By Safe Home Podcast
The podcast currently has 76 episodes available.
We are just switching our name from Safe Home Podcast to Unraveling Adoption, and this is the first full episode under our new name.
In this week’s episode, Beth Syverson chats with Leslie Pate Mackinnon, a licensed clinical social worker and an adoption activist for the past 30 years. Leslie is a seasoned and well-respected therapist in the adoption community. She is a nationally known trainer who travels across the country training therapists, agencies and child welfare workers about the psychological issues inherent in adoption and third-party reproduction. Following four decades of successful practice in Atlanta, Leslie and her husband relocated to Asheville, NC.
Leslie comes to this work by way of being a birthmother in the 1960s, the Baby Scoop Era. She understands adoption trauma deeply, both as a lived experience and as a therapist for all members in the adoption constellation - adoptees, birthparents, and adoptive parents. On Safe Home Podcast, we’ve had 8 episodes so far with adoptees, and 1 episode with another adoptive parent, but this is our first episode from the birth mom’s perspective, which is a super-critical piece of this puzzle.
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💌 Sign up for our Unraveling Adoption email list: http://eepurl.com/hVIAVX
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RESOURCES:
Leslie’s information:
Other resource mentioned in this episode:
Other Resources:
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Unraveling Adoption is produced and hosted by Beth Syverson
Music written and performed by Joseph Nakao
Email questions or comments to [email protected]
Find us on Facebook, Instagram, and YouTube
Support Unraveling Adoption on Patreon: Patreon.com/UnravelingAdoption
www.UnravelingAdoption.com
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TIME STAMPS:
2:00 All voices in adoption matter, and adoptees’ voices come first
3:16 Positive adoption language and listening to adult adoptees
6:35 Birth parents’ stories are often suppressed
8:16 Leslie’s birth parent experience #1
16:08 Adoptees and birth parents both get stuck in culture’s judgements about adoption
17:03 Coping with trauma with substances, the intersection between adoption and addiction
25:30 Adoptive parents talking openly with their children about their adoption
28:35 Leslie’s birth parent experience #2
33:25 Birth parents’ difficulties, then and now
39:00 The importance of family preservation, and Follow the Money
44:10 How Leslie & Beth are dealing with their past regrets
In this very special episode, Beth Syverson, host of Safe Home Podcast, explains her pivot to Unraveling Adoption. This is the last episode of Safe Home, and the first episode of Unraveling Adoption. She explains what the new title means, what the future plans are, and she provides ways for everyone to help get the new podcast launched.
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💌 Sign up for our email list: http://eepurl.com/hVIAVX
===============
RESOURCES:
Beth’s information:
Other resources mentioned in this episode:
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Safe Home is created by Joseph Nakao and Beth Syverson
Music written and performed by Joseph Nakao
Cover art by Joseph Nakao, photo by Beth Syverson
Email questions or comments to Safe Home at [email protected]
Find us on Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, and YouTube
Support Safe Home on Patreon: Patreon.com/SafeHome
www.SafeHomeFamilies.com
Unraveling Adoption is created by Beth Syverson
Music written and performed by Joseph Nakao
Cover art by Amanda Mullins
Email questions or comments to [email protected]
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TIME STAMPS:
1:22 Thanks to all those who’ve helped make Safe Home Podcast happen, and some stats
9:17 Why are we making the pivot to Unraveling Adoption?
10:50 What does Unraveling Adoption mean?
13:05 What are our plans for the future?
16:26 Ways you can help
In this week’s Safe Home Podcast, Beth talks with Lainie Liberti and her 23yo son Miro Siegel.
Lainie Liberti is a best selling author, international speaker, teen mentor, worldschooler, partnership parenting paradigm advocate and mother. In 2012 Lainie co-founded Project World School with her son and has lived in community with over a 100 teens in over 20 international locations. Lainie founded Transformative Mentoring for Teens in 2020 in response to the growing need to support teen's mental health. Lainie just released her first book, Seen, Heard & Understood, Parenting and Partnering with Teens for Greater Mental Health, the number 1 best seller on Amazon in the Parenting New Releases. Her book is right in line with what we’ve been advocating here at Safe Home - that parents do their own work and partner with their kids instead of being an authoritarian figure over them.
Beth talks with Lainie and Miro about unschooling and worldschooling because they lead a fascinating alternative life. But over the top of everything is the partnership that they’ve nurtured which allows them to both live as their fully authentic selves.
