Parenting is rewarding, but it is not always easy. When problems arise in a family, it is often the children who are emotionally or physically affected. Unfortunately, some parents do not know
where to turn to get help for their children or themselves. This handbook was written to explain the role of CP&P workers and other staff who work together to serve you and your family.
CP&P recognizes this can be a very difficult time for you and your family. You may have many questions along the way, so feel free to speak to your worker about your concerns at anytime.

The purpose of this expanded version of the Toolkit is to empower individuals with disabilities and their family
and professional caregivers by providing information to more effectively advocate for persons with complex
severe behavioral health conditions (which we formerly referred to as “dual diagnosis”) for treatments, supports,
services and the conditions that promote mental wellness. Individuals with diagnoses of developmental
disabilities and behavioral health disorders face multiple challenges in their daily lives. Some of these
challenges relate to the behavioral health conditions themselves. Other barriers include the shortage of qualified
medical and non-medical behavioral health providers and the failure to give mental health and behavioral
disorders the same attention as with medical disorders. Individuals of all ages with intellectual and
developmental disabilities and behavioral health challenges, therefore, face the barriers of limited access to
needed services, lack of equality and problems with obtaining and affording care.

Building Resilience: Supporting Grandfamilies’ Mental Health & Wellness, 2023

The latest report from Generations United on grandparents raising grandchildren and relatives.  Information includes how grandparents’ challenges effect mental health, various findings, services, supports and more.

Stepping Out of Adoption’s Shadow: Confronting the Problem of Unlicensed Adoption Intermediaries and Online Advertising in Private Domestic Adoption
Adoption Advocate No 176

Adoption creates a split between a person’s biology and biography, and openness is an essential way to help adoptees heal this split.1
This article covers what openness means in the context of adoption and how adoptive parents can, through openness, help adoptees
integrate and heal. There are three shifts adoptive parents can make—supported by adoption professionals—to better focus on
what really matters. This article addresses situations faced by adoptive parents who have contact with birth parents, those who do not
and feel that is just as well, and, finally, those who wish to be in contact with birth parents but, for various reasons, are not.

Exploring Medication for Adopted Children: Mental Health and Behavioral Treatment Options

Published by the Adoption Advocate, July 2023, Issue Number 173

The adoption community has made great progress in understanding the impact of trauma on children’s mental health and emotional well-being. As more adoptive parents seek healing for their children through mental health services, they are part of an overall rise in the general population of children and adolescents whose mental health and behavioral treatment plans involve medication. In this issue of the Adoption Advocate, child psychiatrist Joshua Sparrow outlines common concerns and considerations for psychotropic medications, when to worry, tips for observing, describing, and understanding your child’s behavior, and how to develop a team approach for parents, children, doctors, and teachers.

Adoption Advocate
Prenatal Stress, Preverbal Trauma, and
Developmental Trajectories: The Importance of
the Attachment Relationship

The impact of prenatal stress and preverbal trauma on developmental trajectories is
both a topic of education and area of treatment focus in my clinical
practice. As a specialist in infant and early childhood development, as well as trauma
and attachment disorders, I often work with children who present with a variety of
surfacelevel symptoms that are, at their core, the effects of prenatal, preverbal,
or developmental trauma. I often discuss with parents the potential longterm
ramifications, and the hope and healing that arly intervention can bring.

It is always better for children and youth to remain with their birth families if it is safe to do so. When foster care is necessary, the goal is to provide a temporary safe, stable and nurturing environment for children and adolescents while actively seeking and supporting reunification with their families. A robust relationship between a child or youth’s birth parents and foster parents or kinship caregivers can help achieve this outcome and reduce trauma for everyone. These relationships are best nurtured when child welfare staff, parent partners, court and legal personnel, court advocates, foster parent organizations and other service providers are supportive and help facilitate early and ongoing communication.