Out-of-home placement in institutionalised care and returning to the family system present young people and their families with major transformational challenges. This involves affiliations and demarcations, relative autonomy and relative dependence. Based on a qualitative research project, the author explores the question of how family members experience return processes and thereby continually create 'family/families'. She analyses the interactions between the actions, feelings and explanations of young people and parents in interaction with the activities of professional actors and the legally coded structures of child and youth welfare. The empirically and theoretically orientated work links important discussions of child and youth welfare research with current concepts of