About Us

At Family Affect we aim to bring brightness & joy to people‘s lives using an approach of Compassion, curiosity, Acceptance, attunement, Kindness, knowing, Empathy, engagement (CAKE) (inspired by Dan Hughes’ PLACE)

The overall aim of Family Affect intensive therapeutic family work is to enhance family life for both the child and parents or care provider. The specific aim is to reduce the debilitating effects caused by the child’s exposure to trauma whilst increasing their feeling of safety, ability to self regulate & ability to rely on their parents or care providers as significant others.

Family Affect is a Child & Family Service offering a specialist therapeutic intervention for families whose children have experienced developmental trauma (i.e. early life, chronic & pervasive neglect & abuse, attachment breakdowns, foetal alcohol or drug abuse) or trauma as a result of loss, bullying, domestic violence, accidents. Working with Children with disabilities is very much part of our expertise.

Family Affect incorporates a variety of Attachment Focused Therapeutic techniques and practices including:

  • Dyadic Developmental Psychotherapy (DDP).
  • Theraplay® (Interactive Play Therapy).
  • Sunshine Circles® (Theraplay®: social-emotional development groups).
  • Support & Sunshine Circles® (attunement) for schools.
  • Life story work.
  • Supervision/Consultations for teachers, social workers, teaching assistants and family workers.
  • Attachment Focused Therapy Training for professionals & parents.

At Family Affect we specialise in delivering training for parents, care providers & professionals 

Family Affect provide therapeutic interventions following a full and comprehensive assessment of the needs of the family. This includes gaining an understanding of:

  • The strengths and needs of the family.
  • The effect of trauma (on the whole family).
  • The capacity of the child to make and maintain relationships, their emotional regulation and well being.
  • The impact of attachment experiences and behaviour on relationships and the capacity of parents/care providers to parent their children with confidence, empathy and joy.

Family Affect use multiple methods of assessment based upon research in areas of attachment theory, developmental trauma, neurobiology of trauma, attachment parenting & child development. Children and parents, carer providers and teachers (where appropriate) are invited to take part in interviews, structured observation of interactions (Filmed & analysed) & complete questionnaires to gain a more detailed holistic understanding of the child & family dynamics. Once this information has been gathered and analysed, child/children and parents or care providers are invited back to Family Affect to spend time in the open countryside together with a therapist from the team doing therapeutic tasks. Homemade/cooked food is provided throughout the day. Also parents or care providers have individual time with a therapist to share their concerns and perceptions of their child’s or children’s difficulties. Each child is able to spend time with a therapist, who uses verbal and non-verbal creative therapeutic techniques to help them to express their feelings, emotional states, images (which often do not have words), impulses, beliefs, attachments, their hidden internal world & defences.

Comprehensive Assessment Outcomes and Recommendations

All the information collated throughout the assessment process will be analysed. A detailed report will be produced from the analysis & recommendations will be made for the therapeutic interventions required for each individual child/family.