Creating a Family: Talk about Adoption, Foster & Kinship Care

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We talk about the challenges of adopting, fostering, IVF, or third-party reproduction while being in the military. We talk with the co-founders of the Military Family Building Coalition, Katy Bell Hendrickson and Ellen Gustafson.

In this episode, we cover:

• What are the challenges of being in the military and trying to adopt?
• What are the challenges of being in the military when seeking fertility treatment
• Military health insurance: Tri Care
• Military Family Building Coalition https://www.militaryfamilybuilding.org/
• What does Military Family Building Coalition do?

This podcast is produced  by www.CreatingaFamily.org. We are a national non-profit with the mission to strengthen and inspire adoptive, foster & kinship parents and the professionals who support them. Creating a Family brings you the following trauma-informed, expert-based content:

• Weekly podcasts
• Weekly articles/blog posts
• Resource pages on all aspects of family building

Please leave us a rating or review RateThisPodcast.com/creatingafamily

Support the show

Please leave us a rating or review.  This podcast is produced by www.CreatingaFamily.org. We are a national non-profit with the mission to strengthen and inspire adoptive, foster & kinship parents and the professionals who support them.

Creating a Family brings you the following trauma-informed, expert-based content:

• Weekly podcasts
• Weekly articles/blog posts
• Resource pages on all aspects of family building

Drop us some Fan Mail. Thanks!

Kinship caregivers (primarily grandparents raising their grandchildren) are often functioning as a shadow foster care system. We talk with Josh Gupta-Kagan, a Professor of Law at the University of South Carolina School of Law and author of America’s Hidden Foster Care System in the Stanford Law Review, and Karissa Phelps, a Stoneleigh Emerging Leader Fellow at Temple Legal Aid, where she provides legal representation and services to kinship caregivers.

In this episode, we cover:

• In many cases, child protection agencies induce parents to transfer physical custody of their children to kinship caregivers by threatening to place the children in foster care.
• How often does this happen?
• Why do you call this the “hidden” foster care system?
• Generally speaking, don’t we consider it best practice for kids to remain with extended family? So why is this a problem? Is it inherently coercive?
• What are the advantages to encouraging placement with kin before they enter the formal foster care system?
• What are the risks?
• If this transfer takes place outside of the system, how long does it last? How can children go home? Who decides?
• How does this differ from informal kinship care?
• How does The Family First Prevention Services Act of 2018 contribute to the “hidden foster care system”?
• Do you see kinship placements increasing?
• What are child welfare agencies doing to support kinship families?
•  Follow the money: Is it less expensive for agencies to place with kin rather than unrelated foster parents?
• How is foster care funded?
• What is the status of kinship navigator programs? 
• How can we best support kinship families?
• What do you see as the biggest challenges to kinship families? 

This podcast is produced  by www.CreatingaFamily.org. We are a national non-profit with the mission to strengthen and inspire adoptive, foster & kinship parents and the professionals who support them. Creating a Family brings you the following trauma-informed, expert-based content:

• Weekly podcasts
• Weekly articles/blog posts
•  Resource pages on all aspects of family building

Please leave us a rating or review RateThisPodcast.com/creatingafamily

Support the show

Please leave us a rating or review.  This podcast is produced by www.CreatingaFamily.org. We are a national non-profit with the mission to strengthen and inspire adoptive, foster & kinship parents and the professionals who support them.

Creating a Family brings you the following trauma-informed, expert-based content:

• Weekly podcasts
• Weekly articles/blog posts
• Resource pages on all aspects of family building

Drop us some Fan Mail. Thanks!

The trauma of racism impacts our children's physical and emotional health. In this episode, we talk with Dr. Roger Harrison, a clinical assistant professor of pediatrics at Sidney Kimmel Medical College at Thomas Jefferson University and a pediatric psychologist in the Division of Behavioral Health at Nemours/Alfred I DuPont Hospital for Children; Dr. Lonna Gordon, the Division Chief of Adolescent Medicine at Nemours Children’s Hospital in Florida. She is board certified in pediatrics, adolescent medicine and obesity medicine; and Cindy Bo, Senior Vice President, Delaware Valley Strategy and Business Development and Interim DRIVE Enterprise Leader.

In this episode, we cover:

We talk a lot about the impact of trauma on children and often we do so in the context of neglect, loss, abuse, removal from biological family, and prenatal exposure. Today we are going to expand the concept of trauma to include the impacts of racism.

