Adoption, Resilience and the Importance of Stories: The Making of a Film about Teenage Adoptees

Abstract

Adolescence is a critical time for adoptees because it highlights themes of identity, belonging and attachment. The Post Adoption Resource Centre in Sydney, Australia, ran a group for teenage adoptees in which they created a film about being adopted. The group process assisted participants to explore and enrich their narratives of adoption in the company of their peers. To tell a coherent story of one's life is developmentally important and closely tied with identity formation, attachment and resilience. Helen Fitzhardinge presents key themes that arose from the film project and explains why narratives are important in adoption.

Coherence and Awareness among Young People from Quilombo do Areal

“…Our study used action research (Tripp, 2005;Paulon, 2005) and adopted a focus group intervention model (Hassen, 2002;Gondim, Feitosa, & Chaves, 2007). The project was inspired by the work of Fitzhardinge (2008), in which the author asked a group of teenagers to make a film about their own lives focusing on the experience of being adopted. The objective of the focus groups, as used by Fitzhardinge, was to provoke participants to reflect on their own condition and help them develop strategies to deal with the difficulties imposed by the adversities of the socio-cultural environment.…”

“…Investigating the narrative organization of the resilient self in young people in socially vulnerable situations of abandonment and adoption, Fitzhardinge (2008) identified the organization of coherent narratives as a fundamental element in the construction of a resilient narrative self. Young people tended to construct life stories focused on the theme of attachment and interpersonal relationships, so that the presence of coherent narratives seemed to indicate they were managing to deal with traumatic and disruptive elements present in the situation of abandonment through a re-signification of adverse experiences.…”

Relationship Between Family History Knowledge, Identity Style and Resilience of 16-19 Year Old Adolescents

“…Šāda veida stāsti vairo bērnu dzīvesspēku -spēju adaptēties, "atsperties" un ātri atgūties pēc nelabvēlīgiem vai stresa notikumiem savā dzīvē (Bonanno et al, 2004). Atsevišķi pētnieki dzīvesspēku skaidro kā indivīda spēju izprast savu stāstu tā, ka tas rada iespēju, nevis ierobežo (Fitzhardinge, 2008). Jo vairāk bērni zina par savas dzimtas vēsturi, jo spēcīgāka ir viņu dzīves kontroles izjūta, jo augstāka ir viņu pašcieņa un jo veiksmīgāk, viņuprāt, viņu ģimenes funkcionē (Duke, 2013).…”