Support 4 every Family

Campaign Summary

February, Family Day’s month, has come to an end, and with it, Adopt4Life’s 2nd social media outreach campaign.  Once again Adopt4Life’s community of adoptive parents have bravely and poignantly shared their experiences to promote positive change to the adoption system for the benefit of awaiting children in care and children already in their forever families.  The total of 29 stories provides strong irrefutable evidence of the need for permanency support for all families formed through adoption, kinship, or customary care.

This month we heard of the struggles families have experienced early in their adoption parenting journey, feeling left isolated and alone, and of the families further down the road that found themselves unprepared for challenges presented and no supports available because so much time had passed.  Conversely families shared with us how having emotional and financial supports for their family and children made the difference between successfully forming their family and watching their children heal and grow, versus disruption and losing their children back to the system.

We have learned support can come in many forms. As such, a variety of readily available permanency supports are needed around the province that can be individualized to meet the unique needs of children and their families.  In terms of emotional support, knowledge sharing and normalizing the experience of adoption, CAS workers, adoption practitioners, foster parents, and peers were all described as making the difference and enabling families to be successful and help their children.  Government funded services and programs are a great resource for our children but accessing them can be a problem due to lengthy waits and may not be sufficient because of resource constraints on the amount of service that can be provided to any given child.  Private assessments, counselling, and therapies are in most cases extremely costly but absolutely necessary to help our children heal from past traumas.  Some families are fortunate to have insurance coverage through work and this is a great way for employers to compensate their employees, helping them to attract and retain top talent.  However, Ontario cannot rely on families having insurance coverage when it comes to the complex needs of traumatized children adopted from care.  Unfortunately only some CAS agencies provide subsidies to their families post-permanency, and in some cases only some of the time, which is leaving many families without the financial support they need to help their children heal and reach their full potential.

Experienced adoptive parents and foster parents have not only spoken out about their experiences, they have made important recommendations for change.  They told us they want to see support groups established throughout the province, with one year mandatory participation for all new adoptive parents, enabling these new families to establish valuable peer connections and to normalize their adoption experience.  They have also said that all children in foster care should receive trauma therapy and that therapy should continue as they grow up – adopted or not.  As well, they recommend that all new adoptive parents take mandatory attachment training or therapy once they are matched with their child(ren) so they can better understand the behaviours of their adopted children and how to foster attachment which is foundational to their children’s wellbeing and ability to have healthy future relationships.  When it comes to our older youth in care, any financial disincentives to being adopted should be removed so that no child has to decide between becoming an official part of a family and losing their college bursaries or not being adopted and keeping the bursaries and extended care agreement.  Finally and importantly, all families need financial support through subsidy agreements for therapy, medical, and dental needs so they may provide their children with timely and qualified assessments, counselling, therapies, and treatments that go beyond public services and programs in order to help their children overcome past traumas and not just survive but thrive.

With all of the stories and recommendations, it is clear that having a network and ongoing support ensures all children are better prepared and able to reach their full potential. Timely and accessible #Support4EveryFamily is invaluable to children, their families and ultimately society – strong families create contributing citizens, engaged communities, and an economically stable society. From peer support to financial support for therapies, Ontario can help families come together and stay together, so that all children have a permanent, loving home to grow up and grow old in. With more than 7,000 children in care and 1,000 about to age out of the care, Adopt4Life believes that proper #Support4EveryFamily will help ensure a #Home4EveryKid, making Ontario a leader in building families by adoption.   

In less than one year, adoptive parents have seen their association rapidly grow to become a positive and influential body for change. February 2015 has been another momentous month for awaiting children and adoptive families in Ontario; let’s keep the momentum going with continued dialogues and action towards understanding the problems and bringing about improvements that will mean #AHome4EveryKid with #Support4EveryFamily! Ontario can do better but we must do it together, working with our partners in government and all stakeholders in the adoption process!

You too can help us advocate for change!  Adoptive and prospective adoptive parents and adoption professionals are invited to join Adopt4Life - membership is free! By joining Adopt4Life, you help us help Ontario do better for our adoptive families and awaiting children by being counted - the larger our numbers, the louder our collective voice!

 Permanency support is at the heart of what Adopt4Life does in addition to advocacy work at the government level.  If you are in need of peer mentoring, help in establishing a peer group, or assistance in advocating for your child(ren) with CAS, mental health professionals, school and the like, please contact Julie Despaties or Sylvia Gibbons (contact information is on our website). We are here to help you!

Therapy for Parents Is Essential

My partner and I are both educators.  I’d like to think we’re pretty darned good ones.  So, when we went to the CAS intake session and they told us that adopting a child meant we would have to face a lot of difficulties in order to give that child everything that he or she needed, we didn’t really blink.  After all, I can manage 35 teenagers at a time, what’s one child?

Therapy for parents is essential.  How else can we deal with our own personal barriers to good parenting?  Even as a teacher, I do not have the training to provide proper therapeutic response to my child.  It is only by learning to step back and truly listen that I have been able to help my son.

During the PRIDE training, we learned about the various issues children who have been in care are likely to have, from Fetal Alcohol Syndrome, to autism, to attachment disorders.  Again, we took all this in stride.  We knew that we wanted to adopt and give a child a better life, to be their forever family.  For that matter, we agreed to adopting an older child because we knew how many there were in the system and we knew that we could manage it.  We felt we were up for the challenge.

When we first met our son, he was a charming, polite ten year-old boy.  The honeymoon stage of the adoption went exceedingly well.  He started staying for long visits over the summer, and since both my partner and I are educators, we had the summer off and could spend a lot of time with him.  There were difficulties, of course.  He had problems with anger and would destroy his belongings and throw things when he was upset.  Again, nothing we couldn’t manage.

Then school started.  And the “snits” as we called them to him got worse and more frequent.  I was taking the parental leave and would find myself constantly drained by his anger.  He would orbit me in the mornings; picking at me in “jest,” but in reality passive aggressively trying to prompt an angry response from me, and often got it.  He began stealing.  The smallest disappointment would send him into a rage.

One day, we caught him shoplifting and we put him on house arrest.  No more friends for the month.  He would be walked to and from school, even though he was comfortable doing so alone.  My partner, or myself, would always accompany him until we felt we could trust him again.

All through this, I was finding it incredibly difficult to manage.  I was one big ball of rage.  I was angry all the time.  I knew that he’s a child, who has been through a lot, and PRIDE training should have prepared me for this, but even still, I was angry and frustrated and I didn’t understand.  I didn’t know what to do.  I felt completely incompetent.  I felt like an utter failure.  His behaviour and the attitude he gave me frustrated me to no end. 

