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19
CHAPTER
Why Motherhood? Setting the Scene
A Personal and Professional Reflection
Lucy Baldwin
‘Motherhood: All love begins and ends there.’ (Robert Browning)
During my many years of practice, in whatever context I have worked, I
have often been impressed and inspired by women in general and I nd
working with women and girls rewarding, something I sincerely hope
has always been conveyed to the women I have worked with. However
I have always been particularly aected in relation to working with
mothers. Mother, motherhood, mothering — are all terms which seem
to somehow ‘invite’ opinions, sometimes judgements, arguably always
expectations — and often shared empathy and compassion. Working
with vulnerable mothers can be as challenging as it can be rewarding,
not least because ‘motherhood’ and its experience, from both sides, i.e.
from that of the child or the mother, is something that is of enormous
consequence; psychologically, emotionally and physically to all con
-
cerned. I remember all too well being a ‘teenage mum’, trying to escape
a past whilst at the same time trying to forge a future — a future in which
no-one expected me to succeed. As with all of us there are aspects of
our pasts that inform and shape our futures, we all have our story. I was
determined my future would not be ‘as predicted’ and this perhaps gave
me a certain demeanour and determination, most certainly inuencing
my life choices, both personally and professionally. As a much older and
wiser person — as well as being an experienced professional and three
times mother — for the most part a single mother — I am able to reect
on when, where and how personal experiences can and do ‘leak’ into
our professional lives or our career choices.
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ere are many aspects to the successful management of this ‘phenom-
enon’ and that is perhaps someone else’s book for another time — but
I would suggest that signicant key aspects to successful and healthy
‘professional engagement’ very much include open, honest self-reection
and positioned self-awareness. Practitioners in this book provide oppor-
tunities for reection on thoughts, feelings and emotions and practice
during work with mothers by including ‘Pauses for ought’ in every
chapter in the hope that readers will nd this thought-provoking, reas-
suring and productive.
I am lucky in that despite a rocky start there have been some positive
and signicant people in my life and via those people came oppor-
tunities — without which my life would be very dierent — two such
people are my midwife and my health visitor, namely Ann Fox and
Mary Maruf. Both met me when I was pregnant with my rst child at
16, I became pregnant a month after coming out of hospital following
a serious attempt to take my life. Without them this book wouldn’t be
possible — without them perhaps even life for me wouldn’t have been
possible. Wherever you both are thank you from the bottom of my heart.
I have witnessed and experienced rst-hand the devastating conse-
quences of pain-lled childhoods, abusive relationships and unhealthy
coping strategies — adopted often as a means of survival. I have observed
and reected on the challenges this can present to happy, healthy and
eective parenting. Later, as a practitioner working with women and
mothers I found such issues all too often beset the lives of many of the
women who come to the attention of statutory or third sector services
or who might enter the criminal justice system (CJS). However, equally
as signicantly long-lasting and aecting to me has been the positive
experience of working with women who tirelessly and valiantly ght to
be seen and heard in systems that often appear to want to ignore women’s
needs, or to punish them further than their disadvantage already does.
I was lucky that when I insisted on leaving hospital less than 48 hours
after my rst son was born (the norm was a minimum of seven days usu-
ally ten in those days!) that my midwife supported me rather than judged
my behaviour risky and immature. Or again when I discharged myself
from hospital with my second baby on our second day, even though I
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was still young (just turned 18), that my midwife didn’t share the view
of the consultant who called it an ‘act of wanton rebellion’ — instead
recognising it as the act of someone who needed to be home to feel safe
and needing to be with her other child too. I was lucky I was not judged
reckless and I was fortunate that my midwife had no concerns for my
ability to parent based on my age or my background — she trusted me,
supported me and encouraged me. I was lucky that my health visitor
felt the same and was ‘who’ she was and ‘how’ she was — and that she
was able to know when I needed help — because I would never have
asked for it (I’m stubborn that way!), reaching out to me when I needed
her instead. Despite being labelled ‘clever’ I had left school with hardly
any qualications (I truanted for most of secondary school!). My health
visitor encouraged me to do my A-levels. I completed three in a year,
she then even secured me paid childcare via and old lady and the local
vicar — which enabled me to go on to university for my undergraduate
degree (Long story — and I’m not religious — but very grateful).
I am very, very aware that my life could have been quite dierent for
me and for my children had it not been for these two people — Fiona
Anderson wasn’t so lucky. Fiona was a 23-year-old mother of three chil-
dren all under the age of four: Levina, Addy and Kyden. Despite the
involvement of child protection services, Fiona hadn’t felt able to engage
with professionals or disclose the fact she was struggling to cope — she
actively avoided professionals out of fear her children would be taken
from her and so she continued to struggle. Until the day when Fiona
could apparently struggle no more, and in April 2013 she leapt to her
death from a multi-storey car park — whilst eight months pregnant with
her daughter, Eve … and after killing all three of her children. e inquest
revealed ‘a harrowing insight into the real state of her mental health’ and
the struggles she had been battling with became apparent in a torn-up
letter found in the bin and Fiona’s writing on the walls. Despite receiv-
ing over 50 visits from services in the three years prior to her death and
intermittent service involvement — there had been no mental health
assessment — partly due to Fiona’s avoidance and reluctance to engage
and partly due to system failures and failure to engage the family. After
drowning her children Fiona had placed a lipstick kiss on each child and
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wrote that she loved them on their tummies — she had apologised for
‘taking them with her’ but wrote ‘a mother never abandons her children.’
(SCR: 2013).
