Month: July 2016

W.I.S.E. UP! Handling Pokey Questions or Comments about Adoption

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W.I.S.E. UP!: A Tool to Empower Youth to Handle Questions/Comments about Adoption

A popular tool developed by Center for Adoption Support and Education (C.A.S.E.) to empower adopted children is the W.I.S.E. UP! program for handling comments and questions about adoption.  W.I.S.E. UP! gives children, teens, and parents the power to choose comfortable ways to communicate about adoption with others. This program has spread across the country and internationally as children have embraced its simplicity and power to address the consistent challenge of explaining adoption and their adoption stories.

Center for Adoption Support and Education (C.A.S.E.): http://adoptionsupport.org/

  • W.I.S.E. UP! http://adoptionsupport.org/store/wise-up-sm-powerbook/
    • Walk away
    • It’s private
    • Share a little something
    • Educate or Explain about Adoption in General
  • Training for Adoption Competency (TAC)
  • U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, Administration for Children and Families (ACF)
  • National Adoption Competency Mental Health Training Initiative (NTI)
  • Kid’s Adoption Network (K.A.N.)K.A.N. is a program that provides opportunities for groups of children, teens, and adoptive parents to share their common questions, experiences and challenges around adoption in a safe, supportive environment.
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Food & Nutrition

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http://adoptionnutrition.org/about-us/

Food is a huge issue.  It’s not the first one I wanted to tackle.  It turns mealtime into a mess.  This is still a work in progress.

Positive Self-Image Messages For Girls

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Positive Self-Image Messages For Girls:

Girls on the Run http://www.gotrsv.org/

Girls Leadership Institure http://girlsleadership.org/

Athena Camps http://athenacamps.com/

Adult Conversations/Blogs

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You generally will require a dose of adult conversations each week with someone who gets what you are going through. Chances are you won’t have the same support group you did before you embarked on this path. Not everyone is up for understanding this task you have chosen.  Just like football or ballet is not everyone’s bag, adoption and its related issues are just not interesting  or perceptively relevant to everyone.

Reading blogs is a one-sided conversation with a like-minded individual – an adult. But they get you.  They’ve done this before.  You need to hear what they have to say. You can subscribe in your email or connect to parenting blogs on Facebook.  They often provide inspirational truths that give you just enough strength and faith to keep going a little longer. Some of them are religious faith-based while some of them just stick to the faith of humanity.  You can find something to hold onto in each.

Eventually, your support group might come back together and or you will create a new one. By then your toolbox will be stronger. You will be able to educate others, if they are able to absorb it.

 http://imperfectfamilies.com/

Camps

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An adoptive family camp is a place where everyone breathes a big sigh of relief.  But getting a bunch of kids together can easily overstimulate everyone.  Parent training, and the instant support group you get is a miracle. The kids don’t want to leave.

Lilliput Camp Always

http://www.lilliput.org/

http://lilliput.org/Documents/2015-Camp-ALWAYS-flyer.pdf

http://www.aask.org/family-support/camp-always/

PACT

https://www.pactadopt.org/adoptive/services/education/pact_camp.html

Nancy Thomas

http://www.attachment.org/parents/camps/

 http://camps.adoption.com/

Conferences

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http://california-adoption.org/resources/news.html

Northern California Adoption Resources Expo
CAAA hosted the first annual Northern California Adoption Resources Expo (CARE) on Nov 7, 2015 at 9:00 am to 4:00 pm.

 

 

Facebook

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Connect easily to resources that appear in your feed without you having to seek them out.  The latest stuff just magically appears and you don’t have to do much.  I enjoy having the information served up to me. I skip stuff that is not applicable or low priority.  I save links later for when I have time to digest and take notes.

To more fully understand, what the kids are going through now and will be as they grow up, there’s a lot of information out there.

You can learn A LOT about attachment and healing trauma (especially early childhood complex trauma, also called Complex or Childhood PTSD). It is a brain injury that may or may not heal, and requires special expertise. The residual effects can last a lifetime, and shorten lives. It is often intergenerational: meaning it is a cruel cycle that repeats in each generation. If everyone is deliberately working on healing, it can stop the cycles.

Here are some websites and organizations that can be found on Facebook: