Therapy for Adoptive Parents in Annapolis, MD
Therapy for adoptive parents carrying the weight of parenting that no one prepared you for. Serving Annapolis, Severna Park, Crofton, Arnold, Edgewater, and throughout Anne Arundel County.
Adoption therapy for adoptive parents in Annapolis, MD
You went through the home study, the background checks, the fingerprints, the waiting. You read the books, joined Facebook groups, and talked to other families. You thought you were ready.
Now your child is home in Annapolis, and the reality looks nothing like what you prepared for. Your seven-year-old screams for forty-five minutes because you gave him the wrong cup. Your toddler goes rigid when you try to hold her, arching her back and wailing until you put her down. Your teenager smiles at the social worker and then punches a hole in their bedroom wall the second the front door closes.
You've tried the Anne Arundel County school counselor, who suggested a sticker chart. You've tried the family therapist in Annapolis who told you to "set firmer boundaries" and "stay consistent," advice that works fine for kids who grew up feeling safe, but falls apart for a child whose nervous system was shaped by neglect, chaos, or loss before they ever met you.
Learn more about my approach to working with adoptive parents here.
How adoption therapy works for adoptive parents
You've probably read every book, taken every training, and tried every parenting strategy the adoption community recommends. You understand why your child hides food in her pillowcase, why he flinches when you raise your voice even though you've never given him a reason to, why bedtime turns into a battle every single night. You have the knowledge, and you're still losing it at 7pm when nothing you've learned seems to work on a child who's screaming that you're not their real parent.
The gap between what you know and what you can do in those moments isn't about effort or education. When your child melts down and your heart starts pounding and your thinking brain goes offline, your body is reacting to months or years of living in crisis mode.
You've been absorbing your child's distress day after day, and your brain has started treating every escalation as an emergency, responding before you have a chance to choose how you want to show up.
That's where my work focuses. The therapeutic approaches I use work directly with how your body responds to stress, so the parenting tools you already have can function the way they're supposed to.
You won't need to spend weeks retelling your story or narrating every hard moment from the beginning. Much of this work happens at the level of the physical stress response, the racing heart, the tight jaw, the urge to shut down or yell or walk away, and helps it shift so you can stay present when things get hard at home.
I spent nine years working in child welfare and adoption before becoming a therapist. I sat in placement meetings, reviewed case files, and worked alongside families from the very first day a child came home.
That means I already understand what food hoarding means, why the anniversary of a placement can bring everything rushing back, and how exhausting it is to love a child who tests your relationship every day because testing is the only way they've ever learned to figure out if someone will stay.
So when you describe what's happening in your house, you can go straight to what you need help with.
What changes with specialized, adoption-competent therapy
You'll stay in the room when your child is falling apart. Right now when the screaming starts, your body takes over before your brain catches up, your heart races, your jaw locks, and you either match their intensity or shut down completely. After doing this work, you'll feel the activation start and be able to stay with it instead of being hijacked by it. Your child will melt down at dinner and you'll keep your voice steady, not because you're performing calm, but because your body has genuinely learned that their distress isn't an emergency you have to fix in the next thirty seconds. The meltdown will still be hard, but it won't ruin the whole evening, and your child will learn something about what it looks like when someone stays.
You'll feel things again, including the good ones. The numbness that settled in somewhere along the way, the one that makes you go through the motions of family life without feeling much of anything, will start to lift. Your child will say something funny at breakfast and you'll laugh before you've decided whether it's a good day or a bad day. You'll feel genuine warmth when they climb into your lap instead of just relief that they're not in crisis. You'll look at your partner across the room and feel something other than exhaustion and logistics.
You'll stop carrying the shame of struggling with something you chose. You wanted this child. You fought for this child. And some days you wonder what you were thinking, and the guilt of that thought is worse than the hard day that produced it. When the shame loosens, you'll be able to tell your partner you need a break without it feeling like a confession. You'll be honest with your close friends about the hard days instead of performing the grateful, happy adoption story everyone wants to hear. You'll advocate for your child at school without the fear that asking for help means admitting you can't handle this.
You'll grieve what you lost without the grief swallowing your whole week. Whether the grief is about infertility, a failed match, the biological connection you'll never have with your child, or the version of family life you pictured before reality set in, it won’t eclipse the joy. You’ll be able to attend a baby shower without needing to leave early. You'll fill out the school medical history form with its blank spaces and move on with your afternoon instead of carrying it into the next day.
You'll sleep through the night and have energy left for your own life. The 3am anxiety spirals, the ones where you replay every mistake and plan for every catastrophe, will lose their frequency and their intensity. You'll fall asleep without running through tomorrow's potential disasters, wake up without the dread already sitting on your chest, and have enough energy left after the kids are in bed to read something that has nothing to do with adoption or parenting or trauma.
You'll remember that you're a person outside of being this child's parent. Somewhere in the crisis management and the appointments and the IEP meetings and the constant vigilance, you lost track of the parts of yourself that existed before all of this. You'll pick up a hobby you abandoned three years ago, make plans with a friend and keep them, have a conversation about something other than your child's progress, and make a decision about your own career or your own life without the guilt telling you that wanting something for yourself means you're taking something from your family.
You'll have more of yourself to bring home at the end of the day. When your body stops running on high alert all the time, when the depression isn't draining your reserves before noon, when the shame stops taking up so much space, you simply have more to give. Not because you've tried harder or pushed through, but because the weight you've been carrying has gotten lighter. You'll return a friend's text, sit on the floor and play with your child without watching the clock, have a real conversation with your partner after the kids go to bed, and feel like a person who's living their life instead of just surviving it.
Online therapy for adoptive parents throughout Annapolis
All sessions happen over secure video, which means you don't have to find childcare, fight traffic on Route 50, or explain to anyone where you're going. You log on from your home in Annapolis, Severna Park, Arnold, Edgewater, Crofton, or anywhere in Anne Arundel County, and we get to work.
I also work with adoptive parents in Baltimore and Columbia and throughout Maryland.
Hello! I’m Summer
I worked in child welfare and with adoptive families for nine years before starting my private practice. I've sat across from foster parents who just lost a placement to reunification, walked adoptive parents through the aftermath of a failed match, and supported families through the slow grind of parenting a child who doesn't feel safe enough to let you love them yet.
I'm C.A.S.E. trained (Center for Adoption Support and Education), which means I have specialized certification in adoption-competent therapy.
That training shapes how I understand what's happening in your home, the difference between a child who's being defiant and a child who's terrified, the grief that hits after finalization when everyone else expects you to be celebrating, the exhaustion that sleep doesn't fix because your body has been running on high alert for months or years.
I hold an active Maryland LCSW-C license (#34104). If you're an adoptive parent in Annapolis carrying the weight of all of this, I'd like to talk with you. You can schedule a session or reach out through the contact form below.
Logistics
50-minute Sessions are $300.
I also offer 90-minute sessions for $450 and intensive sessions (2-4 hours) ranging from $600 to $1200 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