Working with System Involved Youth Separated from Biological Families: The Impact of Traumatic Separation on Attachment

Pamela Parkinson, Ph.D., LCSW

Training Description

Do we realize the attachment trauma that family separation has on our kids of all ages? This includes kids being separated from their families in foster care, juvenile justice, immigrating to the U.S., etc. What does this breaking up of families do to our kids? This training will look at the deep attachment ruptures that are occurring for system-involved youth and other ruptures that are happening in their lives and which are contributing to the behaviors for which they are exhibiting. These ruptures are interfering with positive outcomes of system involved youth and we need to understand that.

Learning Objectives

Participants will be able to:

· Explain what is meant by the trauma of loss and identify at least two attachment ruptures that these traumatic losses can create for system involved youth.

· Identify at least 2 ways that we can decrease the pain of attachment ruptures for system involved youth and families.

· Identify at least 2 ways to keep families “intact” after they have been separated that will facilitate possible reunification and more permanent placements.

Agenda

10:00 – 10:15AM  Sign In

10:15 – 10:45AM  What is secure attachment, and how do human beings develop this?

10:45 – 11:15AM  Discussion of what we mean by the trauma of loss through family Separation, and what is meant by attachment rupture?

11:15 – 11:30AM  What do signs of trauma “look like” in youth?

11:30 – 11:45AM  BREAK (CE Hours will not be offered for this time)

11:45AM – 12:00PM  The neurobiology of attachment.

12:00 – 12:30PM  The stories we tell ourselves, and how this becomes our attachment narrative.

12:30 – 1:00PM  What is an earned secure attachment, and how do we facilitate it’s development with our youth?

1:00 – 1:30PM  LUNCH (CE Hours will not be offered for this time)

1:30 – 2:00PM  Explore Pain in the Heart Theory (PITH). How it relates to supporting youth as they recover from the trauma of family separation.

2:00 – 2:30PM  Understanding and identifying emotional boundaries, and the loyalty bind and trauma in our youth.

2:30 – 3:00PM  How to use PITH to help us understand why our kids have symptoms, and how we can start to respond to the healing.

3:00 – 3:15PM  BREAK (CE Hours will not be offered for this time)

3:15 – 3:45 PM  Small Group work to explore strategies for healing the attachment ruptures that our youth experience during and after family separation!

Ways we can advocate on behalf of this healing and how important it is to be addressed!

3:45 - 4:15PM  Taking a specific youth example, and ways that we might help that youth! A real life case example!

4:15 – 4:30PM  Wrap-up/Adjournment

Meet Our Trainer

Pamela Parkinson, PhD, LCSW, is a clinical psychologist and clinical social worker, whose specialty area is working with youth and their families. Dr. Parkinson has spent most of her career working with system involved youth in our Continuum of Care (foster care, juvenile justice, mental health and the kids struggling in our school systems). She is a certified PCOMS evidence-based practice trainer. Pamela currently works as a child/family consultant to CBO’s in the Bay Area and has worked in level 14 residential, NPS, hospitals, and a variety of community-based settings including outpatient clinics, schools, diversion, kinship, etc.

This course meets the qualifications for (5.5) BBS CE hours for LCSWs, LMFTs, LPCCs, and LEPs as required by the California Board of Behavioral Sciences & is provided by Fred Finch Youth Center, CAMFT Provider #045295.