Separation and Loss: The Impact on the Emotional Health of Afro-Caribbean Young People

Trained as teacher before changing careers to social work, specializing in Psychiatric Social Work and Child Guidance. She practised in both professions in Trinidad and Tobago, West Indies and in England. She researched the project of Finding Black Families for Black Children for the Independent Adoption Service and the London Borough of Lambeth. She was social work Students' Unit supervisor in the London Borough of Wandsworth, before teaching MSW students at Goldsmiths College London, and Sussex University for ten years and, after retiring, was Director of Training in Intercultural Counselling for Nafsiyat Intercultural Centre. She researched the sometimes traumatic effects of broken attachments, separation, and loss on mothers and on children as a result of immigration from the West Indies to Britain, utilizing the theoretical framework of Attachment Theory. In 1999 she founded the Separation Reunion Forum, which aims to raise awareness of, and to promote discussion on, the importance of secure attachments of young children and parents or consistent caregivers.