Creating a Family: Talk about Adoption, Foster & Kinship Care

Latest Episodes:

A Conversation with Dr. Bruce Perry About Trauma Jan 19, 2022

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Join us as Dr. Bruce Perry answers your questions about how trauma impacts adoptive, foster, and kinship kids and families. Dr. Bruce Perry, is a child psychiatrist and neuroscientist, the principal of the Neurosequential Network, Senior Fellow of The ChildTrauma Academy, and adjunct Professor at Northwestern University School of Medicine in Chicago. He is the author the numerous books including co-author along with Oprah Winfrey of What Happened to You?: Conversations on Trauma, Resilience, and Healing, and co-author of The Boy Who Was Raised As A Dog.

In this episode, we cover:

The shift in perspective from what’s wrong with you to what happened to you--the ability to understand seemingly senseless behavior by looking at what’s behind it.
What do you include as “trauma”? How severe does it have to be to impact us later in life?
We hear foster, adoptive, and kinship parents say, “she was only neglected.” Is neglect less harmful than abuse?
When siblings are separated in foster care and parents are taken completely away from seeing the children for a year at a time does this lack of contact count as trauma and how does this type of no-touch abuse effect the child's brain?
How common is trauma? ACE study.
Does trauma at a young age have longer lasting impacts?
We have a child who is chronologically 3yrs, who had a non-accidental TBI at 3 months of age. He is a sweet boy but prone to rages and is very loud. Could this be from the trauma or is it his age and frustration?
How can parents help their child manage trauma if they don’t know what the trauma was?
The times of healing are often very short but very powerful. And that the more times our kids experience healing, even in short bursts, the more their brain "re-develops" in healthier ways.
Is there is an association between trauma and sensory processing and if so, do we know why?
How do you become “unstuck” on being a victim? My daughter is 18 and is struggling to become an adult, but constantly feels and acts as though she is still a victim from her past.
Can you discuss how trauma is related to the sabotage of relationships, family events, life events, and opportunities?
Prenatal trauma—
- in utero exposure to alcohol or drugs
- maternal stress
Can generational trauma be passed down genetically through the various forms of DNA?
Resilience and Healing: My question is coming from the perspective as an adoptive and foster mom of some kids who have some pretty big behaviors. Can we really grow these kids and help them live happy, well-adjusted lives? Not problem free, but a life where after many years of love, they will come to find peace within themselves?
I have two children who are currently in foster care because their father was abusive and I stayed with him and allowed my children to witness the abuse. Is there any way to reverse the trauma?

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:

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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

2021 Adoption Tax Credit Jan 12, 2022

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Are you planning on claiming the Adoption Tax Credit this year? We talk with Becky Wilmoth, an Enrolled Agent and Adoption Tax Credit Specialist with Bill's Tax Service and Josh Kroll, the Adoption Subsidy Resource Center coordinator at the North American Council on Adoptable Children.
In this episode, we cover:

What is the Adoption Tax Credit for adoption being claimed on 2021 federal taxes? $14,440 per child
It is a non-refundable tax credit. How to advocate for refundability?
What is a “credit” and how does it differ from a deduction or some other form of tax savings?
If you get a tax refund every year, how would you use the Adoption Tax Credit?
If you don’t have any federal tax liability, should you still apply the credit to your federal income taxes?
What type of adoptions are included or excluded? Stepparent adoption? Embryo adoption? Same-sex partner second parent adoption? Unmarried heterosexual second parent adoption? Surrogacy?
Can you get credit for each adoption you complete even if completed in the same year? What about adopting siblings at the same time?
What is a Qualified Adoption Expense for purposes of the Adoption Tax Credit 2021?
When can you claim the Adoption Tax Credit?
- Domestic private adoption
- International Adoption
- Re-adoption in the US for international adoption
- Foster Care Adoption
How does the Adoption Tax Credit work with kinship adoptions? What if the child never was involved with the foster care?
Special Needs Adoption: How does the Adoption Tax Credit differ for adoptions from foster care? What does the IRS accept as proof of “special needs”?
Special needs child for international adoption?
Can you reclaim your expenses for a failed adoption? How?
What income level is excluded from claiming the Adoption Tax Credit in 2021?
How long can the credit be carried over?
Will the Adoption Tax Credit offset self-employment tax?
Secure Act and Qualified birth or adoption distributions.
How does the Adoption Tax Credit work in conjunction with employee adoption benefits? For special needs adoption?
If you adopt, can you still get the Child Tax Credit? How does the timing work?
What do you need in order to get the Child Tax Credit for your adopted child? Social Security # for the child.
How does Advanced Tax Payments work with adoption?
What type of documentation for the Adoption Tax Credit should you submit with your taxes? What type of documentation should you keep in your records?
What should you do if you do not have your child’s social security number when you get ready to file your taxes? When should you consider using an Adoption Taxpayer Identification Number (ATIN #) or Individual Taxpayer Identification Number (ITIN #)?
What are the most common questions received about the Adoption Tax Credit?
How to find a tax specialist knowledgeable on the Adoption Tax Credit?

