My son and I attended sessions with a child therapist and family counsellor at Respond. At the time, I was struggling to deal with his anger and violent outbursts, a result of trauma due to events in his early childhood. Fortunately, my son’s school knew of Respond and made the referral, they seemed to be the only service in London who did this particular work.

I was very concerned about my son, also about how he was behaving towards his younger sister and there were times when I was worried that I would not be able to keep the family together because of his behaviour.

The therapists at Respond gave us both time and space to talk about what happened to us individually. I was able to look at stuff from my own past and how we operate together as a family, and all the staff in the project were there for me when I felt at my lowest. They have given us both the strength to make some of the changes we needed to stay together as a family.

The service we received was excellent; my counsellor was extremely helpful and the only person I was able to be truly honest with. Now my son doesn’t fly off the handle so much and we can talk so much better and we do more stuff together as a family.

(*Anna is not her real name)

N.B: Photograph uses models.