Mothers' Experience of Custody Loss: Implications for Practice

Background and purpose. “Once identified as a ‘bad mother,' the system knows the woman as a collection of risk factors to be managed, a profile, which subsequently frames how the child protection system will interact with her. These profiles may be very much at odds with the experiential knowledge of the mothers they describe” (Brown, 2006, pg. 355). This paper integrates and elaborates the programmatic significance of the studies reported in the first two papers to create a more nuanced and complex analysis of the experience of mothering while under the scrutiny of the child protection system. We examine the service commonly required in the plans of most child welfare agencies (parenting education) against the mothers' articulated experiences and needs. This analysis may form the basis of an intervention paradigm shaped by the mothers' goals in the context of their lived experience. Method. Sample. The sample for this analysis consists of the three qualitative studies presented in the first two reports. Analysis. The qualitative findings from these studies are compared and contrasted to the fundamental principles underlying parent-education- service programs. Results. The analysis suggests the skills-based educational parenting model, even when paired with other interventions, is ill suited to some mothers with children in foster care because it fails to address the challenging context of mothering. Often poor, frequently struggling with mental health and substance abuse problems, mothers grapple with the demands of a child welfare system that typically leaves them feeling demoralized. The findings of our analysis highlight the need for a fundamental shift in how we engage mothers, understand their circumstances, help them to resist stigma, respond to shame, rework definitions of their maternal (and other family) role, and join with them to create the long-term scaffolding many will need to regain and maintain custody of their children. As Davies and her colleagues (2006) suggest, developing the “mothering narrative” moves women from the “periphery to the center of child welfare practice” so that services are both meaningful and relevant. Conclusion and implications. Through these three linked presentations, therefore, we aim to highlight emerging research that holds the potential to inform development of social work practices that respond therapeutically to mothers' experiences and to help them to “rebuild” and to “sustain” their families, in recognition of the conference theme.