I was in regular contact with my caseworker.  She was incredibly helpful.  She told me I was doing well, but she also told me that I needed help and  support.  She got me in touch with an attachment therapist and told me to go.  It took me a few weeks, and my partner’s prodding to finally agree to see her.  And I’m so glad I did.

The thing about being an adoptive parent is that you cannot parent the way that you were parented.  Furthermore, your child may as well be from another planet.  I could not for the life of me understand why he was behaving the way he was (even though intellectually I could connect what he was doing with what I had learned in PRIDE training).

He is a child who has faced so much disappointment and rejection from the adults in his life that it affected him in ways I couldn’t understand.  His rages were symptomatic of his inability to regulate the numerous fears and triggers that boiled inside of him, and I didn’t have a Rosetta Stone to translate what he was communicating.  To me, he was just stubborn and angry, and all I could see was his behaviour.

The therapist helped talk me through it all.  It was with her help that I stopped thinking like a teacher trying to control an unruly student and allowed me to think more therapeutically.  I came to realize that parenting an adoptive child is not about managing his behaviour; parenting an adoptive child is about getting to the root of their issues, and providing for his needs.  And sure enough, once I started focusing on what he needed, the behaviour improved.  And once I started seeing past the behaviour to what he needed, my anger subsided.  How can you be angry when you can finally look past the behaviour and see that he is not lashing out at you, but is in fact grieving, afraid, and anxious?

The therapist also helped me with me.  She helped me to see why I was reacting so angrily to everything.  Quite often, I would go into a dissociative state, where I felt like I was watching his tantrums from far away.  She helped me realize how I had developed coping mechanisms like these ones in order to help deal with anger I had dealt with as a child in my own household.  We strategized ways for me to be engaged rather than dissociate or respond with anger.  I hadn’t realized how much of good parenting would require me to work on myself.

Most of the language around funding to support children through the adoptive process is phrased around supporting the children.  However, the language needs to include the support of parents.  While therapy for a child may be useful, that is perhaps one day every week.  It is, in the end, the parents who are the child’s greatest form of support.  In a given day, there are dozens of minutes - long therapeutic moments - provided to children, not scheduled, but provided in the moments a child is ready or needing it. 

Parents need to be trained and supported during the transition.  A course is not how that training should be provided.  Therapy for parents is essential.  How else can we deal with our own personal barriers to good parenting?  Even as a teacher, I do not have the training to provide proper therapeutic response to my child.  It is only by learning to step back and truly listen that I have been able to help my son. 

Support for adoptive parents is support for their children.  It is only by teaching parents how to be therapeutic parents, that these kids get the type of parenting that they need.In providing #Support4EveryFamily there needs to mandated trauma and attachment therapy beginning shortly after placement.

Proper Supports Make an Immeasurable Difference

When it comes to adoption support, we have been fortunate. Our son came home to us at almost two years of age. He had global developmental delays, and while in care, was receiving private stimulation therapy and was in a Preschool Speech and Language government funded program. During the probationary period of our adoption, our son’s home CAS agency helped us to get referrals to local governmental programs as we do not live in their region. Between this support from CAS and guidance from our private adoption practitioner, who supervised the placement, we learned of available programs and got on waitlists right away. 

We are also lucky to have insurance coverage, albeit limited, through work, for private speech and language therapy which we obtained while on the waitlist for the local Preschool Speech and Language program. Research shows that early intervention can make a significant difference for children’s development and certainly we feel it has been invaluable for our son’s developmental progress that we obtained these services as quickly as we did. Once everything was in place, we accessed Children’s Development Services for physical and occupational therapies, Catulpa Community Support Services for their in home early intervention support, and Preschool Speech and Language program for speech therapy. During the toddler/preschool years we also regularly attended various Ontario Early Years programs. All of these government funded programs are wonderful resources for families unfortunately due to resource constraints they have lengthy wait lists and are not able to provide intensive therapies as they have so many children to serve.

As a part of our support network we belong to a local adoptive parent support group. This group of peers provides a safe place to share triumphs and challenges, providing a listening ear, encouragement, support and guidance to one another along the parenting journey. 

Our son did very well with the physical and occupational therapies as well as the early intervention support he received and was discharged from these programs once he met age appropriate milestones. For speech however, due to his apraxia, he requires ongoing sessions a minimum of twice per week for a couple of years. The preschool speech and language program was not robust enough to meet our son’s needs and ended once he began public school, and our insurance through work was not enough to meet his needs running out in only a few months. The public school system has speech support but we have been told that it will be at least a year before he will receive services and those services will be a maximum of once a week for one ‘block’ a year. Notably this will not be sufficient either once it is in place.

Our son’s home CAS agency had assured us at time of placement that they would provide subsidies to support his needs, which are not covered through government programs or our insurance post adoption, but we did not have that in writing. Learning the extent of our son’s needs we approached his CAS for support but initially did not receive meaningful responses to our repeated requests and inquiries. Months went by, our coverage had long run out, and still we didn’t have an answer.  We reduced our son’s sessions to once a week, not wanting him to lose momentum but knowing we wouldn’t be able to continue much longer given how expensive it is. At this point we were giving up on receiving support.

As a part of our support network we belong to a local adoptive parent support group. This group of peers provides a safe place to share triumphs and challenges, providing a listening ear, encouragement, support and guidance to one another along the parenting journey.  During a meeting we shared our concerns about our son’s urgent need for speech therapy and how extremely expensive it is.  We could see that his delays in speech were impacting his social skills and would have far reaching affects academically as being able to speak and communicate effectively is so foundational. Through discussions we learned that many of our peers have written subsidy agreements covering assessments, counselling, and therapies, and orthodontics. They encouraged us to reach out to our son’s home CAS agency one more time for help.

Our experience exemplifies how timely and accessible #Support4EveryFamily is invaluable to children, their families and ultimately society – strong families create contributing citizens, engaged communities, and an economically stable society.

We are so grateful to the CAS that they did finally respond and, once we provided them with the supporting documentation they requested, we were approved for speech and language subsidy to be reassessed each year. It has been more than a year now since he has had speech sessions twice a week and his progress is amazing. He has gone from being recommended for an assistive communication tool to make his needs known at school, to being able to speak with his teachers, friends and classmates. He hasn’t fully caught up yet and will likely need at least another year of the intensive therapy before he is but the changes in him have been truly monumental and life altering. The once shy and anxious little boy is disappearing and a new, much more risk taking, 5 year old boy is immerging that is making friends and thriving in school. 