• What is racism and what are the different forms it can take? 
• Examples of the different types of racism.
• Does racism impact the physical health of minorities? 
• Racism hurting the emotional health of minorities.
• In other forms of trauma we can see that the impact on the child varies depending on many factors, such as who was responsible for inflicting the trauma and that persons relationship to the child, the child’s age, and the child’s basic temperament. Is the same true for the traumatic impacts of racism?
• Internalized racism
• Cumulative impact of different types of trauma.
• Are children of color being raised by white parents more vulnerable to the traumatic impacts of racism? 
• Does the trauma of racism differ depending on the race or ethnicity of the child or person? Model minority?
• Are non-minority children also impacted negatively by racism?
• How can we help children of color cope with racism and not be unduly impacted by the trauma?
• Suggested books and activities.

This podcast is produced  by www.CreatingaFamily.org. We are a national non-profit with the mission to strengthen and inspire adoptive, foster & kinship parents and the professionals who support them. Creating a Family brings you the following trauma-informed, expert-based content:

• Weekly podcasts
• Weekly articles/blog posts
• Resource pages on all aspects of family building

Please leave us a rating or review RateThisPodcast.com/creatingafamily

Support the show

Please leave us a rating or review.  This podcast is produced by www.CreatingaFamily.org. We are a national non-profit with the mission to strengthen and inspire adoptive, foster & kinship parents and the professionals who support them.

Creating a Family brings you the following trauma-informed, expert-based content:

• Weekly podcasts
• Weekly articles/blog posts
• Resource pages on all aspects of family building

Drop us some Fan Mail. Thanks!

What do you need to know about uterine fibroids if you want to get pregnant? We talk with Dr. Desiree McCarthy-Keith, is the Medical Director of Shady Grove Fertility Atlanta and a Board Certified OB/GYN and Reproductive Endocrinologist. She also has a Master of Public Health in maternal and child health. She has been listed in Atlanta Magazine’s Top Doctors for Infertility from 2017-2021 and as one of Black Health Magazine’s Most Influential African American Doctors.

In this episode, we cover:

• What are uterine fibroids?
• What are the main symptoms of fibroids?
• Who is most at risk for having fibroids?
• Is there a genetic connection to uterine fibroids? Do fibroids pass through families?
• Why do some fibroids grow very slowly and others rapidly? Is the speed the fibroid is growing something to worry about? How should women track this?
• Are fibroids always a problem requiring treatment?
• How to diagnoses fibroids.
• Symptom distinction between endometriosis and fibroid?
• What is the best way to medically treat uterine fibroids?
• Are their alternative medicinal treatments that have been seen to be effective at treating uterine fibroids?
• When is a hysterectomy the preferred treatment?
• Skill of surgeon is important when using a surgical treatment. How can a patient determine the surgeon’s skill?
• Can fibroids cause infertility?
• Impact of fibroids on pregnancy?
• What happens to fibroids during pregnancy? If a woman knows she has fibroids, what should she be aware of when she is pregnant?
• Are their lifestyle factors that contribute to having fibroids or worsening fibroids once you have them?
• Does diet affect fibroids?
• Are women with fibroids at a higher risk for uterine cancer or reproductive tract cancers?
• What other routine medical treatment should women with fibroids make sure they receive?
• What can infertility nurses do to help patients with fibroid.
• Other health issues associated with fibroids.
• Are tampons safe to use? Do they cause or contribute to fibroids? Are the sponge and cup safe to use or better to use?
• What happens to fibroids after menopause?

This podcast is produced  by www.CreatingaFamily.org.  Creating a Family brings you the following expert-based content:

• Weekly podcasts
• Weekly articles/blog posts
• Resource pages on all aspects of family building

Please leave us a rating or review RateThisPodcast.com/creatingafamily

Support the show

Please leave us a rating or review.  This podcast is produced by www.CreatingaFamily.org. We are a national non-profit with the mission to strengthen and inspire adoptive, foster & kinship parents and the professionals who support them.

Creating a Family brings you the following trauma-informed, expert-based content:

• Weekly podcasts
• Weekly articles/blog posts
• Resource pages on all aspects of family building

Drop us some Fan Mail. Thanks!

Do you have a child that is more—more loud, more energetic, more argumentative, more everything? Intense children can be harder to raise, but their intensity is a gift as well as a parenting challenge. We talk with Howard Glasser, creator of the Nurtured Heart Approach to parenting. He is the author of Transforming the Difficult Child and Transforming the Intense Child Workbook.

