Blocked care happens when a carer or carers enter a state of prolonged stress, suppressing their capacity to sustain loving and empathic feelings towards their child. It stems from a need for self-protection and defensiveness and fosters child's immediate behaviour and most negative aspects a reactive style of caring that is narrowly focused on the immediate behaviour and most negative aspects of the child.

Children and young people need adults in their lives to make decisions that are in their best interest, create safety and foster positive relationships; this is paramount for children in out-of-home care. These best interest decisions are especially true for children and young people from culturally diverse backgrounds who are in out-of-home care or have a statutory intervention. Unfortunately, I have often seen a breakdown in relationships and communication due to language barriers, cross-cultural misunderstandings, and missed opportunities for repair and strengthening of protective factors.

Kevin Creeden, Director of Assessment and Research at Whitney Academy Massachusetts and a speaker at the 2022 International Child Trauma Conference said in recent training, “If you don’t feed the staff, they will eat the kids:”