Adoption Development

When Sandra Leigh was seven years old, she fell into the role of protector of her mother and three younger siblings. One winter night, she ushered her mother out of the house during one of her father’s tirades, and then snuck her back into the dark home through a window. Sandra was used to events like these; what she wasn’t used to were the mountains and nature surrounding her new home in West Virginia.

When Deb Moerke and her husband decided to become foster parents, they never imagined how their lives would change. And never did they imagine their worst nightmare coming true: Their five-year-old foster daughter, Hannah, murdered at the hands of her birth mom, Karen. The Moerkes were overwhelmed with horror and grief. And just when they didn’t think they could bear any more, Deb received a phone call from Karen in prison. Facing a life sentence for Hannah’s murder, she was pregnant. And Karen had an incredible request: Would Deb take her unborn baby and love it as her own?

Healing isn't possible, though, without first uncovering the hurts—starting with adoption's central players: adoptees, who are so often in pain, suffering from what the latest brain science validates as the long-term emotional effects of separation trauma. By encouraging others to vulnerably share their stories, the authors discover that adoptees aren't the only ones in the adoption constellation who are hurting. Birth parents regularly shut down after being shut out by adoptive parents.

Transform your organization using AI-driven solutions with Microsoft 365 Copilot Adoption: A Practical Guide for Business Leaders and Consultants. This book draws on real-world case studies and insights from Microsoft’s early adopters to provide a practical framework for successful AI integration. It emphasizes the importance of leadership alignment, cultural readiness, and continuous skill development, equipping listeners with the mindset and methods needed to foster innovation and efficiency in an AI-driven workplace.

At only five years old, Saroo Brierley got lost on a train in India. Unable to read or write or recall the name of his hometown or even his own last name, he survived alone for weeks on the rough streets of Calcutta before ultimately being transferred to an agency and adopted by a couple in Australia. Despite his gratitude, Brierley always wondered about his origins. One day, after years of searching, he miraculously found what he was looking for and set off to find his family.

Read by the author. Discover simple habits and easy-to-implement daily rhythms that will help you find meaning beyond the chaos of family life as you create a home where kids and parents alike practice how to love God and each other. You long for tender moments with your children--but do you...

Wards of the State by journalist and author Claudia Rowe widens an eye-opening case from a true-crime lens to an exploration of the foster care-to-prison pipeline. The system is broken—hundreds of thousands of children every year leave America’s $30 billion dollar foster care system and enter its prisons, where in some cases, 75 percent of inmates are former foster kids. Through the stories of eight former foster kids, Rowe illustrates exactly where, when, and how the system is failing the children that it parents.

In 1955, an American farming couple saw a film about the thousands of Korean children orphaned by the Korean War. Through a special act of Congress, they were authorized to adopt eight of these children - which marked the advent of international adoption. Since that time, there have been over 170,000 children adopted out of Korea to more than 30 countries. Korean adoptee Glenn Morey and his wife, Julie Morey, spent six years interviewing 100 Korean adoptees from around the world. This stunning Audible Original is comprised of 15 first-person accounts....

From the social media superstar behind @SimonSits, Isabel Klee—known for her heartwarming tales of dog rescue—comes an utterly winning memoir about a twentysomething woman’s search for true love in New York City and the dogs who helped her find it. A Jersey girl by birth, Isabel Klee had...

The adoption of a child is always a joyous moment in the life of a family. Some adoptions, though, present unique challenges. Welcoming these children into your family - and addressing their special needs - requires care, consideration, and compassion.

Renowned child-development expert Dr. Karyn Purvis gives you practical advice and powerful tools you can use to encourage secure attachment in your family. You will benefit from Karyn’s decades of clinical research and real-world experience. Coauthor Lisa Qualls demonstrates how you can successfully implement these strategies in your home, just as she did in hers. You will learn how to simplify your approach using scripts, nurture your child, combat chronic fear, teach respect, and develop other valuable tools to facilitate a healing connection with your child.

The moment Diane Burke, an author and mother of two grown sons, received an unexpected certified letter in the mail, she had no idea her life would be shaken to its core. Memories of a past she had buried more than forty years ago suddenly resurfaced and she wasn't prepared to deal with them. Steve Orlandi, happily married, father of two and step-father of three, was living the typical middle class American life. But since the age of eight, when he discovered he was adopted, he had led that life dealing with inner questions about his self-identity and genetic history.

Do you want to take a step towards confidence, acceptance, and well-being? This audiobook is my inward look at adoption trauma with some helpful tips that I have used over the past six years to help me overcome the feelings of unworthiness, anger, fear, and rejection that plagued me for 50 years.

A New York Times Notable Book The shocking truth about postwar adoption in America, told through the bittersweet story of one teenager, the son she was forced to relinquish, and their search to find each other. “[T]his book about the past might foreshadow a coming shift in the future… ‘I...

Is your parenting journey turning out differently than you imagined? You had so much love to give, but now you feel ashamed and bewildered by your lack of compassion. You may be experiencing blocked care—a self-protective mechanism in your nervous system that makes it difficult to connect with your child and maintain compassion. When it happens, it’s like your heart seems to have left the relationship. But the good news is you are not a bad parent. You can heal from blocked care, and compassion can be rekindled in your heart.

A practical, integrated approach for therapists working with child and adult patients impacted by developmental trauma and attachment difficulties—featuring a foreword by Waking the Tiger author, Peter Levine. Kathy L. Kain and Stephen J. Terrell draw on fifty years of their combined clinical...

The gospel of Jesus Christ—the good news that through Jesus we have been adopted as sons and daughters into God’s family—means that Christians ought to be at the forefront of the adoption of orphans in North America and around the world. Russell D. Moore does not shy away from this call in Adopted for Life, a popular-level, practical manifesto for Christians to adopt children and to help equip other Christian families to do the same.

The voices of adopted children are poignant, questioning. And they tell a familiar story of loss, fear, and hope. This extraordinary book, written by a woman who was adopted herself, gives voice to children's unspoken concerns, and shows adoptive parents how to free their kids from feelings of fear, abandonment, and shame. With warmth and candor, Sherrie Eldridge reveals the 20 complex emotional issues you must understand to nurture the child you love.

In this groundbreaking book, adoption advocates Betsy S. Kylstra, Lisa C. Qualls, and Jodi Jackson Tucker-an adoptee, a birth mother, and an adoptive mother-reveal that adoption is rooted in both loss and redemptive victory. And healing is needed by all in the adoption triad-adoptees, birth parents, and adoptive parents-to experience restoration and wholeness.

Open adoption isn't just something parents do when they exchange photos, send emails, share a visit. It's a lifestyle that may feel intrusive at times, be difficult or inconvenient at other times. Tensions can arise even in the best of circumstances. But knowing how to handle these situations and how to continue to make arrangements work for the child involved is paramount. This book offers listeners the tools and the insight to do just that.