Dr. Ronald Federici: Special June Workshop

More information about this workshop, held in late in June in Boulder, CO with Heather Forbes LCSW, can be found here.

Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Viktorovich Lavrov

Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Viktorovich Lavrov (Сергей Викторович Лавров) is now responsible for the Russian-American adoption agreement.

Lavrov is a career diplomat. He graduated from the Moscow State Institute of International Relations. He speaks Russian, English, French, and Sinhala, the latter being the language of Sri Lanka, where he served as a Soviet diplomat.

Kazakhstan Update

On May 17, 2010, the U.S. Consulate General in Almaty received confirmation that the Ministry of Education in Kazakhstan has given instructions to the Kazakhstani Embassy and Consulate in New York not to accept new dossiers for inter-country adoptions. The Ministry said that this moratorium on new adoption cases will remain in effect until Kazakhstan implements a Hague Convention-compliant system, which it intends to have in place by September 2010. Kazakhstani officials have confirmed that this moratorium will not affect adoptions already in process.

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We are in consultation with our sources in the Kazakh government. We fully expect to participate in the newly established Kazakh adoption regime, either through this project or a through a charitable organization we are in the process of establishing.

Update: May 17, 2010

According to various sources, the meetings between the American and Russian teams went well.

There is agreement, apparently, on many key points.

The actual agreement, though, may not be in place for another two months (possibly July 2010).

In the interim, there are likely to be many rumors flying around!

Situation in Russia: Conflicting Reports

Unfortunately, there is no clear answer to the question “what’s happening in Russia?”

Some news sources say adoptions have been suspended. Others say the suspension has been proposed, but not yet implemented.

There are reports of adoption cases being heard in Russian courts. There are also reports that some Russian courts have refused to process adoption cases.

Representatives of the US State Department are scheduled to visit Russia the week of April 19th to work on a bilateral adoption agreement. The Russians have wanted this for some time, as Russia is not a signatory to the Hague Convention.

Suspension of Russian Adoptions

Russian adoptions have been suspended pending finalization and ratification of an agreement between the US and Russia.

All indications suggest this matter will be resolved promptly.

In the interim, the Project continues to provide services in Kazakhstan, Ukraine, and Uzbekistan.

The Hippocrene Children’s Illustrated Russian Dictionary

This book is very helpful in dealing with children who speak little or no English.

It can be used for building vocabulary, but it is also useful as a “point at it” phrase book.

The book is in English alphabetical order, and and has a Russian-English alphabetical indiex.

Each entry gives the English and Russian spelling, as well as an approximate Russian pronunciation, including stress.

The book is available directly from the publisher.

Ronald Federici on Institutional Autism

Institutional Autism is not a genetically induced autism like most diagnosed  in the United States, but one learned from years of neglect and sensory deprivation. Dr. Ronald Federici, a renowned adoption psychologist has done a vast amount of research on this topic and written numerous articles. He and Michael Rutter, an American psychologist, indicate some of the major symptoms of institutional autism as:

1. Sensory and social deprivation can result in the autistic-like behaviors.
2. These behaviors may diminish after the child is removed from the initial deprived environment.
3. A substantial minority of children will continue to exhibit these difficult behavior patterns for many years.

Risk Factors:

1. Heredity and neurological make-up of the adopted child.
2. Lack of postnatal care and negative conditions of development before institutionalization.
3. Age when placed in an institution and the length of institutionalization.
4. Conditions in institution/country of adoption.

Basically, children learn to be autistic because of their experience in the orphanage…stimulating themselves to pass the time or to entertain themselves. In our case, we believe AJ (an adopted child) was swaddled for a decent amount of the two years he was there. He was chronically ill will bronchial infections due to an undiagnosed milk intolerance and an oat and banana allergy (the two main foods in his diet there ). Thus, if he was ill he would have either been swaddled and placed on his back in his crib or left to sleep in the playpen off to the side.

Now, if you were 1-2 years old with nothing to do, no toys to play with…what would you do????

AJ learned to play with toys inappropriately (line up and spin all toys because what else can toys do?), poke his eyes, spin in circles, stare out windows, throw monster tantrums at ANY change in movement (if you were in the same place ALL day, would you like to be moved?), stare at lights to keep from sleeping, attentive to every sound (in his crib he could not make eye contact but could hear everything)…I could go on but those are the MAJOR items.

Now, those things have diminished, as have most of his sensory issues. As Federici and Rutter state, most children will recover from Institutional Autism given the right home life. Thank goodness he has been given that.

One thing that we are specifically working on is making sure that AJ has the right resources to improve, not just the “positive dynamic in the child’s development of appropriate behaviors in the family.” If he truly does have organic autism we need to make sure to have him tested on a regular basis. Now that AJ has been home two years and has made some language improvements we need to start chronically his improvements. If he does not make any improvements (or falls behind) we should be looking at organic autism, not just institutional autism.

Dr. Ronald Federici Announces Independent Adoptions in Russia and Ukraine

Dr. Ronald Federici, a recognized expert on the diagnosis and treatment of insitutionalized children, is offering independent adoption services in Russia and Ukraine through the Russian-Ukrainian Private Adoption Project.

Dr. Federici is the proud father to seven adopted children of his own. Each adoption was done privately, so he is very familiar with the process.

Dr. Federici has assembled a team of experts, including social workers, translators, and attorneys, to make sure everything goes smoothly. Dr. Federici will oversee each adoption himself.