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What Are Your Chances of Getting Pregnant With Unexplained Infertility Jan 05, 2022

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If you have unexplained infertility, what are your chances of ultimately having a baby—either through infertility treatment or natural conception? We talk with Dr. Denis Vaughan, a board-certified Reproductive Endocrinologist at Boston IVF and a Clinical Instructor at Harvard Medical School. He was the principal investigator on the study "Long-term reproductive outcomes in patients with unexplained infertility".
In this episode, we cover:

What year was the original FASTT trial and what were the findings?
What is unexplained infertility and how common is it?
Did most of the women try to conceive after the original FASTT trial?
How did the women who agree to participate in this follow-up study compare to the original FASTT participants? Was there a difference between those who participated in the follow-up and those who did not?
What percentage of the women were successful at conception with IUI? IVF? Natural conception?
What percentage tried to conceive with donor egg?
What percentage adopted?
If the woman had conceived via fertility treatment in the original FASTT trial is she more likely to conceive successfully in the future?
Some speculate that a signiﬁcant proportion of unexplained infertility is due to un-diagnosed endometriosis. Did this follow-up study shed light on that question?
Did many of the women after the original FASTT study receive a more definitive diagnosis of why they were not able to conceive?
What did the study show about patient satisfaction with their family building process and ultimate family size?
What did we learn about conception with unexplained infertility as a result of the follow-up to the FASTT study?

This podcast is produced by www.CreatingaFamily.org. We are a national non-profit with the mission to strengthen and inspire infertility patients 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

Please leave us a rating or review RateThisPodcast.com/creatingafamily

Support the show

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Resource pages on all aspects of family building

The Connected Parent Dec 29, 2021

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The next step in understanding attachment and Trust-Based Relational Intervention is the new book, The Connected Parent, by Dr. Karyn Purvis and Lisa Qualls, with great assistance from Emmelie Pickett. On this episode, we interview Lisa and Emmelie about connected parenting.
In this episode, we cover:

Understanding the foundations of attachment.
What do parents bring to the situation that influences how their children attach.
Using “scripts” to help you implement Trust-Based Relational Intervention.
Coping with chronic fear in our kids.
Coping with parental fear that things will never improve or that our children will never be able to heal.
How to discipline the TBRI® way.
How to teach respect.
Understanding how sensory issues can be confused with attachment issues.

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How Does Adoption Affect the Siblings Already in a Family? Dec 22, 2021

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Does adoption positively or negatively affect children already in the family and what can parents do to lessen the negative impacts. We discuss this topic with Dr. Jana Hunsley, an experimental psychologist, Licensed Clinical Social Worker (LCSW), and TBRI® Practitioner, specializing in understanding and meeting the needs of siblings is foster and adoptive families.
In this episode, we cover:

Much of the focus of adoption literature and research is on the adopted child and the adoptive parents with little attention on the children already in the family.
Tell us your story as the sibling of 7 adopted siblings.
Research on adopted siblings.
What are some of the challenges that siblings of the adopted child might face?
- Feeling invisible
- Coping with overwhelmed distracted parents
- Parentification
  - Becoming another parent to your siblings
  - Becoming the emotional support for their parents
- Trying to keep the peace in the home by acting as a peacemaker
- Feeling the need to be extra good or accomplished to add less stress to their parents. Or suppressing their own needs so as to not add to their parent’s burden. Try to not have any needs.
- Feeling embarrassed by your sibling’s behavior
- Blaming parent who isn’t able to “control” the new child or make them behave better or meet their needs.
- Mourning the loss of your calm “normal” family
- Secondary trauma
- Unwanted public attention on your family because of size, behavior, transracial adoption
- Jealous of the adopted child because they perceive them as getting all the attention
- Resentful of the adopted child because of the added burden they brought to the family
What factors influence the degree of these challenges to siblings in an adoptive family? (age of the children in the family and the children being adopted, degree of trauma, type of behavioral issues, etc.)
Disrupting birth order.
What can adoptive parents and professionals do to mitigate some of these challenges of siblings of adopted children?
How can parents prepare kids already in the family for the adoption of a sibling?
Tips for parents in reducing the negative impact of adoption on the children already in the family.
What are some of the benefits of adoption to siblings in the family?
Have you talked with your parents?

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LGBTQ+ Parenting (Part 2): Adoption Dec 15, 2021

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We talk about LGBTQ+ adoption with Dr. Abbie Goldberg, a Professor of Psychology and Director of Women’s & Gender Studies at Clark University. Her research and writing focus on diverse families, including LGBTQ parent and adoptive families, and she has authored and edited 8 books and over 130 peer-reviewed articles in this area.
In this episode, we cover:

Legality of LGBTQ+ parents adopting in the US.
Statistics on LGBTQ+ adoptions. Percentage, transracial, foster care adoption
Do you see any residual prejudice against LGBTQ+ parents when wanting to adopt or foster? Foster care? Domestic infant? International? Embryo?
Hesitancy with placing with someone who is transgender?
Does open adoption look different in LGBTQ+ adoptive families.
Do LGBTQ+ parents parent in ways that are different than cisgender heterosexual parents?
How are children in LGBTQ+ faring?
Lesbian, gay, and heterosexual adoptive parents’ experiences with pediatricians: A mixed-methods study.
Parental naming practices in same-sex adoptive families.
How are LGBTQ+ youth in foster care doing?

