Managing Transition: Building Adoptions That Work

1. Managing Transition:Building Adoptions That Work YYYYYY Maris H. Blechner, M Ed, LCSW FAMILY FOCUS ADOPTION SERVICES Little Neck, New York

2. Today’s Plan • Who are you and who am I? • What we want to accomplish • Handouts? - Questions?

3. What is “transition” anyway …..and why is it so important? • a specific time-frame • lots of danger/minefields • many variables involved

4. What are some variables within transition? • local versus distant placements • moving from a foster home versus moving from an institution • moving to a stranger versus kin • the “team” surrounding a child

5. Let’s step back a step, and look at some adoption realities… 1. Are there different types of adoptive families that impact upon successful adoptive placement? 2. Given the reality of approved families, and the histories of the children moving to adoption, are there minimum requirements necessary for any protective adoptive placement process? 3. What are some ways to minimize disruptions?

6. Approved Families (1) The “Committed” (2) The “Well-intentioned” (3) The “Entitled”

7. The “Committed” Families • People who grow……and learn. • People who follow through and hold on……claiming the child as their own. • (What is adoption anyway - if not a claiming?)

8. What Adoption is not: athe day in court (that’s the finalization!!) athe paperwork (that’s following the rules) aa getting-together of equals, like marriage

9. What is Adoption? aA decision made by an adult aIn a discrete moment in time aPermanent, irrevocable, and unconditional (like all parenthood) aAn emotional claiming aA true life-cycle event, like birth

10. Committed families finalize their adoptions - because they have claimed their children. • Note: Sometimes there are those who • find themselves unable to “connect” to a • particular child (the “mismatched”), but go • on to successfully adopt a different child.

11. The “Well-intentioned” Families • The “Fantasizers” • The “Under-estimators” • The “Life-stylers” • The “Eccentrics”

12. The “Entitled” Families • They are the center of their universe……and not open to change. • “I am owed” is their mantra. • They are “blamers.” • They cannot tolerate a transition process. • They will always disrupt. • The only cases where the children will end transition.* *(except the “Deceivers”)

13. The Children Being Placed • The multiply rejected: A) by their birth family, B) by one, and often more than one, foster home. • A small minority of the children who were available for adoption. They require special planning, beyond the typical ways children are moved into adoption. Above all, these children need to be protected from disruption and its consequences.

14. Transition Process • The protocol used to move children from their foster placements into adoptive homes. • It is, above all, a protected period of time for a child and a family to do the work each needs to do in order to enter an adoption that all of us - child, family, and agency - can trust will be permanent, unconditional, and irrevocable. Empowered TransitionTM: The structure for that protected period of time.

15. Top 3 Goals ofEmpowered TransitionTM * Protection for the child * Protection for the family (and sometimes from the family) * Protection for the referring agency 1. Protection 2. Protection 3. Protection!

16. How does the Empowered Transition accomplish these goals of protection? By correcting the imbalance of power intrinsic within any adult-child relationship. (Adoption, always a relationship between adult parent and child, is built upon that imbalance of power.) The balancing of power occurs with the empowerment of the child which, paradoxically, equally empowers the family.

17. “Maybe” • The idea of “maybe” is the most important concept we can give to children and to families. Nothing we can do will protect the children more. It is the truth: maybe the family will adopt the child, or maybe they won’t. • “Maybe” is the foundation of empowerment.

18. Maximizing Empowerment • Time: Commit to open-ended time frame: no deadlines. • Transition Teams: One worker for the child; one for the family. • Control: We insist that the child make a conscious decision about whether to be adopted by the family. • Establish a structure of clearly defined measures of progress in meeting the challenges of transition. We call that structure: the Steps of Empowered TransitionTM.

19. How To Construct An Adoption Ceremony • The formal recognition of the claim, the “discrete moment in time.” • The place to sign special individualized papers. • The creation of an adoption “Rite of Passage.” • Pictures, refreshments, and celebration are all part of the ceremony.

20. The Adoption Covenant: A Tool for Defining Responsibility • Covenants are “agreements” or “contracts of understanding.” • These are initiated by the adoptive parent(s) and responded to by the child. • They are read at the ceremony and signed by the parties involved.

21. Major Points to Remember: • *Approved families fall into three general categories. • *All of the children have been multiply rejected and are • terrified. • *The goal of any transition process is to protect from • disruption and its consequences. • *Empowered Transition corrects for the inherent • imbalance of power between the children and families. • *The concept of “maybe-families” is the best possible • protection for the children, the families, and the • referring agencies.

22. Still more worry about: • Who has prepared the new family? • Things are not always what they seem. • How long does it take for a child to heal? • Who has warned the new family about interference and lack of understanding by friend and neighbors, and relatives?

23. Workshop Wrap Up • Questions, please! • Technical support; where to get more information • Thank you! ffasmarisb@nyc.rr.com