being prevented (whether or not permanently, and for whatever reason) from providing him with suitable accommodation or care. (The Children’s Act 1989, 2018). She stated that she found prison a positive experience and it made her realise that she could cope without her partner, and eventually left him in 2016.

An adoption support agency is defined as an undertaking, the purpose of which, or one of the purposes of which, is the provision of adoption support services (BACP 2018). The law states that no services may be provided by an adoption support agency before it is registered by Ofsted. An adoption support agency might include a government or non-government organisation, a partnership or an individual therapist in private practice (BACP 2018).

The BACP states that local authorities have a statutory duty to provide post-adoption support (BACP 2018). It is lawful, however, to provide therapy to these clients as long as the focus is not on the adoption but on the disenfranchised grief itself.

In order to understand the impact of loss and the feelings and behaviour that follow a bereavement, we must have some knowledge of attachment. Bowlby’s attachment theory allows us to understand the human tendency to create strong bonds and the emotional reaction presented when these bonds are broken. Bowlby’s thesis is that these attachments come from the need for security and safety; they develop early in life, are usually directed towards a few specific individuals and tend to endure throughout a large part of the life cycle (Worden, 1991). These attachments can be seen in Darwin’s 1872 work around the expression of emotion in men and animals where he states Children, when wanting food or suffering in any way, cry out loudly, like the young of most other animals, partly as a call to their parents for aid, and partly from any great exertion serving relief. His work would suggest that attachment is imprinted at an early age and this notion is echoed in Lorenz’s 1935 work with goslings. Lorenz believed that A breakdown in the relationship with its mother led to a disruption in the development of a bird’s normal social behaviour, supporting his theory that the first relationship a bird experiences determines the bird’s future. Likewise, John Bowlby claimed that a disruption in the child’s attachment to its mother had grave consequences for his or her adult personality (Vicedo, 2009). It is my understanding that in Bowlby’s attachment theory, an anxious attachment style has a prolonged, more complicated effect upon grieving, a person with an anxious style of attachment may experience deeper levels of depression, contrary wise a secure attachment to the deceased, may indicate less depression and aid the transition through grieving and the recovery from it. This may be that in an anxious state of attachment the deceased may not have been emotionally available to the bereaved, and therefore the bereaved person may over-activate their grief response. There are several limitations to Bowlby’s attachment theor