Last week I set out from Denver to head to Orlando for a conference about adoption laws and practices.
I got to stay in in a Doubletree Hotel Resort for a couple of days. The grounds were beautiful.
I was there to attend and speak at the Florida Adoption Council’s annual conference.
Shortly after arriving, I met Ashley Mitchell, who was there to present as a birth mom, and who is the force of nature behind Big Tough Girl (TM). (Ashley and I have known each other for awhile, but this was our first meeting. Of many, I hope.)
(Just to prove that I did wear clothes, here’s this.)
Adoption attorneys and social workers gathered around the theme of post-adoption support. The conference offered updates in adoption laws (adoption birth records are still sealed), as well as how to make adoption practices work better for the people who place a child, for the adoptive families that are formed, and for the children themselves.
Ashley spoke to the latter, as did a panel of adopted persons, as did I.
My workshop was titled “What Today’s Climate of Openness Means To You: Setting Up Your Clients for Long-term Success.”
I covered how, with the Internet and advances in DNA testing, adoption professionals must help their clients realize that nothing is really closed any more, and that they must prepare folks for not just contact, but true openness, for relationships. For mess and for clarity, for grief and for healing, for waning and waxing, for hard things and for rewarding things.
I covered my definition of openness, which is dealing with What Is. And my definition of closedness — not dealing with What Is, maybe not dealing at all. I shared the possible consequences of each approach.
The attendees were incredibly receptive to the message. Many said during later during lunch that they had been wanting a simple way to help their families embrace openness. They were happy to have a framework that will enable them to easily articulate to clients both the why and the how of cultivating openness in their relationships.
I’ll take all that over Disney any day.
- What you can do to head off an open adoption closure
- How to get closed clients to open up
- Why there should be no supplicants in an adoption arrangement
- All Adoption Advice posts
~~~~~
This post is part of #MicroblogMondays? Whazzat? A post that’s not too long. Head to Stirrup Queens to join the fun.
11 Responses
Oh, I wish I could have seen you speak! The conference sounds amazing, and inclusive. I feel like Florida and sleek hair are not friends… so I’m amazed yours looked so amazing even for those moments! And ha, the naked picture. 🙂 What a great experience.
1. Sounds like an amazing event! 2. You look super cute! 3. That blue horse is pretty scary, like “Welcome to Denver…never sleep again!”
Very cute, frizzy hair or no! (I can relate – it’s one of the reasons I’ve cut my hair off.)
I’m glad you’re able to help adoption professionals, and in turn the families and adoptees.
Really good information in the Consequences graphic. Thanks, Lori!
Disney would have been the icing on the cake? 🙂
I love that concept of accepting the What Is. I think it’s applicable to so many places in life where our openness to the situation (rather than trying to deny it) could serve us better. Trying to look at the what is today and move with it rather than against it.
I’ve never done the Disney thing – only time I’ve been that part of Florida was for a Tupperware convention! Your event sounds like it was as amazing as the smiles you and Ashley had. Oh, and Blucifer – holy cannoli, Batman!
Well, they got a sweet deal on a speaker at that meeting! Too bad it was in Orlando, though – you could have met me in St. Pete too. I hope that everyone who attended took away a lot of good information.
And if Orlando was anything like St. Pete, you should be looking like a giant puddle of Lori, instead of merely slightly frizzy. IT WAS SOOOO HOT THERE!!!!
Glad it went well! And did you see the petition to remove Blucifer? Some people apparently do not find him very welcoming. Psh!
I am sure the parents & prospective parents there really appreciated & learned a lot from your message! 🙂
I think one of the greatest things you do for people (one of your greatest gifts, to be sure) is how you whittle down all of the huge anxiety-filled, scary unknowns of adoption and open adoption and bring them to a human, person-to-person, one-on-one level that people feel they can not only understand but handle. I’m sure you’re a great comfort to the people whom you advise.
The consequences list is great information. Reading it, I can only think, yeah, that’s so easy and should be easy knowledge, but I can also see how it isn’t. I love that you make it simple and easy for anyone to understand. And like Mel said, it can be applied to many facets of life.