In our recent blog post we discussed The 5 Love Languages of Children, by Chapman & Campbell and learned the benefits of using a child’s primary Love Language because it provides a direct way to connect with them. The 5 Love Languages of Children asserts that once parents start speaking in a language which the child understands fluently, communication improves dramatically. The child’s Love Language provides a fast lane to their attention and their hearts. To recap, the five Love Languages are: Words of Affirmation, Quality Time, Physical Touch, Receiving Gifts, Acts of Services

This week we wanted to recognize the flip side of communicating via this direct link to her heart. Chapman and Campbell remind us to never use the primary love language to discipline or punish.  Disciplining a child using her preferred Love Language, can be devastating. The message is received, amplified and taken to heart. If the discipline is delivered in anger, it crushes rather than corrects. The message keys directly into the lock that guards their most vulnerable part, sweeps over their defensive walls and strikes.

Think of it this way. Communicating via a Love Language opens and activates their deepest vulnerabilities. Instead of strengthening a connection and creating a positive experience, it delivers a sucker punch. This damages the relationship—especially when done in the heat of anger and frustration. This result is counter to our intentions as adoption-attuned parents who are committed to relationship building.

Chapman and Campbell devote an entire chapter of The 5 Love Languages of Children to the topic of anger. This may seem an odd concept to discuss in relation to Love Languages. Yet we all know that anger often accompanies parental efforts to discipline (and the child’s response to it). It is easy to lose sight of the education and training purpose of discipline and instead to concentrate on the punishment part. This serves neither child, parent nor the relationship. In fact, it damages both and it teaches a child to build higher walls to ensure protection from similar encounters in the future. Instead of learning from parents, they learn to fear connection with parents. Instead of heeding the parental message, the child tunes it out--and they miss the chance to acquire the missing skill that precipitated the need for discipline in the first place.

As adoptive families, we have a deeply vested interest in raising children with a strong emotional literacy. Adoption is inherently colored with complex feelings. It is up to us to educate our kids on how to express and cope with this crazy quilt of emotions. We must teach them that all of their emotions are welcome. In the absence of clearly conveying this openness, kids are left to struggle unsupported as they wrestle with the feelings of grief, loss, curiosity, joy and anger that is part of life in an adoptive family.

Chapman and Campbell further suggest that parents resist the urge to stifle children’s anger—especially verbal anger. It is after all, far better to use angry words than fists or other kinds of violence.  Anger is a real and valid emotion and children need to be trained on how to express it productively, safely and with respect. Like all important learnings, this takes time and practice, (and good parental modeling.) For further exploration, read the entire book. It is chock full of strategies for parenting with compassion, respect and healthy relationship in mind.

Adults have primary Love Languages as well. Consider how these communication lessons can benefit our relationships with our spouse or partner. Commit to learning the Love Languages of your family members. (And to use them wisely.) Many benefits result when "love tanks" are full. Happy parents are the hub of happy families!

available here

Growing Intentional Families Together Adoption Articles

• Support for Adoptive Parents: Know Your Options
• What to Expect From An Adoption Coach
• Creating an Adoption Plan With Your Adoption Coach
• Pre-Adoption: The Big Questions to Ask and Answer
• Support for Adopted Children: Know Your Options

Featured Posts for Adopting.com

• Understanding the Need for Positive Adoption Language,
• Moving Beyond “Color Blind” Parenting to Value The Human Rainbow, 

Featured Posts for Americaadopts.com

• The Secret to Creating a Successful Open Adoption Relationship with a Birth Mother
• How Open Adoption Builds Bridges to Healing
• Giving Thanks for Adoption

Books—Non-fiction

Written by Growing Intentional Families Together Coaches

ABC, Adoption & Me (REVISED & REILLUSTRATED The original version of this book launched in 2013. It earned many awards[1] and adoptive families reported that it genuinely helped them explore and discuss adoption with their little children, in a way that kids felt supported and that also deepened their connection. Using the familiar framework of an alphabet book, it introduces a range of adoption-connected concepts, from the very simple such as "B is for bellybutton. Everyone has one." to "R is for real. My birth parents and my adoptive parents are all real. I'm a real kid and we are a real family."

ABC, Adoption & Me (REVISED & REILLUSTRATED) allows parents to plant seeds of understanding which they can expand over the years in age-appropriate ways. This revised version reflects the latest in the professional understanding of adoption complexity, the challenges of young adoptees, and the conversations and strategies that draw families in support of one another. Wesley Blauvelt’s evocative illustrations are compelling. The illustrations in this revised version of ABC reflect a more nuanced emotional tone and better capture adoption complexity. We hope you agree! Includes a Parent Guide.

ABC Adoption and Me, A Multicultural Picture Book for Adoptive Families by Gayle H. Swift - Named a Notable Picture Book of 2013 by Shelf Unbound, this is a book about adoption that celebrates the blessing of family and addresses the difficult issues as well. With charming, exuberant illustrations and a diverse representation of families, ABC, Adoption & Me will warm hearts, deepen understanding of what it means to be an adoptive family, and provide teaching moments that bring families closer, connected in truth, compassion, and joy.

Midwest Book Review:

Truly a multiple-award-winning book about the experience of adoption, "ABC, Adoption & Me" breaks new ground in the field of adoption experience integration. Useful for children, families, caretakers, and teachers, "ABC, Adoption & Me" offers positive presentations of many common experiences shared by adoptive children and families. Prefaced by a helpful introduction titled How to Use ABC, Adoption & Me, this cheery, vivid color illustrated ABC book focuses on special topics related to adoption in a non-judgmental and respectful way. Some examples are, "C is for children. You can be adopted at any age, from tiny babies to teens," or "M is for miss. Sometimes I miss my birth parents. I wonder if they miss me too." Also memorable is "P is for parents. Birth parents gave me life. Adoptive parents gave me a (forever) family." And finally, there is "Z is for zig-zag. Sometimes I feel happy and sad about being adopted." Written by an adoptive mother/daughter team, "ABC, Adoption & Me" uses bright cartoon illustrations to present interracial adoptive families and origin birth families with equal validity and authenticity, as well as many other adoption sensitive issues and topics. "ABC, Adoption & Me" deserves every single one of its many awards and should be a part of every child's library.

We’re Adopted, So What? Teens Tell It Like It Is

 Kids need to see themselves in the books they read. We're Adopted, So What? tells the story of a diverse group of girls and the complex emotions and thoughts that often come with being adopted.  Aimed at middle-schoolers, it strives to help adoptees grapple with and discuss their adoption-connected thoughts, feelings, and emotions.

Being a teenager is tough enough. When you factor in the complexities and challenges of being adopted, it is exponentially harder. This graphic-style book, "We're Adopted. So What?" features five teen girls who share a huge thing in common: each of them was adopted. This shared experience draws them together yet the distinctions between their experiences are as unique as their personalities. Feisty, fun and outspoken, the girls tackle some tough topics. They share their thoughts and feelings about adoption, how it shapes their world and relationships, creates challenges, burdens them with curiosity, frustration, anger, and grief, and shows how they strive to blend together their biological and their adoptive worlds.

Open adoption has become the norm for most contemporary domestic adoptions yet questions and complications still remain for adoptees and their families. How can all these people cooperate to create healthy, supportive relationships that best support adoptees? How does a young adoptee balance their dual loyalties and connections? How do they weave the spectrum of their feelings, challenges, and experiences into a cohesive identity?