What is all the more tragic is that there were opportunities to sup
-
port Fiona and her children — indeed the night before her death her
ex-partner and her had an altercation in which she injured him with a
knife — but he failed to disclose this at the hospital as he was ‘trying to
protect’ Fiona, fearing if he was honest about the attack that the children
may be lost to the care system. Issues such as these will be revisited in
the Mental Health chapter (Chapter 2) and Social Work chapter (which
deals with child protection) (Chapter 3) of this book, but sadly this situ-
ation is not unique. In order to avoid what they fear is the inevitable
and unwelcome ‘intrusion’ of child services, mothers may disengage,
minimise their symptoms and fears — or deny them altogether; thus
meaning that for some mothers the opportunity to secure real help and
positive support is at best delayed, at worst lost. is needs to change,
mothers need to feel there is ‘support’ rather than judgement at the end
of a phone call — to be able to admit they are ‘struggling’ — without
that being seen as an admission they are ‘failing’.
Dolman et al (2013) suggest this is especially the case when a mother
has an existing mental health diagnosis. Fear and anxiety exacerbate men
-
tal distress, never so painfully demonstrated than by the tragic death of
Charlotte Bevan in 2014 who, again, apparently leapt to her death with
her four-day-old daughter Zaani. Charlotte, who was living with a diag-
nosis of schizophrenia and depression, had reportedly stopped taking her
medication in order that she could breastfeed. e full inquiry has yet to
take place and any one that does will address how far the hospital and
Charlotte’s care team adhered to the recently updated National Institute
for Health and Care Excellence (NICE) guidance relating to working
with pregnant and new mothers at risk of mental distress. It will not
be surprising should the inquest nd there was some issue with multi-
agency communication and a ‘joined-up approach’, which is tragically
all too often a feature in most serious case reviews (SCRs) or inquir-
ies. Mothers like Fiona Pilkington, who killed herself and her disabled
daughter in 2007 and who features in the Police chapter (Chapter 4)
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alongside Jael Mullings who killed her baby sons despite calls to police in
the hours before their deaths stating she was a risk — or Tania Clarence,
also in 2014 (who killed her three disabled children and was detained in
psychiatric care rather than custody), or indeed Angela Schuman who
leapt from the Humber Bridge in 2005 with her two year old daughter
Lorraine (both survived). Angela was jailed for attempted murder of her
daughter — later released on appeal — though with a no contact order.
All of these women lost children to their own hands, that is true, but
in one way or another they were failed by society and systems that are
meant to oer protection to vulnerable women, mothers and children.
It almost goes without saying that ‘lessons must be learned’ from each
of these tragic cases — but not singularly. Every SCR report I have ever
read mentions failure to communicate or failure to share information
in some important way. However, often a conclusion will be drawn in
each report that due to the ‘individual’ and particular characteristics of a
case ‘the tragic outcome could not have been predicted’ — meaning ‘les-
sons aren’t learnt because ‘failings’ are seen as ‘case specic’. Nonetheless,
often what is key is that in many cases the ‘common’ failings have not
only been missed opportunities to support and engage mothers — but
there have been many missed opportunities to ‘listen’ to the mothers
themselves, for the mothers to have a voice.
is ‘failure to listen’ is illustrated by Tania Clarence and her legal
representation in court. Tania did in fact have extensive support for
her family, up to 60 professionals were ‘involved’ in her daily life as
a mother caring for three disabled children — however her legal team
stated poignantly that Mrs Clarence felt pulled this way and that, she
felt ‘undermined, insecure and patronised’. He went on to say that ‘each
separate specialist seemed unable to appreciate the whole — and it is this
“whole” that Mrs Clarence lived.’ One person in the sea of professionals
involved with her family whom Tania did trust and engage with posi
-
tively was her social worker, who was with her from the beginning — yet
eight weeks before the children’s deaths this social worker was removed
from the case because her manager felt she was ‘getting too involved
with the family’ — both Tania and the social worker fought the deci-
sion and lost — the social worker, an experienced senior practitioner
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resigned — following a stressful meeting with her new and inexperienced
social worker Tania texted her husband stating simply, ‘I don’t have any
hope.’ Tania Clarence’s ‘ voice’ was not ‘heard’.
One of the aims of this book is to assist the reader to think about the
presenting issues from the perspective of the mother — to truly try and
place the reader, yourself, in her shoes and to think through issues for
practice that will produce positive results, even when decisions being
made might not be the ones the mothers want — for example being
separated from her baby in prison or a mother deciding not to allow her
children to visit. How does that then feel for mothers and how can these
decisions and the subsequent emotions impact on her ability to engage,
to trust or to survive? e ‘Pauses for ought’ throughout the text
assist the reader to think critically and compassionately about the issues
and challenges faced by mothers and practitioner responses to them.
For example, if we revisit Fiona, Charlotte and Tania for a moment via
‘Pause for ought’ — it becomes apparent how re ection and critical
thinking is encouraged throughout each chapter. is book, rather than
giving you all of the answers, seeks to encourage you to ask the questions.
II Pause for Thought
What could have been done differently to support Fiona? — Do you think
her fears were real in relation to losing her children? — What support
package would have been best for Fiona and her children? What does
her own statement, ‘Mothers don’t abandon their children’ tell us about
expectations of mothers? How do you think the fact she was ‘struggling’
would have made her feel as a mother?
For Charlotte — How must it have felt to her knowing she needed her
medication — but also knowing breast milk is best? How do you think
her anxiety/dilemma could have been managed? What are your initial
thoughts of motherhood and mental illness? What are the dilemmas
for mothers and professionals? For Tania — How might she have felt in
a ‘sea’ of ‘experts’ and professionals?
