setting the scene: Reflections on a ground-breaking book
- Mother, madonna, whore: understanding perverse mothering: Reflections on a ground-breaking book
- Caring for the mother and as well as her children
- Mothers and the law: Mythologies and stereotypes - a woman’s lot?
- Infanticide, matricide or suicide
- Treating violent men: The significance of the mother-son relationship
- Staff accused and abused: Managing anxiety, pain and distress in systems of care
- Transition to motherhood and becoming a child-less mother in prison
- Therapy with a mother and baby in prison
- Cover stories: Art psychotherapy with mothers in prison who have killed or harmed their children
- Last chance saloon: From repetition to growth, a young mother's journey in brief psychotherapy
- Better outcomes and better justice: The Family Drug and Alcohol Court
- The mother in mind: A therapeutic group for mothers who have had a child removed from their care
- Taking a break: The work of Pause
Estela V. Welldon
Angela Foster
Helena Kennedy
PART TWO
The pain of relationships lived and re-lived
Carine Minne
Celia Taylor
Angela Foster
PART THREE
Mothers in prison
Laura Abbott
Pamela Windham Stewart
Jessica Collier
PART FOUR
Interventions following child care proceedings
Fiona Henderson
Steve Bambrough, Nicholas Crichton & Sheena Webb
Gwen Adshead & Anna Williams
Content provided by Pause
PART FIVE
Ways forward
Ways forward
Angela Foster, Beate Schumacher & Davina Jhummun
Glossary of psychoanalytic terms
Robert D. Hinshelwood
Index
Biography
Angela Foster is a psychiatric social worker, a psychoanalytic psychotherapist, supervisor and consultant working with clinical teams and individuals in mental health, forensic, substance misuse and child care services. She has published many papers and co-edited a number of books.
I found the chapters to be well written and thought provoking. The book would be a helpful read for frontline social workers, and professionals who work alongside such mothers - such as drugs and substance misuse workers.
Farrukh Akhtar, Journal of Social Work Practice
This thought-provoking book of essays on mothers who harm, or are accused of harming, their children, will become required reading for professionals seeking to understand what one eminent contributor, Estela Welldon, has famously described as perverse motherhood. Edited by Angela Foster, with contributions from a wide range of experts ranging from the law to psychology, the book describes groundbreaking work across disciplines seeking to support women who have complex needs but are also a risk to their children. The book makes a powerful argument for treating such women, rather than marginalising them, so that the cycle of neglect and harmful mothering can be challenged and finally broken.
Katharine Quarmby, Author and Journalist.
Nothing can be more vital than the mental health of mothers, who, if loved, will nurture their offspring to become law-abiding citizens or, who, if abused, will be at risk of rearing criminals. Angela Foster has curated a magnificent collection of carefully constructed essays, written by leading forensic mental health professionals, who explain not only the causes of maternal violence – often stemming from humiliation and trauma – but, also, the devastating consequences thereof. The contributors provide a veritable blueprint for treatment and, hopefully, for prevention. This book must be read by every serious student of psychology, criminology, feminism, and politics.
Professor Brett Kahr, Senior Fellow, Tavistock Institute of Medical Psychology, London, and Senior Clinical Research Fellow, Centre for Child Mental Health, London, and Series Editor for the Routledge "Forensic Psychotherapy Monograph Series".
This is an essential collection of powerful papers about women who re-enact trauma and abuse with their children, and the ways in which society fails these women. Angela Foster has skilfully brought together a wealth of information about mothers who abuse and the systems that treat them. This important book offers expert accounts of mothers who inflict serious harm on their children, the intergenerational transmission of violence and perversion and profound insights by clinicians working with mothers and babies in women’s prisons, and within secure health settings.
Anna Motz, Consultant Clinical and Forensic Psychologist, Psychoanalytic Psychotherapist and Author.