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Surviving Intervention: Grandparents’ Struggle to Maintain Relationships with their Grandchildren Following Contact with Child Protection Services

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  01 December 2015

Erin Rigby ,
Susan Gair  and
Ros Thorpe
Erin Rigby
Affiliation:
Social Work, College of Arts, Society and Education, James Cook University, Queensland, Australia
Susan Gair*
Affiliation:
Social Work, College of Arts, Society and Education, James Cook University, Queensland, Australia
Ros Thorpe
Affiliation:
Social Work, College of Arts, Society and Education, James Cook University, Queensland, Australia
*
address for correspondence: Susan Gair, Associate Professor, Social Work, College of Arts, Society and Education, James Cook University, Queensland, Australia. Phone: 61 7 4781 4892. E-mail: Susan.Gair@jcu.edu.au
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Abstract

Grandparents play an important role in families, contributing to the maintenance of intergenerational relationships. Recent literature has identified increased incidence of grandparents raising their grandchildren, often after family breakdown. Less evident is the literature highlighting Australian grandparents’ experiences of reduced or lost contact with their grandchildren. Lost contact can result from many factors including family disputes, separation or divorce of adult children, or children being taken into State care. The primary aim of the Honours research project reported here, a component of a larger project, was to explore the lived experiences of Queensland grandparents who had reduced, lost or denied contact with their grandchildren after contact with child protection services. In recent years, almost 8000 Queensland children have reportedly been living in out-of-home care arrangements annually. In this qualitative study, in-depth interviews were conducted with a sample of seven (7) grandparents. An emerging key theme was that grandchildren were very important to grandparents, but that grandparents struggled to maintain contact with their grandchildren after families came to the attention of child protection authorities. These findings can help inform social work practice with families for the wellbeing of both grandparents and grandchildren.

Keywords

grandparentsgrandchildrenstate carechild protectionlost contact
Type
Articles
Information
Children Australia , Volume 41 , Issue 2 , June 2016 , pp. 98 - 105
Copyright
Copyright © The Author(s) 2015 

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