Online Adoption Therapy for Birth Parents in Sacramento, CA
Grief counseling for birth parents who placed a child for adoption, whether it happened recently or decades ago. Serving Sacramento, Roseville, El Dorado Hills, Elk Grove, Folsom, and surrounding communities.
Your child found you. Or you found them. Or someone sent a DNA match and now you’re staring at a message from a person who shares your biology and your face and thirty years of questions, and you have no idea what to do next.
Maybe the reunion is already happening and it’s nothing like what you imagined. You expected relief, or closure, or some version of the relationship you’ve been grieving all these years. Instead you’re navigating a connection that has no script, no rules, and more emotional weight than any relationship you’ve ever been in. One day you’re texting back and forth and it feels like a miracle, and the next day they go quiet for a week and you’re nineteen again, standing in that hospital room, losing them all over again.
Or maybe you’re thinking about reaching out but the decision feels impossible. Part of you has wanted this for years. Part of you is terrified of what you’ll find, or what they’ll think of you, or what it will do to the life you’ve built since the placement. You’ve been turning it over in your mind for months and you’re no closer to an answer than when you started.
Some birth parents come to me in the middle of a reunion that’s going sideways. Some come because they’re thinking about searching and the ambivalence is paralyzing. Some come with grief that has nothing to do with reunion, the kind that surfaces at birthdays, holidays, or when their other children reach the age they were at placement, and they’ve carried it long enough that they’re ready for something to change.
Read more about how I work with birth parents here.
When Talking About Adoption Doesn’t Change the Grief
You may have tried therapy before, and it may have helped you understand what you're carrying without changing how your body responds to it. That makes sense, because birth parent grief is different from other kinds of grief. The person you lost is alive. There's no funeral, no social permission to mourn, and no timeline where people expect you to still be hurting years or decades later.
And if you're in reunion, the grief doesn't go away just because you've found each other. It changes shape. The old loss mixes with new fears, new disappointments, and the complicated reality of trying to build a relationship with someone who is both your child and a stranger.
The approaches I use work directly with how grief and stress are stored in your body rather than asking you to talk your way through them. The goal is to loosen the hold these responses have on your daily life so you can make decisions about reunion, contact, and your own future from clarity instead of from fear.
What Changes After Therapy for Birth Parents
Your child sends a text that would have sent you into a tailspin six months ago, something about wanting to meet your parents or asking why you chose the family you chose, and you read it, take a breath, and respond that evening instead of agonizing over the wording for three days. You say something honest, they respond, and you go to bed without replaying the conversation until 2 a.m. The next day you go to work and your mind stays on your work instead of cycling through every possible interpretation of what they meant.
They go quiet for a week and you notice the old panic rising, the certainty that you’ve lost them again, but instead of sending four follow-up texts or spiraling into worst-case scenarios, you let the silence sit. When they text back on Saturday like nothing happened, you realize the silence wasn’t about you. That’s a new thought, and it holds.
Your child’s birthday comes and you feel the sadness, but you light a candle and look at the photos and then you take your other daughter to soccer practice and help her with her science project, and the rest of the week is a normal week instead of something you have to white-knuckle through.
You tell your partner what you’ve been carrying, and instead of the catastrophe you’ve been imagining for years, you say it simply and get through the evening. You wake up the next morning and nothing has collapsed, and the energy you used to spend on keeping the secret starts going toward things you’d put off, signing up for a pottery class, calling a friend you’ve been avoiding, planning a weekend trip you would have talked yourself out of a year ago.
You notice you’ve stopped bracing for the good things to disappear. You got the promotion and you let yourself enjoy it. Your partner suggests a vacation and you book it instead of finding a reason not to. You start building a life that has room for more than grief and managing, and the reunion becomes one part of your life instead of the thing that swallows everything else.
About Summer
I spent nine years working in child welfare and adoption before becoming a therapist. During that time I supported birth parents through the placement process and saw firsthand how little follow-up support exists after the paperwork is signed. The agencies move on, the adoptive family’s needs take priority, and the birth parent is expected to go back to regular life as if something fundamental hasn’t changed.