We now recognize that connection to, and respect for, an adopted child's biological roots is integral to an adoptee's ability to successfully unify their dual heritage. Still, the concept of openness remains shrouded in apprehension, confusion, and curiosity. How is it possible for a child to have two sets of parents involved in their lives? Against this backdrop of openness, how do teens in international or "traditional closed" adoptions, feel about and deal with their lack of connection with birth families?

This book overflows with practical suggestions for how to navigate the constantly changing seas that adoptees face. The influences of DNA are forever, just as the influence of the adoptive family's nurturing will permanently shape the child's worlds. The process is complicated and can be difficult to articulate. This book provides a way to spark these important conversations with families or friends. It validates and renders compassionate witness to the adoptee experience.

Reimagining Adoption: What Adoptees Seek from Families and Faith by Sally Ankerfelt, M. Div., and Gayle H. Swift, CPC

As certified coaches, cofounders of GIFT family services, and as adoptive parents, the authors bring a unique blend of professional skills and personal experience with adoption to their book. Sally is a Lutheran minister and Gayle is an award-winning author. This combination of education and experience provides them with a robust perspective on the issue. They see beyond the cultural mythology and understand the practical reality that challenges adoptees, their families, and the people who support them. They infuse this knowledge into an examination of adoption practice and on forging ways to improve it. "Reimagining Adoption: What Adoptees Seek from Families and Faith" aligns personal experience, trauma research, expert insights, and adoptee interviews into adoption-attuned strategies that support adoptees and their families. They infuse this knowledge into a reimagining of adoption practice inside and outside the church.

The book is intended for anyone who is interested in understanding adoption through the lens of faith as well as how congregations can grow in support of adoptees and their families. One thing that makes the book powerful is that adoptee interviews form the basis of the book. The authors heard from many adoptees how their faith has been challenged because of what people in their congregations and some family members have told them. For example: "It was God's will."  "We were meant to be together." "You should feel lucky you were adopted."

Reimagining Adoption is a resource that is both practical and visionary, one that understands the history as well as the current needs of adoptees and their families. This Adoption-attuned approach will help families build a deeply connected life together, a fundamental goal of every adoptive family.

Additional Authors and Titles

Who’s in My Family

Families come in all shades and groupings—bio families, stepfamilies, foster families, and adopted families. Who’s in My Family: All about Our Families by Robie H. Harris and illustrated by Nadine Bernard Westcott presents a wide array of family constellations. Most readers will be able to spot their own family reflected in the range depicted in the illustrations. The multicultural illustrations depict families as they participate in several activities: eating, exercising, visiting the zoo, etc.  While the variety of families is richly depicted, the unifying thread of the story is that families enjoy spending time together and love each other regardless of how alike or similar they look.

Personal Space Camp

One excellent resource is a marvelous book by Julia Cook titled, “Personal Space Camp.”With a deft sense of humor and zany illustrations by Carrie Hartman, this book tackles the complicated concept of personal space. Louis, the confused main character loves the world of outer space. But when it comes to personal boundaries, Louis is clueless. His frustrated teacher arranges for him to attend “Personal Space Camp.” This thrills Louis. He is surprised to learn that he will not be an astronaut exploring.

Louis is, however, entering unexplored territory: the world of personal space boundaries. “Personal Space Camp” is entertaining and informative without being preachy. It conveys important information that will assist kids that lack an understanding of social cues.

I Can’t Believe You Said That

Julia Cook has written several other books that delve into the confusing world of social cues and interaction. One that is also quite helpful is,“I Can’t Believe You Said That.” (Illustrated by Kelsey De Weerd, it features multicultural characters.) The story helps kids discern the difference between saying something true:  ”You are fat,” versus something that is appropriate: “You are a good cook.”

Lullaby

What greater blessing than that of a mother’s love? It is exquisitely depicted in the book, Lullaby (for a Black Mother.) Based on the Langston Hughes poem, it is illustrated by Sean Qualls in acrylic, pencil, and collage.

This lovely book beautifully captures the intimacy of a bedtime ritual. The text is melodious, soothing, and accompanied by pictures in the perfect palette of soft hues of blues, purples, and aqua. When I view the book’s universal theme of mother/child connection through the lens of adoption-attunement, what do I notice? Read more 

In Our Mother’s House

As an adoptive parent, an adoption coach, and a writer on adoption issues, I found In Our Mother’s House by renowned author, illustrator Patricia Polacco exceptional. As is probably obvious from the title, the story focuses on a/n (adoptive) family with two mothers. Readers searching for stories that include LGBTQ families will appreciate this upbeat and poignant tale. Read more

And Tango Makes Three

And Tango Makes Three is a charming book that presents a sweet story of “family as different” but still very much a family. On the flyleaf of the book is this quote: “In the zoo, there are all kinds of animal families. But Tango’s family is not like any of the others. Tango has two dads. Read more

Jack & Emma's Adoption Journey

Jack & Emma's Adoption Journey speaks about adoption through the adoptee's personal lens. It is a short yet powerful book. Written by an adult adoptee, the story focuses on the thoughts and feelings of Jack and Emma. The text on each page is accompanied by an author's note addressed to the adoptive parent. This sidebar clarifies the moment/issue for the parent and shines a light on Jack and Emma's action or thought being depicted on the page. Although this book is brief, it touches on some important adoptee issues, e.g., identity questions, yearning to fit in, anxiety, fear of rejection, wondering about birth parents, ambivalent feelings about birthdays, self-blame, anger and longing to understand biological ancestry. All of these thoughts are common to adoptees. Mentioning them in the story helps to normalize their thought processes and opens the door to important family conversations in which parents can listen, validate and support their child's feelings and concerns. When parents share such conversations, they reassure their children that their love is unconditional and does not require kids to choose between their two families. It affirms that each is an integral and treasured part of the child, and by extension to the entire family. Pam Kroskie serves as the past President of the American Adoption Congress, is a Congressional Angel in Adoption Award Winner, the current president of H.E.A.R. (Hoosiers for Equal Access to Records,) and for many years has raised her voice on behalf of adoptees. She hosts AAC Adoption News and Views on Blog Talk Radio.

A Place in My Heart

Mary Grossnickle’s sweet story, “A Place in My Heart, is one great example of a story that validates the adopted child’s point of view. Charlie–a chipmunk adopted into a family of squirrels wrestles with the differences in their appearance. Adoptees commonly feel like they don’t quite fit so they will easily identify with Charlie’s struggle. Read more

Three Names of Me

Tells the story of Mary’s little girl who was adopted from China. It asserts she has three names: “My first name was whispered to me by my first mother; when I was born; it’s someplace in my heart.” Even though the child is unable to recall it, she finds comfort in the belief that her first mother called her by a name, one that is no longer part of conscious memory but it still part of her history. Further along her timeline, at her orphanage, she was given the name Wang Bin which means “gentle and refined.” The child experiences a sense of being seen as an individual worthy of a name that captures who she is. This affirms her dignity, acknowledges her journey through to adoption, and is a treasured part of her. Finally, from her adoptive parents, she receives her third name: Ada, a phoneme of the Chinese  Ai da  which means “love arrived.” Three names of Me is a heartfelt tale of tradition, identity, and history.

