found ourselves needing to dampen the
surprise we experienced on finding that she
didn’t want the letter replying to her
questions. Eileen didn’t need the letter at
that point. She had needed to write a letter
earlier but now she wanted to be out of
communication and putting her attention
elsewhere; she had moved on. Eileen was
glad that some communication was
happening between the youngsters and she
felt the issue lay more with them anyway. This process – from the initial
letter from Auntie to try and stop the relationship – had taken 8 to 9
months by the time we’d taken letters back and forth and they’d thought
about them and what they wanted to say. The time the participants needed
to reflect between communications was what determined the pace of the
communication; and there inevitably was a slight delay in terms of the
logistics of our shuttling the letters.
Eileen had had to accept that no-one can stop a relationship other than
those within it and she’d had to start thinking about why she was worried
about it. The youngsters have all had to think about it and how they’re
going to live together afterwards. Now that Eileen had accepted that this
has more to do with the kids than with anybody else, the mediators task was
to relay that information appropriately.
Jimmy said that even though Eileen didn’t want the letter he was glad he
had written it to say what he wanted to say about the court and the lies. He
found himself involved in a lot of communication with his contemporaries
who were all over 17 years old. This communication was not known to the
parents and carers.
When Jimmy came up for release there was a complicated set of
communications that were facilitated sometimes with and sometimes
without the mediators.