2.2: Care, professional practice and emotions

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A photograph of a woman sitting at a desk in an office, with a laptop in front of her. She leans her elbows on the desk and covers her eyes with her hands, pushing her glasses up onto her forehead.

The challenges of working on a daily basis with very vulnerable unaccompanied migrant children are well known – complex caseloads, challenging client situations (including emotional trauma and high volumes of work), and a lack of resources, all point to high emotional demands (Griffiths et al., 2019). Providing care for UASC young people often competes with other systemic, legal and professional demands. The sense of fatigue and burnout was present in our data from across a variety of sectors.

Ophelia, who worked in the education sector, told us how she moved from direct work with UASC to managing other people, something that was quite a common approach for managing the emotional challenges of these roles:

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‘I sort of manage people who provide that care, and that is probably – that happened because I became washed out – what’s the word? Yeah, completely – I had a – it was too much. And then I had a baby and I had to step back, overworked, but that was because it was a job that I loved and I was so in there, but the care is – young people need a lot.’

Charlie, who worked directly with young people within the charity sector told us:

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‘It is very emotionally demanding, very demanding of your time and energy. I spend a lot of my free time just recovering from the work!’

Research studies with social workers working directly with young people suggest that an emotional commitment towards young people is the key to the most effective practice (Kohli, 2006). This is also very challenging because social workers in the same study also felt like they were sometimes the containers or conduits for traumatic stress. They described how ‘bearing witness’ can be very difficult. The literature also characterises the emotional toll as burnout syndrome, leading to exhaustion, cynicism, emotional distancing and depersonalisation or Secondary Trauma Stress (STS), in which repeated exposure to others’ trauma has an impact on emotions, behaviours, beliefs and values (Hadwin, 2022; Vîrgă et al., 2020).

Therefore, we know that care – when we look at it from the wider perspective as presented in the literature – has both practical and emotional entanglements that are often difficult and challenging for those working in practice (Milligan and Wiles, 2010). This is especially true for those working within a system and broader environment where the day-to-day pressures seem to work against being able to exercise care that can sit in conflict with the Corporate Parenting principles [Tip: hold Ctrl and click a link to open it in a new tab. (Hide tip)] . At the same time, young people can struggle to communicate and feel understood about their own care needs and life experiences. In addition, young people’s own caring relationships are often neglected or misunderstood. The reality is that social workers who work with Unaccompanied Asylum-Seeking Children (UASC) face many ethical dilemmas and conflicts of interests. On the one hand, building honest, trustful and supportive relationships whilst also complying with resource and asylum requirements (Wright, 2014).