In this episode, we cover:

• What do you consider to be an intense child? My child was “more”—more loud, more energy—their reaction to most things was simply more. They go from 5 mph to 60mph in about a second. 
• What are the labels and diagnoses that intense children often accumulate? ADHD, ODD (Oppositional Defiance Disorder), conduct disorder, PTSD, anxiety disorder, depression.
• What makes some kids more “intense” than others? 
• What do you mean by energy-challenged kids? Unable to handle or effectively control their physical, cognitive or emotional energy. They have a disorder of self-control. They have more energy than they have self-control.
• Energy is a gift as well as a challenge.
• You mention in Transforming the Difficult Child that many intense or difficult kids love video games—more so than the average child. I’ve noticed this too. Why? 
• Structure-while I think all children need structure, the high intensity child really needs structure. Positive forms of structure vs. negative forms of structure
• Traditional parenting techniques did not work well for my intense little wonder. Your approach to raising an intense child is based on your Nurturing Heart Approach as outlined in your book, Transforming the Difficult Child and Transforming the Intense Child Workbook. What are the basic principles of this approach to parenting? The 3 strands.
• Strand 1: Refuse to energize the negative. What are some of the challenges parents face when applying this? What are some common ways we might accidentally energize the negative?
• Strand 2: Energize the positive. active recognition, experiential recognition, proactive recognition, creative recognition.
• Is there a problem with too much praise?
• Strand 3: Absolute clarity on limits and consequences. How to set limits?
• Intensity is not something that a person outgrows.

This podcast is produced  by www.CreatingaFamily.org. We are a national non-profit with the mission to strengthen and inspire adoptive, foster & kinship parents and the professionals who support them. Creating a Family brings you the following trauma-informed, expert-based content:

• Weekly podcasts
• Weekly articles/blog posts
• Resource pages on all aspects of family building

Please leave us a rating or review RateThisPodcast.com/creatingafamily

Support the show

Please leave us a rating or review.  This podcast is produced by www.CreatingaFamily.org. We are a national non-profit with the mission to strengthen and inspire adoptive, foster & kinship parents and the professionals who support them.

Creating a Family brings you the following trauma-informed, expert-based content:

• Weekly podcasts
• Weekly articles/blog posts
• Resource pages on all aspects of family building

Drop us some Fan Mail. Thanks!

Have you ever thought about becoming a foster parent but didn't know where to begin? This is the show for you! We talk with Vicki Ochoa, State Director for South Carolina MENTOR, an organization that provides an array of child and family services, on the ins and outs of becoming a foster parent.

In this episode, we cover:

• Why should you become a foster parent?
• What is the role of a foster parent?
• What are the expectations of what a foster parent will do?
• How to become a foster parent.
• How do you get licensed to be a foster parent?
• How much training is required?
• What type of ongoing training is required?
• Do you have to own your home?
•  How big does your house need to be?
• How many kids can you have already in your home?
• What agency can you work with to become licensed?
• Who places the child with you?
• What are the needs of kids in foster care?
• How is the decision made as to which child or children should be placed in your home?
• Can you specify the age, gender, # of kids, and degree of special need of the child you want to foster?
• What type of help should the agency provide for you after the child is in your home?
• If you have a choice, how do you choose a foster agency to work with?
•  How much voice do foster parents have on what happens to the child?
• Do foster parents get paid?
• Can you adopt your foster child?

This podcast is produced  by www.CreatingaFamily.org. We are a national non-profit with the mission to strengthen and inspire adoptive, foster & kinship parents and the professionals who support them. Creating a Family brings you the following trauma-informed, expert-based content:

• Weekly podcasts
• Weekly articles/blog posts
• Resource pages on all aspects of family building

Please leave us a rating or review RateThisPodcast.com/creatingafamily

Support the show

Please leave us a rating or review.  This podcast is produced by www.CreatingaFamily.org. We are a national non-profit with the mission to strengthen and inspire adoptive, foster & kinship parents and the professionals who support them.

Creating a Family brings you the following trauma-informed, expert-based content:

• Weekly podcasts
• Weekly articles/blog posts
• Resource pages on all aspects of family building

Drop us some Fan Mail. Thanks!

How can we raise children who are resilient and able to bounce back from the ups and downs of life and move forward with optimism and confidence? In this episode, we talk with Dr. Ken Ginsburg, the Co-Founder and Director of Programs at the Center for Parent and Teen Communications, a Professor of Pediatrics at the Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia (CHOP) and The University of Pennsylvania’s Perelman School of Medicine, and author or “Building Resilience in Children and Teens” and “Raising Kids to Thrive”.

