Facilitating Parents' Agency in Child and Adolescent Mental Health

Book excerpt: This book explores parents’ experiences of their child’s treatment in an adolescent mental health services in Sydney, Australia. It represents the incisive narratives of parents of a chronically struggling child. Such parent groups are under-consulted in the field, and yet their experiences provide clinicians with effective ways to engage them as a resource for the child’s recovery. The author draws on her research and vast experience in the field to map out how program managers and clinicians can involve parents as a valued part of the child’s treatment. Readers are taken on a very personal journey with parents through their help-seeking efforts, their hopes for treatment, their varied experiences of involvement and the impact of these experience six months following their children’s treatment.