Older Child Adoption | What We Did Right

So after this post, a thoughtful reader asked for what I thought I did right in our adoption journey. It was a hard question; I’m my own best (or worst) critic…depending on how you look at it. In my insecurity and looking for objectiveness, I turned to social media. I’m glad did. The comments were […]

Older Child Adoption | What I Would Have Done Differently

For various reasons, the three older kids are not living at home. One wants to return, the other two are desperately trying to find their wings so that they can fly the nest for good. With more mental margin than I’ve had in years, I’ve been reflecting over our experience of adopting older kids and […]

Foto Flashback Friday

For those of you who don’t know us in real life…or have entered our lives more recently…I sat down to write out a blog-length version of our adoption story recently. I had agreed to it months ago. It was challenging writing it without the narrative being completely colored by where we currently are in our journey. […]

What I Learned from Adopting Teenagers

I wanted to publish a post like this on Monday (Airplane Day for John and Kayla), but I was had been waiting all night in the ER for psych bed for one of the other kids. That’s a story for another post, but you can keep our family in your prayers. This has been a long […]

Love is Enough

Because of our story and our training in trust-based parenting, I am privy to a part of our culture that is going largely unrecognized save for a few sensational news stories like this recent one. People, the stress of healing hurt kids is tearing families apart all over our country every day. Most of these […]

Your brain is a mirror | Some notes on relationships

  Someone recently shared a video on a Facebook that really resonated with me. It’s a really-smart guy, Dr. Bruce Perry, validating our ETC Training, reasons for homeschooling, and experiences we’ve had with our kids. Watching this video (or a comparable one) should really be required of all politicians, parents, and education majors…or just everyone. […]

food and older adopted teens

Food and Older Adopted Kids

Food is one of the hot topics that comes up often on adoption forums and in support groups. Because kids from hard places often need control to feel safe (remember that ‘feel’ is different than ‘be’), it’s important to pick and choose your battles. If a family does not choose to let their child(ren) feel […]