Envisioning a reflective, relationship-based approach to termination in child welfare: The importance of thinking, feeling, and doing

Turnover among child welfare workers inevitably creates relationship disruptions between workers and youth. Workers then face decisions about how to approach those endings with young people, who often already have a considerable history of relationship loss with family members and other child welfare professionals. There is a lack of research exploring the ways in which workers approach these endings, even though it is likely a regular occurrence given the high rates of turnover in the field. Using in-depth interviews and participant observation over a two-year period, this study explores workers’ experiences of and strategies for ending relationships with youth in an independent living program. Findings indicate that workers made assumptions about their relationship endings with clients, and like their clients, experienced emotional responses to the endings. Workers also made decisions about how to end their relationships with clients including what to say (i.e., content); how to say it (i.e., process); and when, where, and with whom to say it in front of (i.e., context). The ways in which workers approached the endings tended to either facilitate a space for processing the ending or create a barrier to processing the ending. Data suggest an increased need for training, supervision, and support for workers throughout the ending process. By taking a reflective, relationship-based approach, workers may be better able to process and critically reflect on their work, in order to facilitate the endings in a way that is most therapeutic for the client.