Support has come in many forms for us - by the CAS, our adoption practitioner and peers – and these supports have empowered us to help our son.  Our son would not have progressed so far developmentally without all of the support we received. We don’t know what the future holds and whether additional supports will be needed for him but with a strong network behind us we will be able to advocate for our son and ensure he reaches his full potential.

Our experience exemplifies how timely and accessible #Support4EveryFamily is invaluable to children, their families and ultimately society – strong families create contributing citizens, engaged communities, and an economically stable society. From peer support to financial support for therapies, Ontario can help families come together and stay together, so that all children have a permanent, loving home to grow up and grow old in.   

The Invisible Family: A Story of Support and Survival in Adoption Part II

As can be surmised from our story outlined, we don't quite fit with specialty groups dedicated to families living with a specific identified issue. Nor do we automatically qualify for more formal supports (and don't necessarily need or want a lot of professional involvement, or direct therapy for the kids). At the same time, something is missing, and we are stretched in ways that are not sustainable. We experience frequent (and often extended) pauses in our days to manage (or prevent) dysregulation and directly work on connection. Unplanned detours in our routines lead to other necessary tasks not being done, or more regulated children missing out on family time while parents manage dysregulation. Connection/attachment needs come in addition to the "usual" demands of family life, and can easily be pushed aside in an effort to cover the basics. We know we need to be working less and maintaining a much slower pace to help regulate and build deeper attachments with our kids (they do so much better when life is simple), but aren't sure how to make that happen within our current financial reality. We already minimize outside commitments and evening activities, but even those efforts are inadequate.

Solutions

So, what would help us, and families like us? Based on our experience, both looking back and looking ahead, we believe the following would offer the kind of hope, assistance, respite, and skill necessary not only to survive, but thrive, and to ensure our children do the same:

·         Automatic access to post-adoption supports, with built-in invitations to schedule in-home social work check-ins at 6 months, 1 year, and even 2 years after finalization. Some families may not need this, and should be able to decline, but in our situation it would have been so helpful to touch base with a known person a year or two after finalization to identify areas for additional support or investigation and problem-solving.

·         Formal and informal mentoring and "buddy" opportunities with other families, offered as routine practice.

·         Financial support for families who either had placements prior to June 2015 (of siblings or children over 10), or who have particular needs that necessitate extra services or increased parental presence at home. For some families, work can still be an added stress that becomes unmanageable even with high needs children who attend school during the day. Such parents may require daytime availability for appointments, unexpected school pick-up, quiet time to take care of household business, particularly if household responsibilities and business cannot be taken care of when the child is at home.

·         Practical daily living assistance programs to provide services like housekeeping, meals, childcare, and transportation during transition or times of added family stress.

·         Respite or specialized "babysitting" with trained child care providers so couples can have some restorative time together and know there are opportunities for short "breaks". As well, on-site child care during support group gatherings and other meetings would allow more parents to attend sessions and supportive social activities.

·         Funding for continued education (formal and informal) for parents, post-adoption, on topics like compassion fatigue and secondary trauma, attachment, self-care, and connected parenting, or other topics relevant to individual circumstances.

·         Increased pre-adoption training focused on trauma, attachment, and development of concrete family self-care plans (including long-term plans for regularly scheduled couple’s time). Additional education stressing that mainstream parenting practices (e.g., time out, sleep training, behavioural methods) will be ineffective, and could actually harm attachment, would be invaluable.

·         Extension of parental leave time to include a period similar to the maternity leave available to mothers who give birth, recognizing that adoption presents unique physical and emotional demands that often necessitate extended leaves even in addition to government-funded parental leave.

·         Educational opportunities for friends and family, to increase their understanding of unique issues experienced by families formed through adoption, and how to support their loved ones effectively.

We have come to realize that our kids may bear the burden of their pre-natal and adoption experience indefinitely. Raising even one child with  attachment and trauma needs requires intentional and time-consuming effort (which is absolutely of great value and worth), and raising three is triple the investment of time and energy. We continue to miss the early days of regular in-home social work contact, reduced work commitments, and connection with other families living similar experiences. Despite clear memories that this was definitely not an easy period, there was more opportunity for refreshment in a better-balanced schedule with some external support for good measure. This was enough to keep us going, compared with our current reality in which we continually feel we are "running on fumes".

In our situation, appropriate support would include a combination of informal contact and opportunity to reduce work demands in order to meet our children's needs. With so many creative ways in which support can be defined and developed, I am eager to see opportunities emerge over time that will contribute to healthy and happy adoptive families in Ontario. Let’s see #Support4EveryFamily become a reality for our children and the 7,000 children in care and their future families.

The Invisible Family: A Story of Support and Survival in Adoption Part I

Once they were home, and the initial novelty of being the family with three little ones adopted all at once had pretty much worn off in our social circles, and there failed to be any completely unexpected challenges (although sometimes I wondered how we would manage even the expected ones, times three), we started to become invisible

Our family is conspicuous. With three active children very close in age, who look nothing like my husband and I, and with their wide brown eyes and willing smiles, we attract attention wherever we go. It seems a bit ironic, then, that the word "invisible" is one of the first adjectives that comes to mind when trying to describe our family.

Our children became part of our family after a not-unusual roller coaster adoption process that began with pursuing a life-long dream of international adoption, and eventually led us to public adoption in Ontario. They arrived home after a smooth transition, at ages 1, 2, and 3. We enjoyed regular in-home visits with our CAS adoption social worker for one year until the adoption was finalized in June 2012 (somewhat ironically on the same day that funding became available to families placed with siblings or children over age 10 on or after that date. We missed that opportunity by one year).

While our three experienced pre-natal substance exposure and maternal stress, they were placed in loving foster homes at birth, and appeared to be developing and attaching well. Once they were home, and the initial novelty of being the family with three little ones adopted all at once had pretty much worn off in our social circles, and there failed to be any completely unexpected challenges (although sometimes I wondered how we would manage even the expected ones, times three), we started to become invisible.

Our struggles included things like a child dealing with insecurity by attempting to take control of everything and everyone around him (bossing siblings and adults, lying, refusing to accept leadership), another expressing distressing feelings and opposition through extended (and often aggressive) rages over nothing and everything, competition for nurture and babying between the 1 and 3 year-olds (who had not lived together prior to placement, despite being siblings), and one coping with grief and fear through lengthy night wakings during which she was angry and inconsolable, as well as having a need to be picked "uppy" continuously. On top of all this (and perhaps in part because of it, in addition to other factors like age at placement), attachment was slow to develop toward the boys in particular.