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During my long career I have been lucky enough to work with many
professionals who are committed to improving social and justice system
responses to vulnerable women and their children. Passion and drive is
something I have rarely found lacking in any of the professionals I have
come across in relation to working with women and mothers I have had
the pleasure to do this with, including those involved in this book; pro-
fessionals who come from a range of statutory and third sector settings
all seeking to aect positive change on both macro and micro-levels
for women in criminal justice and related settings. e importance of
responding to people as ‘individuals’, with kindness and respect cannot,
I think, be overstated. It is my experience that even when the ‘reins’ of
the ‘system’ employing said practitioners may prevent workers from
working perhaps as freely as they would like, or with less than ‘ideal’
resources, many of the practitioners I have come across simply as ‘people’
have aected change, or at the very least had a signicant and positive
impact on women and/or mothers they have worked with.
So the purpose of this book is to bring together some of that knowledge
and experience to facilitate understanding and assist in the development
of professional condence, professional empathy and ‘emotional safety’.
is will be achieved by exploration of, and reection on, a range of
emotional and related issues that may arise when working with women
and mothers, particularly in the criminal justice system — but equally
in a range of other settings. e book is designed to be used almost as a
thought-provoking ‘companion’ text to assist those who work with and
are learning to work with women, girls and mothers facing challenges,
but additionally to enrich and inform knowledge whilst inspiring fur-
ther learning. It is hoped this will be facilitated by providing examples
drawn from a variety of practice settings together with encouragement for
professional and personal reection via a range of ‘Pauses for ought’,
oering an opportunity for reection around experiences, feelings and
responses.
It is further hoped the book will add to the practical and experiential
rather than purely academic literature surrounding working with women
and especially working with women who are mothers. It is a book for
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practitioners written by practitioners and hopefully to benet women
and mothers by including their voices and experiences.
ere are no assumptions made here or in what follows that all of the
women ‘we’ work with will be mothers and nor are we suggesting that
women who are not mothers are ‘less’ in anyway, or indeed that working
with non-mothers is any less important. ere is simply a wish to high-
light ‘motherhood’ in relation to wider professional engagement — as
often it is an aspect of working with women that has a ‘centrality’ to it.
Even if it is not be the ‘focus’ of the work we undertake in a specic rôle,
for example in relation to substance misuse or policing, it is likely that
‘mother’ status will interact with the intervention and the practitioner
somewhere. Arguably, motherhood is an aspect of identity, emotion and
sense of self that no practitioner is able to or would want to ignore when
working with women. During work with mothers within our specic
roles, there may or may not be legal aspects and implications in relation
to working with women who are mothers — additionally there may or
may not be practical considerations depending on the employing agency
we represent, but arguably there will always be emotional aspects to
working with women who are also mothers. Whether the women have
their children with them or not, the impact of those ‘emotional’ aspects
and responses to them — are likely to have at least some relevance to how
we work and how we ought to work with women who are also moth-
ers. Recognising the importance of working positively with emotions,
recognising trauma in order to move forward, especially with mothers,
is something that is central to this book and is discussed further in the
closing chapters.
Motherhood and Professionals
Motherhood is a rôle many women expect and are expected to play
in their lifetime, it is one that has a duality to it, in that often we are
mothers alongside being something else or someone else. It is a rôle that
paradoxically invites celebration and heightened status for women who
sometimes are perceived as ‘superior because of their “mother status”,
e.g. mother knows best’ — yet also invites judgement and can be a means
to ‘reduce’ a woman, e.g. ‘She doesn’t work, she’s just a mother.’ We see
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these paradoxes and attitudes reproduced and represented in the media
and in society (Johnson and Swanson 2003) — but where and how does
the motherhood ‘script’ t in professional working relationships with
vulnerable women in challenging circumstances?
Obviously, during work with service user mothers, then the focus is
on the service user and as previously stated may not be focused on the
service user ‘as a mother’ — but is it ever ‘left out’ of the picture? When
working professionally and engaging with women and mothers as ser-
vice users, we are often engaging — sometimes as mothers ourselves (and
daughters?). Does this have any relevance to how we work, what we think
professionally and on the decisions we make? Often part of our work
might be dealing with and/or exploring the impact of both positive and
negative mothering. We as professionals, but arguably everyone, have a
list of ‘shoulds’ and ‘should nots’ in relation to motherhood — in terms
of personal qualities, characteristics and behaviours (Bowlby 1978; Oak-
ley 1979; Kaplan 2013).
It is important therefore to be able to reect honestly, at least internally,
on our own thoughts, feelings and values in relation to being a mother
or ‘expectations’ of motherhood — if only to assist in ‘managing’ our
own internal processing and to ensure our working relationships are not
unconsciously governed or aected by our own emotions (as illustrated
in the Mental Health chapter (Chapter 2) of this book). Much has been
written on the expectations and stereotyping of mothers (Kaplan 2013;
Oakley 1979; Rich 1992), but not so much on its relevance in relation
to professional relationship dynamics and scripts.
Phoenix (1994) suggests that although it is not a lone consideration,
nevertheless when working with mothers, being a women and addition-
ally being a mother will lend itself well to the establishing of rapport,
trust and ergo quality of the working relationship — but does that also
bring other dimensions and dynamics into play too? Would therefore
not being a mother have any relevance, perceived or real? Would being
a male practitioner bring more dimensions into play — for both moth-
ers and the practitioners? However, ‘sisterhood’ and identication aside
Rowe (2011) reminds us that women are not and nor should they be
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regarded as a homogenous group ‘reduced in terms of social identity’
neither in expectation, assumptions or rôles.
