Therapy for Adoptive Parents in Fremont, CA
Serving Fremont, Newark, Union City, Milpitas, and throughout the East Bay
Online sessions throughout California | Licensed CA LCSW #68507
Trauma Therapy for Adoptive Parents Who Are Struggling
Everyone keeps telling you how lucky your child is, how amazing it is that you're doing this, how grateful you must feel. Nobody asks how you're actually doing.
Because if they did, you'd have to tell them about the panic attacks in the Safeway parking lot, the way you can't sleep through the night because your body won't stop waiting for the next crisis, the depression that settled in after your child came home and never lifted, the grief that still surfaces when you think about the adoption that fell through even though that was months or years ago, the way your child's meltdowns send your own nervous system into complete meltdown mode because you're absorbing their trauma into your body.
You're holding it together on the outside while falling apart on the inside. Your chest stays perpetually tight, your jaw aches from clenching, and you're so tired that no amount of sleep makes a difference. You're avoiding playdates and school events because you can't explain your reality without either lying or saying way too much, and the isolation is making everything worse.
The worst part isn't even the struggles themselves - it's the shame of struggling when you "chose this," when you're supposed to be grateful, when admitting you need help feels like admitting you're failing as a parent.
What Fremont Adoptive Parents Are Experiencing
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Your child's dysregulation is dysregulating you.
Every time they have a meltdown, your body goes into full fight-or-flight mode with your heart pounding like you're in actual danger, your hands shaking, your stomach churning. You're walking on eggshells in your own home, constantly scanning for warning signs, hypervigilant and exhausted from never being able to fully relax. Some days you love your child deeply but can't actually feel it through the fog of numbness and survival mode. You're realizing that absorbing their trauma day after day, witnessing their pain and behaviors without being able to fix it, is creating trauma in your own nervous system.
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The depression that showed up after adoption won't leave.
You expected joy, gratitude, that rush of love everyone talks about. Instead you woke up feeling hollow, went through the motions of caregiving while feeling nothing, smiled for the adoption announcement photos while dying inside. Between 10% and 32% of adoptive parents experience post-adoption depression - both mothers and fathers - but nobody talks about it openly because admitting depression after getting what you wanted feels like betraying your child. The numbness is crushing, the guilt about not feeling instant connection is overwhelming, and you're terrified that struggling this much means you made a terrible mistake.
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That failed adoption still owns real estate in your heart.
You bonded with that baby for months while supporting the birth mother through her pregnancy, painted the nursery in colors you'd chosen together, told family and friends the good news, started calling yourself a parent in your mind. Then she decided to parent, which was always her right and which you respect, but nobody prepared you for the specific agony of grieving a child who was never legally yours. Fremont friends and family keep asking when you'll "try again" like this was just a setback instead of a death, and the thought of risking your heart like that again feels impossible even though you still desperately want to be a parent.
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Foster-to-adopt keeps breaking you open.
You showed up for every single court-ordered visit even when it was inconvenient, drove hours for appointments your foster child needed, advocated for their best interests even when it was hard, loved them with everything you had while trying to protect your heart. Then reunification happened, which you knew was always the goal and which you genuinely wanted for that child, but the grief is still overwhelming and nobody seems to understand why you're not "past it" after a few weeks. You're stuck between truly wanting what's best for them and mourning the family you thought you were building, and facing another placement feels unbearable.
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The infertility grief came back with a vengeance after your child arrived.
You genuinely thought adoption would heal that wound, that becoming a parent would be enough to close that chapter. Instead the grief ambushes you at random moments: filling out school forms with blank family medical history sections, fielding comments about how your child doesn't look like you, wondering late at night if biological children would somehow be easier, seeing pregnancy announcements and feeling that familiar ache you thought you'd left behind. You feel guilty for these thoughts, like grieving what never was means you're betraying or resenting the child you have, but the grief won't go away just because you want it to.
What Happens to Your Body During Adoption Trauma
This isn't stress you can fix with better organization or positive thinking. Your body is physically holding every traumatic moment, every loss, every day of feeling on edge.
You're having full panic attacks in public places for no clear reason, your heart suddenly racing and your breath catching. You lie awake at 3am replaying every interaction from the day in excruciating detail, analyzing what you did wrong, spiraling into catastrophic worst-case scenarios about your child's future. You're snapping at your partner over tiny things because your nervous system is completely maxed out and has zero capacity left for normal frustrations.
