People have a lot of ideas and thoughts about what adoption looks like today. They might have seen things on television or in movies or heard stories about what the adoption process entails.
Unfortunately, there are some common misconceptions about adoption. On this episode, Laurie Poole welcomes Laura Summers, LMFT to unpack what some of these are and discuss the truth about the family-building option that is today’s modern adoption.
Therapist Unplugged is brought to you by The Montfort Group. Each episode will feature the unplugged views of guests and fellow therapists as we navigate hot topics, therapy trends and the world around us.
*The Montfort Group provides a serene, calming setting where you can feel challenged, supported, and motivated. Our skilled therapists bridge specialized backgrounds and varied philosophies together to create one unified strategy. Rather than steer you away from your own natural abilities, we help you maximize your unique strengths. We do not view a broken history as the end of a story, we see it as an opportunity for a new beginning.
People have a lot of ideas and thoughts about what adoption looks like today. They might have seen things on television or in movies or heard stories about what the adoption process entails.
Unfortunately, there are some common misconceptions about adoption. On this episode, Laurie Poole welcomes Laura Summers, LMFT to unpack what some of these are and discuss the truth about the family-building option that is today’s modern adoption.
Therapist Unplugged is brought to you by The Montfort Group. Each episode will feature the unplugged views of guests and fellow therapists as we navigate hot topics, therapy trends and the world around us.
*The Montfort Group provides a serene, calming setting where you can feel challenged, supported, and motivated. Our skilled therapists bridge specialized backgrounds and varied philosophies together to create one unified strategy. Rather than steer you away from your own natural abilities, we help you maximize your unique strengths. We do not view a broken history as the end of a story, we see it as an opportunity for a new beginning.
Hello everyone and welcome to therapist unplugged. I'm Laurie pool, your host and today my very special guest is Laura summers, a licensed marriage and family therapist in the state of Texas who works with individuals and their families. In her private, her, excuse me her private practice, engage counseling and consulting. Her clients specialties include issues of family of origin conflict, and cut off complex trauma, and post traumatic stress disorder and adopted persons and their families. Laura is also intensively trained in Dialectical Behavioral Therapy, emotion folks focus therapy with couples and families and EMDR. As a domestic adoptee from a private adoption, she is passionate about increasing awareness of the trauma of maternal separation, as well as creating lasting change in the global systemic issues that intersect with adoption. Laura, welcome to therapist unplugged, it's so great to see I think it's been about six years since our paths crossed, it's been quite a while, way, way too long. I am so fascinated by today's topic, as we were just chatting before I hit record, adoption, something that people don't really talk about. It seems to me there's a lot of myths and misconceptions, and perhaps false beliefs around adoption. And I would love to get into that with you today and have some straight talk on not only your own personal experience as an adoptee, but also in your experience as a therapist working with families and individuals. So maybe we could start off today by hearing a little bit about your own personal interest in this topic, and your experience as a child who was adopted.
Laura Summers:Absolutely. Thanks for having me. And I love I love getting to explore this topic with someone who is unplugged. Right. Like real talk, because you're right, I think there's a lot of a lot of things about adoption that are, I love the word myths that you use, because I think that carries a lot of weight. And I think that's pretty accurate to my experience and others experiences of being adopted. And I grew up in the Midwest, and my parents and like many people who come to adoption, tried for a long time to have their own children and struggled with that. And adopted me through a lawyer, lawyer. So it was It wasn't through an agency, it was a private adoption. And my adoption was an is and remains closed, which essentially means that both parties do not have access to original birth records. So I, you know, still don't have my original birth certificate, my birth certificate has my adoptive parents names on it. I also don't have any legal quote unquote, right to that information, I would have to petition a court. And, you know, there are lots of reasons for doing closed adoptions. I think primarily they they were done with, with issues of safety in mind for the bio families. And, and I, but I also think that they're done just kind of to be kind of cut and dry, you know, a little bit less messy in the eyes of the law. Laura, what
Laurie Poole:do you mean, when you say for the safety, the safety of the biological families?
