Adoption Wise

It's easy to get bogged down in big behaviors and forget to have positive interactions with your kids. TBRI® Nurture Groups provide a positive, attachment-rich environment that is imperative to helping your child increase their sense of felt safety while connecting and learning new skills for life.

In this workshop, you will learn:

importance of Nurture Groups

six aspects of a Nurture Group

how to implement the components into your family

Tristen McGhee is a certified Trust Based Relational Intervention (TBRI®) Practitioner, adoptive mom, foster/adoptive parent trainer, as well as a trauma-wise parent coach. She has extensive experience working with vulnerable families to find a path of hope and healing. Her passion for helping families and advocating for children with early childhood trauma backgrounds has led to her current enrollment in a graduate program to receive her Master of Education in Trauma and Neuroscience.

Click here to download a transcript for this episode.

Relevant Links

Safe Precious Heard Website

Connect with Tristen on Instagram

Download workshop handout

The Connected Parent* by Purvis and Qualls

Click here to join Reclaim Compassion for future workshops

*This is an affiliate link

We often have opportunities to be guests on other podcasts, and we've had some great conversations. We'd hate for you to miss them. Because we're taking the month of July off from recording new episodes, we thought it would be the perfect time to share some of those interviews with you right here on our podcast.

We couldn’t be happier to share this conversation with Melissa Corkum & Lisa Qualls of The Adoption Connection. We have long respected the work these two remarkable women are doing in the world. They are some of our favorite voices, offering hope and encouragement, to adoptive parents and caregivers. They’ve written numerous books, have a fantastic podcast, offer coaching and speaking, and host a beautiful Facebook community of support. They are doing such good and meaningful work in this space bringing decades of personal and professional experience to the equation.

Click here to download a transcript for this episode.

Relevant Links

This episode first appeared on the Raising Boys and Girls Podcast.

Reclaim Compassion: The Adoptive Parent’s Guide to Overcoming Blocked Care with Neuroscience and Faith* by Lisa C. Qualls and Melissa Corkum

Join our Reclaim Compassion Coaching Group

Join our free Facebook group

*this is an affiliate link

We often have opportunities to be guests on other podcasts, and we've had some great conversations. We'd hate for you to miss them. Because we're taking the month of July off from recording new episodes, we thought it would be the perfect time to share some of those interviews with you right here on our podcast.

The authors of Reclaim Compassion and hosts of The Adoption Connection podcast, Melissa Corkum (Enneagram 7) and Lisa C. Qualls (Enneagram 3) join Suzanne Stabile and Joel on the Journey.

Parenting is HARD

Working together as a 3 and a 7 and how they related differently to feelings

Blocked care

What is hand lettering?

Click here to download a transcript for this episode.

Relevant Links

This episode first appeared on The Enneagram Journey Podcast.

Reclaim Compassion* by Lisa C. Qualls and Melissa Corkum

Free blocked care assessment

*this is an affiliate link

We often have opportunities to be guests on other podcasts, and we've had some great conversations. We'd hate for you to miss them. Because we're taking the month of July off from recording new episodes, we thought it would be the perfect time to share some of those interviews with you right here on our podcast.

Blocked Care is language identified by Jon Baylin & Dan Hughes which describes the experience whereby:

Overwhelming stress in a parent’s nervous system can create this subconscious, not on purpose, self-protective mechanism that makes it so that some of the parts of our brain and nervous system that bring us the joy and the compassion into parenting shut down.

This can look like parents who are doing a lot of the actions of parenting (i.e., making therapy appointments, packing lunches, driving kids, etc.), but all the reward of parenting– that reciprocal relationship, the enjoyment, the satisfaction– has left, and it leaves parents feeling a sense of apathy towards parenting, which then cycles into guilt and shame.

The stress in a parent’s nervous system that causes blocked care is not always, but can often be related to big, baffling behaviors.

Melissa and Lisa help parents begin healing their nervous systems by looking at three different aspects of their lives:

We look at their internal world. So what’s happening in their nervous system, what’s happening in their mindset;

We look at what’s happening in their external world, their sensory environments;

We look at their relational world to safe people, spiritual relationships, etc.

Note: Robyn's podcast is now titled The Baffling Behaviors Show

Click here to download a transcript for this episode.

Relevant Links

This episode first appeared at https://robyngobbel.com/blockedcare/.