Twenty Things Adopted Kids Wish Their Adoptive Parents Knew

Twenty Things Adopted Kids Wish Their Adoptive Parents Knew by Sherrie Eldridge - An essential book in the adoptive family’s library. Written by an adoptee, it provides a broad sweep of the issues adoptees face. With this awareness parents can provide the emotional context their children need to develop healthy attachments and to reconcile the challenges of being adopted. It is never too early or too late to read this book. A gem.

The Adoptive & Foster Parent Guide

The Adoptive & Foster Parent Guide: How to Heal Your Child's Trauma and Loss by Carol Lozier, LCSW    The book is written in a straight-forward style that is practical and easy to understand. Because it is compact, overwhelmed parents can read it quickly and put the suggestions to work immediately.
Carol writes in a manner that is informative, compassionate, and encouraging. She understands that adoptive parenting is different from bio-parenting and requires adoption-appropriate techniques. She shares tools that parents can use to educate themselves, family and friends. This helps to create a team that supports the family instead of critics who sit in judgment. Carol Lozier's book is practical and insightful.

Adopting the Hurt Child

Adopting the Hurt Child: Hope for Families with Special-Needs Kids A Guide for Parents and Professionals by Gregory Keck and Regina Kupecky; 1995 by Gregory C. Keck and Regina M. Kupecky; Pinon Press - For those who have adopted special needs children, this book is helpful in its realistic portrayal of the challenges and also the hope and opportunity in parenting children who have been hurt. I appreciated the vingettes interspersed throughout the book that helped illustrate the concepts that Keck and Kupecky were discussing. This book also includes a chapter on intercountry adoption, which we found helpful.

I Choose

Children enjoy being able to decide things for themselves. As parents we often make the bulk of the decisions in our children's lives. Most of us understand that decision making is a skill. Like all skills, mastery only comes through practice. Long before kids become proficient decision makers, they will plod through many errors in judgment. As parents, we face a learning curve too--when is it "safe" for kids to make a choice and when must the decision fall on our shoulders? Read more

Adoption & the Jewish Family

Adoption & the Jewish Family by Shelley Krapnek Rosenberg -

This book addresses some of the unique issues that Jewish families face when adopting.

Anger: How To Live With And Without It

Anger: How To Live With And Without It by Albert Ellis, 1977 by Reader's Digest Press and Thomas Crowell Company - Though this is not directly a book about adoption, it has helped me greatly in my response to not only my children but all people in my life. Anger is partly a learned response. Learning and discerning when and how to be angry can improve relationships greatly, especially when we may have children who come with a great deal of anger over past hurts. I highly recommend this "oldie but goody."

Being Adopted

by David Brodzinsky Ph. D., Marshall D. Schechter M.D. And Robin Marantz Henig - This book covers all stages of development, infancy through adulthood, of the adoptee. The authors use stories from their patients and surveys to illustrate the 6 major themes of their book; life from the adoptees perspective, how the adoptee feels about being adopted changes throughout their developmental stages, giving the adoptee a sense of normal, creating individuality as there is no right way to experience adoption, search for self when a part of them has been cut out of their life and the adoptees sense of loss. I appreciated how the authors tied the scientific evidence to life through the adoptees experiences.

The Blessing of a B Minus

The Blessing of a B Minus: Using Jewish Teachings to Raise Resilient Teenagers by Wendy Mogel - Similar in nature and follow up to Wendy Mogel’s first book and looks at the blessings of raising teens and some of the issues today’s parents face and practical advice for dealing with them. Although rooted in Jewish precepts, I agree that Mogel's compassion and authenticity will ring true with parents of all faiths facing the tumultuous teen years.”

The Blessing Of A Skinned Knee

The Blessing Of A Skinned Knee: Using Jewish Teachings to Raise Self-Reliant Children by Wendy Mogel - Although not particularly about adoption, this book is a guide to parenting and supports a coaching model in that we cannot, nor should we save our children from experiences from which they can grow to be self-reliant, compassionate and ethical children. Draws on the wisdom of the Torah, the Talmud, and other Jewish teachings and employs the framework of nine “blessings” to address key parenting issues such as respect for adults, chores, keeping expectations in line with your child’s temperament, avoiding over scheduling and overindulgence, and more.

Building the Bonds of Attachment

Building the Bonds of Attachment: Awakening Love in Deeply Troubled Children by Daniel A. Hughes - Looks at, through the experience of one child how attachment can occur, even at a later date in a child's life. Attachment only worked by using a technique called "The Attitude" (its five qualities include being accepted, curious, empathetic, loving and playful) and by creating strong boundaries.

The Connected Child

The Connected Child: Bring Hope and Healing to Your Adopted Family  A brilliant book filled with strategies to assist adoptive families. Dr. Karen Purvis is the Director of the Institute of Child Development at Texas Christian University (TCU) in Fort Worth, Texas. Her work focuses on building and strengthening relationships.

The Eye of Adoption

The Eye of Adoption by Jody Dyer Jody Cantrell Dyer writes from the heart with integrity, honesty, humor, compassion, and a commitment to guide others who wait for “their” child to arrive through private agency adoption. She offers her experience as encouragement as they too, work through the arduous pre-adoptive process. When adopting, a baby doesn’t arrive after a nine-month wait; sometimes the matching process takes many years.
Jody’s story gives an inside view of how one person successfully navigated the journey. She and Kerri created an open adoption that works for them. It acknowledged the grief and loss of all parties—Kerri’s, Bryant, and their extended families—and continues an ongoing relationship.
Dyer understands that adoption must be focused on finding the best family for a child versus finding a child for hopeful parents. This awareness does not dilute the raw emotions that she experiences. Joy, excitement, yearning, frustration, fear, impatience, self-doubt, depression, envy of the fertile—all of these feelings make an appearance in this engaging portrait of a woman who is 100% to adopting a child. Eight years is a long time to remain dedicated to a dream but Jody never faltered.
The interview pages with Kerri provide insight into this young birth mother’s thoughts, emotions, and choices.
Waiting parents will find Eye of Adoption an excellent read. They will also want to read widely on how to prepare and educate themselves for the unique task of living as an adoptive family.

Family First

 Family First: Your Step-by-Step Plan for Creating a Phenomenal Family
by Dr. Phil McGraw - In this book by Dr. Phil, parents are honored for their “noble” and powerful role that shapes the “tone, texture, mood and quality of this interconnected and vitally important unit”. The book empowers parents by providing strategies for creating a phenomenal family, for creating a family legacy and for parenting with the insight of knowing your personal style, as well as your child’s. Divorced and blended families are recognized for their unique challenges as well and he addresses that in the beginning of the book. In Part Two, Dr. Phil shares seven tools for purposeful parenting: Define success, Listen and learn, Partner with your child, Performance and payoffs, Shake it up to break it up, Put your house in order and Walk the talk.

I found this book an incredible resource for families and recommend it whole-heartedly. I loved the practical tips but, more importantly, I was impressed by how much the book coincided with the personal growth work that I’ve been involved with in the past few years. Dr. Phil says, “…the challenge of raising a successful family cannot and will not happen until you decide to clean house inside yourself first.” And, what a great first step in creating your phenomenal family – Being the best and most authentic parent you can be.