Laura Summers:So in issues of things like rape and incest, right, like, okay, there may there may be issue or abuse, things like that, so that people can't just go contacting each other whenever they like, when I see. And I again, I think that's more of a legal perception, in terms of that close term, but that essentially what that means is I wasn't raised around other biological relatives, and I didn't, I didn't have that access, which is not something that I think I really thought much about as a child because my childhood really looked like a lot of other people's childhood. I had a sister, my my, by my adoptive parents became pregnant, right after they found out that they were adopting so amazing how often that happens. That does happen a lot. Yeah. So she and I are only seven months apart. Oh, I didn't know that. Laurie. Yeah. Yeah. So um, my, yeah, my sister and I, you know, very close in age but raised very normally. You know, and really are Around 12 years old is when things started to come up. And it was just like, I have questions. You know, and and didn't feel quite right to me. And we certainly talked about adoption from a young age in terms of, you know, my parents were honest with me and upfront, but there wasn't a lot of ongoing conversation about it. Because I think for my parents as well, I think they expected it to be just like, any other kid, you know. And that was really kind of what they were sold. And now the landscapers are in the US there?
Laurie Poole:Of course they are. They're going to use their their blower, and I'm expecting that same sound to happen up here. But this is what happens when you're unplugged. Laura. Right. You know, we just work with the sounds around you do. Question for you, Laura. It's interesting. When I think about developmentally around the 12, around the age of 12, the search say, Hey, I have questions. Seems to me that search for identity and who am I is so appropriate. Right? It falls right within that that developmental task of searching for identity?
Laura Summers:It sure does. I might wait a second, because I don't want you to have to. I don't think they're going to be doing this for long because they're just here planting some new plants for us because a bunch of our stuff died. Because of the deep freeze. Yeah, yeah. So I don't think he's going to be using the blower for that long.
Laurie Poole:You know what, I'm not hearing it that much on my end. Oh, good.
Laura Summers:Headphones, headphones are protecting me.
Laurie Poole:I said, yeah. Okay, so we can we can just Okay, so my question was, or my observation and kind of aha was, when you started asking, at the age of 12, you recognize like, Hey, I have some questions that is developmentally appropriate. And it's a developmental task for young adolescents, throughout the teens to ask who am I? How am I different than my family of origin? How am I the same? Yeah, no, it sounds like those questions came up in divine timing. They did.
Laura Summers:And really, what I found as an adopted person or an adoptee is that those big developmental shifts in life, the same questions arise, but they have newer contexts now. Right? They have layers on them. That first one at 12 was a really big one where it was Who am I, where do I fit in, because I, I felt like many kids do that I didn't fit in anywhere. But I felt that in a way that I think other people around me didn't really grasp. And I certainly had no idea what was going on. And I struggled so much to fit in. And I was this was really, when I look at it was really the search for belonging on a deeper level that I couldn't really get at with, within my family of origin in the way that other people might be able to non adoptive people might be able to. And I also couldn't. within social settings, you know, it was really hard for me, and I find that true for a lot of my adopted friends. You know, we kind of this is one of the first big challenges. Is that is that adolescence. And it's where a lot of clients come to us to us therapists that work with this population, because parents are just kind of like, what do I do? And, you know, Adolescence is tough anyway, but then add in this deeper struggle with identity. Yes. And it's it's even tougher. Yeah.
Laurie Poole:It's tough for it's tough for the teenagers and so tough for parents, because adolescence is a time of disruption anyway. And then when you have the added layer of, well, where do I come from? Why did my parents give me up? Do I look like them? Right? Is there anything about me that is similar to other people? You know, it's that that physiological aspect, it's the interests that come up and you go, Holy mackerel, I play the violin too. I had no idea that my biological father was, you know, a musician. I mean, it's this kind of thing of this deep sense of not only wanting to belong, but curiosity.
