Adoption and Foster Care

Adoption involves a decision to create a family with people who are not biologically related.

In therapy, children, adolescents, and adults who were adopted frequently have questions that they want answered, such as:

• Why didn’t my birth mother and birth father keep me?
• Did I do something wrong that made them want to give me up for adoption?
• Can my adoptive parents give me up for adoption?
• Will my parents be hurt if I search for my birth parents?
• Do I have siblings?  Are they living with my birth family?
• How did my birth parents choose who to keep and who will be adopted?

In therapy, Dr. Frank helps individuals feel safe enough to ask their questions.  Through creative arts projects, family sessions, and talking, people who are adopted learn about themselves and work towards accepting and embracing their unique life experiences.

When there is abuse or neglect, child welfare agencies may separate children and adolescents from their families and place them with relatives or in foster care.  These children often need help adjusting to the myriad of changes in their lives.

The primary goal of therapeutic intervention is to help the children feel safe and loved.  In order to achieve this goal, Dr. Frank involves foster families, birth families, and other caregivers as integral parts of the therapeutic work.

Dr. Frank offers individual and family therapy sessions to address the multiple needs of children living in out-of-home placement.  Some areas addressed in therapy may include:

• adjustment to out of home placement, family visits, new caregivers, new school
• preparation for reunification and re-adjustment to family life
• behavior management specifically designed for traumatized children
• preparation for adoption
• coping and communication skills