You're avoiding other Fremont parents at school pickup because their complaints about picky eating or bedtime battles feel like they're from another planet compared to what you're dealing with every day, and you have no idea how to explain your reality without making them uncomfortable or being judged. You can't post honestly in adoption Facebook groups without risking harsh criticism or unsolicited advice. The support from your adoption agency evaporated once finalization happened. Even your own family keeps saying "but isn't this what you wanted?" like wanting to be a parent should somehow erase every hard thing about how you actually became one.
The exhaustion runs deeper than just needing more sleep. It's the bone-deep weariness of carrying multiple griefs simultaneously and constantly: grief for the biological children you'll never have, grief for your child's birth family and their losses, grief for the imagined family life that doesn't match reality, grief for the version of yourself you're losing to constant crisis management and survival mode.
Adoption Trauma Requires Specialized Therapy
You've probably already tried regular counseling. Maybe your therapist was compassionate and well-meaning but kept offering parenting strategies when what you actually needed was trauma treatment for yourself, not tips for managing your child's behaviors. Or they focused all their attention on your child's healing journey with no acknowledgment that you're drowning, that loving a traumatized child can traumatize you too.
Maybe they simply didn't understand adoption trauma at all, and you spent precious therapy time educating them about attachment issues, failed placements, and post-adoption depression instead of getting actual help for what you're going through. The research is clear: 75% of adoptive parents rate their therapists as not adoption-competent - this isn't something you're imagining, the gap is real and documented.
Here's what's actually happening: traditional talk therapy works beautifully for processing thoughts and feelings, for understanding patterns in your life, for gaining insight into why you react certain ways. But when trauma lives in your body - when your heart races at specific triggers, when your chest stays perpetually tight, when grief feels physically heavy like you're carrying extra weight, when your nervous system is stuck in constant threat-detection mode - you need therapeutic approaches that work directly with your body and nervous system, not just your thoughts and insights.
Trauma-Focused Approaches That Help Fremont Adoptive Parents Heal
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IFS recognizes that you have different parts of yourself with competing needs and each part is trying to protect you in the only way it knows how. The part that loves your child with fierce devotion, the part that's utterly exhausted and fantasizes about running away, the part grieving your imagined family, the part desperate to be the perfect parent, the part that feels absolutely nothing - instead of these parts creating constant internal war and shame spirals, they can learn to work together with compassion and understanding. So you can stop beating yourself up constantly for having contradictory feelings, make important decisions from a place of internal alignment instead of constant turmoil and second-guessing, respond to your child from your deeply held values instead of your immediate triggers and reactions.
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EMDR helps your brain file traumatic memories where they actually belong: firmly in the past, not bleeding into your present moment. The moment you learned the adoption fell through and your world collapsed, the day your foster child was removed and driven away, the first time you felt absolutely nothing when your child said "I love you" and you panicked about what that meant, that panic attack in the Target bathroom when everything became too much - we can process these memories so your brain stops treating them like current active threats to your safety. So you can think about difficult moments without your entire body reacting like they're happening right now in real time, drive past significant locations without your chest tightening and breath catching, look at photos from painful times without completely falling apart.
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ART can rapidly reduce intrusive trauma symptoms and haunting mental images, often providing substantial relief in just a few focused sessions rather than months or years of weekly traditional therapy. It's particularly effective for the specific images that torment you: seeing the birth mother walk away with the baby you thought was yours, replaying your child's most extreme meltdown in vivid detail, the look on the caseworker's face when they said your foster child was leaving, the moment you realized you felt nothing for this child you'd fought so hard to adopt. So you can get meaningful relief much faster, function better in your daily life while continuing to heal deeper layers of trauma, and not spend multiple years in therapy just to reach a basic baseline of okay.
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Brainspotting locates exactly where trauma and grief are physically stored in your brain and nervous system, then helps release them without forcing you to verbally relive every excruciating detail over and over again. You don't have to retell the complete story of what happened in order to heal from it. So you can process the failed adoption, the crushing depression, the secondary trauma from your child's behaviors without retraumatizing yourself repeatedly in the therapy room, getting real relief without those emotionally draining talk therapy sessions that leave you feeling wrung out and raw for days afterward.
