City Advice for Children & Teens
City Support for Children, teens & young people
Children & Teens Advocacy (City)
The Children and Teen Advocates who operate in the county, otherwise known as the CAT team work with children and young people who have experienced domestic abuse within Nottingham City.
The children we support have frequently seen traumatic scenes and witnessed physical violence and emotional and psychological harm. We support Children who have have gone through a range of experiences due to the abuse that happened within the home including providing evidence at court, being removed from home, seeing a parent imprisoned, struggling with child contact arrangements, bedwetting, nightmares, self-harming, lack of attainment and attendance at school and even suicidal ideation.
The CAT team support children to talk about their feelings and have their story listened to, to understand they are not to blame, to be taught about what a healthy relationship should maybe look like and how to keep safe. We work with children between 6-12 weeks depending on their support needs and situation. The support work can either be done as 1-1 support that takes place weekly up to an hour in a safe space such as school or within a therapeutic group setting.
Teen Advocate Service:
The CAT team also supports teenagers 13-17 who are experiencing domestic abuse themselves; often in their own intimate relationships, but also within more complex scenarios such as sibling and parental abuse,
Our teen advocate service includes the following:
- A personalised package of practical advocacy and emotional support to female teenagers aged 13-17 years experiencing abuse in their intimate relationships.
- Safety planning – to address the specific risks to teenagers including, but not limited to, Sexual Exploitation, Honour Based Violence, Forced Marriage and online abuse.
In most cases 16 and 17-year-olds will be referred to the Multi-Agency Referral Assessment Conference (MARAC) to further the support given between specialised agencies. The advocacy service will work flexibly with teenagers in order to obtain their engagement and be aware of the high level of normalisation of domestic violence and abuse in teenage relationships.
The Teen Advocate role supports young survivors with housing, criminal and civil court matters, sexual health, mental health, drug and alcohol issues and education. It is a specialised service that supports Female survivors.
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