"If you have the love in your heart and the courage to adopt a child from a traumatized background, then you must have this book." -- Robert Rich, PhD, anxietyanddepression-help.com
This booklet is a fact-filled resource for adoptive parents who have a child with trauma and attachment disruption experiences. Fraser provides tips and strategies that can be considered before placement as well as days, weeks, and months after your child joins your family. It addresses the day-to-day issues that new parents often get stuck on and provides info on the "Four S's" parenting plan that she shares with families (safety, structure, supervision and support).
Readers will:
Understand how kids with trauma and attachment disruptions first require emotional safety Learn how providing structure will help your child connect with your family Discover the importance of providing engaging supervision Affirm that adoptive parents need support and learn how to help
Therapists' Acclaim for Adopting a Child with Trauma...
"The subtitle of this little book is apt: it is a practical guide. If you are considering adopting, read it first. It may well put you off, but that's better than taking in an already troubled child, only to pass the load on to someone else, causing another experience of rejection and loss for the child."
--Robert Rich, PhD. anxietyanddepression-help.com
"Anyone adopting a child with a history of trauma will find this in work a wealth of practical advice. Its very shortness is a virtue when parenting is already so demanding. Effective parenting, including adoptive parenting, comes out of knowledge and understanding was well as love. Theresa Fraser cuts to the chase with just what you need to know to be prepared to meet the challenges of adopting a traumatized child."
Marian K. Volkman, editor of "Children and Traumatic Incident Reduction"
Learn more at www.theresafraser.com
From Loving Healing Press www.LovingHealing.com

Prior to World War II, international adoption was virtually unknown, but in the twenty-first century, it has become a common practice, touching almost every American. How did the adoption of foreign children by U.S. families become an essential part of American culture in such a short period of time? Rachel Rains Winslow investigates this question, following the trail from Europe to South Korea and then to Vietnam. Drawing on a wide range of political and cultural sources, The Best Possible Immigrants shows how a combination of domestic trends, foreign policies, and international instabilities created an environment in which adoption flourished. Winslow contends that international adoption succeeded as a long-term solution to child welfare not because it was in the interest of one group but because it was in the interest of many. Focusing on the three decades after World War II, she argues that the system came about through the work of governments, social welfare professionals, volunteers, national and local media, adoptive parents, and prospective adoptive parents. In her chronicle, Winslow not only reveals the diversity of interests at play but also shows the underlying character of the U.S. social welfare state and international humanitarianism. In so doing, she sheds light on the shifting ideologies of family in the postwar era, underscoring the important cultural work at the center of policy efforts and state projects. The Best Possible Immigrants is a fascinating story about the role private citizens and organizations played in adoption history as well as their impact on state-formation, lawmaking, and U.S. foreign policy.

A family built, a family lost. Truth Has a Different Shape is a story of the power of compassion, of love and loss, revelations and relationship, and the evolution of self. Growing up in the 1970s and 1980s, Kari O'Driscoll was taught that strength and stoicism were one and the same. She was also taught that a girl's job was to take care of everyone else. For decades, she believed these ideas, doing everything she could to try and keep the remaining parts of her family together, systematically anticipating disaster and fixing catastrophes one by one. Truth Has a Different Shape is one woman's meditation on how societal and familial expectations of mothering influenced her sense of self and purpose, as well as her ideas about caretaking. As an adult, finding herself a caretaker both to her own children and to her aging parents, O'Driscoll finally reckons with the childhood trauma that shaped her world. Adoption, loss, and divorce defined her approach to motherhood, but in Truth Has a Different Shape, O'Driscoll finally pushes back. This memoir tracks her progress as she discovers how to truly care for those she loves without putting herself at risk, using mindfulness and compassion as tools for healing both herself and her difficult relationships.

Numerous reasons cause adopted teenagers to reconnect with their birth family via Facebook, creating new challenges for adoption today and tomorrow. Incorporating theory, practice, anecdotes, metaphors, diagrams, models and case studies, this accessible book, written by an experienced adopter, clearly explains these complex issues. It maps connections between trauma, child development, grief, adolescence, contact, truth telling and parenting styles; offering fresh perspectives and strategies for parents and professionals.