That experience is why birth parents are a central part of my practice now. I am C.A.S.E. certified in adoption competency, which is a post-graduate training program that prepares clinicians to work with the lifelong effects of adoption on adoptive parents, birth parents, and adult adoptees. You won’t need to spend our sessions explaining what placement grief is, why reunion is complicated, or why this still affects you decades later.
I use EMDR, Brainspotting, and Accelerated Resolution Therapy because birth parent grief is stored in the body, not just in thoughts. These approaches work directly with those responses so the memories and triggers lose their hold on your daily life.
Online Adoption Therapy for Birth Parents in Sacramento & Northern California
All sessions are conducted through secure, HIPAA-compliant telehealth. You can meet with me from a private room in your home, your car, or any quiet space with a stable internet connection.
The privacy of online sessions means you don’t have to explain where you’re going or who you’re seeing.
I work with birth parents throughout the Sacramento area, including Roseville, Elk Grove, Folsom, El Dorado Hills, Davis, Citrus Heights, Rancho Cordova, and surrounding communities.
Because sessions are online, I work with California residents statewide, including in the Bay Area.
Logistics
50-minute Sessions are $250.
I also offer 90-minute sessions for $375 and intensive sessions (2-4 hours) ranging from $500 to $1000 for people who want to work intensively.
I don't take insurance directly, but I can provide superbills for out-of-network reimbursement if your plan covers that.
I am available early mornings, evenings, and weekends. I provide services online only.
Self-Schedule or Contact Me Below
For the quickest and most confidential option, you’re encouraged to book directly into my calendar by clicking the Self-Schedule Here button below. That button will take you to my HIPAA-compliant calendar where you may request an appointment. Once I confirm your appointment request (typically within 24 hours), I will email you the new client forms to digitally sign. Then, we will meet on your scheduled day.
If you have questions prior to scheduling, you can also use the contact form below, and I’ll reply within 48 business hours. If you don’t see a reply, please check your junk/spam folder.
I look forward to hearing from you!
— Summer Verhines, LCSW
Contact Summer
Frequently Asked Questions
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The first session is a chance for me to hear what brought you here and for you to decide whether working together feels right. I’ll ask about your adoption experience, what’s been hardest, and what you want to be different. We won’t jump into the heavy stuff right away. For many birth parents, the first session is the first time they’ve talked about this with someone who already understands the weight of it, and that alone can bring some relief.
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All three involve focusing on a specific memory or experience while your brain works through it in a new way. In EMDR, I guide your eyes back and forth while you hold a memory in mind. Brainspotting uses a fixed eye position to find where stress is stuck in your body. Accelerated Resolution Therapy uses guided imagery and eye movements and is designed to work in fewer sessions. None of these require you to describe painful experiences in detail out loud. Most clients say the experience is intense but manageable, and many notice a shift after just a few sessions. The memory is still there, but it doesn’t have the same grip.
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Yes. Reunion is one of the most emotionally complex experiences a birth parent can go through, and there’s no roadmap for it. Therapy can help you manage the intensity of the feelings that come up, set boundaries without guilt, tolerate the uncertainty of a relationship that doesn’t follow normal rules, and make decisions about contact from a grounded place rather than from panic or desperation.
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No. Many of the birth parents I work with placed their child ten, twenty, or thirty years ago. Research shows that for many birth parents, the grief gets heavier over time rather than fading. Milestones like your child’s 18th birthday, becoming a grandparent, or your own health changing can bring the grief back to the surface with full force. There is no expiration date on this kind of work.
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Sessions are $250, private pay only. I do not accept insurance directly, but I provide superbills you can submit to your insurance company for possible out-of-network reimbursement. Many PPO plans reimburse a portion of the session fee. I recommend calling the number on your insurance card and asking about out-of-network mental health benefits before your first session.