The Role of Mindfulness in Adoptive Parenting (and book giveaway)

MileHighMamas is pleased to reprint Part 2 of this 3-part interview, previously published in Foster Focus magazine. The conversation, held by Addison Cooper of Adoption at the Movies and Lori Holden (MileHighMamas’ own columnist) of LavenderLuz.com, is of interest to anyone parenting via adoption of any sort — domestic, international, foster — or by donor sperm, egg or embryo.

Missed Part 1? Topics covered included how to handle the sometimes brutal online adoption world and how the author would update her adoption book in light of parenting now-teenagers. Read Part 3 here.

Dealing with Common Fears about Openness in Adoption

Considering Open Adoption? What You Should Keep in Mind

What about open adoption agreements? What do adopting parents need to consider when entering into an open adoption? When do adoptees get to have a say in their open adoptions? How has social media changed openness in adoption?

For November — National Adoption Awareness Month — Rachel Garlinghouse (author of the new children’s book Black Girls Can) recently interviewed Mile High Mamas columnist Lori Holden

Open Adoption: Does It Get Easier?

Last fall I led workshops about raising children in an open adoption in Seattle, Portland and Eugene (OR) for an agency with values that closely align with my own.

In one of the workshops, a question arose from a woman who was preparing to adopt. She was contemplating the homestudy process, the matching stage, the birth and placement of the baby and finalization of the adoption — all of which are merely the beginning of a life-long journey through open adoption parenting. She asked with a sense of overwhelm in her voice:

Does open adoption get easier?

It was another participant who gave an insightful answer

A Bold Prediction for Adoptive Families

Even though the Berlin Wall fell suddenly a quarter-century ago, hastening the end of the Cold War, in hindsight we were not all that surprised. Historically we note that of course people eventually throw off shackles. Of course the human spirit cannot be contained forever. The human spirit is hard-wired to reach for light, to yearn for freedom, to crave openness. And settle for no less.

So we just closed out National Adoption Awareness Month, I make a bold prediction for adoptive families and the birth parents who helped form them: the walls that still exist in adoption will fall not gradually and softly but in a rush. A shocking, thunderous rush, just like we saw nearly 25 years ago in Europe.

It’s coming — mark my words: openness in adoption will be here within the decade. We’ll wonder how we ever tolerated anything less.

So what are these walls in adoption?

Local author and her child’s birth mom achieving success with adoption guide

Our own MileHighMamas columnist Lori Holden is fast becoming an nationally recognized expert on the benefits of openness in adoption. Her new book, The Open-Hearted Way to Open Adoption: Helping Your Child Grow Up Whole — written with her daughter’s birth mom — is earning accolades from adoption and infertility circles as well as from parents who are navigating the previously uncharted waters of open adoption and donor conception.

Before Lori embarks on a speaking tour through Washington, Oregon and California, we asked her to sit down with us here in Colorado. Below are some questions she’s answered about her new groundbreaking book that de-freakifies open adoption.

Denver-area birthing center offers adoption training and support

Parker Adventist Hospital in Parker has debuted The Family to Family program, which provides education for its staff members so they can support patients and other people involved in adoption births.

From the website:

We believe in the love and caring of families who adopt children, and we believe in the generous hearts and enormous love of parents who decide it is best to place their baby for adoption. It is our goal to make sure that the experience for both families is sensitive and caring, combining expert medical care with the utmost compassion and sensitivity.

Rebecca Vahle, an adoptive mom to three, founded the program in 2005. She told NBC-affiliate KUSA, “The staff used to run away from these situations or tip toe around them because they didn’t quite know how to support. Now they dive in because they are confident in the training and know they can help make a good experience even in a really tough situation.”

All staff members at Parker Adventist’s BirthPlace attend the