How It Feels to Be Adopted

How It Feels to Be Adopted
by Jill Krementz, 1982 by Jill Krementz; Alfred Knopf, Inc. - This book is smaller than Sacred Connections but similar in its structure of telling the stories of adoption, this time exclusively from the children's viewpoints, ages ranging from eight to sixteen years old and from various backgrounds. It's an honest book that provides great conversation starters for children as well as letting them know they are not alone in the adoption experience.

In on It

In On It: What Adoptive Parents Would Like You To Know About Adoption. A Guide for Relatives and Friends
by Elizabeth O’Toole

Lets Talk About It

Let's Talk About It: Adoption (Mr. Rogers)
by Fred Rogers ("Mr. Rogers"); 1994 by Family Communications Inc.; Penguin Putnam Books for Young Readers - Mr. Rogers of Mr. Rogers' Neighborhood does an excellent job of describing adoption, giving equal weight to the need of the child and the need of adults to be parents. The pictures are diverse, offering different ethnic backgrounds of both the child and the parents. It's an easy, short read and a great book for children of pre-school and grade school ages. Our kids had us read it together over and over again.

No Matter What by Sally Donovan Yes, love heals but parenting kids with trauma/neglect histories, requires so much more. Immerse yourself in this story of the fierce love of this adoptive family. Understand the day to day challenges as these children learn to deal with and heal from their past. Cheer on these parents as they are called on to muster every ounce of patience, determination, and hope while they discover what their kids need emotionally, academically, and socially and then work to provide it. Experience the heroism of both kids and parents who must confront the aftermath of abuse, learn to cope with and channel the anger, shame, and grief. This story will break your heart wide open, expand your understanding of the life-long impact of abuse and neglect and educate you on how to be a better, friend, teacher, family member, and perhaps call you to rise to the challenge of parenting kids with "tough starts." At the very least, it will open your eyes and hearts and draw you in to view adoptive families with more empathy and less judgment. This is not a happily-ever-after tale but a true portrait of what it takes as a family to overcome such a disastrous beginning and to triumph.

One for the Murphys by Lynda Mullaly Hunt

Get ready for a rollicking ride on an emotional roller coaster. One for the Murphys by Lynda Mullaly Hunt will make you laugh and weep as you follow Carly Conner’s journey through foster care. She’s a sassy, resilient survivor shaped by her single mom’s inconsistent parenting. Carly never knows what to expect: her mom’s whacked-out version of nurturing or neglect. When a violent stepdad enters the picture, home life deteriorates from inadequate to life-threatening.

Carly enters foster care with the Murphys. Life becomes more complicated than ever as Carly experiences what it feels like to have a mom that knows how to love unconditionally and who enjoys caring for her children. The contrast between her two families becomes apparent to Carly. Now that she’s experienced a calm, loving family home, she wants that for herself too. Carly must face a gut-wrenching decision—deciding whose daughter she wants to be.

In Carly, Lynda Mullaly Hunt has created an unforgettable character that will grab your heart and leave an indelible mark on your memory. A truly exceptional read.

The Open-hearted Way to Open Adoption

Open adoption has moved beyond the experimental stage and become the norm for most contemporary domestic adoptions. It has also created awareness that even with international adoptions, every effort should be made to gather as much birth family information, to preserve and respect these ties and to foster ongoing communication. We now recognize that connection to and respect for an adopted child’s biological roots is integral to successfully unify their dual heritage. Still, the concept remains shrouded in apprehension, confusion, and curiosity. How is it possible for a child to have two sets of parents involved in their lives?

Questions abound in the minds of prospective adopters as well as expectant parents contemplating adoption for their unborn child. (Do we need a contract? Is it enforceable? Desirable? Isn’t open adoption confusing for the child?) These and many more issues are addressed in The Open-hearted Way to Open Adoption by Lori Holden and Crystal Hass. They are the adoptive mother and birthmother who have an open adoption relationship.

There are many reasons to recommend this excellent book. It overflows with practical suggestions for how to navigate the constantly changing seas that permeate open adoption. Not just for adoptive parents, it offers ideas for all members of the triad because the three are inextricably connected. Each will be a permanent part of the child. Only the degree and level of involvement will vary. The influences of DNA are forever, just as the influence of the adoptive family’s nurturing will permanently shape the child. (Lori refers to these factors as biology and biography.)

Lori and Crystal Hass (the birth mother of one of Lori’s children,) share strategies, ideas, and personal anecdotes that are valuable, sensible, and practical. They offer options, not a specific blueprint for every adoptive family to follow. This makes sense since each adoption is unique. Their honesty and shared experience provide a window into living an open adoption journey. They reveal that open adoption is not without challenges and suggest “Talking about it and bringing your emotions up to a conscious level allows a healing release to occur … and prevents misunderstandings from cropping up.”

But the greatest value of The Open-hearted Way to Open Adoption is the philosophical assumption that underpins the book: open adoption is fundamentally an attitude that must infuse the relationship and all of the parenting decisions. The child’s best interest is the foundational premise. This may sound like an obvious fact, but all too often—especially in the past--adoption considers the comfort level, fears, and of the adults over the needs of the child. Yes, each of these is an important factor, but the foremost criteria must to be child-focused. Many fear that children will be confused or distressed by having an ongoing relationship with a birth parent/s. Lori responds, “Openness is not the cause of any eruptions but instead can actually be part of the solution to them. If you’ve established an open relationship with your child, he is more likely to allow you into his innermost thoughts and fears. He then doesn’t have to face them without you. But if you are closed, he is more alone.” [emphasis added]

The Open-hearted Way to Open Adoption is a positive and inspiring book that will touch your heart as well as provide you with persuasive, practical, and useful ideas. I am an adoption coach and a mom of now-adult children who came to us in the 1980s through closed adoptions. My children have reconnected with their birth mothers and I have seen first-hand the beneficial impact this reunion has brought all of us but most especially my children and their birth mothers. Lori points out that she takes her children to various professionals who can provide services that she cannot: physician, dentist, therapist, etc. She writes, “I can’t fill a certain emotional need that Tessa has, but I can take her to the well.” (Tessa’s birth mother, Crystal) That is love and that is parenting with a child’s best interest at heart.  I would assert that no adoptive parent wants to leave their children unsupported as they process difficult parts of the adoption experience.

Open adoption is not easy nor is it perfect, but it is far better than the old secrecy-based closed adoptions.  The greatest ingredient to success is a heart-connected attitude. This book offers a welcome, worthwhile resource for parents who are embarking on the adventure of open adoption parenting. As Lori writes, “Open adoption is a journey rather than a destination.”

Parenting Adopted Adolescents

Parenting Adopted Adolescents: Understanding and Appreciating Their Journeys by Gregory C Keck - A hopeful message that acknowledges and understands teen behavior as a regular developmental pattern and then gives parents tools for handling the behavior in light of new understanding of the behavior. It is all about relationship!

Parenting Teens With Love And Logic

Parenting Teens With Love And Logic (Updated and Expanded Edition)
by Foster Cline, MD & Jim Fay - I found this book during the teen years and wished I had found their other versions sooner. A no-nonsense approach to giving choices and allowing natural consequences even expressing empathy for the pain of the choice when it doesn't turn out the way your teen expects. Fabulous learning for both parent and teen.