Laura Summers:Yeah. Do you agree? Awesome. My parents couldn't answer those questions for me, which I think left them a little bit at a loss. Yes. And you know, everything in retrospect, now we can look back and say, oh, here are some ways we might have supported this adopted person in discovering and connecting with her identity, but I think you know, A lot of adoptive parents just do what they're told. You know, and I think what we're discovering now, both in the, in the therapy field as we're learning more and more about trauma, and how to support individuals who are carrying that, that kind of trauma, we have, we have some better answers now than we did in 1984. You know,
Laurie Poole:I was gonna say, I think it's I think things have changed a little bit. You know, as people talk more about adoption, and it becomes a more, what's the word I'm looking for? Even though there's still a lot of myths? And a lot of fear, too, I think around all of that, because the adoptive parents don't want their adopted children to feel as though they're not part of the family or that they're less than
Laura Summers:the line. I think that we have to walk, you know, yeah. Because you both want to honor the fact that you are different, because if you don't, there's there's so much delusion there, right? Like, is the child part of your family? Absolutely. Are they? Do they come from other biological groups? Absolutely. And we need that needs to be honored. Right? And it needs to be saved for that adoptive person to discover that and really searched for that. And there are many adoptees who are a different race from their adoptive parents. Yes. Those are called transracial adoptees. Often the parents are white and the child is non white, black, Hispanic, you know, yeah. Asian, Asian. Yep. International adopted. That's right. Yeah. And so that's another layer. I think that we, there are a lot of adoptees like myself, who were adults who are helping to try to support families in that. In that journey, having been through it themselves, so I didn't have that layer of race to unpack. I'm, you know, I'm, I'm white, my parents are white. And there are a lot of other, you know, searches for identity that I think we don't necessarily know about until we're in them,
Laurie Poole:you know, right. Absolutely. Such as the birth of a child. Absolutely. Which
Laura Summers:is my current role that I'm working through. Yeah,
Laurie Poole:you became a mom, how many months ago now? 666
Laura Summers:months ago?
Laurie Poole:Okay, I want I want to come back to that lore. Because that, that that's a huge, huge experience for a lot of people. But as an adoptee to give birth to your child, I have to imagine is quite an experience that there's added to that.
Laura Summers:Yeah, there's a, there's a, the term that goes around a lot in the adoptee community is coming out of the fog we talk about in terms of becoming aware of adoption, trauma, or maternal separation, trauma. And really, when I say maternal separation, I think I think there's a little bit of a misnomer, because I think, really what we're talking about is the general lack of biological mirroring, which I know you're you're an attachment therapist, Laurie. So I know the importance of mirroring. And from a biological standpoint, I think, I think we've started to understand what it means for a child when they don't have that throughout their lifespan. To I describe it myself as almost like, rather than having a stable point to stand on. I'm on one of those weird, like balance boards. Yes. Yeah. Brown ball. And yeah. And I have to kind of teeter back and forth.
Laurie Poole:Can you talk a little bit, Laura, about what you mean, when you talk about the trauma of adoption? And I pulled a couple of sentences from your website. And you you state here adoption is a trauma that affects every adoptee in a myriad of ways. Each adoption is specific to every family and adoptee and requires a trauma informed attachment based person centered approach. I would imagine, you know, I don't know if this is true, but I would imagine that the general public doesn't necessarily consider adoption, a form of trauma. Right. So no, and so I'm wondering if you could speak to that, in terms of helping our listeners to understand what you mean when you say it's a trauma that affects every adoptee in a myriad of ways.
