Description
Book SynopsisAdoption has become widely practiced, accepted, and accessible, and has greatly changed the composition of families making it a timely subject for study. The authors of Understanding Adoption undertake exploration of this important terrain of loss and connection, and of the fragility and resilience of human bonds.
Trade ReviewRarely has an edited volume on the topic of adoption offered so rich a collection of chapters steeped in theory and clinical practice examples. ...clinicians working with this population could find few better uses for the modest purchase price of the paperback version of Understanding Adoption. However, the use many readers will make of this volume might warrant investing in a hardback copy.... * Clinical Social Work Journal *
This is a wonderful and desperately needed book addressing the multiple levels of complexity faced by clinicians working with adopted children and their families. The authors address a topic that has received virtually no attention in the psychoanalytic literature, despite the fact that adoption has long been recognized as posing particular challenges to families and clinicians alike. The need for a broad reaching and nuanced discussion of these issues is especially keen today, when traditional, international, and non-traditional adoptions bring families to the consulting room on a very regular basis. Thankfully, this compilation of clinically rich, compelling, thoughtful and accessible papers will give clinicians a much needed and wise guide to navigating the array of diverse internal, familial, biological, and societal influences that characterize each adoption story. -- Arietta Slade, Yale Child Study Center
A deeply compassionate and illuminating exploration of the psychological ramifications of adoption in all of its diverse forms. -- Francine Cournos, MD
...is an excellent book...is easy to read and jargon-free. It is a tour de force of issues on adoption....a wonderful tool for teaching concepts of attachment theory, internalizastion and identity formation. It thoroughly covers the process of psychotherapy as well as how tranference and counter-transference affect the treatment. * Psychoanalytic Social Work *
|s|a|fKatherine Marsh
The world of adoption has undergone radical change and, for the first time, we have a book, which brings together the range, variety, complexity and impact of adoption on everyone involved. For all those therapists, teachers and parents who need to understand the contemporary experience of adoption, this significant book is an important basic reference that speaks to the complex challenges adoption can pose to child and adult development, and also illuminates the potential for secure identity and joyful engagement with the future for each person in the adoptive configuration. -- authors of
Working with Parents Makes Therapy Work, Kerry Kelly Novick and Jack Novick, PhDauthors of Working with Parents Makes Therapy Work
Rarely has an edited volume on the topic of adoption offered so rich a collection of chapters steeped in theory and clinical practice examples. ...clinicians working with this population could find few better uses for the modest purchase price of the paperback version of Understanding Adoption. However, the use many readers will make of this volume might warrant investing in a hardback copy. * Clinical Social Work Journal *
Understanding Adoption is a long-overdue look into how adoption affects everyone involved, from the clinician/patient and parent/child dyads, to the social workers, teachers, foster parents, medical professionals, and adoption process. It is a groundbreaking and very welcome contribution to the literature and deserves to be widely read and discussed....an incredibly valuable tool. It as the unevenness expectable of writing breaking new ground, and is all the more exciting to read....Given the opportunity to turn back time, we would gift a copy of this book to each and every coworker and adoptive family in our care. -- . * Psychoanalytic Books, Winter 2008 *
Table of Contents
Part 1 Clinical Issues Chapter 2 The World of Adoption: An Introduction Chapter 3 Unconscious Communication and the Transmission of Loss Chapter 4 International Adoption: Projection and Externalization in the Treatment of a 4 Year Old Child and her Parents Chapter 5 Working with Parents of Adopted Infants and Toddlers Chapter 6 Gay and Lesbian Parents in the World of Adoption Chapter 7 Losing Each Other in the Wake of Loss: Failed Dialogues in Adoptive Families Chapter 8 The Adoption of Foster Children Who Suffered Early Trauma and Object Loss: Implications for Practice Chapter 9 Secrecy in the Psychotherapy of a Severely Traumatized Adopted Child Chapter 10 Adoption Fantasy in the Treatment of Two Adolescent Girls Chapter 11 Identity and Identification: Being Different and the Quest to Belong in an Adopted Young Adult Chapter 12 The Plight of the Adoptee in Adult Life: A Case of Kinship Adoption Chapter 13 Loss and the Dynamics of an Adoptee's Identification with Her Birth Mother Part 14 Special Issues Chapter 15 Child Custody Disputes in Adoption Cases: Safeguarding the Relationship with the Psychological Parent Chapter 16 Consultation during the Adoption Process: Working with Families Adopting Older Russian Children Chapter 17 Birth Parents and Adoptive Parents: Who are the 'Real' Parents?