Pieces of Me

Pieces of Me: Who do I Want to Be by L. Ballard, editor, EMK A series of essays written by adoptees. They face the same identity issues of all teenagers with the added complication of adoption themes. Well written in a way that addresses difficult topics without sugar-coating or catastrophizing. A heartfelt exploration that might provide a much-needed sense of common experience to a teenage adoptee and several possible roadmaps that could inform their own adoption journey.

The Primal Wound

The Primal Wound: Understanding the Adopted Child
by Nancy Newton Verrier - A wound exists when a child is separated from his/her mother. The Primal Wound explains how this wound came to be and how it manifests itself in various ways throughout the developmental stages. The book provides solutions to facilitate healing the wound for different age groups and in different situations. This book validates the existence of the Primal Wound and offers great insight to behaviors caused by it. The solutions are extremely helpful for any adoptive parent.

Raising Adopted Children

Raising Adopted Children, Revised Edition: Practical Reassuring Advice for Every Adoptive Parent
 by Lois Melina - An updated version that is comprehensive in covering adoption issues and a good resource book to have on hand.

Sacred Connections

Sacred Connections: Stories Of Adoption
, essays by Mary Ann Koenig and Photography by Niki Berg; 2000 by Mary Ann Koenig; Running Press Book Publishers - Mary Ann Koenig, a clinical psychologist and herself an adoptee, interviews those connected through adoption. The stories are real, touching, and span the various experiences of adoption: some who find their birth parents and some who do not, some who are excited about the reunion, and some who are disappointed, birth parents who are have searched for their children, etc. My adolescent son has read this book with me several times. Each night, we would take one story and read it, looking closely at the pictures. As the title suggests, the book honors all connections and this is evident in how carefully and candidly the stories are told. I highly recommend this book as a bridge to discussions with your adolescent about adoption.

Saving CeeCee Honeycutt

Saving CeeCee Honeycutt: A Novel by Beth Hoffman - A both delightful and heart-felt fiction book that reveals 12-year-old Cecelia Rose’s (CeeCee’s) journey through her mother’s tragic mental illness and death to her soft landing in her great aunt’s home in Savannah, GA. I especially liked the author’s “take” on grief and how Great-Aunt Tootie so beautifully nurtures CeeCee through it.

Here’s a quote from the book, “You might not think you’re grieving, but grief comes in all sorts of ways. There’s the kind of grief that leaves you numb, and the kind of grief that rips your world in half. And then there’s another kind of grief that doesn’t feel like grief at all. It’s like a tiny splinter you don’t even know you have until it festers so deep it has nowhere to go but into your soul. I think that’s the hardest kind of grief there is because you know you’re hurting but you don’t know why.”

Scattered Links

Scattered Links by M. Weidenbenner connected with me in many ways. First, the story is exceptionally written. Second, As an adoptive mother and a coach to adoptive families, the story had authenticity. Page after page, I ached for Oksana, the twelve-year-old heroine, for the sad reality that was/is her life and that of many other orphanage-raised, severely traumatized children who fear to trust and open themselves to attachment.

The emotional struggles portrayed ring true for both Oksana and her adoptive parents. Self-doubt, grief, loss are experienced by the entire family, not just the child. It affects the way they relate to one another. It factors into their thoughts, beliefs, and expectations

Each is shaped by both their history and their dream of becoming a family. Successfully bridging the gap between their painful reality and their idealized fantasies demands a leap of faith that does not come easily for any of them. Oksana’s struggle to build attachments, to trust and heal is well depicted. Children like her who have experienced such significant trauma cannot magically release their fears, their self-limiting coping behaviors, and their isolating belief that they must rely only on themselves. History has taught them trust is a luxury they cannot afford. They’ve learned that lesson well. In some cases, their wariness and resistance to connect was the only thing that kept them alive. (No wonder they are so reluctant to change their strategy.)

This unwillingness/inability to open oneself to emotional connection is often referred to as “RAD” (Reactive Attachment Disorder.) Many prefer to call it something less judgmental, like Reactive Attachment Syndrome. This acknowledges that the child’s response to the emotional trauma of her history is less a “disorder” and more an imperfect, self-isolating, and inefficient strategy. But they are terrified to relinquish it because they mistakenly believe it is their only way of preventing further hurt.

This complicates the attachment building process, especially when they haven’t been taught how to identify their own “stuff” and it from that of their adopted children.

When Oksana rebuffed her parents, resisted their affection and their rules, she wasn’t being ungrateful or bratty. She was in survival mode. All walls up. Heart on lockdown. Mind on Red Alert. She’s as adversely affected by her ill-designed strategy as her parents are.

There is no quick fix for this family and others with similar trauma histories. Healing takes time, patience, commitment. The process is difficult. Success is possible just not quick or easy.

Scattered Links features horse therapy. It is one therapeutic method finding that when human relationships have been contaminated by abuse, neglect, and significant violations in trust, sometimes it is easier to trust an animal. This is because they bring a clean slate to the relationship.

This book succeeds in depicting both the struggles, the good intentions, and the long road to breaking down walls and weaving family attachments.

As an adoption professional, I do have one criticism of this wonderful book. The celebration of Oksana’s joining her adoptive family is called “Gotcha Day.” This is a term many adoptees find offensive. It is seen as depersonalizing and parent-centric because it casts the child as acquired by the parents.

Some preferable terms for celebrating the anniversary of a child’s adoption would be, Homecoming Day, Adoption Day, Oksana* Day (*use your own child’s name.) Adoptive families must be sensitive to the co-existing grief that celebration days may highlight: Adoption day cannot exist without the prior loss of the birth family. Even if that family was utterly dysfunctional, the separation from one’s ancestral roots is still a loss. Some children enjoy celebrating their adoption; others do not. Let your child determine if he likes it or not.

The bottom line of this review: Adoptees are not the only ones with emotional baggage. Adoptive parents also bring their own…

The Tell

The Tell: A Memoir Heartbreaking, honest. A mother shares her family's worst nightmare. It is both an immensely cautionary tale and a story of family commitment. This is a book you will never forget. The Tell: A Memoir by Mags Karn chronicles a family walking through the unspeakable horror of sexual abuse perpetrated by one child against his sisters.

Why Love Matters

Why Love Matters: How Affection Shapes a Baby's Brain
by Sue Gerhardt - Explains why love is essential to a baby's development & how this starts very early on... even in the womb & has lasting effects on the infant.

You Don’t Look Adopted

We parents often lament that children do not come with a handbook. That’s why You Don’t Look Adopted is the next best thing.  Please read Anne’s responses; she has a great deal of insight to share with us. It is a raw, unflinching look at adoption through an adult adoptee's experiences. Her story will inspire parents who are currently raising children to create the spaces, open the conversations, and help support their kiddos through the adoption-related stresses and fallout. This is an exceptional book that is well worth the read.

Yushi and the Tall Man

Yushi and the Tall Man by Tami Staut - A children’s (pre-school and elementary school) book about adopting a Chinese baby. This is a great children's book to open discussions about adoption, and Chinese baby girl adoptions in particular. The story follows what happens to most Chinese baby girls who are abandoned in China, and has a happy ending with a forever family. The illustrations are wonderful and calming.

This book was written by my friend Tami Staut and is about and for my friends, the Jones family, when they adopted their baby Chinese girl, now named Elizabeth.

