THE LATEST WORD

IMPORTANT THEMES FOR ADOPTED ADOLESCENTS . . .

Debbie Riley, author of the book Beneath the Mask: Understanding Adopted Teens recently wrote an excellent article in Adoptive Families...

The uniqueness of adoptee loss (part 3: Conclusion) . . .

I once worked with a young man, age 18 (I’ll call him Caleb) in a long-term residential program for older adolescents. He told me that by...

The uniqueness of adoptee loss (part 2) . . .

The uniqueness of adoptee loss (part 2) . . . In light of their being relinquished in the past, adoptees experience grief in different...

The uniqueness of adoptee loss (part 1) . . .

Many years ago, author and adoptive parent Deborah Silverstein wrote that, in the world of adoption, “Loss is the hub of the...

I will not ask you to forgive me, the one who had to send you away like this

“I reproached myself for being so bad, and cried with my heart aching and tearing apart. I thought about raising you by myself, but it...

Residual Suffering

“When you adopt, you are walking into someone’s suffering.”—I heard these words spoken a couple of years ago at an adoptive parents...

“I wasn’t a keeper, was I?”

“Why did my birth mom not want me?”, cried five-year-old Samantha to her adoptive mom. For the past few months, Samantha’s parents had...