When you step off the plane and go home together for the first time, your journey as an adoptive family has really just begun. You will have highs. You will have lows. But every step of the way, and no matter what life brings, Holt’s robust post-adoption team will be here to support you, your child and your entire family. Here are just 10 of the post-adoption services we offer for families and adoptees.
1. Empowered to Connect
Every spring, Holt hosts simulcasts for “Empowered to Connect,” a parenting conference especially for foster and adoptive parents that features Trust-Based Relational Intervention®, a method that promotes healing, bonding and attachment between children and their families.
2. Picnics
Every summer, we host picnics across the country for families, adoptees and friends! Whether you’re currently in the adoption process or you adopted 30 years ago, this is a time to gather together, have fun and build community with others who are unified by the experience of adoption.
3. Adoptee Camp
With weeklong overnight camps held every summer in four states across the country, Holt Adoptee Camp is a chance for teen and preteen adoptees to have fun, make friends and discuss issues that are important and unique to them. We also hold day camp for families with young children and overnight family camp, which offer parents the opportunity to ask questions and learn from the adoptee community as well. Learn more here!
4. Birth & Foster Family Search
If an adoptee wishes to search for and reconnect with their birth or foster family, we will help search for them on the adoptee’s behalf. If the birth or foster family is found, we can act as an intermediary for them to reach out and begin a correspondence.
5. Heritage Tours
Every summer, Holt facilitates group homeland tours for adoptees — giving them an opportunity to experience the country and culture of their birth. When possible, Holt can also help adoptees visit known people or locations that are meaningful to them, such as their orphanage or sometimes even the caregivers who knew them as a young child.
6. Counseling
Growing up, adoptees can experience a wide range of emotions, thoughts and experiences surrounding their adoption. Our expert team of adoption-competent therapists specifically focus on the needs of children, youth and adults from hard places — giving children and parents the tools and resources they need to process and overcome adoption-specific issues.
7. Circle Back
Circle Back encourages and empowers adoptees to process their adoption story. Via webcam, young adoptees meet one-on-one with an adult adoptee facilitator to lay the foundation for healthy identity development, acknowledge and process different facets of their adoptee and racial identities, and discuss adoption in a way that is uniquely tailored to each adoptee and their family. Learn more here!
8. Scholarships
For adoptees pursuing higher education, we offer a scholarship contest that challenges them to respond to an adoption-related question in a creative way. Submissions have included essays, songs, poems and even choreographed dances!
9. Independent Travel
If your family or your adult child wishes to travel to their birth country, we are here to help you with travel logistics, connecting with our in-country staff, visiting meaningful people or locations, and preparing emotionally for your trip.
10. General Support
No matter what you, your family or your child are experiencing — and no matter how long ago you adopted — we want to support you. So please reach out to us at any time.
Holt Post Adoption Services
Holt offers lifelong support to all adoptees, adoptive families, birth parents, caregivers and others whose lives have been touched by adoption.