Books—Fiction

Help A Hamster

Help A Hamster by Hilary Robinson (Picture book for children) Meet Alphie, his classmates, and their pet hamster, Henry. Turns out, Henry is a she who recently delivered a litter. Taking care of all those babies overwhelms Henry so Alphie and his friends search for safe, loving homes for the babies. They appoint Alphie hamster monitor.
Alphie, an adoptee, sees the parallels in his own story and works hard to find homes where each of the hamsters will be happy.
This book includes information about adoption that is presented in a gentle and subtle tone. It will offer many teachable moments for kids to learn about adoption whether they are adopted themselves or not.
The illustrations by Mandy Stanley are lovely, engaging, and inclusive. As in real life, families come in different shapes and sizes. “Help a Hamster” is an excellent addition to the family library.

The Road to Paris

The Road to Paris (Coretta Scott King Author Honor Books) by Nikki Grimes - Paris is a person, not a place. This is the story of her journey as a frightened eight-year-old girl placed into foster care. Protective of her mischievous little brother, she is resilient and resourceful. This book follows Paris and her younger brother through many placements. After the children are separated, Paris struggles to stay connected. She is finally comfortable in a supportive foster home. Then her final challenge comes―rejoining her mother and brother discovering what it means to be family.

As Simple As It Seems

by Sarah Weeks. Directed toward late elementary and middle-school - Highlights the impact of a fifth-grade girl learning she is adopted. Deals with the powerful questions of nature vs. nurture as the protagonist discovers how the behavior of biological parents may or may not inform her own choices and character. An outstanding book.

Counting Down

A Memoir of Foster Parenting and Beyond by Deborah Gold "Counting Down is a deeply moving memoir about both the reward and daunting challenges of being a foster family." Deborah Gold incorporates both parent and child perspectives creating a unique and valuable perspective on fostering. A great read for anyone even if not a foster or adoptive parent.

Fall or Fly

The Strangely Hopeful Story of Foster Care and Adoption in Appalachia by Wendy Welch "Fall or Fly is a compelling, unvarnished glimpse into the complex world of foster care and adoption in modern-day Appalachia. Dr. Welch provides readers with a multifaceted view of the system through the eyes of children, foster parents, and caseworkers ... offering a more complete understanding of the foster care system."

When we love deeply, we express it in many ways--a thoughtful gesture, a loving touch, a heartfelt note or simply altering our schedule to ensure time spent together. Yet all too often, these expressions go unacknowledged. Even worse, they can occur without ever making a difference. Spouses, children and lovers complain of feeling unloved, unnoticed and unimportant. Communication is the holy grail of interpersonal connection and is especially elusive when parenting kids after trauma. Connection, we know, is the channel for love, self-regulation and for healing. Until our children feel love, they will continue to languish and will resist our attempts to influence, discipline or connect with them. We are left puzzled and frustrated.

Often a behavior that feels loving to one person may be totally ineffective for the other. It is like a radio station that is improperly tuned in; one hears lots of static an occasional word, but the core message is lost in translation.

Gary Chapman's landmark book, The Five Love Languages, provides a remedy to this communication mismatch and handle this dilemma. It allows us to move beyond the desire to connect and find a way that fulfills our intention. Our default inclination is to express love in the ways in which we most like to receive it. But, to increase the likelihood that our loved ones experience our expressions of love, we must  communicate in their love language. We are called to step out of our comfort zone and engage through their love language.

The 5 Love Languages that Chapman identifies are:

Words of Affirmation

Quality Time

Receiving Gifts

Acts of Service

Physical Touch

If  you are a person who hungers to hear, "I love you," you probably speak these words frequently with the expectation that your child/spouse/partner will get the message. But if words of Affirmation are not their language or they are uncomfortable verbalizing feelings their need will remain unfulfilled. One of you is broadcasting on AM and the other on FM.

What is the solution? First determine the love language for each family member, then INTENTIONALLY choose to switch to their channel. For example, if a child "hears" in Acts of Service, connect in his dialect. Perform small gestures--fluff her pillow,  rub her feet, run a bubble bath, bake cookies, prepare her favorite food. Be creative not necessarily grand. Make sure your body language aligns with your intention. Thoughtfulness is key and deliver with a smile.  If this feels like too much work, negative emotions will shine through and nullify your efforts.

Consider each language. Determine which is your preferred style and then do the same for every family member and significant relationship in your life. What do you notice? Which languages meld easily with your communication style? Which requires more effort, discipline and practice. What patterns do you notice between Love Language-comfort level and relationships that feel like less work?

Help family members to identify each other's languages. Practice intentionally connection using each person's channel. Notice what works best for both of you. As you all become familiar with the process, communication will become easier. You become attuned with one another. When under stress, you'll likely  fall back to your own preferred channel. If you feel disconnected, review recent interactions and do a "language" check. Perhaps it is time to recommit to speaking their language and to "translate" your intentions into their dialect. Reset and re-engage.

Chapman has written several books that address this topic and then fine tunes it to different ages/groups. The five love languages are consistent, but he elaborates on strategies for implementing effective connection. Check them out. You just might find discover an important tool. Commit to the love language approach not only with your children, but also with your partner. Remember, happy, emotionally connected parents are the hub of a happy, emotionally connected  family. The need to be valued and loved is primal and one of the most important gifts you can share. The Five Love Languages is one way of growing your intentional family together.

Everyone knows that children feel BIG emotions: anger swirls into fury, disappointment collapses into despair, happiness erupts into delight. They wear their emotions on their shirtsleeves where everyone can easily read them. One might easily dismiss their feelings as childish, trivial, or inconsequential; that would be a mistake. Their emotional life is as important and transforming as any adult's, even if they may struggle to manage or understand their feelings.

In fact, one of their most engaging and charming characteristics is their disarming honesty and their willingness to speak their feelings aloud. Although children's vocabulary is limited, the depth and authenticity of their feelings ring true.

A recent moment shared with my nearly-four-year-old grandson illuminates my point. He and I were on the floor in a sea of Lego pieces rummaging through them together in search of a particular brick. Out of the blue he turned to me and with palpable intensity said. “Naga, I love you.”

I melted in a swirl of reciprocal emotion. Feeling loved is a fundamental human need which each of us craves. When someone blesses us with the gift of a deep, loving connection, the experience is powerful...IF we allow ourselves the pleasure of trulyembracing it. Too often, we miss these moments because we are preoccupied with what is on our own minds and agendas.  It is easy for a child to infer that his declarations of love lack value to us or--even worse--for them to believe that their feelings are a bother and a burden. This is tragic for both individuals. Nothing on our To Do List can outweigh the value of nurturing a child's spirit and teaching him the skill of connecting with others.