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💌 Sign up for our Safe Home Families email list: http://eepurl.com/hVIAVX
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RESOURCES:
Lainie’s & Miro’s information:
Other resources mentioned in this episode:
===============
Safe Home is created by Joseph Nakao and Beth Syverson
Music written and performed by Joseph Nakao
www.SafeHomeFamilies.com
In this very special episode, Beth Syverson, host of Safe Home Podcast, explains her pivot to Unraveling Adoption. This is the last episode of Safe Home, and the first episode of Unraveling Adoption. She explains what the new title means, what the future plans are, and she provides ways for everyone to help get the new podcast launched.
===============
💌 Sign up for our email list: http://eepurl.com/hVIAVX
===============
RESOURCES:
Beth’s information:
Other resources mentioned in this episode:
Other Resources:
===============
Safe Home is created by Joseph Nakao and Beth Syverson
Music written and performed by Joseph Nakao
Cover art by Joseph Nakao, photo by Beth Syverson
Email questions or comments to Safe Home at [email protected]
Find us on Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, and YouTube
Support Safe Home on Patreon: Patreon.com/SafeHome
www.SafeHomeFamilies.com
Unraveling Adoption is created by Beth Syverson
Music written and performed by Joseph Nakao
Cover art by Amanda Mullins
Email questions or comments to [email protected]
===============
TIME STAMPS:
1:22 Thanks to all those who’ve helped make Safe Home Podcast happen, and some stats
9:17 Why are we making the pivot to Unraveling Adoption?
10:50 What does Unraveling Adoption mean?
13:05 What are our plans for the future?
16:26 Ways you can help
In this week’s Safe Home Podcast, Beth talks with Carolyn Balagot, an advocate for neurodiverse people. In her family, she, her husband, and her 3 kids are all neurodiverse in one way or another - primarily with ADHD or Autism Spectrum Disorder. She has worked at her children’s school as a 504 case carrier, advocating for students’ needs. Her kids all went to school at Orange County School of the Arts, where I used to teach and which I highly respect and admire. Especially in an arts school, all kinds of diversity are celebrated, including neurodiversity. Carolyn will talk to us about her family’s challenges and triumphs, and help us know how to better advocate for our neurodivergent loved ones or community members.
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💌 Sign up for our Safe Home Families email list: http://eepurl.com/hVIAVX
===============
RESOURCES:
Carolyn’s information:
Other resources mentioned in this episode:
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Support Safe Home on Patreon: Patreon.com/SafeHome
www.SafeHomeFamilies.com
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TIME STAMPS:
1:52 Carolyn’s family’s background and diagnoses
8:20 High-functioning and low-functioning are outdated. What vocabulary is correct nowadays?
9:50 Autistic people? Or people with autism?
12:35 504 v IEP accommodations
13:55 Is anxiety a neurodivergence? Is a student with anxiety eligible for accommodations?
15:48 Cum. files and labeling in school
18:33 What is ableism? What are some examples of ableist policies in school and work?
21:20 Did Carolyn’s child’s diagnosis make things better or worse?
22:30 Carolyn and her husband are waiting to get their own diagnosis of autism confirmed
25:40 How job interviews are challenging for autistic people and how to make them better
27:30 The powerful concept of universal design
28:43 Carolyn’s advice for parents who think their child might be neurodiverse
30:10 Why to steer clear of ABA - listen to adult autistic people
35:15 Why Autism Speaks is problematic
37:40 Carolyn’s advocacy for the LGBTQ community too
In this week’s Safe Home Podcast, Beth talks with Amanda Lipp, a documentary filmmaker and social entrepreneur working at the intersection of mental health, storytelling, and technology. Amanda has produced over 80 short documentaries about mental health and social impact - covering topics such as youth psychosis, schizophrenia, art therapy, cyberbullying prevention, and housing relief from wildfires. A passionate mental health advocate, she has given over 150 speeches around the U.S. since age 18 sharing her journey navigating the mental health system. Amanda is passionate about mental health leadership, policy change, and tying films to mental health research studies. She serves on the Mental Health Advisory Panel at Google, and the Interdepartmental Serious Mental Illness Committee (ISMICC) created by Congress to advise on federal mental health policy. Amanda formerly served on the board of the National Alliance on Mental Illness (NAMI), the largest grassroots mental health nonprofit in the U.S.