Friends and family tended not to see most of this, although they were (and remain) wholeheartedly supportive, loving, and helpful. To our adoption social worker, most of our experience sounded pretty "normal" given the circumstances, and there were certainly indicators that the kids were wanting to attach to us. With no red flags suggesting a need for more intensive or long-term services from our social worker's perspective, the adoption was finalized and we were on our own. (In fairness, we were, and are, able to contact CAS to discuss options should we identify a need for additional services).

Throughout the first year after placement, regular visits with our adoption social worker through CAS were invaluable. She was experienced, calm, encouraging, and validating. During more difficult periods, even the anticipation of having her in our home to touch base and confirm or develop a plan for moving forward helped me stay the course. We were able to ask questions and get feedback about events that had gone on with the children, which helped us put the things we were living into context. There was an informality to meeting in our home and chatting across the kitchen table that felt natural and non-invasive. The arrangement seemed like the right balance of "normalizing" our family experience and having a bit of helpful external support.

We will soon reach our four-year anniversary as a family. We would never have guessed four years ago that we would still be struggling to figure out our family relationships, manage issues that were initially interpreted as being related to transition and adjustment, and develop effective approaches to parenting kids with trauma.

As time passed, however, and my husband and I returned to work from parental leaves (which included an extra, unpaid leave of absence for my husband, and ultimately resulted in him leaving his long-term job to stay home with the kids, then taking part-time work opposite my schedule), all of the issues we thought would eventually resolve remained present, ultimately becoming harder to manage due to a combination of juggling work, home, and family demands, becoming increasingly burnt out living with repetitious stresses (particularly without strong mutual attachment to buffer the challenges), having less time and opportunity to recharge together as a couple, having less time and finances for education and study on connected parenting, and feeling disconnected from opportunities with people who could really "get" what we were experiencing.

We will soon reach our four-year anniversary as a family. We would never have guessed four years ago that we would still be struggling to figure out our family relationships, manage issues that were initially interpreted as being related to transition and adjustment, and develop effective approaches to parenting kids with trauma. Our children continue to have difficulty managing outside of our direct care, and after time away from us there can be days, or even weeks, of limit-testing and other issues to work through. Our experience has confirmed the work of experts like developmental psychologist Dr. Gordon Neufeld and others who have outlined that children need to have a deep and secure attachment with their primary caregivers before they can venture into the world (including heavily peer-oriented environments like school) with the ability to maintain their sense of identity, safety, and personal values.

We see this first-hand in our kids, and we are happy to make the personal and vocational sacrifices necessary to fulfill our commitment to them as parents, furthering our mutual attachments, and helping our kids reach their potential for wellness and development. However, the impact of changing our work schedules, limiting our community activities, giving up down time as a couple, and pouring extra time into intensive parenting (both out of necessity in-the-moment and in planned ways) includes exhaustion, frustration, and burn-out.

Large Families VS Complex Needs

Don and Kari Murphy are parents and foster parents to ten children. We had our two biological children, Katie in 1990 and Patrick in 1993. Katie is a healthy and brilliant young woman in university studying law and Patrick is a quadriplegic (cerebral palsy) and legally blind due to being born two months prematurely who has graduated from high school.  After we adjusted to the shock of Patrick’s diagnosis, we were not satisfied with the doctors’ recommendation that we stop at two children (we had also had a couple of miscarriages). We both grew up in very large, active happy families. Don was the youngest of twelve and came from a farming family in Northern New Brunswick, and Kari was the oldest of six in a family that had 184 foster children come and go over 30 years. Kari grew up on Manitoulin Island and her parents had fostered for 30 years (dad was also with the OPP for thirty years) and Don’s brother and wife had also fostered for many years so it seemed like a natural solution.

She comes home for visits and still considers the Murphy’s as her family. She was not a foster child as she was over sixteen at the time and CAS could not assist her so that is why the friend asked them to help, which they gladly did until Carling was almost twenty. Older children need to have the opportunity to be fostered or adopted.

We have been fostering successfully since 1996 when our foster son, Noah, was placed with us at the age of three. He was medically fragile, a very sick child whose mother was diagnosed with a terminal brain tumor. We nursed him to good health and he is now a university graduate and has started his career in business; he still lives at home. He was Valedictorian and co-MC for his grade eight graduation and treasurer for his school council. He is also an active, life-long volunteer.

A year later, in 1997, we were asked to take twins with cerebral palsy, who were in wheelchairs, diapers and only spoke a few words. Within six months Dylan and Tiffany were both walking independently, toilet trained in the daytime and speaking in sentences. Two years later they could both read.

A year after that (1998), due to their experience with medically fragile children, the Murphy’s were asked to take a six month old baby girl for palliative care. The baby had just emerged from a three and a half month long coma, had had two cardiac arrests and had full blown AIDS. She was also a “crack baby” and had significant exposure in utero to alcohol. The baby was predicted to have approximately a month to live. The Murphy’s nurtured her, loved her and nursed her to health. At age three, they adopted this child, Ashley. She is now almost seventeen, with no behaviour problems at home or at school. She excels at singing, drama and public speaking in spite of having very mild cerebral palsy from a skull fracture and broken jaw (her stroller was thrown into traffic at two weeks of age and hit by a car). She was also the Vice President of the Student Council, a Rotary International Paul Harris Fellow, and a travelling motivational speaker with We Day, was awarded the Inspire Aware for 2015. In March 2015 she will speak in Geneva Switzerland at the UN AIDS Charity Gala and in May at a luncheon with Laureen Harper.

A year later (1999), the Murphy’s were asked by an acquaintance to help a sixteen year old girl who had been abandoned by her father and whose mother was deceased. This girl is a quadriplegic, severely disabled with cerebral palsy and used a power wheelchair. She was completely dependant in all areas of her care. She is now a 30 year old young woman, living in her own apartment with nursing staff.  She comes home for visits and still considers the Murphy’s as her family. She was not a foster child as she was over sixteen at the time and CAS could not assist her so that is why the friend asked them to help, which they gladly did until Carling was almost twenty. Older children need to have the opportunity to be fostered or adopted.

The workers from the outside agency the Murphy’s are with are in the home every two weeks and the cases are also monitored by the placing agencies with regular visits to the home. All of the children are happy at school and at home and all have done better than anyone expected.

The next couple of years were filled with regular childrearing fun and hard work. Don is a Special Education and Parenting and Religion teacher at St Mary’s Catholic School and Kari left her career in Dental Hygiene when Patrick was born. They have used the medical knowledge and educations to assist the children in their care to become the best they possibly can be.

