Healing bittersweet legacies: Revisiting contextual family therapy for grandparents raising grandchildren in crisis

Journal of Marital and Family Therapy, Apr 2000 by Brown-Standridge, Marcia D, Floyd, Caroline Walters

Though Contextual Family Therapy (CFT) has not previously been applied to grandparents raising grandchildren, it is suitably an integrative approach that emphasizes the fair consideration of developmental freedom for the individual while balancing the negotiation of familial responsibilities (Boszormenyi-Nagy & Spark, 1984; Boszormenyi-Nagy & Ulrich, 1981; Boszormenyi-Nagy et al., 1991). Messages and implicit rules about meeting family obligations are understood to have a powerful momentum and impact spanning generations. Family membership is viewed as involving roots and connections that can be empowering and liberating yet mired in historically based consequences. Past experiences of familial injuries and benefits are expected to accrue to current and future relationships. Treatment clarifies how individuals' current behavior is reactive to hidden familial agendas, loyalties, instructions, and commitments, thus opening up alternative pathways.

The above perspective has typically tracked the aftermath from preceding generations. In contrast, this paper uniquely highlights the dual-directional nature of influence inherent when grandparents and children are attempting to compensate for a missed parenting cycle between them. Specifically, parttime, sporadic: or nonexistent parenting will be the focus rather than early parental death. Moreover, a treatment strategy will be outlined that is tailored to quickly disrupt the role confusion, imbalance, and resentment legacy that can hinder the emotional growth of the most impressionable family members in the grandparenting system-the children. Though CFT has not been originally designed for a managedcare era with time being of the essence, the approach can be revisited for what it has to offer grandparents raising grandchildren in crisis.

Organizationally, this article will begin with a conceptualization drawn from what is known about the present demographics; living arrangements, and developmental challenges of grandparent-headed families as well as nonclinical resources designed to help. Second, this frame of reference will serve as a backdrop for the empirical literature on this population, Third, the first two sections will be integrated into a rationale that shows how a procedure with a CFT lens can be incorporated into crisis-intervention technique, with certain accommodations to common role and rule characteristics of grandparenting systems. Next, case examples will be compared for how attention to culturally laden biases as well as potential community assets could ultimately sway outcome. Finally, certain precautions will be offered to avoid further imperiling highrisk grandparenting situations.

CONCEPTUAL FOUNDATIONS FOR UNDERSTANDING GRANDPARENTS RAISING GRANDCHILDREN IN CRISIS

Boszormenyi-Nagy and Krasner (1986) submit that "the most pervasive problem of today's family life has to do with its felt Loss of resources and the imminent threats of abandonment and fragmentation" (p. 57). Children who have become dependent on their grandparents subsequent to being separated from their parents must absorb and process the "cut-off' internally and socially. At best, grandparents may serve as a buffer. Though they may have differing ethnic roots, Iega/financiai complications, or coping capacities, certain shared issues may be anticipated when encountering this population. These are clarified below.