How to Make and Use an Adoption Lifebook - Weekend Wisdom
Creating a Family: Talk about Adoption, Foster & Kinship Care
06/15/24
•6m
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A Lifebook is the story of how your child came to be yours and the story of his life before he came to you. Adoption is only one aspect of your child, and at some point, his life merges into your life. However, he had a life before he came to your family, and his Lifebook tells this part of his story.
Resources
- Adoption Lifebooks (Suggested Books)
- Welcoming an Older Child to Your Home (Resource Page)
- Transitioning a Child to Your Home (Resource Page)
Please leave us a rating or review. This podcast is produced by www.CreatingaFamily.org. We are a national non-profit with the mission to strengthen and inspire adoptive, foster & kinship parents and the professionals who support them.
Creating a Family brings you the following trauma-informed, expert-based content:
- Weekly podcasts
- Weekly articles/blog posts
- Resource pages on all aspects of family building
Previous Episode
Evaluating Risk Factors in International Adoption
June 12, 2024
•49m
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Are you considering adopting internationally. If so, you really should listen to this interview with the great Dr. Dana Johnson, MD, PhD. He is a Professor of Pediatrics in the Division of Neonatology at the University of Minnesota Medical School. Dr. Johnson founded the International Adoption Clinic at the University of Minnesota.
In this episode, we discuss:
- Prenatal exposure to alcohol and drugs: How common in international adoption? How much and when in the pregnancy? What does the impact look like in an infant, preschooler, school-aged child, and older?
- Alcohol
- Opioids
- Cocaine
- Methamphetamine
- Marijuana
- Cigarettes
- Prenatal stress: Does maternal stress during pregnancy have a long-term impact on the child? Is this something that adoptive parents will know other than by assuming from reading the files?
- How heritable are mental illnesses?
- Depression
- Bi-polar
- Schizophrenia
- How heritable are the following?
- ADHD
- Intelligence or academic success
- Attachment issues: How common with international adoption, and what are the recognizable symptoms of attachment struggles?
- Disinhibited social engagement disorder. What is it, and how common?
- How common is Reactive Attachment Disorder (RAD)?
- Impacts of neglect: How common is neglect in international adoption?
- Impact of institutionalization in international adoption.
- Impacts of physical abuse: How common in international adoption? How often do referrals report physical abuse?
- Impact of sexual abuse: How common in international adoption? How often do referrals report sexual abuse?
- Impact of lack of prenatal care.
- How common are the following:
- Hepatitis B: Where is it most prevalent? Long-term prognosis?
- Hepatitis C: Where is it most prevalent? Long-term prognosis?
- HIV: Where is it most prevalent? Long-term prognosis?
- Congenital Syphilis: Where is it most prevalent? Long-term prognosis?
- Prematurity: Where is it most prevalent? Long-term prognosis?
- Low Birth Weight: What is the long-term prognosis of a child who was born with low birth weight?
- Cleft lip/palate: Where is it most prevalent? Long-term prognosis?
- Congenital heart issues
- Missing limbs/digits-amniotic band syndrome
- Albinism
- Dwarfism
- Most common special needs you are seeing.
- What is the risk to the child if the birth mother has/had tuberculosis?
- Other risk factors to be aware of.
- Tips for evaluating risk factors in international adoption.
- How to find a clinic that specializes in evaluating international adoption referrals?
Please leave us a rating or review. This podcast is produced by www.CreatingaFamily.org. We are a national non-profit with the mission to strengthen and inspire adoptive, foster & kinship parents and the professionals who support them.
Creating a Family brings you the following trauma-informed, expert-based content:
- Weekly podcasts
- Weekly articles/blog posts
- Resource pages on all aspects of family building
Next Episode
Personal Story of Healing from Sexual Abuse
June 19, 2024
•60m
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Join this inspiring discussion with two former foster youths who talk about their time in foster care and how that experience shaped them. Lanitta was a pregnant and parenting teen growing up in the North Carolina foster care system. In May of 2022, she joined the 2% population of former foster youth that graduate from post-secondary education with a bachelor’s degree in business administration and finance. Mayia Warren was in foster care and later adopted by her grandmother. She has multiple invisible disabilities, albinism, and is visually impaired. In the spring of 2021, Mayia graduated with a bachelor's degree in Kinesiology. She is an advocate in multiple fields such as: disability, foster care, children and families, and wellness. She is also an independent recording artist, poet, author and philanthropist.
In this episode, we cover:
- Synopsis of your life story.
- What were the hardest parts of being in foster care?
- What were the better parts, if there were any?
- What would you want foster, adoptive, and kinship parents to know about how it feels to be in foster care?
- What have been the long-term impacts of sexual abuse?
- What helped you heal from the sexual abuse if you consider yourself healed?
- What would you want foster, adoptive, and kinship parents to know about how to help a child or youth heal from sexual abuse? What can these safe adults do to help?
- You have both “succeeded” despite many obstacles. What do you contribute your success to?
Snippet of Mayia’s new album: https://drive.google.com/file/d/1t9j1coN76ZarHnTDkDClXYuPZm2ya-t3/view?usp=drivesdk
Please leave us a rating or review. This podcast is produced by www.CreatingaFamily.org. We are a national non-profit with the mission to strengthen and inspire adoptive, foster & kinship parents and the professionals who support them.
Creating a Family brings you the following trauma-informed, expert-based content:
- Weekly podcasts
- Weekly articles/blog posts
- Resource pages on all aspects of family building
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