Laura Summers:Sure. So, I think when first of all, you're right, the word trauma. I think people shut down when they hear that because I think they think that I'm saying that adoption is bad. Yes. Yeah. That it's wholly a terrible thing. And What I think we need to remember is that trauma is, is part is within the person who's experiencing it. Right. And so when I talk about adoption trauma, I'm talking about the infant or young child who was with their mother. Right? Biologically, yes. You know, just in your belly just Yes, yes, thank you. And you know, there for however long Samad I think I spent a total of three days with my biological mother. And then was taken from that mother, whatever circumstances and placed with a different family in you can do, and I want adoptive parents to hear this, you can do the best job in the world, you can show up for a child in whatever way, but biologically, the way a child is mapped is for that biological parent. So that event of being taken from the mother and gone and, you know, placed somewhere else. Yeah, things happen internally, biologically to that child, neurologically, especially. And that is that is a traumatic event. You know, one incident that happened, not I don't want to get like political, I will, but I, you know, the, the separation of migrant children and their families as well, yes, that was a huge moment where I think collectively we were like, Whoa, this is not right. It wasn't. But I think there's, you know, there's a willingness to say, Oh, wow, that's not right. But when we think about adoption, we just want to think about long term for that child. We don't think about the the event itself, and what's happening for that child in that time.
Laurie Poole:And, you know, Laura, I don't think most people would think about what you said earlier of how an infant is mapped. And Jen, like genetically mapped connected to the biological mother, right, and prepared biologically to be nurtured, said, the smell, heartbeat, all of that, exactly. To the mom, because actually, the fetus is quite in tune with mom, throughout its growth and development. So a mom who was under a tremendous amount of duress, for example, a mom who's calm and relaxed and takes care of herself, a mom who's really, really busy, like a fetus absorbs all of that, doesn't it. And so I just the whole, just that whole framing of, you know, this is what the infant or the fetus is prepared for, and then you remove the fetus from that mom, it is a form of trauma, it doesn't mean that it's going to create PTSD, or that it's a negative, because it's in so many ways, adoption offers a child an alternative, that that is going to be a lot better than maybe what what otherwise would have
Laura Summers:happened possible. But you know, that's kind of the other piece of this that I think we we should unpack as a larger society a little bit, because that's the assumption, right, that that adoption is a I think, quote, unquote, better life. And I think while that may be true, in some ways, it's not a guarantee. That's true. That's yours. Right? I think I think, you know, adoption inherently doesn't necessarily cause PTSD. But there are, again, those biological neurological processes that are set off have ripple effects throughout the lifespan. And we don't yet really know the full extent of that for adopted children and persons. But they know in their body, right, that that kind of what I was talking about the, the 12 year old me where I'm like, something isn't right. Yes. Lots of moments like that. And we all know and love Bessel Vander Kolk, and Body Keeps the Score, right. Some of this is buried so deep, it takes us decades to be like, Oh, that's what that was, right? Oh, that's what that's why this fell off. Or this feels hard, or, you know, I am struggling to connect in this way. Or, you know, there's so so many things that are impacted by this event, and really events over a lifetime. We're having lack lacking that biological mirroring, right. Yeah. That I think we don't necessarily know. And the way that I think about adoption, as far as the better life thing is, I just prefer to see it as it is what it is. Because we can't know what would be better. We can't know necessarily. Are there going to be things that they're because they're because inherently there's loss in this experience, right. And it's not for us to say What's what's better when grief and loss are present? It's for that person. And they're in their journey, right?
Laurie Poole:Yeah, no, I think that's, that's a beautiful, that's a beautiful reframe, and offers up a very different understanding of what it means to be adopted, or to adopt a child. And I think my age was probably showing a little bit because, you know, in 1955, and in the early 60s and 70s, children were often given up for adoption because moms couldn't support them or because someone wasn't married. And you're quite right. It doesn't mean the child necessarily had a better a better life. It was a solution to a problem.
Laura Summers:And I think you've pinpointed Laurie, that there's adoption. There's the experience of being adopted. And then there's the narrative, yes, around adoption. And that larger narrative is something that myself and other adult adoptees are are trying to work to shift and reframe, you know, rescript, I think, because it's not, it's very binary. It's very black and nice. Yeah. It's
Laurie Poole:like it's either or. Yeah, yeah. Absolutely.
Laura Summers:And you're right. I mean, that that is and was the overarching story around adoption, and the overarching kind of way that people saw it, you know?
Laurie Poole:That's right. And it was very, babies were given up for adoption, it was a solution to a problem of an unwanted pregnancy for whatever reason, and then you never talked about it?
