Challenges and Coping Strategies of Children with Parents Affected by Schizophrenia: Results from an In-Depth Interview
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Challenges and Coping Strategies of Children with Parents Affected by Schizophrenia: Results from an In-Depth Interview Study Yvonne Kahl • Johannes Jungbauer
Published online: 29 August 2013 Ó Springer Science+Business Media New York 2013
Abstract This article presents results from an in-depth interview study investigating challenges and coping strategies of children with parents affected by schizophrenia. Thirty-four qualitative interviews of children were conducted and evaluated by content analysis. The interviewees spoke of a wide range of challenges that they must deal with daily. A variety of available coping strategies, social and personal resources were identified in the study. The results show that there is a need for professional support, especially on a low-threshold basis, that helps affected children to develop appropriate and diverse forms of coping. Keywords Children Parents affected by schizophrenia Challenges Coping Individual resources
Introduction Challenges of Children with Parents Affected by Schizophrenia Living with a parent who has a mental health problem can be viewed as a nonnormative developmental task for children. This situation brings with it many challenges for the children (Hans et al. 2004; Jungbauer 2009). Children are most severely affected if the parental mental disorder is recurrent and chronic (Lenz 2005).
Y. Kahl (&) J. Jungbauer Catholic University of Applied Sciences NRW, Aachen, Germany e-mail: [email protected] J. Jungbauer Institute of Health Research and Social Psychiatry, Aachen, Germany
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Changes in the daily lives of families due to parental mental health problems often imply that children experience multiple anxieties such as fear of separation, aggravation of the parent’s health state and feelings such as hopelessness, resignation and fury. Feelings of guilt in cases of withdrawal of the parent are important aspects when considering the children’s situation (Lenz 2005). If children undertake the responsibilities of their parents, siblings and the household, the parent–child-role may be reversed. Future perspectives of the youth with mentally ill parents might be affected if they detach much later than usual from the parental household. Children of parents with a mental disorder are often in fear of stigmatisation (Sollberger et al. 2008; Stelling et al. 2008). Mowbray et al. (2006) state that the challenges of children can last until adulthood, which may be indicated through problems with work and marriage, lower self-esteem, increased consumption of alcohol, increased tendency of isolation and the child’s own mental health problems. The clinical appearance of schizophrenia contains misperceptions and misinterpretations of the environment, causing the affected person to often behave incomprehensibly to onlookers (American Psychiatrist Association 2000; Lysaker and Lysaker 2008; Pretis and Dimova 2004). Feelings of fear, desperation and lack of comprehension increase if children do not know facts about schizophrenic diso
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