Childhood Trauma and Recovery: A Child-Centred Approach to Healing Early Years Abuse

This book presents authoritative guidance to inform and enhance best practice in helping children affected by early life sexual trauma to recover and lead healthy lives. At its heart is the pioneering work of Mary Walsh, who in 1987 co-founded Sexual Abuse Child Consultancy Services (SACCS) in order to provide such children with specialist care and treatment and train practitioners in the skills required to deliver it. By developing recovery teams that crossed traditional working boundaries to put the child at the centre of all activity, the SACCS approach allowed young people to replace unhealthy ways of thinking with stronger, more appropriate cause-effect mechanisms. The book presents Mary’s model for more effective recovery work - a model based on putting children first, ensuring that they feel safe and trusted, learning to communicate effectively with them and actively helping them to heal.