 In 2003, the Murphy’s took in another foster child who had come for a weekend of relief and was clearly unhappy and mistreated in her foster home. Five days after she left the Murphy’s she was back for good. She was only five, she had been moved three times already and she was happy to have found a forever home. She has serious medical problems and has had dozens of surgeries. She was two years behind grade level in grade three but is now working at grade level with a mid-seventies average in grade eleven.

In 2008 the Murphy’s took in a thirteen year old girl who had been Kari’s parent’s foster child since she was a baby. When they stopped fostering after thirty years, this girl wanted to stay in the same family and so the Murphy’s agreed to take her in as well. She was a Special Education student on Manitoulin Island where she was living and now she is a mother to her own little girl and is completing her last couple of high school credits. She is also medically fragile with a hereditary syndrome.

In 2009 Mrs. Murphy’s adopted brother and his partner had a baby boy, Raven. He was taken at birth from the hospital by DCAS and placed in foster care. His father turned to Kari as his main local family and support and asked her to consider taking the baby into her care as a legal guardian until they could get the baby back. Due to the father’s Fetal Alcohol Syndrome, he could not adequately care for Raven on his own and he asked the Murphy’s to take permanent guardianship of Raven. They agreed to. The father is still sober for almost seven years and has a relationship with Raven. Raven has thrived in the Murphy home and is almost six years old and in senior kindergarten. He is a healthy, active, and very happy boy.

The workers from the outside agency the Murphy’s are with are in the home every two weeks and the cases are also monitored by the placing agencies with regular visits to the home. All of the children are happy at school and at home and all have done better than anyone expected.

#Support4EveryFamily is essential. With our large family comprised of biological, foster, and adoptive children, outside supports tremendously helped our family, especially because a number of our children experienced complexities.

#Support4EveryFamily is essential. With our large family comprised of biological, foster, and adoptive children, outside supports tremendously helped our family, especially because a number of our children experienced complexities. When we adopted Ashley it was imperative that we have a subsidized adoption. Her medication fluctuates from $1000-$2000 a month and she has Ensures, had a feeding tube and pump. We would have had a very difficult time managing the expense of her health costs and the extra money a month helped pay for piano, ballet, and swimming lessons which would have been covered by CAS if she had been a foster child. Having a subsidized adoption was a factor in making the decision to adopt rather than continue to foster. We already had a large expense of caring for our biological son who was severely disabled and taking on her extra medical expenses would have been too much. Post-adoption, CAS workers ceased their support but we found support through Sick Kids Hospital social workers. Sometimes too much support can be a hindrance because it can make you feel as if you are not the parent, but #Support4EveryFamily is vital to achieve permanency as well as the ability to build strong relationships within and outside the family unit.

Children Having To Choose Between Family and Education

Some of the greatest joys in life are those that are unexpected. We had never planned on taking in teens; we had always felt that it was best to only foster those younger than our oldest son; we went into fostering to foster babies and young children.  I will never forget the day we received a call about a 13yr old boy who really needed a family and a home. “Hi Leslie, how are you?” the worker said. I knew what was to follow, a request to consider a placement for a child. With excitement I pictured the baby or toddler who would soon be coming to live with us. The worker continued speaking, “I know you normally don’t take teenagers, but we don’t have anywhere else right now that I can place a teen boy. You are my last call if you can’t take him I guess he will need to go to the group home.”  I talked to my husband and many of the same concerns that people list for not fostering teens ran through my head. And if I am perfectly honest, probably even the one I hear most often: “aren’t you concerned how taking an older child will affect your kids?”

Flashforward, watching C up on stage singing his heart out at Church, watching him interact with his younger siblings who absolutely adore him, him volunteering his entire summers to help reach out to other young people at camp, watching him reach out to the homeless, and hearing his teacher before retiring comment, that in all of her many years of teaching, she has never seen any student change so much, makes me extremely happy that we didn’t let those fears and doubts prevent us from fostering C.

It was a hard decision C had to make and one that no child should have to make -- the choice between becoming an official part of a family and losing his College Bursaries or not being adopted and keeping his College bursaries. In the end C chose to not be adopted and to keep his bursaries and extended care agreement.

I don’t want to come across like having C move in with us was picture perfect. We had our fair share of trials and errors, ups and downs, even a period of time where C did not live with us. We did not do it all on our own either, many people wrapped around C with love, support and guidance, helping him become the amazing young men he is today. My kids have learned so much since C came to live with us; he has an amazing testimony, and is an inspiration to so many. He has become the big brother the other kids look up to. My kids will tell you that though they learned that sometimes people don’t always make the right choices in life, with a little compassion, love, patience, and understanding you can make a world of difference in a person’s life. Even though sometimes you can make bad choices, you can always change your life around. They say that they have learned to love even when the person is acting in every way like they don’t want to be loved -- that often those are the ones who need compassion, love, patience, and understanding most.  Most important to them was seeing firsthand the difference love, family and God make and that trust can be lost but with time it can always be earned back.

Kids will often not listen to their parents, but a brother who they have come to love and respect they will often listen to. C has become the young man who I am so glad his siblings have in their lives to look up to. And I am so thankful every day for that unexpected call that changed our lives for the better. We hope to one day make official what we have felt for a very long time; C is not just our foster son but our son.

It was a hard decision C had to make and one that no child should have to make -- the choice between becoming an official part of a family and losing his College Bursaries or not being adopted and keeping his College bursaries. In the end C chose to not be adopted and to keep his bursaries and extended care agreement. Some may say, “why does it matter, it is just a piece of paper?”, but to a youth in care who has had many moves, it can mean everything. The fear of what if I do something wrong, will they no longer want me as part of the family? Will they send me away because they don’t have to keep me? Or when I go to College will I still have a family to come home to? Though we know we are always here for C and will always be his family, it is not just a paper to us either. If something serious were to happen to him legally we could be limited in our ability to help him. People also often think that a person is not a family’s child due to not being biologically related or adopted. For now we wait until C is done College for something we wish we could do sooner: make him an official part of our family.

If asked for my recommendations for improvement in the adoption process, I would want to ensure no child has to make the decision between having a forever family and a post secondary education.

Children in care have experienced trauma through no fault of their own and deserve, as all children do, permanency for a lifetime, beyond the age of 18. Ontario can do better in ensuring a #Home4EveryKid by providing #Support4EveryFamily throughout the parenting journey and giving every opportunity for their child(ren). The benefits are immeasurable to a child and in the long term best for society.

Why are supports cut when children are adopted?