Laura Summers:No. And it was shame. Right. So what
Laurie Poole:show Yes. Tremendous amount of shame. Yes. Absolutely.
Laura Summers:Yeah. And that still exists, I think, you know, there's a lot of ties with adoption to the Christian faith. And like you were mentioning unmarried mothers, there's, there's kind of a lot of, you know, the old way of thinking about wife and husband and baby, you know, that sort of that children need that framework to be okay. There's a lot of that type of thinking, I think, embedded in adoption. And I think I don't think it always matches up with, like I said, the experience of the adopted child. And I know, it doesn't match up for a lot of adoptive families per se, because that's not how they build their families. Potentially, you know, there might be some, some different looking pictures than the 2.2 children. And you know,
Laurie Poole:oh, yes, absolutely. Absolutely. And we think about adoption, what happens for gay couples, for example? Exactly. And adoption has become a political scenario. To your point, Laura, about what the assumption is about what a family looks like? Yes. You know, and it seems to me that some of those laws fall within that those parameters of this is what we think of family looks like, and no, you can't adopt children, even though, you know, a gay couple can can create and provide such such a wonderful, safe place for children in a loving relationship. 100%
Laura Summers:some of them are more equipped, I think, to provide that having, you know, one of the one of the big things that I rail against and, and, and root for our systems, healthier systems. Right. And I know you, you and I being that, like systems thinkers, you know, we'd understand that no one is existing and
Laurie Poole:yeah, yeah, not a chance. And
Laura Summers:that is something that I think I'm very, I'm very passion, passionate about. Changing that narrative. Yes. And also, you know, because we know there's so much loss and grief inherent in adoption. To me that says there are events that are preventable. And as much as I want to route for adopted persons and adoptive families. I also want to say, you know, is it true that there really needs to be as many adoptions as there are, right? Can we can we root for biological families as much as we do adoptive families, right, because the systems at play here that are impacting people, poverty, racial issues, housing issues, security, all of those things, create situations that really could be preventable, and that loss and that trauma may not have to happen for families. And what we're finding is that that's generally when when people do have access to resources and do have access community around them. That's generally true there, there do tend to be less adoptions. You know,
Laurie Poole:it takes a village does matter. It takes a village. It does, it takes a village. And so I think that's what you're saying the more support and community around a family, the easier it is to get through some of those challenges. Laura, I'm wondering if you could, perhaps walk us through what happens when a family comes in? You said often it will happen during adolescence, where where families or parents will show up in your office, as they struggle through this? Can you kind of walk us through an overview of how do you help these families navigate?
Laura Summers:Yeah. So a lot of times, as you know, families get to us the worst. And, unfortunately, with adoptive families, that there's usually some kind of really scary event with their kid where they're really worried about them, and they don't know how to help them. And parents are feeling really helpless and hopeless about the situation. So the first job in that scenario is to support the parents, you know, as a person who might understand kind of both the over the system of the family. Yeah, not just sort of like, because I think because I think a lot of times with adolescents, especially it's combative, right? It's parents, right? Adolescent. Yeah, they're trying to kind of pull back and be like, Hey, let's look at this picture as a whole, and understand this family system. And then I think, parents, something that's scary for parents, is, adolescents really need a safe place, and especially adopted adolescence, that exists for them. And not for everyone else. Because one of these things that adopted persons can carry is this idea that their existence in a family system is for someone else, which sounds really, it's complex, right? It's because because you don't fit in biologically, you have to figure out where you fit in and why you're there. And a lot of it is this people pleasing behavior and stuff that can really, you're trying to, you know, figure out where you fit and making people happy is one way of feeling like you fit in.
Laurie Poole:I wonder if that comes from? I don't know, there's something you just said, Laura, that made me want to think about? Is there an unspoken belief on the part of a child who's adopted into a family that they are there to fill a void?
