Adoptee Group Therapy

For adults older than college age, my Monday night group combines elements of a regular, facilitated support group with group therapy. Some people use group to supplement their individual therapy, when they want to work more on adoption related issues; other use it instead of therapy.

I also run Young Adult Adoptee Therapy Groups, but am not offering one at present. Here is a bit more information if this interests you for a future group.

The young adult group deals with all the same issues as the adult group, but with a focus on the special concerns of people 19-24.

We will work on achieving healthy independence, reducing stress, starting, deepening and ending relationships, relationships with adoptive family, birth family, desires to search, DNA, and managing any symptoms of depression or anxiety.

We also delve deeply into identity.

• Who am I?

• How do I know?

• How do I feel my connection with others?

Depending on what is going on in members lives, we may deal with issues of open adoption, search and reunion, handling family relationships, and working through difficulty histories.

In the adoption world we have a long and vital history of support groups, where adoptees or triad members get together, share their stories, and receive support and comfort from each other.

My groups combine both supportive elements and psychotherapy.

ADOPTEE SUPPORT:

everyone in the room is an adoptee,

people do share their stories and find out what they have in common

in sharing, people find healing and helpful

ADOPTEE THERAPY:

There is a therapist. I am there bringing an adoption competent therapist’s focus and sensitivity to both your individual concerns and the ongoing group process.

Attending to your own process. During group you are encouraged to pay attention to and bring forward your feelings and thoughts and you may do as much work responding to someone else’s content as bringing forth your own concerns.

Focus on experience. Because I am a gestalt therapist, which is an experiential therapy, we will notice together how you feel when you share or respond and maybe even try an exercise together to bring your experience more clearly into awareness or explore what might be a next step for you.

Staying with difficulty. In group we focus on topics that might be challenging, always with the intention to move into greater self awareness. We move towars what is difficult together in the service of your growth. In the difficulty are the gifts for you, and with someone trained to guide the process we can go farther together.

Commitment. When things get difficult some adoptees know how to leave before they are left. In group therapy, members who decide to join the group are encouraged to stay with the group long enough to reap the benefits of building relationships and getting honest feedback and agree to take at least 2 sessions to leave the group if they decide it is not for them, in order to experience a different kind of leaving.