I am a foster parent looking seriously at adoption. The discussion at my house these days is about the advantages, disadvantages, barriers, hopes, dreams, limitations, you name it, of the adoption process. To clarify, I am no stranger to adoption - moral adoption that is. Some of my kids have been with me for many, many years and are very much a part of my family. Some of them have moved out then have come back. Some  "aged out"  but never left. A formal legal adoption could not make these kids anymore mine but it certainly would have had them lose supports that were available to them  as crown wards.  I could not have raised many of my kids without expensive professional services that we could never have afforded.

What has caused us to think about adoption? There is a sibling group that is too large for CAS to be able to allow us to foster together. However for us, keeping sibling groups together is quite important. We have advocated for our kids repeatedly, to make sure that they can live with their siblings and develop those lifelong relationships that will keep them much healthier and connected in later years when we are gone. This sibling group has already been split into separate foster homes and they can be adopted separately, despite their close connection. Their mother was one of our foster children, only for a short while as she went back to her biological family, but she has stayed in contact with us through the years. This is the goal for our foster kids, to have them reunite with their biological family if at all possible. Unfortunately things have not gone well  in the siblings’ mother’s life. So we are discussing how we can ensure a better life for her kids.

But from experience, we know when the teenage years come, and kids begin to re-examine their lives and look towards adulthood and independence, all the hurts can come back. With this hurt and as they struggle to find their identity, comes anger, acting out, and sometimes violence. It doesn’t seem right that we would be left without the means to help our children heal and be all they can be if we adopt.

No one has questioned whether we're capable of raising these children; we have had more children in our home previously than we will if we get this whole group. We have biological children, stepchildren, kin children and foster children - it is a whole big mash up of a family. What we will be missing is the support of agency workers, the assurance that the children's financial, medical and dental needs would be met, and that psychiatric issues could be dealt with despite expenses. To keep this group together, we would have to walk away from all that support. Fortunately they seem to be a pretty healthy bunch at this point, despite the trauma they have experienced. But from experience, we know when the teenage years come, and kids begin to re-examine their lives and look towards adulthood and independence, all the hurts can come back. With this hurt and as they struggle to find their identity, comes anger, acting out, and sometimes violence. It doesn’t seem right that we would be left without the means to help our children heal and be all they can be if we adopt.

We have seen foster parents who adopt, lose their foster kids and fostering "career" because an adopted child went off the tracks in their teenage years. We do not want to risk our other children by our own choices. So we weigh the benefits and risks, and we make the best choice we possibly can. For us that is making sure these siblings grow up together in a strong, healthy family. We have the skills to parent children who have been traumatized and who will have to try to attach to new people once again. If this adoption gets approved and we are able to raise the siblings together then we will adjust our budget once more, hunt for a significantly bigger vehicle and count beds and dressers. Then we all will enjoy watching them settle in, and grow up together, with an amazing number of new siblings, who are already ours, and anxious to get to know them and help them on their way.

Research shows better outcomes for children that remain with their siblings and that have permanency. Ontario can ensure this by providing #Support4EveryFamily. Our children deserve nothing less than our very best.

Adoption Journey a Success Due to Ongoing Support of CAS Worker

Our adoption story began 15 years ago when my spouse and I adopted a sibling group of three aged 6, 4 and 3.  Over a 5 month period, our three children transitioned into our home.  These children came from an extreme history of deprivation and neglect. Due to their special needs, they had been placed in three separate foster homes with very little contact for over 2 years. As safety was a major concern, we were asked to relocate to another community, which we did. 

Living in a new community with a new family we felt very isolated and overwhelmed and we had no one to turn to for support other than our adoption worker.  Although we had a large supportive family and friends, we knew no other family that was experiencing what we were.  We did not fully understand the impact of trauma on attachment and the behaviours that we were seeing.  Due to the special needs of our children, I became a stay at home mom and have continued to stay at home to this day.  School presented many challenges for our children and we often did not have understanding educators.  We decided to homeschool our children to help with the attachment and to build their self-esteem.  After two and a half years of homeschooling, they slowly transitioned back to the mainstream school system.  I continued to bring them home for lunch in order to give them a break during the day.  I volunteered at the school and this helped my children to feel safe.  We often turned to our adoption worker for support and guidance.  She was and continues to be such a valuable resource and was really invested in our family, so much so that she is my oldest child’s godmother.

We often turned to our adoption worker for support and guidance.  She was and continues to be such a valuable resource and was really invested in our family, so much so that she is my oldest child’s godmother.

I educated myself about trauma, attachment, FASD, PTSD, loss and grief for adoption.  My CAS would often ask me to provide support for struggling parents.  Eventually, I started a support group in my community as there was a need.  From the adult support group, I started a youth group for adopted youth.  Both of these groups provide us the opportunity to connect with other families and to normalize the adoption experience.

Over the years, we have had to advocate for our children and ask for help when needed.  We have accessed therapy and have not always been successful, as many mental health professionals do not have the adoption awareness competency.

We believe that our adoption journey has been successful due to our CAS adoption worker.  She remained committed to us and we were able to call upon her at any time for support and guidance.  We also realize that not all families have the same opportunities.  Advocating for our children was needed in order for our family to succeed. 

As a peer mentor, I see the urgency for adoptive parent support groups and adoptive youth groups in every community.  It is vital for our families and youth to connect and support each other.  I have witnessed first-hand the benefit of connecting and sharing with other adoptive families that are facing the same struggles, challenges and rewards.  Families need ongoing training to help them understand behaviours and how loss and trauma affect attachment for our children and youth (at time of placement and long after the adoption has been finalized).  Many families are unable toç access or afford therapy, dental services, post-secondary support, etc.

While we are incredibly proud of our boys’ successes, we often wonder how they would be today if they had had therapy at the onset.

As for our family’s adoption story, it continues to be a lifelong journey.  My oldest child, who is diagnosed with PTSD, continues to struggle with poor self-esteem, identity, attachment to us, and was recently also diagnosed with manic depression and ADHD; after a four month placement in a treatment facility, my boy is transitioning back home.  Following the night of our boy’s chaotic and violent apprehension and placement into foster care, the two CAS workers went off on sick leave and received therapy.  By alarming contrast, our four year old child was placed in a foster home with people that he didn’t know, separated from his siblings with very little contact, and expected to be resilient without therapy or supports.  While we are incredibly proud of our boys’ successes, we often wonder how they would be today if they had had therapy at the onset.

Timely and accessible #Support4EveryFamily is paramount for families to be successful and their children to reach their full potential.  From peer support, which Adopt4Life offers, to financial support for therapies and respite, we can help families come together and stay together, ensuring all children have permanent families to grow up and grow old in. 

