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(CfED are pleased to support this group for adopted parents)
Adopting a child can bring richness and enormous rewards for adoptive parents but it can also place demands on relationships that are beyond what we can be prepared for. The well-functioning ‘team’ of a couple can be disrupted by the day-to-day realities of caring for an adopted child or children. So much so, that we begin to question the foundations ofour relationship. We may find us or our partner:
• Sometimes becoming someone we do not recognize
• Thinking thoughts about each other that previously we wouldn’t have contemplated
• Feeling hateful towards our child and feeling hated by our child
• Fearing encounters with family or friends
• Feeling emotionally drained most of the time
• Seeing our child as a Jekyll and Hyde in their relationship with each of us
• Noticing that sexual intimacy or tender comanionship has disappeared from our couple relationship
If a number of these apply to you, our confidential psychotherapy group may be the safe space that you and your partner could benefit from. We believe that caring for adopted children makes greater demands on the relationships of adoptive parents than is ever acknowledged. The demands are far beyond those of ‘normal parenting’ as they arise from the trauma and abuse in families of origin that are embodied and enacted by children in substitute care. They press on vulnerabilities and open up emotional wounds of adults caring for them.
This weekly group is intended for a maximum of four couples and will hope to create an understanding of a different ‘normal’ from the lived experience and intimate sharing of its members. The importance of the couple relationship will be given primacy in the belief that strengthening this relationship is the best way of creating the security and stability that adoptive families need to survive and thrive. The group co-conductors have a combined experience of fifty years in the fields of child and adult mental health and child protection and will contribute their insights into the psychodynamics of relationships to the expertise of the group members.
When and Where: The group will meet 7.30pm – 9.00pm on Tuesdays in the Preston Park area of Brighton for 18 sessions during term time.
Applications to join: Consultations will be offered to couples who express an interest in learning more about what the group might offer to them and issues they wish help with. Couples may apply for funding from the Adoption Support Fund through their social workers.
Group Conductors: Marcus Page is a group analyst in private practice and is employed as a Consultant Adult Psychotherapist in Sussex Partnership FT. He has a former career as senior practitioner in a specialist child protection and therapy service and as an Expert Witness in the Family Court. Alison Roy is a lead Child and Adolescent Psychotherapist in Sussex Partnership FT. She has worked in Child and Adolescent Mental Health Services (CAMHS) for 16 years and is the clinical lead and one of the co-founders for the CAMHS and Social Services adoption service in East Sussex called AdCAMHS.
For more information: Please contact Marcus Page by email:
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or by mobile tel: 07980-922125 or Alison Roy by email:
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