In this episode, we cover:

• What is resilience and why is it important. Resilience is the ability to bounce back and the capacity to rise above difficult circumstances, allowing our children to exist in this less-than-perfect world, while moving forward with optimism and confidence.
• What are the biggest challenges in creating resilience in children?
• Raising resilient kids
• We want our kids to be successful. What is Success- how does it relate to happiness?
• The importance of imagining the person we want our child to be at 35. How to take the long view of parenting?
• How to Foster Resilience in Children / What are the two fundamental principles of building resilience in our children? Young people will be resilient when the important adults in their lives believe in them unconditionally and hold them to high expectations.
• Unconditional love is key to resilience. It gives children the deep-seated security that allows them to take chances when they need to adapt to new circumstances and the knowledge that in the long run all will be okay.
• What do we mean by hold them to high expectations?
• What are the 7 crucial ingredients to building resilience in our kids/raising resilient kids: strategies to build the seven crucial “Cs” — competence, confidence, connection, character, contribution, coping, and control.
• How does trauma impact resilience?
• Resources mentioned in this episode: https://parentandteen.com/category/for-teens/

This podcast is produced  by www.CreatingaFamily.org. We are a national non-profit with the mission to strengthen and inspire adoptive, foster & kinship parents and the professionals who support them. Creating a Family brings you the following trauma-informed, expert-based content:

• Weekly podcasts
• Weekly articles/blog posts
• Resource pages on all aspects of family building

Please leave us a rating or review RateThisPodcast.com/creatingafamily

Support the show

Please leave us a rating or review.  This podcast is produced by www.CreatingaFamily.org. We are a national non-profit with the mission to strengthen and inspire adoptive, foster & kinship parents and the professionals who support them.

Creating a Family brings you the following trauma-informed, expert-based content:

• Weekly podcasts
• Weekly articles/blog posts
• Resource pages on all aspects of family building

Drop us some Fan Mail. Thanks!

Can problems in our immune system cause infertility, miscarriage, or premature birth? Today we talk with Reproductive Endocrinologist Dr. Daniel Stein, Director of RMA of New York’s Westside office and Chief of Reproductive Endocrinology at Mount Sinai West Hospital, about the impact our immune system has on our fertility.

In this episode, we cover:

• In what ways are our immune system and reproductive system linked?
• Why does the woman’s immune system not react to the presence of a fetus?
• Autoimmune diseases-how do they impact fertility and miscarriage or premature birth
• What are the most common auto-immune diseases? (lupus, rheumatoid arthritis, multiple sclerosis, type 1 diabetes, Crohn’s Disease, Hashimoto's disease, celiac disease, endometriosis, premature ovarian insufficiency)
• Are autoimmune mechanisms involved in infertility disorders such as premature ovarian failure or diminished ovarian reserves, endometriosis, polycystic ovary syndrome (PCOS), unexplained infertility, and repeatedly unsuccessful IVF attempts and may be responsible for the pathophysiology of preeclampsia or spontaneous abortions?
• Endometriosis
• Premature ovarian insufficiency
• Impact of auto-immune diseases on pregnancy complications, miscarriage, and still births.
• What is antiphospholipid syndrome (APS) and do they impact fertility or miscarriage
• Mucosal immunity of the female genital tract? Female immune system reacting to sperm.
• What are anti-seminal/sperm antibodies in men and women?
• Can a woman be allergic to sperm?
• What role does our microbiome play in our immunity?
• What role does our microbiome play in fertility?
•  What are natural killer cells?
• Does infertility treatment, such as IVF, affect a woman’s immune system?

This podcast is produced  by www.CreatingaFamily.org. Creating a Family brings you the following expert-based content:

·         Weekly podcasts

·         Weekly articles/blog posts

·        Resource pages on all aspects of family building

Please leave us a rating or review RateThisPodcast.com/creatingafamily

Support the show

Please leave us a rating or review.  This podcast is produced by www.CreatingaFamily.org. We are a national non-profit with the mission to strengthen and inspire adoptive, foster & kinship parents and the professionals who support them.

Creating a Family brings you the following trauma-informed, expert-based content:

• Weekly podcasts
• Weekly articles/blog posts
• Resource pages on all aspects of family building

Drop us some Fan Mail. Thanks!

What are the long-term impacts of prenatal alcohol and drug exposure and how can we parent these kids to help them thrive. In this episode, we talk with Dr. Mona Delahooke, a clinical child psychologist and the author of Beyond Behaviors: Using Brain Science and Compassion to Understand and Solve Children’s Behavioral Challenges.

