Foundations, Trauma, and the Child's Voice in Sibling Relationships The Sibling Paradox

Part 1: Foundations: Values, Attitudes, Beliefs and Biases

1. One Hand Clapping: Coherence in Fragmented Practice

2. The Mirror in the Room: Self-Awareness in Sibling Decisions

Part 2: The Children’s Context

3. Siblings in the Shadows: When One Child Suffers

4. Shattered Bonds: Trauma’s Impact on Siblinghood

5. Between the Lines: Children’s Voices on Sibling Relationships

Part 3: Evidence and Ethics: Research, Law and Policy

6. The Myth and the Measure: What Research Really Tells Us

7. Law and Paradox: Policy, Courts and Sibling Futures

Part 4: Trauma and Development: Body, Brain and Behaviour

8. Incubated in Terror or Held in Mind? Attachment, Regulation and Developmental Trauma

9. Brains Under Siege: How Trauma Shapes Development and Behaviour

10. Bound by Fear: How Trauma Hijacks Attachment

11. The Quiet Parts Loud: Children’s Voices in Sibling Decisions

Part 5: Hearing the Child: Listening, Validating and Understanding

12. Between Truth and Survival: Forensic Neutrality. Therapeutic Empathy, and the Discipline of Hypotheses

13. Conversations on the Edge: Staying Within the Window of Tolerance

14. Entwined and Unravelled: The Dynamics of Sibling Conversations

15. Hold the Adult, Help the Child: Conversations with Parents and Carers

16. Between the Ship and the Anchor: The Pull of Sibling Ties

17. Echoes of Separation: Adults Reflect on Siblings Lost and Togetherness

Biography

Tim Woodhouse is a senior trauma-informed therapist, consultant, and clinical supervisor with over four decades of experience in children’s social care, psychotherapy, and assessment. He served for 16 years on the NSPCC’s Child Sexual Abuse Consultancy and helped set up the first children’s SARC at St Mary’s Manchester. He is the founder and clinical lead of Tiptoes Child Therapy Services, working nationally across adoption, fostering, residential care, court-directed assessments, and interventions. Tim is a Level III Certified Sensorimotor Psychotherapist, Level III Internal Family Systems (IFS) therapist, EMDR practitioner, and a BAPT-registered Play and Filial Therapist. He is also a registered social worker and ABE-approved interviewer, known for bridging relational depth with clinical precision.

Norma Howes is a highly experienced and respected independent child protection consultant, therapist, expert witness, clinical supervisor, trainer, and author with over four decades of work in trauma-informed assessments, therapeutic interventions, and children and families social work. Her clinical specialism spans complex trauma, dissociation, forensic assessment, and attachment-focused therapy within foster care, adoption, and high-risk family systems. She is also a Sensorimotor Psychotherapist and EMDR practitioner.

'One of the key strengths of this book is that it is written over many years by two extremely experienced clinicians able, through their decades of reflective practice and commitment to their own professional growth, to create a thorough and rich offering to all involved in this complex world of caring for traumatised children. They frequently refer to the use of complex case studies and, for me, this attention to direct work is vital and gives the book validity and gravitas.'

Di Gammage, Core Process Psychotherapist, Child Psychotherapist, and Play Therapist, Senior Clinician, Capstone Fostercare, UK