Laura Summers:I think I think there is for a lot of us, and I think I think that's a hurdle for some families, and they don't know how to, you know, kind of work with that and deal with that. So it's something that I think you kind of have to work really, you have to create a different story as a family. And I feel like that's my job is to facilitate these families ability to create their own story, and not what everyone else thinks it needs to be or
Laurie Poole:Yeah, what a gift. What a relief also, for both parents and teenager alike for the whole family, because it's not just about the adoptee if there's other it's the whole family system. And often in my experience anyways, Laura, I, when you get a family, when you do family therapy with teenagers, it's amazing what comes out in the wash, in terms of how people feel about those teenagers seeing their parents differently, when they hear when they see their parents vulnerability, like it's an unbelievable thing to witness. Yeah. And what a wonderful opportunity you create for these families to understand each other better, you know, and to really get the communication going. I mean, that must be really something to witness.
Laura Summers:Absolutely. And, you know, sometimes what I find with these families is what the kid needs Is that Is that safe space, so we'll kind of go we'll kind of do or individual therapy at first, just to give that exploration, you know, that I think those teams are needing to grow and then once that's established, then we can bring the parents in. I try to equip families with real things that they can use to support their adults like real skills, just ideas, you know, but things that work for them work for the their teenager, a lot of teenagers and adoption. Come having thoughts of self harm. Suicide, which is really terrifying for families. And
Laurie Poole:oh, yes, I can only imagine.
Laura Summers:So they need they need real help, and they need or they need a safe container. Sure. So that's usually priority number one is how can we create a safe container? You know?
Laurie Poole:Yes, absolutely. I wonder too, as we're chatting, Laura, I'm thinking about stories. And I've had clients in my office who have found out only as adults that they were adopted. And I think that there must be questions that parents have about how do we tell our child that they're adopted? Is it something we talk about from the time they're infants? Do we wait to a certain age? Or do we say nothing at all? I'm wondering what your what your
Laura Summers:advices tell them, tell them tell them tell them tell them before you think you should tell them my response because that knowing that we don't quite fit in, like you talked about the the infant being mapped, you know that in your body before you know that in your brain. And if it's not spoken, you know, if it's not acknowledged, you can feel crazy, you know, you you I there's an I have a couple friends who are they were called LDS late discovery adoptees, that can really be the experience that I always knew something was off. But I was made to believe that I was biologically my parents, and it becomes this sort of like fraudulent feeling, upbringing. And I know that adoptive parents don't want that. So as difficult as a conversation is around telling your child they're adopted, it's infinitely more difficult to have to try to go back and fix something. There's there would be layers of betrayal. Yes. And you know, so So tell them. And if you have questions about that, you can absolutely find a therapist to support you through that conversation. But just just the honesty, and upfront nature of that conversation is something that I'm telling you, your child will thank you for, you know,
Laurie Poole:I wonder if you have resources or something that you would recommend Laura, you know, when you're saying tell them, tell them tell them? I can imagine there's parents listening saying how do I tell my child that they're adopted, in a way that feels positive and so on? No, I'm also recalling what you said earlier about, hey, listen, it is what it is, like you're adopted. And that's how you came to us. As opposed to making I don't know how to help me out here, Laura, because this is not an area that I have any expertise in. But I'm really, really curious about how you guide parents through telling their children?
Laura Summers:Yeah, so here's the thing. I don't think that we want to want to believe this. But I think we're discovering this more as the years go on. Kids are smart.
Laurie Poole:Yes, they are. They know way more than we give them credit for don't
Laura Summers:know so much. Right. And, um, I think I think, really what we're speaking to as we're talking about, it's scary competition is about the parents fear, and the parents kind of guilt and shame and kind of, so I think the first step is, have you as parents sit down, and make sure you've got each other's back and you have support in some of these feelings that are going to come up for you. Because as you know, kids are extremely observant, and they will know that you're feeling this fear and guilt and shame and whatever might come up. And so being able to hold that and handle that yourself is really important. Because you don't want, you know, as a parent to think, to have your child think that adoption equals shame, adoption equals fear, right? It's right. I want I want to make sure I'm doing the right things for you. Right. So that's, that's really, we want to we want to deal with those emotions so that we can get to the root and the heart of what's at that conversation is no, I want to be a good parent for you. I want to support you.
