Abstract
“For not only young children, it is now clear, but human beings of all ages are found to be at their happiest and to be able to deploy their talents to best advantage when they are confident that, standing behind them are one or more trusted persons who will come to their aid should difficulties arise. The person trusted provides a secure base from which his (or her) companion can operate.”
Rudi and I want to dedicate this issue of CCPP to all mental health practitioners who work with children, young people and their families. You may be surprised to read that opening sentence, given that CCPP is for practitioners – written by them, inspired by them, edited and reviewed by them, read by them, and, hopefully, enjoyed by them! So, then why dedicate this issue to them?
We have worked in children’s mental health services for well over 30 years, and have seen many changes in service structures and organization. But this is the first time we have seen so much discomfort and even distress around us. As Bowlby so gently advises, we all need to feel secure to function at our best, and especially to be able to help others. We see colleagues beset in many ways, with service redesign, swingeing cuts to budgets, salary downgrading, and very worried about how to maintain both quality and levels of service in this economic climate that seems to affect almost everyone. We also see a somewhat relentless pursuit of what is called “evidence-based” practice that unfortunately revolves solely around diagnosis. For many of us working with children this is exactly the opposite of what we want to do – to cast young lives into descriptive stone rather than work with the potential for change that so inspires those of us privileged to work with children and their families.
In our experience, practitioners are completely committed to high ethical standards in their work and are deeply concerned about the welfare of the people and the communities they serve. The work we all do is both emotionally demanding and very rewarding. We learn together with our clients, and sometimes we have to learn to live with disappointment. But whichever way you look at it, the work gets done.
So, to you the practitioner, we wanted to offer our acknowledgement, and say thank you!