Success Stories > After Adoption

Vignettes from some of Kinship Center's children after the adoption.

Trevor was 15 years old when his mother, Deborah, a single parent of two adopted teenagers, called the social worker that had helped her adopt Trevor and his sister 7 years earlier. His mother stated that she wanted to send Trevor to a group home because she could no longer parent him in her home. Although Deborah would drop Trevor off at school every day, Trevor was not attending classes, resulting in the failure of every class the previous semester. Trevor was also defiant at home, setting off verbal battles nearly every day. Trevor often came home long past his curfew, and recently he had been staying out all night. Deborah called the social worker after Trevor had been gone for 3 days, showing up at home the previous evening. The social worker referred Deborah to AFTER, an agency that provides wraparound services to adoptive families in order to attempt to keep the families together.

After an in-depth assessment, the wraparound team that had been assembled to work with the family secured a male companion for Trevor to accompany him to school and to each of his classes and serve as a mentor. In addition, an educational advocate was assigned to work with his school to identify and help with his educational needs, a tutor was hired to help Trevor catch up in his classes, a therapist experienced with adoption issues was found to help Trevor and his mother to work on communication and other relational issues, and an experienced adoptive parent was assigned to serve as a consultant for Deborah. The team also identified a number of Trevor's strengths, which included excellent physical coordination.

After a year of weekly and bi-monthly wraparound meetings, Trevor was passing all of his classes, holding down a part-time job, and had a driver's permit. He was also attending martial arts classes twice per week. Trevor and his mother still had arguments, but the tension had been much reduced. Trevor was enjoying some success at school and in the community and he was earning his own money. As a result, his time was filled and his attitude was more positive. In the meantime, Deborah had learned to set up her own family meetings and to use community services more effectively to meet her family's needs.