Laurie Poole:That's right. Exactly, exactly. This brings me to another big question. You referenced earlier, translational translational transracial adoptees, talk to me about that. And parents who adopt children from a different race. What are some of the challenges that they face and how how, how do they navigate that or what kind of guidance what are some of the things they should be thinking about? Sure.
Laura Summers:So I I would highly recommend that. Look into get it connecting your child before you To even adopt if you can, you know, connecting with that community that you're going to adopt from. So if you're a white family and you have no black friends, you need to find some community for your child that looks like your child. Right, that mirroring that I've talked about is extremely important within your community too. So having time again, I'm not a TRA. So I always defer to that experience of being a transracial adoption person, to my TI friends. But that's something that I've heard them talk about over and over again, is making sure that there's community mirroring within your community, and having access to a culture that may not be present in your family before that child gets there, right? Yes, you need to create those kinds of opportunities. That othering experience is usually really deeply painful, for my tra friends is feeling like the only Asian kid in their school, the only black kid on their street, you know that that's really heavy. And there needs to be some heavy lifting done, I think by the parents create that kind of opportunity for those kids and have that hurdle of unpacking that piece of their identity, maybe it's a little lessened by that because their parents are in it.
Laurie Poole:That's great advice. That's great advice. And it sounds as though it's something one should plan for, you know, to sit down and think about it beforehand, as you're saying, Where will we connect with this community so that our baby grows up knowing that they are part of and not different than exactly, or at least to help reduce some of that. Laura, what are some of the resources that you would like to recommend? I know you have developed, if I understand correctly, you have a group that you've started or resources, can you can you tell us a little bit about that?
Laura Summers:Yeah, so I'm working on creating a therapy group with a fellow adoptee therapist, and I can I can shoot you those to to include in the notes, okay. That if you'd like, but there are some people I really recommend following on Instagram, that are adult adoptees themselves that had built some incredible resources for other adoptees adoptive parents, and biological families are not talked about as much. But there's it there's certainly an impact with biological mothers and their families. Um, you know, we haven't dug into reunion but I, I am in what we call in reunion with my biological mother, who I found through Ancestry DNA. So that's a whole other
Laurie Poole:Oh, my goodness, we haven't even talked about how that has opened up this discovery of Yes. Oh, I'm your half sister. Yes. You know, these surprises that come out of the woodwork?
Laura Summers:Yeah. So. So in the in the journey of reunion, there's a need there for support. And, you know, I think when we think about how it's viewed in the media, and movies and things, it's this beautiful experience, and reality is, you know, I think about the snowglobe you've just completely shaken up somebody's world, you know, and totally disruptive. It's disruptive. And sometimes that's a beautiful kind of disruption. And sometimes it is just traumatic. And yeah, it doesn't go overwhelming. Yeah. So
Laurie Poole:yeah, Laura, I cannot thank you enough for your time today. I have learned so much in the last 40 minutes talking to you. And I'm so proud of all the work that you've done, Laura should tell our listeners that Laura and I worked together at the Family Study Center at UT Southwestern, more than six years ago, when we were both doing our hours to be fully licensed. And so this has really been a thrill for me to reconnect with you, Laura, and to listen to the fabulous information perspective and advice for adopted persons and for their families and to open up and have straight talk on this this topic, because there isn't a whole lot of conversation. And I know we could have we could have made this much, much longer. There's so many things we haven't touched on the socio economic factors, the political factors, the global factors. There is so much we haven't even touched on international adoption. But I hope that our conversation today gets people thinking gets them curious. I will include your contact information in the notes on this podcast. And if you would shoot me any resources that you would like us to include with the notes. I would be more than happy to do that because I really think this is important. So thank you for educating us and sharing your experience today.
Laura Summers:Thank you, Laurie. I appreciate ate it. It's always great to talk to you.
Laurie Poole:Absolutely. My pleasure. Thank you so much yet