Adoption: The Need for Individualized Supports

I have been a foster parent for over 20 years and have been responsible for many small children. Sometimes the children in my care are returned to their biological families, but many times I have transitioned them into adoption. Recently I helped move 3 preschool siblings into their adoptive family.

The three children had challenges. They acted out in our home, and pushed aggressively to have access visits with their biological family. With the uncertainty in their lives, healing was slow. Eventually the decision was made that they would be placed for adoption rather than returned to their biological family, and an adoptive family was found. We all met, and began to transition them into their adoptive home. Even after all our years of experience, we found this little group exhausting. You can imagine  how a new family would be put off by these challenges. However, this particular family turned out to be completely committed and dug in with us. After the children were placed, we had three scheduled visits with them to provide support. Because babysitters could not manage the siblings, we brought supper and put the kids to bed so that the adoptive parents could have a much needed breaks. When 3 visits proved to be inadequate, we took more time out of our schedule in order to support these new parents.

Had these parents not had this support network provided to them from the onset, I’m not sure the placement would have been successful. 

We shared their experiences, our experiences, our knowledge and their fears; it was a knowledge and experience exchange We let them know not to worry about our sadness at having to give up the siblings as we knew that this was best for them; we recognized pain as just part of the process. There were behaviour strategies to be discussed, and guilt to alleviate. We reinforced again and again that they weren’t doing things wrong, and that the adjustment period takes time! Healing and attachment are both processes, not one time events. To help them gain insight into their children, the agency provided an excellent video series on attachment. When publicly funded therapy took too long, private was provided. Camp was also provided for the oldest.

 The family is doing well. Despite their struggles, they are adjusting and moving ahead.  The supports provided by us and the agency were instrumental in helping them find their way together as a family.  Had these parents not had this support network provided to them from the onset, I’m not sure the placement would have been successful.  We have since welcomed new little ones into our home, and hope to be able to provide support to more adoptive families in the future.

Reflecting on our years of experience with children who experience trauma, we can’t recommend enough that Ontario ensures that there is timely, accessible , and individualized #Support4EveryFamily.

Support4EveryFamily urgently needed to help children heal from past trauma

When we met with the agency to discuss adopting our beautiful six year old daughter we were told very little of her history. We knew she had been in two foster homes and it was made to seem that it was more the fault of the foster parents than our daughter, that she had to move. The big "behaviour" we were constantly asked if we could deal with was her wetting. At six, she was still in pull ups. It was told to us there had been occasions where she would look the foster parent in the eye and pee on her sofa or her dining room chair. This was an issue we felt we would be able to help her with. We were also very briefly told that she had "super human strength" and had bent a steel spindle on the staircase at the foster home although no one knew when or why and she hadn't displayed any destructive behaviour since. Things seemed pretty straight forward to us as we moved forward into adoption probation.

We cannot continue to leave families, like ourselves, to struggle in isolation with children of trauma.

Fast forward through the beautiful honeymoon phase into reality. Our little girl starts having melt downs. The melt downs start with screaming and crying and saying horribly mean things. We can handle this but we turn to our CAS for support because we hate seeing her struggle. They suggest therapy and we are on board. But then the meltdowns become physical. She begins to attack and physically assault me (mom) - punching, kicking, pushing, slapping, head butting, biting, and spitting on me. She does some of the same to Dad and the dog. She puts a plastic bag over my head and threatens to slice my throat with a knife. She rips up and breaks everything in the house she can. She carves into our bedroom door and bath tub. Nothing is safe. She is not safe. Her episodes last 3-6 hours. I beg my agency for help. They offer more therapy, a new therapist and tell me I am doing a good job but my daughter is clearly hurting and now so am I. In crisis I call the after-hours number and they tell me to make a fort and paper airplanes while my child beats me up. I feel so lost, so helpless, and like I am failing her. She shouldn't have to go through this alone but I can't help her because I don't know how --no one is telling me how to help.  

Ontario has to do better by these children and their families. We cannot continue to leave families, like ourselves, to struggle in isolation with children of trauma. Timely and adequate #Support4EveryFamily is needed urgently to help us help our children to heal from past traumas. Locally developed support groups throughout the province with mandated attendance for the first year of adoption, and funding for individualized therapy and treatments is far less costly than the status quo, risking disruption and lack of permanency for Ontario’s children.

Support and Training Necessary Throughout Entire Adoptive Journey

As awaiting parents, we felt as prepared as we could. We enjoyed the PRIDE training and were fortunate to have great facilitators. Our workers were open with us when discussing our parenting dreams and helping us determine what "risks" we were comfortable with.  In hindsight, I don’t think we were really ready at this time but I doubt any more education or reading could have prepared us. We needed to experience parenting before we could determine and customize what knowledge could be applied and what knowledge we still needed to acquire.    

The matching process was very well planned in our case with regards to the first meeting at the foster parents.  This meeting involved coordinating who would "drop off" and "pick up" the children as we spent more and more time with them before they officially moved into our home However, once we all lived together, and the honeymoon phase had progressed to dealing with real issues, we were having fewer visits with our worker and therefore had lost sight of where to turn for support. We were told we were doing really well and the kids were transitioning as expected but it didn't feel like we were effectively dealing with "behaviours". We were having a hard time pinpointing the root cause of challenging moments and wanted to acquire and instill lifelong coping skills to deal with any instances that could arise in the future. We pursued the Watch, Wait and Wonder program through CAS, which our worker did tell us about. It was helpful but I think it would have been more helpful if someone had come to our house for a significant amount of time (at least a few hours on a few different occasions) and observed our interactions, routines and play with our kids. It would’ve been great to then have a debriefing session afterwards, without the kids present in which we could ask questions and express our reactions. In an ideal world this is how Watch, Wait and Wonder would operate to ensure the successful transition of children from care into their new homes.

Our post permanency journey has only just begun in the grand scheme of things. Finalization day was fantastic but even though we know we’re a forever family it still feels like the majority of work has yet to be done, as with any worthwhile commitment

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Our post permanency journey has only just begun in the grand scheme of things. Finalization day was fantastic but even though we know we’re a forever family it still feels like the majority of work has yet to be done, as with any worthwhile commitment. After being together for a year and a half as a family, we signed up for an intensive Nurturing Attachment course (approx 16 weeks). This course was helpful on so many levels. We were in a room with other parents who were dealing with parenting challenges and we were being taught about attachment disorders by a very knowledgeable instructor who helped us understand how to meet our kids emotional needs. If we had one recommendation, I think this course would have been even more helpful sooner after placement…

Where do we go from here? In addition to the rewards and blessings our children are bringing us, experience tells us that we will have many more challenges to meet on our long journey together as a family. Providing qualified, accessible and individualized supports for families from time of placement will go a long way in helping all children in Ontario find forever families. This would allow adopted children in this province to heal and grow into the well adjusted adults they are meant to be.