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Somatic therapy works directly with your body's actual trauma responses instead of trying to think your way out of physical symptoms. Those shoulders holding chronic tension and hypervigilance that won't release, that chest carrying heavy grief and constant anxiety, that stomach churning every single time the phone rings, that jaw clenched so tight your teeth hurt - we help your nervous system actually learn to regulate again, to find real safety and calm in your own physical body. So you can genuinely relax during quiet moments instead of staying perpetually braced for the next crisis to hit, sleep through the night without your body jolting awake in panic mode, breathe deeply and fully without that constant tightness restricting your lungs, be truly present with your child instead of just white-knuckling your way through their presence.
What Fremont Adoptive Parents Experience When They Get Specialized Help
Your nervous system learns to settle independently even when your child's doesn't. You develop actual working tools to calm your fight-or-flight response when their behaviors trigger you, and your body starts remembering what genuine safety feels like even in the middle of chaos. You can stay calmer during their meltdowns without escalating alongside them, get through bedtime routines with more patience, make parenting decisions from clarity instead of panic, sit through family dinners without constant anxiety, and actually enjoy playing with your child instead of just monitoring them for warning signs.
The depression that's been weighing you down starts to lift gradually. The numbness gives way to actually feeling things again - both the hard feelings and the good ones you've been missing. You can laugh genuinely at your child's jokes, feel real affection when they hug you, reconnect physically with your partner, look forward to weekend activities, feel excitement about your child's milestones, and take family photos where your smile feels real instead of forced.
The shame that's been weighing you down loses its grip. You start understanding that struggling doesn't equal failing as a parent, and needing help doesn't mean you made the wrong choice. You can tell your partner when you need a break, be honest with your therapist or close friends about hard days, set boundaries with relatives who don't understand, advocate for your family's needs with schools and providers, and stop feeling like you have to perform constant happiness on social media.
Grief becomes something you can hold without it pulling you under. Whether it's grief from infertility, failed adoptions, or the family life you imagined, you learn to honor these losses without being consumed by them. You can attend baby showers without falling apart, answer questions about adoption without defensiveness, look at photos from difficult times without spiraling, fill out school forms with missing medical history without feeling broken, celebrate Mother's Day or Father's Day without feeling like an imposter, and be genuinely happy for pregnant friends.
You actually sleep through the night and wake up with energy. Your body releases the constant vigilance, and the 3am anxiety spirals happen less frequently. You can fall asleep without replaying the day's mistakes, wake up without dread, have energy for exercise or social time, focus during work meetings, remember things without writing everything down, and handle bedtime routines with more patience.
You reconnect with who you were before trauma took over. Underneath the exhaustion and crisis management, you start rediscovering yourself as a whole person. You can pick up hobbies you abandoned, have conversations with friends about topics beyond your child's struggles, make career decisions that excite you, plan trips without paralyzing guilt, say yes to social invitations, pursue your own interests, and remember what brings you joy beyond just getting through each day.
Your capacity expands naturally through healing. When your nervous system isn't constantly activated, when depression isn't draining your energy, when shame isn't weighing you down, you simply have more to give. You can show up for therapy appointments and school meetings without resentment, attend parent support groups without defensiveness, reconnect with your partner emotionally and physically, return phone calls and texts from friends, host people at your house again, and be present with your child during daily routines without constantly checking your phone to escape.
Virtual Therapy in Fremont and Throughout California
I provide secure, HIPAA-compliant telehealth sessions for adoptive parents across California, including throughout Fremont and the entire East Bay. You can meet with me from your home, your car during lunch break, or any private space with reliable internet access - no commute time added to your already overwhelming schedule.
Session options:
50-minute sessions: $300
90-minute sessions: $450
4-hour intensives: $1,200
I offer flexible scheduling including early mornings, evenings, and weekends to work around your family's complex needs and constraints.
I'm a private-pay provider and don't take insurance directly. I can provide documentation (Superbills) for out-of-network reimbursement if your insurance plan offers it.
About Summer Verhines, LCSW, Adoption Therapist
I work with adoptive parents throughout Fremont and the East Bay because I understand that adoption doesn't just affect your child, it profoundly impacts you too.