In this episode, we cover:

Long term impact of prenatal alcohol and drug exposure: Research has found that most drugs that are commonly abused easily cross the placenta and can affect fetal brain development. In utero exposures to drugs and alcohol thus can have long-lasting implications for brain development resulting in behavioral challenges and mental and physical health implication. Some things to consider:

• The amount of drugs and alcohol used by the mom and the timing in the pregnancy matter, although this is information that is seldom available to adoptive or foster parents.
• Very often children are exposed to more than one substance in utero. For example, it is not uncommon for a pregnant woman who is drinking alcohol to also use drugs. 
• Untreated drug abuse/addiction often coincides with poor nutrition and prenatal care, which increases the risk further for pre-natal and post-natal trauma with potentially lifelong impacts. 

It helps to begin with understanding how alcohol and drugs exposure in pregnancy can affect the child not just in infancy but throughout their life.

• Alcohol
   Fetal Alcohol Spectrum Disorders (FASDs) is characterized with a broad range of deficits. Children with FASD may not have the facial dysmorphology and other physical abnormalities associated with Fetal Alcohol Syndrome (FAS).
•  FASDs currently represent the leading cause of mental retardation in North America.
•  Of all the substances of abuse (including cocaine, heroin, and methamphetamines), alcohol produces by far the most serious neurobehavioral effects in the child and into adulthood.
•  Alcohol exposure can cause a host of cognitive and behavioral impairments, including:
  • Low to average IQs (IQ can range from mental retardation to normal)
  •  Poor executive functioning skills
  •  Poor information processing skills
  •  Lack of social and communication skills
  •  Lack of appropriate initiative
  •  Discrepancy between their behavioral age and their chronological age (i.e., acting younger than they are)
  •  Difficulty with abstract concepts, such as time and money
  •  Poor judgment
  •  Failure to consider consequences of actions. Doesn’t learn from mistakes.
  •  Poor concentration and attention
  •  Social withdrawal
•  Other drugs: Methamphetamines, Amphetamines (speed and also some of the medications used to treat ADHD), 3,4-Methylenedioxymethamphetamine (MDMA)- street name Ecstasy, Opioids-(including heroin, fentanyl), Methadone or Suboxone, cocaine (including crack), and marijuana. While there are distinctions, after reviewing a lot of research it is fair to say that the following long-term impacts are often found.
• In newborns: growth restriction, decreased weight, length, and head circumference, but these don’t necessary follow the child through life.
• Executive function impairments. (Executive function is a set of mental processes for the management of cognitive operations that include attention, behavior, cognition, working memory, and information/problem solving.)
  • Attention and impulse control issues.
  • May include some learning difficulties.
  • Increased child externalized behavioral problems.

Support the show

Please leave us a rating or review.  This podcast is produced by www.CreatingaFamily.org. We are a national non-profit with the mission to strengthen and inspire adoptive, foster & kinship parents and the professionals who support them.

Creating a Family brings you the following trauma-informed, expert-based content:

• Weekly podcasts
• Weekly articles/blog posts
• Resource pages on all aspects of family building

Drop us some Fan Mail. Thanks!

In this episode we talk with a panel of four former foster youth to find out what it is like to be raised in foster care and what they wish foster parents knew about the experience.

In this episode, we cover:

• What was the experience of being removed from your home and taken from your parents? 
• Was there something that your foster parents could have done when you were first placed in the home to help alleviate some of the trauma?
• Did you feel fully included in your foster family? What can foster parents do to help the child feel included?
• This wasn’t relevant when you were in foster care, but what are your thoughts on blurring out the foster child or putting stickers over their face when posting pics on social media?
• Relationships with the children of the foster family.
• Who did you feel like was on your side? Who could you go to if you needed help?
• Do you think enough was done to help your biological parents before you were removed?
• Do you think enough was done to help your biological parents with reunification? Or do you think they were given too many chances?
• Do you have pictures or keepsakes from the time you were in foster care? Would these have been or are they important to you now? What can the system do to make sure these are preserved?
• While I’m sure you carry the scars of your early life trauma, you have all become successful and--at least from the outside looking in—emotionally healthy adults. What factors contributed to this?
• Tips for foster parents.

This podcast is produced  by www.CreatingaFamily.org. We are a national non-profit with the mission to strengthen and inspire adoptive, foster & kinship parents and the professionals who support them. Creating a Family brings you the following trauma-informed, expert-based content:

• Weekly podcasts
• Weekly articles/blog posts
• Resource pages on all aspects of family building

Please leave us a rating or review RateThisPodcast.com/creatingafamily 

Support the show

Please leave us a rating or review.  This podcast is produced by www.CreatingaFamily.org. We are a national non-profit with the mission to strengthen and inspire adoptive, foster & kinship parents and the professionals who support them.

Creating a Family brings you the following trauma-informed, expert-based content:

• Weekly podcasts
• Weekly articles/blog posts
• Resource pages on all aspects of family building