Therapy for Foster and Adoptive Parents in Irvine, CA

Serving Irvine, Tustin, Lake Forest, Mission Viejo, and surrounding Orange County communities

Online sessions throughout California | Licensed CA LCSW #68507

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Body-Based Trauma Therapy for Parents Walking the Foster and Adoption Journey in Orange County

You're an Orange County adoptive parent who prepared for everything: the home study, the waiting, the uncertainty. You read every book, joined every support group, watched every documentary about adoption.

But no one prepared you for this: the weight of a failed adoption that left you grieving a child who was never legally yours, the depression that showed up after your child finally came home when you were supposed to feel nothing but joy, the way your body goes into panic mode during your child's meltdowns with your heart racing like you're in actual danger.

You're exhausted in a way that sleep doesn't fix. Your chest stays tight. Your shoulders live up by your ears. You cry in your car before walking into the house because you need to pull it together before your child sees you.

And the shame of struggling when you “got what you wanted” makes it all worse.

Learn more about my approach to supporting adoptive parents here

Why My Irvine Adoptive Parent Clients Reach Out for Help

  • Failed Adoptions

    Failed adoptions leave a specific kind of grief. You bonded with a baby during the pregnancy. You paid living expenses, went to appointments, prepared the nursery. Then the birth mother changed her mind, which was always her right, but your heart wasn't prepared for that kind of loss. You fell in love with a child who isn't yours, and no one around you understands why you're still crying months later. Many Irvine families going through private adoptions face this heartbreak.

  • Foster-to-Adopt

    Foster-to-adopt can mean loving children who leave. You did everything right, showed up for every court-ordered visit, advocated for your foster child's best interests. Then they went back to their biological family. You're happy for them and also devastated. The risk of going through this again feels unbearable, but you still want to be a parent.

  • Post-Adoption Depression

    Post-adoption depression affects 10-32% of adoptive parents, both mothers and fathers. Everyone expects you to be grateful. You are grateful. But you also wake up with dread instead of excitement. You're going through the motions, smiling for the photos, while feeling completely empty inside. The guilt about not feeling instant love is crushing.

  • Infertility Grief

    Infertility grief doesn't disappear when your adopted child comes home. You thought this would heal that wound. Instead, the grief surfaces at random moments: when there's no family medical history to give the doctor, when someone says your child doesn't look like you, when you wonder if biological children would be easier.

Your Body Carries the Impact of Adoption Trauma

This isn't just sadness you can think your way out of. Your nervous system is stuck in threat mode.

You're lying in bed at 3am, chest tight, replaying every interaction from the day and wondering if you're damaging your child. You're crying in the Target parking lot because you finally have 10 minutes alone. You're clenching your jaw so hard it aches.

Your body has become a constant alarm system. Even in calm moments, you're braced for the next crisis. The exhaustion goes deeper than needing sleep - it's the bone-deep weariness of carrying trauma, both your child's and now your own.

You avoid other Irvine parents because their complaints about picky eaters feel like they're from another planet. When they ask "how's it going?" you don't know how to answer without lying or oversharing. The isolation makes everything heavier.

Why Irvine Adoptive Parents Need Specialized Trauma Therapy

You've tried therapy before. Your therapist meant well but didn't understand adoption trauma. You spent sessions educating them instead of getting help. They gave you generic parenting advice or suggested your expectations were too high.

Or worse, they focused only on your child's healing, not yours. Where's the support for the fact that loving a traumatized child can traumatize you too?

Research shows 75% of adoptive parents rate their therapists as not adoption-competent. You're not looking for parenting advice. You need someone with actual experience in child welfare and adoption who gets that witnessing your child's pain, day after day, leaves marks on your own nervous system.

How Body-Based Therapy Helps Irvine Adoptive Parents Heal

EMDR (Eye Movement Desensitization and Reprocessing)

Helps your brain file traumatic experiences where they belong: in the past. The day the adoption fell through, the moment your foster child left, the first time you felt nothing when your child said "I love you" - we can process these memories so they stop hijacking your present. You'll be able to think about difficult moments without your body reacting like they're happening right now.


Internal Family Systems (IFS)

Recognizes you have different parts with competing needs: the part desperate to be a good parent, the part that's exhausted and wants to give up, the part grieving your imagined family, and the part that loves your child fiercely. Instead of these parts creating internal war, they learn to work together with compassion.

Accelerated Resolution Therapy (ART)

Can rapidly reduce trauma symptoms, often in fewer sessions than traditional therapy. It's particularly effective for the intrusive thoughts and images that plague many adoptive parents.

Somatic therapy

Works directly with your body's trauma responses. Your shoulders hold the weight of hypervigilance. Your chest carries grief. Your stomach churning with anxiety. We help your nervous system learn to regulate again, to find calm even in the storm.