My grandson's heartfelt words are etched in my memory forever. Such is the power of speaking aloud what is cherished in the heart. I replied to him, “That makes me feel very special and I never tire of hearing you say that. Thank you.” He beamed in response as my words acknowledged his gesture. Of course, I also assured him that I loved him as well. Fortunately, in our family, we are all—adults and children—comfortable verbalizing words of love and affirmation. However, some individuals and families struggle with expressing deep emotion aloud; they “say” it without the shorthand of words. Read The Five Love Languages by Gary Chapman to learn more about alternative modes in which to communicate one’s love to another and/or read these blogs.[1]

What coaching nugget does this anecdote offer us as Intentional Parents? Pause for a moment and recall a sweet memory when someone—spouse, significant other, parent, or child—spoke aloud the words I love you and you experienced them as genuine. Savor the memory and allow the positive feelings to flood over you. Notice how it energizes, comforts, and validates you. Choose a “trigger” to remind you and help you revisit this memory whenever you want or need to do so.  Imagine being able to access this affirming moment in a time when you are struggling, lonely, afraid, etc. Notice the comfort it offers because it allows you to do something other than simply worry or be awash in overwhelm

Now consider that as parents we have the ability to help create these kinds of high octane moments of connection with our kids. We can speak the words that comprise their audio archives of connection, affirmation, and reassurance. It is easy for us as parents speak words of correction: to point out when and how they can and ought to do better. Imposing consequences, highlighting their misbehaviors, or reminding them of incomplete chores—all these interactions occur easily. How sad, that words of affection, acknowledgment, encouragement, and unconditional love are often harder to say.

I can attest to the healing and encouraging power of words that verbalize deep, mutual affection. Imagine intentionally filling our kids' childhood teeming with such memories. Now that would be a parental legacy of great worth. What if we set an Intention to proactively build these moments? How might that improve our family relationships, improve connection, and deepen attachments? What if we were as vigilant in our efforts to connect with our children and strengthen them emotionally as we are to correct their actions so they can be “better” people? What might we create as a family?

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Check out these Adoption-attuned resources!

Learn how the coaches at GIFT Family Services can help you and your family navigate your adoption journey. We've faced our share of family challenges and crises, ridden the metaphorical rollercoaster, and our families have not only survived; they have thrived. We offer experience, neutrality, and understanding.

Listen to our podcasts on Adoption-attuned Parenting.

Read these book reviews by GIFT coach, Gayle H. Swift. They are written with an Adoption-attuned perspective.

[1] "Love Languages," Adoption, and the Anger Connection , Listening and Speaking: Two Sides of Relationship Communication, The Language of L♥ve Has Many Dialects

• Loss,
• Rejection,
• Guilt and  Shame,
• Identity,
• Intimacy
• Mastery and Self-control,
• Grief

If you are interested in reading more about these core issues,  read

"The Seven Core Issues of Adoption and Permanency"

 

Learn how the coaches at GIFT Family Services can help you and your family navigate your adoption journey. We've faced our share of family challenges and crises, ridden the metaphorical rollercoaster, and our families have not only survived; they have thrived. We offer experience, neutrality, and understanding. GIFT coaches are available to present workshops online.  Contact us : 1-800-653-9445

 

Listen to our podcast.

Read these books written by our coaches.

In our previous blog, we discussed the value of Love Languages and how this strategy can design more effective communication. Learning to “speak” in a channel other than our own preferred default style  requires Intentionality. As is evident from our name, Growing Intentional Families Together, we encourage and cultivate Intentionality in adoptive parenting. The acronym for our name (GIFT) also asserts our belief that family is the gift of a lifetime, one we never outgrow. Family is a life-long relationship on which we rely at every stage of life. It is where we turn to share our joys, divide our sorrows and work together to face whatever life throws at us.

Learning to communicate by utilizing the Love Language approach is one gift. Deep listening is another powerful and life-changing gift. When we listen with our entire mind and heart, without conjuring rebuttal or solutions, without minimizing or dismissing, without platitudes and denials, something magical happens. People feel seen and heard in a significant way.

As adoptive parents we yearn to provide loving families for our children, to grow healthy attachment and life-long bonds. We search for the best ways to accomplish this vital goal. What better source of information than listening to the voice on now-adult adoptees? Imagine learning from them the things that worked for them as they grew up and the omissions that left them feeling isolated, alone, or invalidated.

One group of adoptees has done that and has collaborated on a book, Adoption Therapy. It took courage for them to speak out,. Their stories are complicated, not entirely rosey and present their personal truth. Most of the stories are based on the Closed Adoption experience. But the lessons learned have great value not only for adult adoptees and their families but also for families parenting adopted children now. With raw honesty, the contributors reveal the painful costs of secrecy, shame and the disconnection from identity and birth family. They tell of loyalty binds in which adoptees felt compelled to choose their relationships with their adoptive families at the cost of denying their interest in their origins and birth families.

Some adoptees were fed outright lies. Adoptees tell how they floundered without adequate empathy, validation, or support for the profound demands that adoption placed on them. Absolutely, many benefits accrue to a child adopted into a loving adoption-attuned home. Equally true, all too real are the significant “costs” adoption demands of the adoptee. Parents and professionals delivered insufficient support. Choosing to see only the benefits adoption offered, they turned a blind eye and responded through rose-colored glasses. But the gains and losses coexist; they do not cancel each other out.

But too often, inadequate preparation, education and support was provided. As a result, these adoptees experienced great challenges in learning how to navigate life as an adoptee. Adoption Therapy unmasks the myth of adoption as the "perfect" solution AND offers insights and strategies for solutions. While the current trends in adoption practice move towards more openness, cultural resistance persists as well as cultural denial of the emotional and identity costs adoption creates.

This ignorance must be remedied. Parents, therapists, adoptive parents must become thoroughly immersed in the reality of adoption grief, loss/identity issues and the neurobiological effects that result from adverse prenatal experiences. All must commit to developing high AQ* (Adoption-attunement Quotient.) Our culture must wake up to the realities and make the appropriate changes to support adoptees, birth parents, and their families. Adoption Therapy offers a wonderful tool for opening, minds, hearts and spirits so that when adoption is the choice, it can be a gentler, more affirming experience for the adoptee.

How will you grow the gifts of: Intentionality, Love language, Deep listening, Adoptee voice?

Most of us adoptive parents spent many childless  years pursuing the holy grail of parenthood. During the waiting process, we promised ourselves and our partners, that we would do "anything" if only we could become parents. (And we meant it!) We envisioned ourselves as loving parents with happy kids who would prove our parental competence. Once  children arrive, however, it didn't take long for reality to rewrite this fairy tale. The idyllic happily-ever-after-ending proved elusive. Instead, the story we lived was full of twists, turns, highs, lows, potholes and mountain tops.

Parenting is hard and adoptive parenting, most of us discovered, is even harder! more complicated. Parenting strategies that worked for friends and relatives  didn't seem to work for us regardless of how much they insisted their tried-and-true methods were superior while adoption-attuned, therapeutic parenting methods were indulgent and lacking in sufficient discipline.

In fact, traditional hard-line parenting often  created more problems than they solved. Often, we felt like complete failures with our burdens becoming heavier as our kids floundered, challenged or resisted parental efforts to educate, discipline and connect. Fantasies of being great parents slipped from our grasp, replaced self-doubt. We were families in stress. A huge disconnect divided the parents we-wanted-to-be from the parents-we-actually were; neither one embodied the parents our kids needed.

When we can't rely on traditional parenting templates, on the strategies that we experienced in our own childhoods, what choices remained for us? That's when we realized the pivotal need for considering, understanding, and recognizing adoption loss, its accompanying trauma and how these factors required a redesign of parenting strategies. It also demanded that we look within ourselves to identify our own triggers, handle our own emotional baggage and brave the challenges of conquering the obstacle-filled landscape of life as an adoptive family. We were ready to become adoption-attuned parents.