I have witnessed mothers in the most desperate of situations where
everyday life is a struggle or indeed sometimes a ght to survive. Yet
in even the bleakest of circumstances those same women may easily be
persuaded to smile in the face of adversity — persuaded by the simplest
of gestures from their child. I have witnessed and worked with women
who have been able to set aside life’s challenges and strive to meet the
needs of their children and families — sometimes at great cost to them-
selves. I have seen women ght like tigers for their children — against
all odds, whilst simultaneously facing innumerate additional challenges,
poverty, mental illness and abuse to name a few. However, equally as sig-
nicant in my mind, are the ‘children’ — of all ages — felled by the loss,
the interruption or the lack of maternal nurturing when this ‘triumph
over adversity’ isn’t possible (for whatever reason). I have seen just how
devastating it can be to all concerned when the powerful bond associ-
ated with motherhood is broken, damaged, imperfectly formed or, for
whatever reason, impossible to maintain.
Reecting on this as a practitioner it has seemed to me that the mother/
child relationship ‘knows no bounds’ in relation to impact and signi-
cance — both in a positive way when it is a healthy, loving, nurturing
relationship, and in a negative way when, for whatever reason, that rela-
tionship is not present, can’t be present or is disrupted.
It is important to state this is obviously notwithstanding additional
relationships and the signicance of ‘others’ in a child’s life, a father gure,
a signicant rôle model, or grandparents for example — of course they
are valuable, important and relevant too, as are a multitude of external,
socio-economic and environmental factors — but in my experience as
a practitioner (and perhaps also as a mother) none, it seems to me, has
such a profound inuence over the development of holistic ‘wellbeing’ as
the one between a mother and her child. It is for that reason that ‘moth-
erhood’ and the importance of appropriately supporting women in this
rôle runs as a thread throughout this working companion.
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Motherhood, Mothering, Social Expectation and Emotion
Where does this concept of ‘motherhood’ come from, is it biological
or is it environmental? Has society and the development of media and
media inuence maintained pressure on women to feel a certain way in
relation to motherhood and mothering? Nature versus nurture. It’s an
age-old question and one that all the books in the world will probably
not succeed in answering fully, but what is known is that, from almost
the moment they are born, girls are located in the emotional landscape
that will ‘expect’ them to become mothers one day (Oakley 1974; Mead
1935; Rich 1992; Baldwin 2015c).
Girls are encouraged to be ‘mini-mothers’, nurturers and carers from
the moment they start to play, ‘pretend’ kitchens, dolls, prams, and shops
etc. — arguably these are all toys that provide inevitable signposts along
the journey towards ‘motherhood’ (orne 2004; Rich 1992; Oakley
1974). So many aspects of women’s identities are tied up with the emo-
tion of birth, motherhood and mothering. Given an acceptance of the
presence of such perspectives, pressures and assumptions (Johnson and
Swanson 2006) this book aims to explore the potential implications of
judgements surrounding the women with whom professionals might
work in and around criminal or social justice settings who are mothers.
Arguably motherhood and emotion are two words that can never be
separated — they are intertwined and interlinked in whatever capac-
ity we look at either one. How often do we see the words ‘No greater
love than that of a mother’s love’? ‘What a joy motherhood is’, ‘What a
beautiful thing it is to witness,’ ‘How consuming motherhood is’, ‘How
completing and how fullling it is.’ is may very well all be true — but
is this the case for all women? What pressure does this place on them to
bear witness to such evocative, emotive language and descriptions of
motherhood? Indeed If we do assume or accept this to be true what does
this say — or perhaps more to the point what does ‘society’ say — about
women who do not feel this way about motherhood or mothering? Or
mothers whose behaviour is ‘deemed’ to not be putting the needs of their
children ‘rst’? Or those for whom mothering does not come ‘naturally’,
or whose mothering is aected by oending behaviours, ‘poor’ lifestyle
choices or reliance on substances. How easy is it to meet the ideals of
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being a protective, nurturing, seless parent when you as a mother face
violence, poverty or homelessness for example?
Media representations and references to motherhood are very often
presented in either judgemental or glowing terms. Repeatedly when
someone well-known or with celebrity status has given birth we are pre-
sented with headlines or lead comments such as, ‘I have never felt love
like it’ or ‘I wasn’t prepared for the emotion of it all’ and ‘My feelings
for this little person have overwhelmed me.’ is is not withstanding
the barrage of idealised motherhood ‘truths’ presented in mothering and
pregnancy guidebooks or latterly internet sites such as mumsnet.com.
Constant exposure to messages such as this are arguably not lost on any
of us (Kaplan 2013). ere is an acceptance and knowledge, but more
than that an expectation that becoming a mother, or perhaps rather giving
birth, will result in feelings as described above (Woolf 1994; Rich 1970).
Furthermore that this feeling alone will facilitate good parenting and is
so powerful that it assumes superiority and therefore takes precedence
over a multitude of socio-economic factors and/or environmental ones.
How does this idealisation and expectation impact on vulnerable
women? Does this often just feel like additional pressure to women and
girls who become mothers in the midst of often already disadvantaged
lives? — Do all of these assumptions about motherhood and how moth-
ers ‘should’ behave simply add to the emotional ‘baggage’ women have
to deal with in relation to coping? If women and mothers engaged in
services surrounding the criminal justice and related settings are already
dealing with the wealth of emotions described above in relation to their
rôle as mothers, how might those emotions be magnied if we add in fear
of judgement, stigma, and fear of consequences — together with feelings
of failure or guilt? erefore in reections of working with mothers, and
within recommendations for future working with mothers we need to
encompass and explore the emotional ramications and manifestations
related to ‘motherhood’ in order to facilitate comprehensive, empathic
and eective working practices.