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💌 Sign up for our Safe Home Families email list: http://eepurl.com/hVIAVX
SafeHomeFamilies.com
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RESOURCES:
Amanda’s information:
Other resources mentioned in this episode:
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TIME STAMPS:
2:09 Amanda’s lived experience with mental illness
6:05 Sports injuries and Amanda’s depression
9:50 Using drugs like an emotional credit card
11:05 Amanda’s support system and challenges of parenting a “problem child”
12:55 Amanda’s major mental breakdown as a college freshman - The Truman Show Delusion
15:08 Psychiatrist ICU and outpatient services from induced psychosis
17:50 Amanda’s daily regimen to maintain her mental health
22:40 Behind the scenes in mental health organizations
24:00 Amanda’s reprise of The Truman Show Delusion and how her parents handled it
26:37 The danger of cops responding to mental health crises, and the hope of the new 988 lifeline
28:50 The importance of compassion and curiosity in responding to psychiatric emergencies
31:50 Advice for how to be supportive to your loved one struggling with mental illness
33:46 How Amanda’s sexual identity intersected with her mental health
35:50 Seek out access points for professional help before a crisis occurs
36:43 Befriending all parts of ourselves with grace, and lean on community
In this week’s Safe Home Podcast, Beth talks with Doris Blumenthal, an adopted person who lives in Northern California. Her adoption story is one of the adoptee narratives in the documentary Reckoning with the Primal Wound, which you’ve probably heard me talking about before. The filmmaker Rebecca Autumn Sansom was on this podcast in Episode 30. If you haven’t seen Reckoning with the Primal Wound yet, I highly recommend it, and I also want to let you know that this episode contains spoilers.
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💌 Sign up for our Safe Home Families email list: http://eepurl.com/hVIAVX
===============
RESOURCES:
Resources mentioned in this episode:
===============
Support Safe Home on Patreon: Patreon.com/SafeHome
www.SafeHomeFamilies.com
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TIME STAMPS:
2:00 Doris’ adoption story, crossing paths with birth mother in the early days
6:40 The overwhelming need to know one’s biological roots
9:16 Doris’ adoptive parents’ attitude about adoption
11:54 The mysterious photograph and the broken relationship with Doris’ bio brother
13:35 Complex emotions with Doris’ paternal sisters
14:36 Starting the pre-internet search process
18:50 First attempt at finding birth mother
20:15 How DNA searches help
21:11 A common problem for adopted people: lack of health history
21:56 Minnesota sisters and other maternal relatives
22:54 How Arizona’s open records laws enabled Doris to find her birth mother
25:05 Finding Doris’ birth mother’s home - and SPOILER ALERT if you haven’t seen the Reckoning film yet
28:00 Doris’ brother’s attitude toward Doris, privacy v. right to know
31:35 Another amazing coincidence
33:40 More details about the reunion day
38:45 Did she find the mysterious photograph or any other mementos?
40:35 How Doris handles her complicated grief
43:45 Most adopted people have a deep desire to meet their natural parents
45:05 Doris’ dream of ideal records for adopted people
47:33 Backlash from sharing her story in the Reckoning with the Primal Wound documentary
51:34 Doris’ advice for adopted people who are contemplating reunion, and book recommendation
53:30 Doris’ book recommendation - The Primal Wound by Nancy Verrier
56:37 Doris’ advice for adoptive parents regarding reunion
In this week’s Safe Home Podcast, Beth talks with Bonnie Harris, a New Hampshire-area director of Connective Parenting, where she is a parent educator, counselor, coach, and speaker. She wrote two parenting books: When Your Kids Push Your Buttons and Confident Parents, Remarkable Kids: 8 Principles for Raising Kids You’ll Love to Live With. AND she has her own podcast Tell Me About Your Kids where anyone can listen in on her parent coaching sessions. Bonnie has a master’s degree in Early Childhood Education And is the proud mother of two adult children raised with her connective approach.
In today’s episode, Bonnie will help us answer the question: HOW CAN WE BE MORE CONNECTED WITH the KIDS in our lives?
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💌 Sign up for our Safe Home Families email list: http://eepurl.com/hVIAVX
===============
RESOURCES:
Bonnie’s information:
Other resources mentioned in this episode:
===============
Safe Home is created by Joseph Nakao and Beth Syverson
Music written and performed by Joseph Nakao
Cover art by Joseph Nakao, photo by Beth Syverson
Email questions or comments to Safe Home at [email protected]
Find us on Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, and YouTube
Support Safe Home on Patreon: Patreon.com/SafeHome
www.SafeHomeFamilies.com
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TIME STAMPS:
1:26 How Bonnie parented her own (now grown) children
6:08 How Bonnie developed her connective parenting model by learning about herself
9:25 The Dandelion Child and the Orchid Child
13:00 Bonnie’s own terms: The Harmony Child and The Integrity Child
13:50 Characteristics of The Harmony Child - compliant but harbors shame
16:40 How Connective Parenting focuses on the parents, not the child
22:56 Connecting with your child’s emotional state instead of their behavior
28:17 Connective parenting as an investment for your child’s self-confidence
31:04 Characteristics of The Integrity Child - demanding but knows what they want
36:07 How to turn the parenting ship around
40:26 How did Bonnie’s orchid daughter turn out?
