The Adoption Support Fund will only fund certain types of therapy and these have to be specifically approved by the local authority in order to gain funding. At TTC we would recommend two methods for working with families who have an adopted child, either child psychotherapy with an experienced child psychotherapist or VIG, or sometimes a combination of both.

VIG

Video Interraction Guidance is a specific form of therapeutic support which uses video to highlight strengths within parent-child relationships and analyse exactly how attuned contact between parents and children is brought about.

VIG is a strengths-based way of working, videos are not taken of things that were done wrong, but things that were done well and how this was achieved. Research shows that it is particularly effective in working with any form of relationship difficulty between parent and child and can help parents to have a better understanding of how to relate to children who are not responding to normal ‘good enough’ parenting.

TTC’s VIG practitioners are all fully trained and qualified Child Psychotherapists who then go on to do a specific further training in VIG.

Child Psychotherapy

Child Psychotherapists have an in-depth training in understanding a child’s state of mind. Therapists are trained to carefully observe a child or young person and respond to what they might be communicating through their behaviour and play and have particular skill in understanding the troubled feelings that children evoke in them. The child psychotherapy training focuses in particular on coming to understand behaviour that is related to early traumatic experiences and how this plays out in current relationships.

Child psychotherapists are also skilled at working with parents and carers and this will often form part of the work.