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Emotion, Judgement, Mothers and ‘Systems’
It is often presented (particularly in ‘popular’ media) that mothers whose
‘actions’ by way of committing crimes or who live in or amongst chaos
or substance misuse are placing the ‘needs’ of their children secondary to
their own. Do ‘we’ (society in general, practitioners) judge such moth-
ers more harshly than women in similar circumstances who do not have
children? If ‘we’ are mothers ourselves do ‘we’ judge more harshly? Are
mothers the harshest critics of other mothers? Does that judgement have
an impact? If so what is it and how does it manifest itself? And more
importantly in relation to this book, how do these emotions, feelings
and perceptions impact on our engagement with mothers, on mothers
themselves — and us as practitioners? Do we suciently acknowledge,
appreciate or explore this? Do women and girls who are mothers ‘fear’
or ‘expect’ this judgement in their engagement with practitioners — and,
if so, how does that feel? Layder suggests:
‘We don’t and cant “do” personal relationships on our own. To a large extent,
how we respond or deal with a friend or a lover, or even a stranger, will
depend upon how we think they will respond to us.’ (Layder, 2004:1)
Such fears, perceptions and expectations are often compounded by
issues pertaining to diversity. If a mother feels emotionally vulnerable
already because of aforementioned inuences, then how might those
feelings seem even more prohibitive and overwhelming in the midst
of cultural, language, socio-economic, age and power dierentials in
relation to engaging with practitioners and professionals? e Hibiscus
organization works with foreign nationals (of which there is a signi-
cant proportion in the female prison estate) reports that many women,
out of shame, will not even let relatives know they are in prison — often
choosing to let their children and families believe they are missing or
dead rather than ‘inict’ cultural shame and therefore community rejec-
tion on them.
Wilson and Huntington (2006) suggest that teenage or ‘too young’ and
especially young and single mothers are often perceived to be the ‘moth-
ers of future delinquents’, not a new suggestion. Zedner (2010) suggests
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this was a common preoccupation in Victorian England (as referred to
in the Prison chapter (Chapter 6)) additionally a perspective reected
in political ideologies and popular media, particularly related to single
mothers and ‘broken families’ whom, as stated by politicians and Prime
Ministers of the time, apparently ‘Cannot represent traditional family
values’ (Daly 1994). Carlen (1983) and Bosworth (1999) suggest female
‘lawbreakers’ already experience higher levels of stigma than comparable
males, and Sharpe (2015) goes further than this, arguing that in the case
of young women who are also mothers that this stigma is only intensi-
ed. In her paper ‘Precarious Identities: Young Motherhood, Desistance
and Stigma’ (Ibid), Sharpe found that all of the participants in her study
revealed that they had experienced ‘gendered stigma’ and that this was
judged against a range of ‘conventional identity scripts’ — like that of
‘mother’. She goes on to suggest that expectations and perceptions of
potential judgement or stigmatisation in young and vulnerable mothers
can actually lead to reluctance or refusal to engage in services or access
support. She gives the example of ‘Anna’, a young mother vulnerable
to re-oending who would not attend a local supportive resource and
who stated to her:
‘I used to get into loads of trouble with the police, and there’s loads of
coppers here in [home town] that have had babies — at the Sure Start centre
there’s these two coppers who have both nicked me loads in the past — so
they sit there and look down their noses at me.’ (Sharpe, 2015, 1-16:8)
Sharpe suggests that having a label as a ‘law breaker’ adversely aects
the ‘good mother’ identity but additionally that the combination of
‘young age’ and oending behaviour attracts additional judgement and
disapproval. Her paper suggests that stigma relating both to status as
‘lawbreaker’ and ‘mother’ often means that women continue to ‘endure
judgement of maternal deciency’ even in the absence of recent oend-
ing or anti-social behaviour. Again this raises questions and concerns
about potential willingness/unwillingness to engage of mothers, espe-
cially young mothers — who are fearful of the consequences of that
judgement — real or imagined, cognitive or physical. is is revisited in
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the Social Work chapter (Chapter 3) and Mental Health chapter (Chap-
ter 2) you may be reminded of Fiona, mentioned earlier in this chapter.
Layder (2004) suggests ‘understanding’ and awareness of ‘dual rôle’
for professionals and service users is important — in relation to all work
with people but especially in agencies such as prison or probation and
social work whom Layder (Ibid) suggests will have a ‘service’ response
but will arguably also have a ‘personal’ response — and perhaps it is that
personal response that mothers, especially young mothers, fear just as
much. Whether only perceived, imagined and internally processed, rather
than real — based on actual experience of professionals and externally
expressed — it is perhaps easy to see how this might have an impact on
interactions, engagement and professional relationships.
Judgement, stigma and consequential emotion share signicance not
just in relation to interactions with practitioners, but additionally within
service user or prison populations in relation to each other. Enos (2001)
refers to a female oender convicted of oences related to property
who felt that, as she had oended to increase her wealth and therefore
improve her children’s lifestyle she did not believe that her own oending
conicted with ‘good mothering’. Yet the same woman was disparaging
of other mothers, particularly those whose oences were drug-related
stating:
‘You can be a good mother and be involved in crime and shoplifting and
stu, but with drugs — that’s another thing.’ Enos (2001:118)
Even within disadvantaged and vulnerable groups there is a hierar-
chy of oences regarded as in conict with mothering — with obviously
child cruelty and sexual oences against children being the ‘lowest’ (as
described in the Psychotherapist chapter (Chapter 7)). Research evi-
dences the impact of formal controls in relation to women and mothers
whose lives enter or skirt around the CJS (Carlen 1983; Epstein 2012;
Caddle and Crisp 1997) — with particular focus on the consequences of
imprisonment for women and their children. However Sharpe (2015)
suggests (and I concur) that ‘the eects of informal labelling and stigma
from peers’, wider society and therefore practitioners can be equally as
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Mothering Justice
34
signicant — not least because of the ‘enduring judgements of maternal
deciency,’ which she suggests often remain long after crime, supervision
and oending behaviour have been left behind. For many the emotional
impact and fear of judgement remains.