44:10 “My child is having a problem, not being a problem.”
In this week’s Safe Home Podcast, Beth talks with a family friend of hers from church - Katherine Osborne. Katherine shared with the church that she was recently diagnosed with OCD - Obsessive Compulsive Disorder. I thought it might be good for our audience to learn from an eloquent teen how OCD feels. Nowadays people joke that they have OCD when they’re bothered when something doesn’t quite line up, or if one tile is a different color. You see memes about OCD all the time. But that’s a very simplistic view of OCD that doesn’t honor the lived experience of people who struggle with this disorder every day of their lives.
In this episode, Katherine explains her own lived experience of OCD, and she mentions things she’s learned so far. But of course neither of us are OCD experts or healthcare professionals. We recommend getting professional help if you or someone you know might be struggling with OCD or any mental health issues.
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💌 Sign up for our Safe Home Families email list: http://eepurl.com/hVIAVX
===============
Resources about OCD that Katherine recommends:
Other Resources:
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Safe Home is created by Joseph Nakao and Beth Syverson
Music written and performed by Joseph Nakao
Cover art by Joseph Nakao, photo by Beth Syverson
Email questions or comments to Safe Home at [email protected]
Find us on Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, and YouTube
Support Safe Home on Patreon: Patreon.com/SafeHome
www.SafeHomeFamilies.com
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TIME STAMPS
1:12 Katherine’s hobbies & college activities
2:25 When did Katherine’s OCD symptoms start? (Thank you, COVID. ☹️)
3:46 How Katherine experiences OCD in cycles - obsessions and compulsions
6:30 What are intrusive thoughts?
8:54 How does Katherine manage her OCD?
10:22 How Katherine was diagnosed with OCD. Did her diagnosis make things better or worse?
14:00 How OCD has affected Katherine’s social life
15:45 How do Katherine’s family and friends support her when she’s having a bad OCD day?
18:11 Is OCD more common for adults and teens? Is it growing?
19:40 Katherine’s advice to parents of teens?
24:13 Can someone pull an OCD sufferer out of an OCD cycle?
27:20 First steps if you’re curious if you might have OCD
In this week’s Safe Home Podcast, Beth talks with Catherine Becker, founder of the support group called Joys and Challenges of Relative Caregivers. She’s a grandma who is raising her three young grandkids while her daughter struggles with addiction. When she tried to find a tribe of other relatives in her same situation, she didn’t find a group that went deep enough or that was small enough to create personal connections. So she made her own group. Her organization is raising money to provide financial assistance to grandparents and other relatives who are caring for or who have adopted their family members’ children.
===============
💌 Sign up for our Safe Home Families email list: http://eepurl.com/hVIAVX
===============
RESOURCES:
Catherine’s information:
Other resources mentioned in this episode:
Other Resources:
===============
Safe Home is created by Joseph Nakao and Beth Syverson
Music written and performed by Joseph Nakao
Cover art by Joseph Nakao, photo by Beth Syverson
Email questions or comments to Safe Home at [email protected]
Find us on Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, and YouTube
Support Safe Home on Patreon: Patreon.com/SafeHome
www.SafeHomeFamilies.com
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TIME STAMPS
1:26 Catherine’s daughter Katie’s journey with addiction and incarceration
6:07 How Catherine plans to keep her young children away from drugs
8:50 How Catherine gained custody of her children
13:03 The boundaries Catherine has drawn with her daughter while incarcerated
16:45 How Catherine manages her emotions and gets support
19:11 How Catherine avoids feeling resentful toward her daughter
22:13 What kind of support do relative caregivers need?
24:26 Struggles Catherine has with her other adult children
26:40 Katie’s relationship with her kids
29:25 Family preservation, open adoption, and relinquishment trauma
33:23 How common is relative caregiving?
36:44 How can allies help relative caregivers?
41:08 Catherine’s advice for parents with teens
43:33 Katie’s mental health challenges
46:03 Catherine’s advice for relative caregivers
The podcast currently has 76 episodes available.