Parent and Teacher Understandings of the Needs of Autistic Children and the Processes of Communication between the Home and School Contexts

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Anger without a voice, anger without a solution: Parent–child triadic processes and the experience of caring for a child with a diagnosis of autism

The paper offers an exploration of triadic attachment dynamics in families with a child with a diagnosis of autism. The Meaning of the Child (MotC) framework was employed as part of a multiple case study design with 18 parents (9 couples) in order to examine their representation of parenting and relationship with their child. The MotC analysis employed concepts of parental sensitivity, mentalisation and reflective functioning, and a triadic, analysis was added to consider the family relational processes. The findings indicate that the parents were significantly influenced by the use of a dominant ‘autism discourse’. ‘Autism’ in their child presented a severe challenge for them and could foster a sense of disempowerment and emotional withdrawal. Locating the difficulties as reflecting ‘autism’ could also serve to detour conflicts between the parents, and in the parents themselves, trapping the family in unresolved anger or fear that could neither be named nor its impact addressed. Autism discourse tended to rob the actions of family members of interpersonal meaning, rendering conflict fixed and unalterable and requiring them to mask the deep feelings inherent in these relational ruptures. The analysis included an exploration of the parents’ own childhood attachment histories which revealed that the parents were also driven by corrective scripts in wishing to form better relationships with their child than had been their own childhood experiences of parenting. A sense of failure to achieve these added to their sense of disappointment and frustration, but also indicated potential avenues for positive changes and growth. </jats:p

Feeling ‘like you’re on … a prison ship’ – Understanding the caregiving and attachment narratives of parents of autistic children

This study explored the caregiving and attachment relationships of parents of autistic children, analysing 16 Parent Development Interviews conducted as part of a larger project. The interviews were analysed using attachment theory–driven discourse analysis, namely, the Adult Attachment Interview and Meaning of the Child Interview methods of evaluating relational discourse for transformations of meaning with a self-protective function. A multiple case-study approach was used to build an explanatory model of the caregiving and parent–child relationships of the whole sample. The study found a high level of trauma in the parents’ early childhood that shaped the way they interpreted their child and the parent–child relationship, often undermining these parents’ intentions to form more positive relationships with their own children. An interpersonal understanding of the problems of these families is suggested, seeing difficulties as residing in relationships, maintained by a circular process of ruptures, as parent and child seek to protect themselves from the pain and shame inherent in the experience of ‘disconnection’, and the apparent failure of the parents’ hope for a better relationship with their children than they experienced as children. This may be exacerbated by commonly available autism narratives, which tend to essentialise problems, mechanise parental understanding of their children and encourage parents to experience their child as fundamentally separate, challenging the caregiving system. Clinicians supporting families with autistic children may be assisted by attending to this meaning-making process, seeking creative alternatives to help these parents realise their positive intentions that do not support a shame-based cycle. </jats:p