Therapeutic Parenting Essentials: Moving from Trauma to Trust

by Sarah Naish, Sarah Dillon, Jane Mitchell

All families of children affected by trauma are on a journey, and this book will help to guide you and your family on your journey from trauma to trust. Sarah Naish shares her own experiences of adopting five siblings. She describes how to use therapeutic parenting - a deeply nurturing parenting style - to overcome common challenges when raising children who have experienced trauma. The book describes a series of difficult episodes for her family, exploring both parent's and child's experiences of the same events - with the child's experience written by a former fostered child - and in doing so reveals the very good reasons why traumatized children behave as they do. The book explores the misunderstandings that grow between parents and their children, and provides comfort to the reader - you are not the only family going through this! Full of insights from a family and others who have really been there, this book gives you advice and strategies to help you and your family thrive.

Genres: Parenting

320 pages, Paperback

Published October 21, 2019

Reviews

[Sasha · Rating 4 out of 5]

Fantastic book told by an adoptive mother with heavy input from her kids. All of them are resilient, communicative, and I'm gratefu that they have shared their story. It has helped me immensely.

[Kerry Pickens · Rating 4 out of 5]

Very insightful book on the effects trauma has on children's behavior. I only wish it focused more on teenagers than younger kids.

[Coco Harris · Rating 3 out of 5]

As a seasoned adoptive mom with training in trauma, this book was very redundant for me personally. I think it would be a better read for a new (or soon to be) foster or adoptive parents that have no prior experience with therapeutic parenting. I also didn't like some of the fluffy language throughout such as, "wee, poo, feeling wobbly" and would've preferred straight talk vocabulary and phrases.

The book's content are laid out in an innovative way. We get the mom's perspective, the child's perspective, followed by a professional's dissection of what is happening. Good for those who are going into foster or adoption with romanticized views and need insight into trauma and therapeutic parenting. I may have loved this book a few years ago. However, all in all, this book didn't provide me with new or helpful information and thus reflects my rating of it.

[Sam · Rating 3 out of 5]

This is a good book to read prior to becoming an adoptive parent. As a foster carer/adoptive parent it's frightening to see how many adopters have unrealistic expectations of how life will be with a child that has suffered abuse. The amount that think the younger the child is, the better, as they won't be affected is astonishing. Whilst this book gives great insight into how adults misread situations and what the children are really experiencing it doesn't give as much advice on how to deal with it. Whilst I'm glad the amount of professional lingo is minimal in this book it goes too far in the opposite direction and it feels a little condescending to read at times.

[Bing · Rating 5 out of 5]

We are going through our assessment for adoption and this is one of the recommended books to prepare ourselves for adoption. I really liked the way this book is written where you get the perspective from both parent and child. The honest way of telling Sarah’s story is super helpful and cemented my expectations that the task ahead is anything but easy. I am happy to hear though that it all ended well and that there is hope to look forward to. This is definitely going to be a reference book that I will come back to when the time comes.

[Helen · Rating 5 out of 5]

I am a huge fan of Sarah Naish.
I have recommended her other book, 'A-Z of Therapeutic Parenting' to many people. This is the same. Such a good, practical book from someone who has been there, done that and now written the book. It's down to earth and realistic.
The aim is to support parents and this book is an excellent resource to use as a parent or to point people towards as someone who suports families.
Thanks to the publishers and Netgalley for the ARC to review.

[Tracy · Rating 5 out of 5]

Very insightful. Makes you consider areas of childhood and parenting that you take for granted and which a child with trauma cannot enjoy, understand, accept.

Great examples throughout of how the parent and child are feeling and why.

[PAUL · Rating 5 out of 5]

Whilst fascinating in some ways due to the overwhelming
odds faced by the family, I couldn’t help thinking this was perhaps too extreme an example to be using to show the whole process? With 5 children and varying needs, it can be a bit hard to keep track of them all! The book is anecdotal and relays the different experiences of the same events from parent and child, and then you get a kind of ‘know all’ voice at the end of each chapter picking apart what went wrong and how it should’ve gone instead. It seems remarkably illogical to me, as hindsight is a wonderful thing. Instead, it may have been better to have led with the therapeutic strategy, shown how it could’ve been applied to the situation, then compare and contrast? I think this really needs to be read after the A-Z book (as far as I can tell) as that gives you a better understanding of the whole theory of therapeutic parenting.