According to the American Academy of Pediatrics Council on Foster Care, Adoption, ＆ Kinship Care (2020), approximately 2.1 million children were adopted into their families. This number brings relevance and faces into our everyday lives, practice and homes. In this post, clinical expert and therapist, Amy Geller, LCSW, shares her insight into how to help teens find the right therapist when exploring adoption issues and provides resources.
Amy Geller, LCSW is a clinical social worker & psychotherapist in private practice. Her office is located in Bergen County, NJ. An adoptee herself, Amy specializes in issues related to all areas of the adoption kinship network. Amy is currently developing a workshop, using neuroscience and attachment theory, for adult adoptees seeking satisfying and healthy relationships. Amy is a member of The American Adoption Congress and The Association for Training and Attachment in Children (ATTACh).
ADOPTED TEENS: FINDING THE RIGHT THERAPIST
Many American parents embrace adoption as a way to begin or add to their families. Each year there are approximately 140,000 children adopted in the United States. There are many reasons people choose adoption. Each story I’ve heard is unique. No two adoption stories are the same but they all start with two ingredients, love and hope. This is why it is can be confusing and distressing to parents when things sometimes get emotionally tricky as their child becomes a teenager.
While adolescence can be a tumultuous time for many, a study in the Psychiatric Times found that adolescent adoptees are significantly more likely to have had contact with a mental health professional than non-adoptees. Adoptees are over represented in all areas of mental health including inpatient, residential and therapeutic school settings. It’s my experience that families often seek initial therapy for their adopted child in late middle school or early high school. This is when issues of self worth, shame, control and identity become outwardly apparent. Behaviors such as substance abuse, self injury, acting out or emotional withdrawal often sound alarms for parents that their child needs help.
Some signs that your teenager may be struggling with issues related to adoption are:
Having trouble in school
Substance abuse
Complaining of physical symptoms like digestive or sleep impairment
Attempting self harm
Extreme attitudes such as perfectionism or apathy
Intensely enmeshed or avoidant attachments to family and peers
Severe reaction to loss or a break up
Once the decision to pursue counseling has been made, finding an adoption competent therapist can make a big difference in the treatment and outcomes of the adoptee and their family. Adoptees can be ambivalent about talking about their feelings connected to adoption unless they feel like the clinician “gets it”. Often this is with a therapist who was also adopted but it doesn’t have to be. What makes a therapist “adoption competent’? Here are some things to ask a potential therapist that can help determine competency:
“What specific training have you had around adoption, attachment theory and developmental trauma?”
“What are your thoughts on implicit, preverbal and sensory memory?”
“Are you trained to work with grief and loss?”
“Are you trained in or open to collaborative trauma therapies such as EMDR (eye movement desensitization reprocessing), Somatic Experiencing, Trauma Focused CBT (cognitive behavioral therapy), Neurofeedback or Equine therapy?”
“How do you help families build and reinforce attachment through your work with the client?”
Below are some resources for finding a therapist for your teen:
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