Let’s face it; the pace of life seems to be sweeping us all along like a swift current. On top of that, the flow of information is equivalent to a gusher. Each day, books, websites, magazines, blogs, listserves, forums, twitter and the like direct us down various arteries of help as parents and professionals. It can be overwhelming and difficult to keep your head above water!
AdoptionCDs.com offers a nice break from sitting in front of a computer, running to Borders, or loading your Kindle.
CDs offer the opportunity to sit back in your favorite recliner with an ice tea or your favorite flavor of coffee and simply “listen” your way to healing your challenged family, or to keep up with “best practice” if you are a professional. CDs make great gifts for the busy school teacher, extended family members, the adoptive father with a long commute and a long work day, and the adoptive mom busy making sure the kids are on time for all their extra curricula activities!
AdoptionCDs records conference workshops and then duplicates these presentations for the consumer. This provides in-home or in-car access to the top professionals in the fields of adoption and attachment! You can shop an array of categories:
Adoption Agency Issues and Concerns
Adoption Support and Preservation
Adoptive and Foster Parent Support Groups
International Adoption
Kinship Care
Parenting Children with Challenges
Preparing Parents for Adoption
Race, Culture and Diversity
Search/Openness in Adoption and much more!
Let’s look at a sampling of the titles available:
The Teen Years
Adolescent and Attachment Difficulties by Gregory Keck, Attachment and Bonding Center of Ohio. This presentation describes the interruptions (i.e., complex trauma) that occur in childhood which lead to attachment problems and developmental gaps in adolescence.
Dr. Keck offers strategies for parenting and treating the adolescent who has experienced such interruptions. Those familiar with Dr. Keck know that he is recognized for his common sense, knowledge and sense of humor. Concerned about handling dating and sexuality? Let Denise Goodman give you some help. Her workshop, Parenting the Horomonally Gifted provides information and great laughs! Dr. Goodman also gives us, Parenting From the Trenches during which she covers such topics as developing trust and attachment, building self-esteem and maintaining your own sanity! Do you know a teen still in need of a home? Finding Permanent Parents for Teens in Foster Care by Pat O’Brien, You Gotta Believe!, provides ample strategies to locate homes for older children.
Kinship Care
Relatives caring for relatives is a permanency option on the rise. Yet, this is an area in which the information and supports available haven’t caught up to the need. AdoptionCds can help fill this gap. When Grandparents become Parents: What Workers Need to Know to Support Them helps workers understand the emotional and psychological issues of grandparents who become the primary caregivers of their grandchildren. Dr. Joseph Crumbley gives us Parenting Issues in Kinship Care and An Overview of Kinship Care. In essence Dr. Crumbley covers all of the major issues involved in parenting and placing kin with kin. Karen Alvord offers another viewpoint regarding assessing prospective kinship caregivers and and the significance of kin in children’s lives, Adoption Practice with Relative Caregivers.
Search and Openness in Adoption
Is your adoptee considering searching for birth relatives? Are you a couple considering an open adoption? You may want to consider, Search 101: Where Do I Start and What Do I Do? by Marilyn Mendenhall Waugh, Failed Fantasies: When Search Brings Us More Mystery and Loss by Joyce Maguire Pavao or Open Adoption through the Years: What Are the Challenges?by Sandra Lenington.
Any adoptive parent struggling with how and when to tell their child the truth about his or his pre-adoptive circumstances may want to listen to Adoption and the Hidden Power of Secrets by Ken Watson. This workshop explores such questions as: Is it ever right to keep adoption secret? What is the difference between secrecy and privacy? How and when do you open up a secret? What should we do about the secrets involved in search and reunion?
Language Development and Acquisition
The ability to speak well influences one’s ability to be literate. Certainly, children’s capacity to perform in the academic setting is thus greatly influenced by their ability to understand and speak the language of their adoptive country. Effects of Institutionalization on Language Development by Susan Hough and Second Language Development and Acquistion for Internationally Adopted Children by Deborah Jill Chitester may be critical CDs to add to your library if you parent a child—that arrived at any age—via intercountry adoption.
Stress Management
Are you feeling overwhelmed by the challenges presented in your family? or your caseload?
Learn ways to de-stress via Compassion Fatigue and the Caregiver by Diane Martin-Hushman, Stress and Coping in Adoptive Families with Challenging Children by Jeanne Howard and Susan Smith and Handling those Dragons in Our Lives: How to Keep Stress from Managing Us by Maris Blechner. The ultimate stress reducing presentation comes from Pat O’Brien, Laughter and Parenting: The Importance of Laughter Even when Nothing Seems Funny. You will have many days when this CD will come in handy!
At Perspectives Press we encourage parents and professionals to educate themselves in the best manner for their learning style. Of course, we love reading and readers! So, for those who want to continue absorbing the written word, the “Reading and Resources”, on the right, provide the books written by many of the conference presenters listed in this blog.