I've been licensed to independently practice in California since 2015 (CA LCSW #68507). I have 9 years of experience in child welfare and adoption and I am C.A.S.E. registered (Center for Adoption Support and Education) through completing training with the National Adoption Competency Mental Health Training Initiative (NTI).
I specialize in supporting adoptive parents through their own mental health challenges: post-adoption depression, secondary trauma, and the grief and burnout that comes with this journey.
Using specialized trauma approaches, I help you heal from failed adoptions, process your own trauma responses, and find sustainable ways to manage the ongoing stress without losing yourself completely in the process.
FAQs
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All sessions are conducted online through secure, HIPAA-compliant telehealth platforms. You can meet with me from anywhere in California - your home, your office, even your car in a parking lot if that's the only private space available to you. For Fremont parents already juggling demanding work schedules, multiple therapy appointments for your child, school meetings, and everything else, virtual therapy eliminates commute time completely and gives you maximum flexibility with scheduling.
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Traditional talk therapy helps you understand your thoughts, process your feelings, and gain valuable insight into your patterns - which has real value but often isn't enough when trauma is stored in your physical body and nervous system. The specialized trauma approaches I use - EMDR, Brainspotting, Accelerated Resolution Therapy, Internal Family Systems, and Somatic therapy - work directly with your nervous system to release trauma at a much deeper level than talk alone can reach. These aren't just new coping strategies to manage your symptoms; they actually help your brain and body process and resolve traumatic experiences so they genuinely stop controlling and hijacking your present life. Many adoptive parents describe years of traditional therapy helping them understand their struggles without actually relieving them - body-based trauma work is what finally creates real, lasting change they can feel.
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It depends on what you're working on and which therapeutic approaches we use together in your treatment. Accelerated Resolution Therapy is specifically designed for focused short-term work - many parents experience significant noticeable relief within just 3-5 sessions when addressing specific discrete traumatic memories like a failed adoption, an unexpected placement disruption, or a particular crisis that's haunting them. Other parents work with me for several months to methodically process multiple accumulated layers of adoption-related trauma: the years of infertility grief, the failed placements that broke their hearts, the post-adoption depression that won't lift, the secondary trauma from absorbing their child's constant dysregulation. Traditional cognitive-behavioral talk therapy often requires years to see meaningful lasting change - these body-based trauma methods are significantly more efficient and effective at creating real transformation. We'll discuss your specific goals and situation in our very first session together and create a realistic timeline based on what you're actually dealing with.
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Absolutely, you don't need to wait for finalization. I work with adoptive parents at every single stage of this complex journey: waiting anxiously to be matched with a birth mother, supporting a birth mother through her pregnancy while wondering if she'll change her mind, recovering from a failed placement that fell through and broke your heart, navigating the constant uncertainty and emotional rollercoaster of foster-to-adopt, newly home with your child and struggling with the reality versus expectations, or many years into parenting and finally realizing you need professional help. Your struggles and pain are completely valid and deserving of support regardless of exactly where you are in the legal adoption process - you don't have to wait until everything is "official" to get help for what you're going through right now.
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I'm a private-pay provider because it allows me to focus exclusively on what actually helps you heal rather than being constrained by what insurance companies will reimburse, which is often limited to approaches that don't work well for complex adoption trauma. However, I can provide detailed documentation called Superbills for out-of-network reimbursement if your particular insurance plan offers that benefit - many plans do provide partial reimbursement. Many adoptive parents discover that investing directly in specialized trauma therapy with someone who genuinely understands adoption saves them literal years of ineffective but insurance-covered talk therapy that doesn't address the root issues and leaves them still struggling with the same problems.
Work With Someone Who Actually Gets Adoption Trauma
You don't have to keep carrying all of this weight alone. You need someone with real hands-on experience in child welfare and adoption who understands the specific trauma of this journey - not generic parenting advice from someone who's never walked this path, but expert help for what you're going through right now.
Let's talk about how trauma-focused therapy can help you heal and recover while you continue loving and showing up for your child.
Contact Me
Please complete this form and I’ll be back in touch via email, text, or phone within 1-2 business days.
Call or Text
855-564-3338
sverhines.lcsw@gmail.com
Mailing Address
P.O. Box 28, Wilton, CA 95693
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