Working with Families Where Caregivers Have Harmed: Lessons from the Infant Mental Health Field
Presenter: Kathleen N. Hipke, Ph.D. Friday, May 23, 2025 ♦ 10:00 a.m. – 1:00 p.m. (EDT) Zoom Webinar
Mental health professionals who work with children inherently also work with the systems within which they are developing, including families. Holding space for caregivers in a child’s therapeutic work is often essential to the creation of meaningful family engagement and healing. Yet strong emotions can be provoked for clinicians when a child client’s caregiver is experienced as challenging or having behaved in ways that have caused the child pain or harm. This interactive workshop will introduce theoretical and practical concepts from the field of Infant Mental Health that can aid child clinicians in the work of regulating one’s own affect and deepening understanding of caregiver history and behavior. Using clinical vignettes and reflective practice activities, participants will explore how doing so can spark curiosity and compassion, improve clinical decision making, and reduce burnout.
ABOUT THE PRESENTER
Kathleen Hipke, PhD is an Assistant Professor in the Department of Psychiatry within the University of Wisconsin’s School of Medicine and Public Health where she provides clinical services, supervision, and education related to parent infant mental health; provides multi-disciplinary and mental health specific state-wide professional development to support and expand workforce development for those working with young children and their caregivers; provides campus wide early care and education Infant Mental Health and Early Childhood Consultation; and is the Director of the UW Madison’s Prevention Research Center’s Core Research Project, Addressing Postpartum Depression in Wisconsin Home Visiting, overseeing a randomized Clinical Trial of Mother-Infant Therapy Group (M-ITG) integrated into Home Visiting Programs as compared to Services as Usual. Dr. Hipke trained in prevention science at Arizona State University’s Prevention Research Center, participating in the development, implementation, empirical refinement and evaluation of preventive interventions for families of latency aged children experiencing family stressors. Per her growing interest in infant mental health, borne of an extended field placement and clinical training at Southwest Development, an Irving B. Harris Infant Mental Health Training Center, she sought pre- and post-doctoral training in the Midwest at Children’s Memorial Hospital and the UW Psychiatry Parent Infant Program prior to working to establish excellence in outpatient services for perinatal women, infants and young children within primary and behavioral health care services across the Dane County, Wisconsin region. While at UW Psychiatry, Dr. Hipke was involved in the initial NIMH trial of M-ITG as post-doctoral fellow and then Research Program Manager, overseeing the initial RCT training, implementation and evaluation of M-ITG as delivered in a clinic environment. She is a founding member and long-term faculty mentor and instructor with the UW Madison Infant and Early Childhood Family Capstone Certificate Program and State Trainer/Co-Director for the Wisconsin Trauma Informed Child Parent Psychotherapy (CPP) Learning Communities. She is passionate about supporting others to expand knowledge and skills related to supporting parents’, infants’ and young children’s mental health, particularly as applied to serving historically oppressed communities and those who have experienced trauma.
PROGRAM OBJECTIVES
Participants will be able to:
PROGRAM AGENDA
10:00 am – 11:00 am Engaging challenging parents or caregivers in child therapy 11:00 am – 12:00 pm Reflective practices for working with challenging caregivers 12:00 pm – 01:00 pm Supporting complex child therapy case work For additional information on continuing education policies, please visit our web site at http://psychology.nova.edu/ce.
Prices range from $0.00 to $45.00 (price depends on options selected)