I would argue that working ‘emotionally’ with women, creating a
place of ‘emotional safety’ especially for women who are mothers and
grandmothers (because of the heightened expectations) is key to enabling
women to reach the point where they are able to engage. Once women
have been supported in or enabled to process the concept of emotional
management, tracing some of the emotional management strategies
(coping mechanisms) that may have led to particular ‘choices’ they have
‘made’, i.e. taking drugs to block out the emotional pain of past abuse
(which may then lead to criminal convictions), women are then more
able to work within trauma-informed practice models, desistance mod-
els and cycle-breaking models (is is re-visited in the closing chapter).
Arguably this can only be achieved if women regard themselves as ‘emo-
tionally safe’ with the people working with them.
What can we do as practitioners to counteract barriers or address these
issues in order to facilitate positive and eective working relationships
and therefore emotional safety and emotional management?
Arguably the very fact of being associated with criminal justice and
related agencies as a mother service user leaves women vulnerable to feel-
ing stigma and the emotional consequences of stigma (Corston 2007).
Presumably, on no-one’s list in a ‘Good Parenting Guide’ would be the
suggestions ‘Go to prison,’ ‘Lead a chaotic life,’ ‘Misuse substances.’ Fol-
lowing on logically, and taking at least some of the feelings described
above in relation to motherhood as read, then just the very act of commit
-
ting a crime, and certainly being sent to prison or needing the assistance/
intervention of related services arguably means a mother might feel she
immediately falls short of the ‘perfect mother’ expectation (expectations
of self, wider society, etc.). Indeed, with regard to multi-agency and child
protective responses it can actually mean that a mother eectively does
fall short of the ‘good enough’ mother expectation and can result in
the loss of her children — as illustrated in the chapters on Social Work
(Chapter 3), Mental Health (Chapter 2) and Substance Misuse (Chapter
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10). For many mothers it is not only fear of judgement in relation to
their parenting skills but additionally fear of consequences that may pre-
vent them seeking advice, guidance and support.
If a mother nds herself in custody these feelings are magnied even
further. Baroness Corston (2007) highlighted this very fact and sug-
gested that simply being imprisoned as a mother would lead to feelings
of anxiety, guilt and inadequacy as mothers — are women who do nd
themselves behind bars therefore seen by others automatically as ‘bad’
mothers too? Indeed do the women judge themselves to be only and
irretrievably ‘bad mothers’? Corston (2007) suggests wearing or being
subject to this assumption/label is, understandably damaging to self-
esteem and self-worth, stating:
‘Many women still dene themselves and are dened by others by their
rôle in the family. It is an important component in our self-identity and
self-esteem. To become a prisoner is almost by denition to become a bad
mother.’ Corston (2007:2.17:20)
For many women in prison incarceration is the rst time they have
been separated from their children for any length of time, and many of
those children do not remain in the care of the family or the family home
(Reed 2014). In fact only ve per cent of children of incarcerated moth-
ers remain in the family home and 14 per cent go directly into the care
of the local authority (Ibid). Obviously this has an emotional impact on
all concerned as found by Corston (2007) who highlighted that:
‘For many women the experience of prison is made worse because they
are anxious all the time about their children’s wellbeing — and even their
whereabouts.’ Corston (2007.3.25:33)
is has implications for working practices when engaging with moth-
ers in criminal justice and related settings. Given what we ‘know’ about
the backgrounds and experiences of many women who become enmeshed
in them, in relation to childhood abuse, domestic abuse, mental health
issues and discrimination (Carlen 1985). Mothers in the CJS and related
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Mothering Justice
36
settings, particularly custody are often dealing with issues and anxiety
related to oending behaviour ‘on top’ of the emotional fallout of pain-
lled lives. So to then have the worry of being or to actually be separated
from one’s children either via custody or mandatory intervention, one
really doesn’t have to leap too far into the hearts and minds of others
to hold some imagining of what this might feel like. e Prison chap-
ter (Chapter 6) explores these issues in more detail. For some mothers
in prison having children is the only experience they have of ‘pure love’
given and taken (Devlin 1998), for others motherhood is simply a further
example of something they have ‘failed at’ by the very fact they are in
prison or are separated from their children (Corston 2007). Either way
I would suggest there is likely to be some kind of emotional impact and
consequently emotional management — arguably both on the part of the
mothers and therefore on the part of the practitioner/professionals too.
e eective management of emotions and the consequences surround-
ing these issues is dealt with wonderfully in some services. Motherhood,
parenting and all that goes with it is given focus and credence ensuring
the surrounding issues are embedded into productive, eective work
with women who are mothers (see ‘Birth Companions’ in the Midwife
chapter (Chapter 8) and the ‘Born Inside Project’ in the Psychotherapist
chapter (Chapter 7) for example). Perhaps it could be argued however
that this is something that could be dealt with more fully, more consist-
ently and therefore more eectively.
As will be illustrated throughout this book many women who are in
prison or leaving prison have complex needs, often as a result of mul-
tiple traumatic experiences — key to working positively with women
throughout the CJS is aiming to promote a climate of emotional safety.
is will be revisited in the closing chapter of the book where the explicit
links between ‘emotional management’, emotional safety and trauma-
informed practice are made.
