Ambiguous Loss & Family Formation

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Adoption After Infertility Ambiguous Loss and Birth of the Family

August 20, 2024
6:00PM - 7:30PM
Virtual
Zoom

Conference Description:

Approximately 80 percent of all couples who become adoptive parents have struggled with infertility. Infertility can feel like a betrayal of the body. Disappointment, loss, and shame are common experiences for those experiencing infertility. Infertility is a loss and one that needs to be adequately grieved. Adoption is often born out of a loss but it is also a birth – birth of a family. This lecture will address ambiguous loss and its impact on the patient. And grief, if experienced and properly processed with the therapist, can empower our clients to become stronger individuals. In therapy, examined grief can further character development and integration. This growth can enhance self-acceptance and one’s ability to embrace the vulnerable self. Stronger individuals and wiser parents naturally arise from this work.

Learning Objectives:

As a result of participation in this event, participants should be able to:

Highlight treatment considerations when working with couples and individuals going through the adoption process, specifically, cases where there has been infertility.
Explore how the clinician’s own losses, if sufficiently processed, can help empower the patient to see their losses as a strength.
Expand our definition of family and reimagine adoption as a story of rebirth.

Presenters

Sara Forsythe Menna, LCSW

Licensed Clinical Social Worker who has been in private practice for over twenty years

Sara Forsythe Menna is a licensed clinical social worker who has been in private practice for over twenty years. She received her Masters in Social Work from Loyola University and completed the Adult Psychotherapy program from the Chicago Psychoanalytic Institute in 2005. In addition to her clinical practice she has done supervision, led training groups for fellows, and presented on adoption and infertility. Currently she is in private practice on the North side of Chicago where she sees individuals and couples.

Questions:

Call Tracy Ashworth 847-869-1500 ext. 207

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Yellowbrick collaborates with adolescents and emerging adults, ages 16-30's, their families and participating professionals toward the development and implementation of a strategic “Life Plan.” An integrative, multi-specialty consultation clarifies strengths, limitations, and risks, and defines motivations, goals and choices.