As an adoptive parent and member of an extended birth family in reunion, I bring my own experiences and sensitivity to the task of providing adoptees, adoptive parents, and birth family members the support they need to tackle the complex issues inherent in adoption.
I provide support groups, individual consultations on adoption-related issues, parenting coaching, and ongoing psychotherapy. I work primarily with teens and adults, both adoptees and those parenting adopted children, using psychodynamic and relational approaches to address issues such as:
parenting adopted children
transracial adoption
open adoption
making and using lifebooks to create a healthy adoption narrative
attachment
trauma & loss
family building
infertility and third party reproduction
search and reunion
identity issues throughout the lifespan
Our work together can focus on helping the family you have to flourish, or focus on decision-making as you begin the process of growing your family through adoption or third party reproduction. Blended, alternative, traditional, and single parent families all have particular and distinct needs, so I bring an interactive, patient-led approach that supports your goals for change and growth.
I also provide evaluations and assessments for prospective adoptive parents who are required to have evaluations as part of their dossiers. I began doing pre-adoptive parent evaluations since the adoption of our daughter in 2010 and have experience with evaluations tailored for the specific needs of the country that requested the evaluation. As an adoptive parent myself, I totally understand the anxiety and stress adoptive families experience with ever-changing legal and paperwork requirements. Testing and evaluation doesn’t have to be stressful, in fact, most families report enjoying the interviews and find the meetings informative and helpful.
Many people adopting seek out of state specialists or agencies to assist in international adoption. I can evaluate and test prospective adoptive parents in the privacy of your own home at convenient times through a secure and completely encrypted and HIPPA compliant web platform, though you are certainly welcome to visit my Westchester, NY office. Location and travel constraints are no issue as we can complete the evaluation and interviews from the comfort of your own home.
I know that the adoption process can feel like it takes forever – that’s why I focus on being very responsive, easy to schedule and timely in getting the evaluations done and ready for your dossier as quickly as possible. I’ve done hundreds of evaluations and will work with your agency to ensure that the evaluation report contains exactly what the request requires.
Email or call today to start the Pre-Adoption Evaluation process or to get answers to any questions or concerns.
917 439 8181 or AmyHechtPhD@HRGTherapy.com