Mothering, Guilt and Interventions
Aside from the wider societal expectations of women, maternal expecta-
tion is high from the moment pregnancy is conrmed (Annandale 1998).
Opinions about good and bad mothering arguably present themselves
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before children are even born; pregnancy generates similar fears and elicits
similar judgement as motherhood does. e internal management and
processing of many of the emotions related to fear of judgement, fear
of consequences, fear of failure and guilt described above often begins
in pregnancy.
Sutherland (2010) et al suggest most if not all mothers ‘do’ guilt as
a result of expectation and ‘failure to match up to mothering ideals’.
Imagine how it must feel to be incarcerated ‘by your own hand’ and be
separated from your children? Or to give birth whilst in prison? To have
a child with you in prison — then to have that child taken from you per-
haps when the Mother and Baby Unit age limit is reached and the child
is removed screaming from you? How and where does the emotional
fallout of such events present? Or to lose a child because of substance
misuse or because of lifestyle choices — how does that feel? Years after
such events, how does it still feel? Obviously there is an argument in
relation to ‘choices’, but for many reasons — beyond the scope of this
book — some choices are more challenging than others, some feel impos-
sible to make and others are simply not available to all — but that doesn’t
necessarily remove the ‘emotions’ or the ‘trauma’ of a situation. Emo-
tions that will arguably come into play in the interactions between the
practitioner and the ‘mother’, irrespective of her status as a law breaker.
e Prison chapter (Chapter 6) and Psychotherapist chapter (Chapter 7)
in particular illustrate that pain is quite simply just pain.
Enos (2001) suggests that sometimes, especially in custodial settings,
emotional responses are misread and recorded according to percep-
tion — sometimes having disastrous consequences in relation to maternal
capability assessments for example.
‘ey [prison sta ] think that I don’t hang them up [pictures of her chil-
dren] because I couldn’t be bothered. at hurts me. For me, it hurts for me
to see my kids in pictures and stu and I’m not there. You know what I’m
saying? I can’t look at them. I feel so guilty. I can’t look at their pictures and
not feel so guilty.’ Enos (2011:110)
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Additionally Gannon and Cortoni (2010) found that in their expe-
rience of working with imprisoned women, apparent ‘emotionless’
responses, rather than being evidence of embedded deviancy was in
fact merely a coping mechanism adopted to facilitate the ‘survival’ and
management of guilt, shame and stigma — achieved by shutting-o all
emotional responses. During an interview a woman who had spent four
years in prison and four under supervision told me she never once had
a conversation with anyone either in prison or whilst on probation for
four years following her sentence about how she was ‘coping’ away from
her children or how it was going re-establishing a relationship on release:
‘Mostly because I couldn’t, I needed to be in control of my emotions:
about missing my kids, how I felt about myself and all the stu to do with
domestic abuse — I had to constrain them in order to cope, if I told people
I was struggling they would see that as heightening my risk — meaning
they could keep me away from my kids longer — so why would I tell
them? — But also because no-one ever asked.’ Ursula (2015)
My response to this was one of shock, how could it be that no-one
thought to ask about this? As Ursula tells us herself in the Prison chap-
ter (Chapter 6), being a mother is central to her world so to not enquire
about her relationship with her ve children during the most stressful
period in her life is the epitome of ignoring a giant elephant in the room.
As Worrell (1999), Carlen (1988) and Sharpe (2015) et al suggest, sim-
ply being linked to ‘chaotic’ or ‘oending lifestyles’ is enough to attract
at least stigma and labels related to ‘bad mothering’. Baroness Corston
(2007) discusses the impact in relation to guilt and anxiety that many
women then feel — particularly those who might end up losing their
children altogether — suggesting this is particularly the case for women
in custody and is an obvious factor in relation to mental ill-health — but
perhaps particularly for mothers and grandmothers in prison.
Building on research and knowledge like Rotkirch (2009) and Suther-
land (2010) in relation to mothering and guilt, this perhaps raises
questions of how mothers such as those described above ‘manage’ the
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burden of guilt, of judgement — how this feels for mothers is explored
throughout the book.
Court for many is a place of ‘shame’ and guilt, where one’s ‘wrong-
doing’ is aired and one’s aws and misdemeanours and mistakes are
eectively ‘on show’. Court alone for many women is a traumatising
experience (Pryce 2013). Pryce (Ibid) suggests that many women are re-
traumatised by what they hear in court about themselves as evidenced
in the Courts chapter (Chapter 5) and ‘Nina’s letter to her daughter in
the Prison chapter (Chapter 6).
Judges’ summings-up in relation to sentencing women with children
often do not only pass ‘judgement’ in relation to sentence but also in
relation to mothering skills (Baldwin 2015c). So is it naïve to think prison
sta or others working with women in prison or on release do not have
an emotional response to mothers’ crimes, or indeed some crimes more
than others — and that mothers themselves don’t ‘know’ and fear this in
their interactions with the professionals they come across.
A judge summing up a recent child sexual abuse case in which a mother
was charged alongside a male stated:
‘at you were manipulated by [her male co-defendant] is obvious. But you
are a mother, your infant only ten-months-old. A mother naturally loves,
protects, shields, nurtures and cherishes. Your infant would have trusted you
implicitly. You totally betrayed that trust.’
Or, in the case of a mother who was jailed alongside her adult daugh-
ters — but who received a sentence almost twice as long — despite all
three being charged with a similar number of oences and to the same
value, the judge sentencing the mother stated:
‘You are the villain of the piece. It is your fault your daughters are in court.
Some mother.’
So was this woman’s sentence longer because of the ‘seriousness’ of
her crime — or was it because she wasn’t a ‘perfect mother’? is will be
further explored in the Courts chapter (Chapter 5).