From Torey Hayden, the number one Sunday Times bestselling author of One Child comes Lost Girl, a poignant and deeply moving account of a lost little girl and an extraordinary educational psychologist's courage and determination.

Jessie is nine years old and looks like the perfect little girl, with red hair, green eyes and a beguiling smile. She even has a talent for drawing gorgeous and intricate pictures. But Jessie also knows how to get her own way and will lie, scream, shout and hurt to get just exactly what she wants.

Her parents say they can't take her back, and her social workers struggle to deal with her destructive behaviour and wild mood swings. After her chaotic passage through numerous foster placements, Jessie has finally received a diagnosis of an attachment disorder. Attachment disorders arise when children are deprived of the all-important close bonds with trustworthy adults that allow them to develop emotionally and thrive. Finally educational psychologist Torey Hayden is called in to help. Torey agrees to weekly meetings with Jessie to try and uncover why she is acting out. Torey's gentle care and attention reveal shocking truths behind Jessie's lies. Can Torey and the other social workers help to provide the consistent loving care that has so far been missing in Jessie’s life, or will she push them away too?

All families of children affected by trauma are on a journey, and this book will help to guide you and your family on your journey from trauma to trust. Sarah Naish shares her own experiences of adopting five siblings. She describes how to use therapeutic parenting - a deeply nurturing parenting style - to overcome common challenges when raising children who have experienced trauma. The book describes a series of difficult episodes for her family, exploring both parent's and child's experiences of the same events - with the child's experience written by a former fostered child - and in doing so reveals the very good reasons why traumatized children behave as they do. The book explores the misunderstandings that grow between parents and their children, and provides comfort to the reader - you are not the only family going through this! Full of insights from a family and others who have really been there, this book gives you advice and strategies to help you and your family thrive.

The story every mother in America needs to read. As featured on NPR and the TODAY Show. All moms have to deal with choosing baby names, potty training, finding your village, and answering your kid's tough questions, but if you are raising a Black child, you have to deal with a lot more than that. Especially if you're a single Black mom... and adopting. Nefertiti Austin shares her story of starting a family through adoption as a single Black woman. In this unflinching account of her parenting journey, Nefertiti examines the history of adoption in the African American community, faces off against stereotypes of single Black moms, and confronts the reality of what it looks like to raise children of color and answer their questions about racism in modern-day America. Honest, vulnerable, and uplifting, Motherhood So White is a fantastic book for mothers who have read White Fragility by Robin DiAngelo, Stamped from the Beginning by Ibram X. Kendi, Why Are All The Black Kids Sitting Together in the Cafeteria? by Beverly Daniel Tatum, or other books about racism and want to see how these social issues play out in a very personal way for a single mom and her Black son. This great book club read explores social and cultural bias, gives a new perspective on a familiar experience, and sparks meaningful conversations about what it looks like for Black families in white America today.

Many adopted or foster children have complex, troubling, often painful pasts. This book provides parents and professionals with sound advice on how to communicate effectively about difficult and sensitive topics, providing concrete strategies for helping adopted and foster children make sense of the past so they can enjoy a healthy, well-adjusted future. Approximately one of every four adopted children will have adjustment challenges related to their separation from the birth family, earlier trauma, attachment difficulties, and/or issues stemming from the adoption process. Common complicating issues of adopted children are feelings of rejection, abandonment, or confusion about their origins. While many foster and adoptive parents and even many professionals are reluctant to communicate openly about birth histories, silence only adds to the child's confusion and pain. This revised and significantly expanded edition of the award-winning Telling the Truth to Your Adopted or Foster Child equips parents with the knowledge and tools they need to communicate with their adopted or foster child about their past. Revisions include coverage of significant new research and information regarding the importance of understanding the child's trauma history to his or her well-being and successful adjustment in his foster or adoptive family. The authors answer such questions as: How do I share difficult information about my child's adoption in a sensitive manner? When is the right time to tell my child the whole truth? How do I obtain more information on my child's history? Detailed descriptions of actual cases help the parent or caregiver find ways to discover the truth (particularly in closed and international adoption cases), organize the information, and explain the details of the past gently to a toddler, child, or young adult who may find it frightening or confusing. Presents age-appropriate, specific guidelines that make an intimidating and potentially uncomfortable task straightforward, organized, and manageable Serves to remove the fear of how to make sense of the past for foster and adopted children of all ages, allowing parents, teachers, counselors, and other caregivers to have open, honest, and beneficial dialogues with children and teens with tough pasts Explains how children's development is impacted by separation from their birth families and identifies the issues generated by the trauma occurring before, during, and after the separation Reveals powerful insights gained from the story of one of the first African American children to be adopted in the United States by a white family-an individual who is now middle-aged