Reclaim Compassion* by Lisa C. Qualls and Melissa Corkum

Free blocked care assessment

*This is an affiliate link

Our "What We Learned in 2022" episode got such great feedback that we decided to drop in with a mid-year reflections conversation.

We spontaneously answered the questions:

What did you discover in the first half of the year?

Share something that's on your mind right now.

What is one thing you would like to learn this summer?

These make great journal prompts or conversation starters with a friend. How would you answer them?

Click here to download a transcript for this episode.

Relevant Links

Reclaim Compassion: The Adoptive Parent's Guide to Overcoming Blocked Care with Neuroscience and Faith* by Lisa C. Qualls and Melissa Corkum

Wanderlog

Anchored* by Deb Dana

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Abandoned at a young age, Stephanie wandered the war-torn countryside of Korea. Due to her bi-racial ethnicity, she was abused and violated in every way. She was adopted around the age of nine by David & Judy Merwin. Her parents surrounded her with "lavish love" and encouragement instead of consequences when she acted out during her childhood. They seemed to understand her behaviors came from a well of deep hurt and shame. A profound personal encounter with Jesus Christ enabled her to exchange her pain with Him at the cross and see her identity and purpose in the light of God's love.

This message, Stephanie has had the privilege to share with anyone who will listen.  God has honored her with very diverse audiences. Over the past 30 years, her story and teaching have been on TV, radio, in magazines and other people's books. She recently wrote her first book; She Is Mine. She has been an Advocate for Orphans and Adoptees her whole Christian life, believing there is an orphan in each person without Jesus.

Click here to download a transcript for this episode.

Relevant Links

Stephanie's Website

Destiny Ministries

Vacations are fun until they're not. The anticipation anxiety, change in routine, and potential overstimulation can make enjoyable vacations feel impossible.

In this episode, you'll learn:

things to consider when planning

how to set realistic expectations

tried and true tips for keeping the fun in vacation

Rachel Bell is an adoptive mom and founder Bell Travel Co. (@belltravelco), that specializes in travel for families and also individuals with food allergies and special needs.

Kristen Perso is an adoptive mom and founder of Cherry Blossom Vacations (@cherry_blossom_vacations) which renews families through the gift of vacation

Click here to download a transcript for this episode.

Relevant Links

Join Reclaim Compassion for access to the Q&A portion and future workshops

Connect with Rachel and Bell Travel Co. on Instagram

Bell Travel Co Website

Connect with Kristen and Cherry Blossom Vacations on Instagram

Cherry Blossom Vacations Website

This week we answer listener questions such as:

How do I give "yesses" to an adult child to strengthen connection?

Is younger child adoption easier than older child adoption?

Can you explain why my child begs for hugs and then rejects them?

Click here to download the transcript for this episode.

Relevant Links

The Connected Parent* by Dr. Karyn Purvis and Lisa C. Qualls

Join Reclaim Compassion

*This is an affiliate link

Parenting kids who have experienced trauma, loss and separation can be challenging. Finding strategies that heal and actually work provides hope to parents who are struggling, but these strategies can seem strange to others. Our parents, neighbors, friends, and family (maybe even that lady we see at church each week) have opinions, suggestions and perhaps even judgment about our new parenting strategies. This workshop will give us some tools to help our loved ones understand why we parent the way we do.

Beth Smith Feger has over 20 years of experience in training and education. Since completing a Ph.D. in early childhood education in 2009, she has worked training teachers, parents and young people. She is a passionate life long learner and has co-written a text book for early childhood educators. She is currently the Director of Programs at Fostering Hope, an organization the equips and supports families and churches to care for children who have experienced trauma. She is also the mom to three kids, two adopted from foster care. She lives in Austin with her family and enjoys reading, swimming and Marvel movies.

Click here to download a transcript for this episode.

Relevant Links

I Am Fostering Hope

Join Reclaim Compassion

When Kristen Thomas acted out as a child at school, it was a cry for help, but she was instead labeled as a "difficult child." Eventually placed in foster care, Kristen struggled with shame and being misunderstood by the people who were supposed to protect her. In this episode, she openly shares her story of how she's breaking the cycle of generational abuse in her family. She also shares the importance and role of community and what she needed from her caregivers.

Click here to download a transcript for this episode.

Relevant Links

Connect with Kristen on Instagram

Free blocked care assessment