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Is it perhaps predictable that mothers in prison feel often compounded
by ‘normal’ feelings of guilt, rstly just because of the separation from
their children but additionally, and arguably especially, if their own chil-
dren were to suer or fall into wayward ways, possibly as a direct result
of their own incarceration?
‘My son got in a ght and was sentenced to custody whilst I was in
prison — that is a direct result of me going to prison — it wouldn’t
have happened if I was outside — I was meant to stop things like that
happening — I failed him.’ Ursula (2015)
For Ursula, she isn’t just serving her sentence for her crime but an
additional one as a mother which for her she feels ‘has no end’, stating
she felt she will ‘forever be looking at her children through the lens of
a mother who went to prison’ — constantly checking if her childrens’
choices and experiences are ‘aected’ by her sentence. Do fathers who
go to prison feel the same? Is it the same? What needs to be oered long
term to support parents who have been to prison and are post licence?
We ‘know’ statistically that children of mothers in prison are more
likely to enter the care system and because of that are more likely to
become victims of crime themselves or fall into oending behaviour
pathways of their own (Reed 2014). What must it feel like if as a mother
you feel all of those consequences are because of you? Where do those
emotions go? How are they expressed? Are they understood? Do they
impact on the sentence ‘management’ of women? Baldwin (2015c and
e) in her doctoral research suggests that this is something that is indeed
a highly relevant factor in relation to how mothers in custody ‘manage’
their sentences and arguably how far mothers are actually ‘able’ to com-
ply with sentence planning targets and interventions whilst in the midst
of this emotional tornado. Women, mothers and grandmothers need to
be in a place of ‘emotional safety’ before they can fully engage with such
things as oending behaviour programmes or courses which try to address
root causes of addictions to substances. Early ndings of the research
suggest that women very much feel that courses which only ‘scratch the
surface’ of their emotions do more harm than good and therefore often
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they will avoid them in order to maintain control of their emotional
wellbeing. We will come back to this in the closing chapters, but it is
explored within the Community Supervision chapter (Chapter 9) also.
Many scholars and practitioners have long argued for gendered
approaches to punishment in relation to working with female oenders
and female service users in social and criminal justice settings (Hedder-
man 2014; Carlen and Worrall 2004; McIvor 2004; Minson 2012; Epstein
2012; Baldwin 2015a, et al). Discussions with fellow practitioners and
contributors to this book conrmed that ‘motherhood’ is something that
has had, if one will excuse the paradox, a ‘discreet prominence’ in their
engagement with women and girls they have encountered. Most, though
not all, of the contributors to this book are mothers, not all are of the
same socio-economic backgrounds and not all are heterosexual — but all
have felt that the mother role, mother identity, expectations of mothers
and the consequent emotions are something worthy of explicit discus-
sion in relation to practice.
is working companion came about because as previously stated all
felt the signicance and importance of motherhood and its presence
in their working experiences even when not the fundamental ‘focus’ of
their particular intervention. Each chapter could have been a ‘book’ in
itself and it was frustrating to not be able to cover more. Despite this it
is hoped the collection will oer opportunities for reection and some
guidance in relation to working with mothers based on experience and
heed from the voices of women who have been in exactly these positions
(both from a service user and practitioner perspective).
However, given all of the above, it remains important to note, as Rowe
(2011) in her paper ‘Narratives of Self and Identity’ takes the opportu-
nity to remind us, that women in prison, even mothers in prison are not
a homogenous group — nor should they be researched or regarded as
such. is remains valid in relation to all women and mothers who for
one reason or another become engaged in one or more services related to
social or criminal justice or the third sector. Rowe (Ibid) reects on the
position that women ought not to be ‘reduced in terms of social identity’
neither in expectation, assumption or rôles (Jones 1993: Bosworth 1999).
e intention of this book isn’t to suggest a ‘one size ts all’ approach to
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working with mothers, quite the opposite — it seeks instead to provide
additional support for the view that individual experiences and emo-
tions are valid and relevant to eective working with women, girls and
mothers and grandmothers.
We hope the book will be used to facilitate the understanding and
empathy of students and professionals alike, particularly in relation
to both the emotional impact of prison for mothers and their fami-
lies — which is where my own passions lie — but additionally in relation
to contributing to eective, empathic and productive work with women
across a range of settings.
You will ‘meet’ a number of women and the people who work with
them. We have aimed to include a cross-section of women with a range
of issues and a range of professionals with diering perspectives and back-
grounds. In terms of the identities of the individual women in the book,
none are wholly based on any one individual but are an amalgamation
of many women who I and others have worked with during our many
combined years of practice (Well over a hundred years of experience
between us!). Many professional scenarios described have been created
for the purpose of facilitating learning and understanding, but again are
based around real life experiences. We have by no means been able to
cover every profession or agency that works eectively with women nor
have we been able here to address every single issue or challenge that the
women we work with face. All of the ‘women’ (mothers) chosen for inclu-
sion either have been in the CJS or are vulnerable to entering it — either
due to substance misuse, oending behaviour, coercion or circumstance,
however not all are in or have been to prison. e focus is really the ‘lived
experience’ and ‘emotions’ of mothers and how this aects the interplay
between mothers and practitioners — and more importantly perhaps
practitioners with mothers — and how best to move forward positively.
It is hoped the book will go some way towards assisting practice by
developing and encouraging understanding and reinforcing that even if
not everything we do as ‘professionals’ is deemed ‘successful’ even sim-
ply ‘how we are’ and how we engage with people we work with on a
basic human level can still have a profound and signicant impact on
individuals’ lives.
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