Adopt4Life Instrumental in Aiding and Connecting New Adoptive Parents Throughout Adjustment Period

After two years of attending Adoption Resource Exchange (ARE) conferences and showing interest in adopting siblings, my husband and I were finally selected to adopt two boys, ages eight and nine years old. It felt like we had won the lottery! We are now in our 4th month since the placement date, but it feels like so much time has already gone by. We have been on a rollercoaster ride since our initial meeting with the boys. Does this sound familiar to you? Unlike many adoptive parents, my husband and I have been very fortunate to receive support and services during our transition period.

AdoptOntario

Being not only first-time parents and but first-time adoptive parents was both scary and exciting. Prior to meeting the kids, we contacted AdoptOntario to help us prepare ourselves for the journey. We borrowed books, such as Attaching in Adoption, Real Parents Real Children, and Adoption Parenting. Educating ourselves on attachment and parenting issues was a good start. But it had limited value at that time in that this knowledge would go unapplied until we knew what issues would crop up. Nevertheless we felt having more education rather than having no education on these matters would make us confident from the outset of our parental journey.

Networking

We started to spread the word amongst our friends and neighbours of our plans to adopt our two boys. This was a good move for us. Our network expanded with the introduction of other adoptive parents who were more than willing to share their experiences. We had a feeling building a network of contacts would be valuable to us in our future. That feeling turned out to be correct.

Children’s Aid and Treatment Centre

We met our two beautiful boys for the first time in May. They were full of life and energy. Their short life had multiple traumas, including two foster homes, and one disrupted adoption.

The first time we were together on a community visit, they asked if we were going to keep them and begged us not to return them to the foster home. You can imagine how those boys were scared of being rejected again. In spite of their fears, they felt hopeful. Children’s Aid was very supportive from the beginning. They desperately wanted to make things work out, especially after the previous disrupted adoption. Very early on, I started to investigate where to get trauma therapy in our home city. This was strongly recommended by Children’s Aid.  I got us on the waiting list at a treatment centre which specialized in trauma therapy.

The honeymoon phase did not last for long during the pre-placement phase. The oldest one was acting out and we could see that the sibling relationship was toxic. We now knew the meaning of the phrase “maladaptive ways of coping” which puzzled us when we first read the boys’ ARE profiles. 

The honeymoon phase did not last for long during the pre-placement phase. The oldest one was acting out and we could see that the sibling relationship was toxic. We now knew the meaning of the phrase “maladaptive ways of coping” which puzzled us when we first read the boys’ ARE profiles.  We had the boys in our home for eight consecutive days just a week prior to the placement day in June.  This was a real test for us!  Both boys were acting out but this week felt more intense, more real compared to our weekend visits. I was not ready for this. I felt discouraged, inadequate, and I was losing self-confidence. I recalled reading about post adoption depression (PAD) in the Adoption Parenting book and started to meet with a therapist from my work Employee Assistance Program. I needed to do something for myself and taking an anti-depressant didn’t seem like a permanent solution.

It was a blessing my husband was strong through this time. Without him, I don’t think I would have followed through.  I wanted to be a strong parent but I was far from being one. We had to postpone the placement date. We were afraid that making the decision to delay would hurt the kids and make them more anxious and insecure about their future. Instead of revealing my emotional state to them we focused on the need to prepare our home before placement day.

Our Children’s Aid worker recommended us to meet a social worker from AdoptOntario to talk about the issues we were facing. Accessing a social worker who was dedicated to post adoption support turned out to be of invaluable importance. We felt understood, not judged, and began feeling hopeful we could be successful. The social worker put us in contact with Julie Despaties from Adopt4Life who had a similar experience with adoption. Being able to talk to someone following a similar path gave us hope. We also started to consult with a wonderful attachment therapist as a couple and individually. This was a blessing. She was helping me identify some personal triggers which were being set off by our two boys. She made me examine whether I should proceed with the adoption or not, whether I was emotionally ready, and how I would feel after a year had passed and the kids were still rejecting me.

Reaching out for support has been key to our survival. You can’t be alone in this journey. Building a network through Adopt4life that connects us with other adoptive parents has given us strength to move forward.

A book that really change my perspective on understanding our boys’ challenging behaviors was The Promise  Truth from the trenches of Adoption by Christen Shepherd and Lisa Highfield

The story is of a couple with two kids who chose to adopt four more children. The entire family was challenged, but they came out the other end feeling the journey was worth it. Every time I thought my life was a nightmare, I thought of this family and thought to myself “We can get through this!”

After the placement date in September, we were facing many issues, such as attachment, sibling rivalry, self-esteem issues, anxiety issues, and controlling behaviours especially exhibited by the oldest one. The kids were having therapy once a week with our attachment therapist. Children’s Aid assigned to us a family worker who would come to our home, observe the kids and coach us on handling their behaviors. Our home slowly became unsafe for each of us. The oldest one could not self-regulate and we had one major outburst which lasted for hours. Therapy was not progressing with the older one, because he could not handle any emotional “work”. He needed to be medicated and therefore needed thorough medical assessment. At this point we were still on a waiting list with the treatment centre. Our family doctor would not prescribe our son medication prior to a specialized assessment. This is where we thought that we should have looked to get a family physician way back in September.  In a state of crisis, we made a phone call to the treatment centre pleading to have our boys assessed as soon as possible. We started the assessment in November and it is still in progress. We have a team of experts in trauma who are trying to figure out what is the most appropriate intervention for both boys. Without their professional help, we felt that our life was unstable and hopeless.

The oldest one had a really hard time adjusting at school. We found that teachers are not prepared to deal with kids with experienced trauma. They were looking for us to be the experts while we were in the process of getting to know the learning issues and learning ourselves about different therapeutic approaches. They offered us a social worker who came to the school once a month but we already had so many resources devoted to our family: treatment centre team, post-adoption family worker, and  an attachment therapist. The challenge was to ensure that the services provided were not duplicated and not too overwhelming for the kids.

The major challenge in our current journey is keeping the communication between all the different team members, ensuring that everyone is on the same page and working together.

Reaching out for support has been key to our survival. You can’t be alone in this journey. Building a network through Adopt4life that connects us with other adoptive parents has given us strength to move forward.

Ontario can do better in ensuring immediate and ongoing supports for families and their children. #Support4EveryFamily is a must if we are to provide the best outcomes for all of Ontario’s children.