Parent conflict

172. We are committed to helping families to communicate better. We know that relationships are key and positive communication is what we want to see.

173. Good quality relationships are a right and not a privilege. For many families, stress is a large part of everyday life and stress is often the reason relationships feel strained and communication is poor. Whilst it can be hard to eliminate stress from everyday life, we understand that we can work towards improving the way we react, by communicating in more constructive ways.

174. When supporting families, we have a unique opportunity to enable communication in a more positive manner as opposed to in a way that ultimately damages their relationship.

175. We will work with families using solution focused ways to guide people towards working out what better, looks life for them. We understand this is a more effective strategy than offering our own advice and solutions. When supporting families with struggling relationships we will consider the following:

• don’t assume you know is going on, explore both parties’ through and feelings;
• be curious, what is really going on?;
• encourage a culture a culture of appreciation between the people you are supporting. Kindness wins over blame every time;
• Remember that not everyone feels able to change, all we can do is offer support, but someone need to want things to be different in order to make change happen, and
• Its normal to feel uncomfortable sometimes talking to someone about their relationship, we will not try to fix things or give advice but instead ask thoughtful, open questions.