'A writer of genuine accomplishment' Good Book Guide A story of adoption and queer parenting from the award-winning author of The Spring of Kasper Meier, The Other Hoffmann Sister and An Honest Man A pause. 'Ah, Herr Fergusson. It's Frau Schwenk.' Our social worker, I now understood. 'Thank you for getting back to me. I'm calling because we have a little boy, four weeks old, who needs a family.' In 2018, after the introduction of marriage equality in Germany, Ben Fergusson and his German husband Tom became one of the first same-sex married couples to adopt in the country. In Tales from the Fatherland Fergusson reflects on his long journey to fatherhood and the social changes that enabled it. He uses his outsider status as both a gay father and a parent adopting in a foreign country to explore the history and sociology of fatherhood and motherhood around the world, queer parenting and adoption and, ultimately, the meaning of family and love. Tales from the Fatherland makes an impassioned case for the value of diversity in family life, arguing that diverse families are good for all families and that misogyny lies at the heart of many of the struggles of straight and queer families alike.

Each adoption is a unique event for the people who are personally involved, or for those who feel connected to the parents-to-be. The adoption period takes you to a new world and can wear you down emotionally if you are not prepared for what can be expected. It is not the regular pregnancy with which some people like to compare it. It is a pregnancy between cold bureaucracy on one side and the daily feelings of vulnerable tenderness on the other. Many books have been written about the ins and outs of pregnancies but there was never a book to prepare oneself for that very special time we call adoption. Geeri Bakker takes you there with her positive attitude and her sense of humor. She takes you along the unpredictable, uncomfortable and sometimes seemingly endless path that is the adoption procedure. THE ADOPTION HANDBOOK teaches adoptive parents-to-be how to face stress in its many appearances during the sometimes dark and winding road that leads to their adoptive child. To illustrate the book, Geeri Bakker shares her own story of the procedures that she and her husband endured when adopting their two children. It is not the (Dutch) procedure that makes this story so touching and at times breathtaking. It is the way that stress burrows into hearts that desperately wish to adopt a child; something that anyone going through an adoption procedure will recognize. THE ADOPTION HANDBOOK helps adoptive parents acknowledge their feelings of stress during their long-term 'pregnancy' and deal with them: facing the main goal, and feeling energetically able, both physically and mentally, to 'conceive' their child when the time is right. It is only normal that pregnant couples gather information to prepare themselves. So now it is time that adoptive parents prepare themselves, as well. For the well-being of this special child, given to you to have, hold, love, cherish, and to let it grow and grow up in your family.

Twelve year old Danielle has been excluded from a special school and her former foster family can no longer cope. She arrives as an emergency placement at the home of foster carer Angela, who soon suspects that there is more to the young girl's disruptive behaviour than meets the eye. Can Angela's specialist training unlock the horrors of Danielle's past and help her start a brave new life?

The Girl With Two Lives is the fourth book from well loved foster carer and Sunday Times bestselling author Angela Hart. Another true story from the experienced and bestselling foster carer – sharing the tale of one of the many children she has fostered over the years. A story of the difference that quiet care, a watchful eye and sympathetic ear can make to those children whose upbringing has been less fortunate than others.

The Foster Parenting Manual is a comprehensive guide offering proven, friendly advice for novice and experienced parents alike. Distilling many years' experience into one book, John DeGarmo combines his own wisdom with that of fellow foster parents. He describes what to expect from the process, how to access help and how to ensure the best care for your child. He tackles thorny issues such as children's use of the Internet and social media, managing contact with birth parents and how to support your child at school. Most importantly, he provides advice designed to help your child feel safe, secure and loved. The Foster Parenting Manual offers seasoned, sympathetic advice that will be valued by foster parents and the professionals who support them.