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LGBTQ+ Parenting (Part 1): Surrogacy Dec 08, 2021

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What's it like for a gay couple to create their family through egg donation and surrogacy. We talk with Armando Correa, People Magazine En Español's Editor In Chief and author of In Search of Emma: How We Created Our Family.
In this episode, we cover:

Did you always want to be a parent?
Did you think that you would get to realize that dream?
What options for becoming a parent did you consider?
Why did you decide on surrogacy?
Did you also use a separate egg donor?
What was your process to finding an egg donor and surrogate?
Was cost a consideration?
How much did it cost you in total to become Emma’s dad?
What has happened to your family since Emma arrived?
What would you recommend to other gay guys who want to become a father?

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Child Hosting Programs: Getting Prepared to be a Host Family Dec 01, 2021

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Have you ever thought of hosting a child for the summer or over the winter holidays? Check out this show where we interview Kathy Holiday who worked in adoption for 25 years and she supervised the child hosting program for Children’s House International.
In this episode, we cover:

What are child hosting programs?
What is the purpose of a child hosting program?
What are some of the ways different agencies design their hosting programs?
- Whether they are open to families that do not want to adopt, but are willing to advocate for the child.
- When they have host sessions. What times of year?
- Length of time the children are here.
How much does it usually cost for a host family?
Are there many differences in cost to the host family?
What type of training?
What is the age range of children commonly available for hosting?
What type of special needs do you commonly see?
What are the children told before they come? Are they aware that they are "on trial" to be adopted? (Be on your best behavior if you want to get adopted?) Do hosting programs put too much burden on kids and set them up for feeling like a failure?
What type of trauma have the children experienced in the past?
Influence of trauma. Typical behaviors you might see in the short term.
Language issues?
How much information are you given on the child before you decide whether to accept?
What type of home study is usually required?
How to prepare children already in the home?
How much do you share with the children in the home about your interest in hosting? Should you share that you might adopt the child?
Disciplining a host child?
What type of support should you expect from your hosting agency?
Advocating for your host child or for other children in the orphanage. What do you mean by advocating and how do you do it?
If you decide to adopt this child, what is the typical process and how long does it take?
What are the benefits to being a host family?

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Home Based Therapy Nov 24, 2021

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Have you ever thought that it would be a lot more effective if the therapist could really see your child in action? That's the gist of home-based therapy. We talk with Stephanie Glickman, a licensed clinical social worker at the Clinical Director of the Family Centered Treatment Foundation and an adjunct professor at the University of North Carolina Charlotte's School of Social Work.
In this episode, we cover:

What is home-based therapy?
Is it family therapy or child therapy?
Why is it so effective for families struggling with behavioral issues?
What type of issues respond well to in-home therapy?
What does the research show about the effectiveness of home-based therapy vs. residential placement?
How does in-home therapy work? How often does the therapist come? How long do they stay? How long does it need to continue?
What if the child does not act out while the therapist is in the home?
Who in the home participates in home-based therapy? Parents? Siblings? Others?
Are their confidentiality concerns with this type of therapy?
What are some of the advantages and disadvantages to home-based therapy?
How does the cost of this therapy compare to office-based therapy?
Does Medicaid cover home-based therapy?
How do you find an in-home therapist that is knowledgeable about adoption and fostering and the trauma these kids may have experienced?
What are some tips for knowing if you have found a good fit between the therapist and your family?
Family Centered Treatment Foundation

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How to Avoid Triggering and Being Triggered by Our Kids Nov 17, 2021

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Do your child's reactions seem bigger than they should be to everyday events? Are your reactions sometimes a bit too big? What causes us to get triggered by our kids or to trigger them? We talk with Dr. Tripp Ake, a licensed psychologist with over 20 years of experience in the field of child trauma treatment. He is an Associate Professor in the Department of Psychiatry and Behavioral Sciences at Duke University Medical Center and the program director for the National Child Traumatic Stress Network.
In this episode, we cover:

What do we mean by “triggering” and how does it differ from getting our buttons pushed?
What’s the difference between being triggered and being annoyed or irritated?
How to become a trauma detective?
What types of things can trigger a child?
How much of having our “buttons pushed” stems from the belief that our child’s behavior is a reflection on us as parents?
How do the belief systems that we grow up with impact us as adults? We may not even be aware that hold these values and may not even agree with them.
How can we identify the things in our past that make us likely to be triggered?
Examples of things parents have told us drives them to distraction (aka triggers them).
- Whining
- Disrespect
Two universal parenting tips for improving a child’s behavior.

National Child Traumatic Stress Network