Contextual postures, narratives, and positioning: working with families and colleagues through discomfort, the unsaid and the unsayable.

We are a group of four clinicians from different parts of the UK that came together in February 2024 following brief and infrequent conversations after the AFT Birmingham Symposium. 

From Brighton to Scotland and Suffolk to London we connected through zoom once a month talking about everything under the sun that related to our practice and our professional/personal relationships. We found an alliance gradually developing as we got to know one another better through different aspects of ourselves, the personal, the professional, our beliefs, values, cultures and passions. With time we started to have conversations about our professional and clinical practice that may have seemed difficult at the beginning which nurtured an appreciation of other perspectives and helped to create new networks. 

Four practitioners reflect on the art and science of trying to hold multiple positions” both/and + both/and/and” Are we able to hold this space in times when we are drawn into either/or? We will invite ideas from participants of how they navigate such situations with families and other professionals. We will then have a reflective conversation as a group, about what has been shared and our different journeys. From this process we hope to co - create a ‘takeaway framework’ for practitioners to envision in their own contexts. Our hope is to contribute to a Context article from this collaborative effort.