Honoring How Clients Define Family

In my first Practice Thoughts post, I shared several ways to engage in anti-oppressive practice, including understanding systems, collaborating with clients and communities, using “power with,” and honoring lived experiences. This month, I want to spend time with that last point by thinking about how people define family. Whether we work in clinical roles, case management, outreach, schools, shelters, advocacy, or policy, how we understand family shapes how we understand the people we serve.

I want to start with the many ways I’ve seen practitioners honor clients’ lived experiences. Across settings, I have seen people ask open questions, use the client’s own language, and recognize relationships that fall outside what forms or policies usually consider “family.” I’ve seen practitioners who make space for client-defined family members in planning or support conversations, and who document these relationships with care. I’ve seen people treat grief and loss in chosen or nontraditional families with the same compassion as any other. These moments matter. They tell clients that their relationships count, that the people who have cared for them are valid, and that we trust them to define what family means.

People define family in many different ways. For some, family is biological or legal. For others, family is created through caregiving, shared experience, or community. Someone might see a step-parent as their true parent because that is the person who raised them. Someone else might have two moms and not distinguish between them. Others have cultural or community-based kinship systems, or people they call siblings or parents without any biological ties at all. These relationships are real and meaningful, and they say something important about identity, safety, and connection.

It is also important to recognize that the dominant cultural definition of family did not arise naturally. The idea that a “real” family is a married man and woman raising biological children in a single household reflects a white, patriarchal, heteronormative worldview. It has been reinforced through policy, education, media, and the systems many of us work within. It shapes the categories on intake forms, the way documentation is structured, and the assumptions built into professional tools. Family is sociocultural and political, not neutral. Once we understand this, it becomes clearer why so many clients’ family structures fall outside the dominant model and why it is essential to approach these definitions with openness rather than rigidity.

Even with this understanding, there are times when practitioners unintentionally override how clients define their families. I’ve seen situations where someone referred to the parent who raised a client as their “stepmother,” even though the client always said “my mom.” I’ve seen biological but emotionally distant parents labeled as the “real” parent while the actual caregiver was minimized. I’ve seen children with two moms repeatedly asked, “Which one is the real mom?” And I’ve seen terms like mother, father, brother, or sister replaced with “caregiver,” “friend,” or “support person,” even when the client clearly viewed these relationships as family.

Practitioners might think they are clarifying something, but clients often hear a different message: that their family is less legitimate, or that the way they understand their life is wrong. For young people, this can be especially painful, particularly if they already feel their family structure is different from what society considers normal. These moments can erode trust, shut down communication, or cause clients to disengage. Sometimes the harm carries forward, making them less likely to seek support in the future.

How we talk about family communicates something to clients, whether we intend it or not. It is never neutral.

Anti-oppressive practice asks us to notice these moments and shift our approach. It invites us to ask open questions like “Who are the important people in your life?” or “Who do you consider your family?” It reminds us to use the client’s own language and to document their relationships accurately. It encourages us to understand family structures in their full cultural, economic, and political context. And it asks us to honor the significance of conflict, connection, grief, and loyalty in all forms of family, not just the ones that fit the dominant model.

For those of us in practice, this raises important questions. Whose definitions of family do we privilege? When have we unintentionally replaced a client’s language with our own? How might we adjust our questions or documentation to better honor clients’ lived experiences? And what would shift if we approached every client as the expert on who their family is?

These are questions I continue to ask myself. I invite you to explore them as well, wherever and however you practice.

What are your thoughts/reflections? Join the community and engage in our discussions.