Brainspotting

Locates where trauma and grief are stored in your brain and helps release them without reliving every detail. You don't have to retell the story over and over to heal from it.

What Irvine Adoptive Parents Experience After Starting Trauma Therapy

  • Your nervous system settles. You develop tools to calm your fight-or-flight response when your child's behaviors trigger you. You’ll stay present during meltdowns without yelling back, make parenting decisions from clarity instead of panic, and actually enjoy family dinners without waiting for something to go wrong.

  • The depression lifts. Slowly but surely, you have more moments where you can access joy alongside the challenges. The numbness gives way to feeling again, both the challenging feelings and the good ones. You’ll be able to laugh at your child's jokes without it feeling forced, initiate sex with your partner instead of avoiding intimacy, and plan activities you enjoy rather than just surviving each day.

  • You process grief without drowning in it. Whether it's grief from failed adoptions, infertility, or the family life you imagined, you’ll be able to honor these losses without being consumed by them. The waves of sadness still come, but they don't pull you under. You’ll be able to talk about your adoption journey with friends without breaking down, fill out your child's medical forms without spiraling about the missing genetic history, and show up for Mother's Day or Father's Day events without feeling like a fraud.

  • Shame loses its grip. You understand that struggling doesn't mean you're failing, and needing help doesn't mean you made the wrong choice by adopting. You’ll be able to ask your partner for help without feeling like you're admitting defeat, tell your friends the hard truths about your experience without sugar-coating it, and set boundaries with your child's school or caseworker when you need to advocate for your family.

  • You sleep through the night. Your body is no longer on edge, and the 3am anxiety spirals happen less and less. Irvine parents I work with report waking up with actual energy to face the day, being able to focus at work without brain fog, and having patience for bedtime routines instead of snapping at their kids because they're running on empty.

  • You reconnect with yourself. Underneath the exhaustion and constant crisis management, you rediscover the person you were before trauma took over. So you can pursue hobbies you used to love, have conversations with friends about topics other than your child's struggles, and make decisions about your career or future that aren't just about survival mode.

  • Your capacity expands. Not through pushing harder, but 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 have more to give. You’ll be able to show up for your child's therapy appointments and school meetings without feeling resentful, reconnect physically and emotionally with your partner, and respond to texts from friends instead of isolating.

Virtual Therapy for Adoptive Parents in Irvine and Throughout California

I provide telehealth sessions for adoptive parents across California, including Irvine and surrounding Orange County communities. You can meet with me from your home, your car during lunch break, or anywhere you have privacy and internet access.

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.

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.

Self-Schedule or Contact Here

FAQs

  • All sessions are conducted online via secure telehealth. You can meet with me from anywhere in California, including from your home, your car during lunch break, or any private space with internet access. This means Irvine parents don't need to add commute time to an already packed schedule.

  • Regular talk therapy focuses on understanding your thoughts and feelings, which can help, but often isn't enough when trauma or burnout are involved. I use specialized approaches like EMDR, Brainspotting, and Accelerated Resolution Therapy that work directly with your nervous system to release trauma at a deeper level.

  • It depends on what you're working on and which approach we use. Accelerated Resolution Therapy (ART) is designed to be short-term (1-5 sessions), and many parents feel significant relief within as little as one session when working on specific traumatic memories like a failed adoption. Other parents prefer to work through multiple layers of adoption-related trauma over several months. Traditional talk therapy can take 6+ months to see results. The body-based approaches I use are much more efficient. We'll discuss your goals in our first session and create a realistic timeline.

  • You don't need to have finalized your adoption to work with me. I support adoptive parents at every stage: waiting for a match, supporting a birth mother during pregnancy, navigating a failed placement, in the middle of foster-to-adopt uncertainty, or years into parenting.

  • I'm a private-pay provider and don't take insurance directly. However, I can provide documentation (Superbills) for out-of-network reimbursement if your insurance plan offers it. Many adoptive parents find that investing in specialized trauma therapy saves them years of ineffective talk therapy that insurance would cover but doesn't actually help.

Work With Someone Who Understands Adoption Trauma

You don't have to keep carrying this alone. You need support from someone who has worked in child welfare and adoption, who understands the specific trauma of the adoption journey; not generic advice, but expert help for what you're going through.

Schedule your first session here

About Summer Verhines, LCSW, Adoption Therapist

I work with adoptive parents throughout Irvine and Orange County because I understand that adoption doesn't just affect your child, it profoundly impacts you. 

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) with training completed through 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 in the process.

Learn more about me here

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

Email

sverhines.lcsw@gmail.com

Mailing Address

P.O. Box 28, Wilton, CA 95693
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