As coaches, we ask clients to assess current circumstances and implement fresh strategies to interrupt auto-pilot patterns in order to generate change. Sometimes this mandates a shift in perspective: Instead of viewing a behavior as manipulative, irritating or intentional, view it as communication. What happens when we remove the emotional baggage that attaches to behavior formerly labeled as malicious, lazy or defiant? How does this shift our emotional response? How does this shift in feelings, influence our thoughts? How does it open up new possibilities for connection and communication?

Rubber Meets the Road Challenge: Let's try an "experiment" for one week. What one behavior are you willing to add/eliminate/enhance/reduce that might have the largest impact on your relationship with your child? Think carefully here. Some examples:

• Commit to observing and acknowledging ten positive things with your child daily.
• Promise to avoid all sarcasm.
• Eliminate "mixed" message comments
• (positive feedback with a criticism or "I-told-you-so" tacked at the end.)
• Share laughter at least once daily
• Say "I love You" daily in each person's Love Language.
• (Read more on Love Language.)

Here's an activity you can do as a family. Create a flip book. Send to birth parents, distant family or even exchange it within the family.

Activity:  Via Inner ChildFun 

When I went to the dictionary to look up the word addict, the definition that most resonated with me was from the Franklin Language Master.  It defined addict as “one who devotes or surrenders oneself to something habitual or excessive”.  From this definition, one might infer that everyone is an addict.  Everyone has habits that may be considered excessive, at times. However, it has been my experience, that a true addict does not just surrender to something, but rather, his life is consumed by it.  The outer world of an addict has no willpower to break the hold or grip that the pattern has upon him.  There is an absence of self-control in many aspects of their life.  Generally, there is not just one pattern that has a hold on the addict.  There are generally many -- or a succession on them that will occur each time one of them becomes controlled.

As adoptive parents, there is a strong possibility that we have an addict in our family. Due to their DNA and background, many of our children have addictive personalities.  My son is one of them.  He has been addicted to drugs, weight loss, health, alcohol, tobacco and “love”.  Although I recognized his addiction to most of these, it wasn't until recently that I recognized his addiction to “love”.  The pattern was there.  However, it is not one that is typically labeled an addiction.

Since he was little, he had to have a female companion in his life.  Whenever they would be in his life, he would do everything and anything to please them.  He becomes so consumed with the relationship that everything else in his life takes a backstage.  Although he has just begun recognizing this addiction, it is still a pattern that is difficult for him to break, especially because of his deeply embedded issues regarding attachment and abandonment.

When one struggles with these issues, as many adoptive children do, it has been my experience that they are not able to self-regulate, i.e. nurture, themselves.  They need others in their lives to do it for them.  Thus, they constantly seek a partner who can self-soothe them.  When this does not happen on a constant basis, these addicts reach a “high alert” stage and sabotage the relationship in some way.  Since the attachment is not secure, the relationship eventually dies and, if they have been adopted, the feeling of abandonment occurs again.

Paul Sunderland, who is a therapist, did a wonderful talk on adoption and addiction at Lifeworks Community Treatment Center. Because of the trauma that has occurred at birth due to their separation from their primary caretaker, adoptive children have a difficult time attaching securely to another human being.  Generally, they are on alert that they will be abandoned all over again, and because of this ever present threat, find it difficult to have a stable relationship.

It is my belief that, through awareness and a change in their patterns, adoptive children can find emotional stability and security.  However, it will take time since they initially have to learn to self–regulate and nurture themselves.  That can only happen after they have fully accepted themselves, showed compassion and unconditional love for self and have allowed themselves to trust in the love and support of others.  Only when they feel secure with whom they are will they be able to form a healthy and lasting relationship with another.

Joann DiStefano

Feeling short of time or finding it difficult to concentrate? You can listen to this post. Listen time 6:04

The month of May, rich with burgeoning life after winter’s severity, brings motherhood to mind . The observance of an official holiday further nudges our awareness!  So, a question comes to mind: What does it mean to mother?

Like the iconic, multi-tasking mother herself, the word holds several jobs: noun, adjective, and verb. Each category has nuanced sub-definitions. Mothering is complex—both passive and active—we can be a mother to someone and we can be mothered by someone.  We can have a mother and lose a mother to death or life circumstance.

In adoption, the word Mother holds additional unique subtexts: Expectant, Hopeful, Real, Birth, First, Adoptive, Foster… Mothers—and fathers—are described as Permanent, Temporary, Terminated, or Forever…

As so often happens, language is freighted with emotional weight. Like a fence, words mark who or what is in or out. Too often, we use language as a leveraging tool in an adversarial, either/or power play. Language influences who or what has value and/or power.

One of the most enduring realities in adoption is that family life is complicated, messy, crowded, and necessitates a Both/And approach. Our children depend on us to be inclusive. We can love with courage and verve. The choice is ours. We can resist our fears and insecurities and not allow them to limit and distress us. We can embrace the Both/And approach and harvest the advantages of inclusion. Not only will our children benefit; we will as well.

We parents love all of our children whether we adopted them or gave birth to them. If someone insisted that we choose one child and forsake another, we would adamantly refuse. We would insist that the request was impossible! Unreasonable! Cruel!

Yet, too often, this expectation of exclusivity and undivided loyalty is imposed on adopted children, not only by society but also by their adoptive parents. Adoptees are told—overtly or subtly—that they must choose their adoptive parents over their birth parents. Whether out of insecurity or fear, some adoptive parents cannot, or choose not to make room in the family circle to include all of their child’s relationships. Instead, they insist: Choose us or them.

From this limited, polarized vantage point, only one set of parents are held as real. Adopted children whose families believe this either/or point of view, suffer tremendous emotional upheaval. Mother Love becomes a knife that cleaves them instead of a sanctuary that enfolds and nurtures them.

As adoptive parents, we can refuse to ask our children to split themselves in two. Instead, we can offer them a great grace and not insist that our children be exclusively loyal and emotionally connected only to us. We can offer our children an inclusive, unconditional love that genuinely appreciates their need for all of their significant relationships. We want to forge ways to sustain emotional, intellectual, psychic, and—as long as it is safe—physical openness with birth parents. (When physical connection is not possible or is unsafe, we can still  nurture the other aspects of openness.)

Before we know it, our children will be autonomous adults no longer under our control. They will decide for themselves with whom to engage or not. Will they experience us as having been their champions, mentors, and best advocates as well as their beloved parents? Their decision will be partially based on how well they feel we met their needs and that they felt safe, seen, validated, and supported, and loved in ways that touched their hearts' core.

When we are able to create that connection, they will have experienced belonging in a way that they felt in their hearts, minds, and spirits.

Sometimes our emotions run so deep that the only way we can begin to express them is through poetry. This poem is dedicated to all those who mother...

On Mothering, Part II

For all who mother,

            We wish you blessings and joy, memories and connection.

For mothers who mourn,

            We wish you comfort and peace.

For mothers who grieve,

We wish you solace.

For those who yearn to mother,

We wish you hope and fulfillment.

For mothers who wonder,

We wish you answers and reassurance.

For mothers who suffer,

We wish you healing and understanding.

For all who seek to Mother,

We wish your dream fulfilled.

For those who love with a mother’s soul,

We wish you love returned in full measure.