Therapy, Assessment, Coaching, and Therapeutic Consulting
Susie Wallace, LPCA; MA,OTR/L
You are growing a beautiful family. Let us help provide the right nutrients!
Adoptive Health provides therapy, assessment, parent coaching, and therapeutic consulting to meet the sensory and emotional needs throughout the childhood of adopted children and families. ​
Our goal is to help you and your child find a sense of baseline sensory safety, enhance emotional and behavioral regulation, provide adoption-specific opportunities for growth and discovery, and settle into the special rhythm of your unique relationship.
Adoptive Health combines the power of occupational therapy with compassionate and adoption-competent clinical mental health expertise. We respect the strength and intention that parents provide to help their children succeed, and we would be happy to partner with you and your child through the twists and turns in the beautiful and intricate world of adoption.
Adoptive Health is informed by Sensory Motor Arousal Regulation Treatment (SMART™), Collaborative and Proactive Solutions, Multi-modal Attachment Therapy (M-MAT), Nurtured Heart Approach (NHA), and Trust-Based Relational Intervention (TBRI).
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Bottom-up Approach
Adoptive Health knows that healthy brains are built from the bottom up. Biological and safety needs must be met for a child to regulate. Kids must regulate before they can relate to others and be effective learners. We must learn to spot and treat dysregulation in ourselves and our children before we can work on building a healthy neurological system.
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Many times, early losses and developmental trauma leave a child feeling a loss of physical and emotional safety that is necessary for higher-level functioning. This lack of safety leads to stress response behaviors: fight, flight, freeze, and fawn, and results in dampening the child's ability to flourish.
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Adoptive Health teams with your family and child to build a picture of your child's specific signs of stress behaviors. You will also learn to spot and treat early dysregulation with the sensory toolbox developed in therapy. When your child is feeling safe, they will be capable of working on the higher-level skills of emotional connection, socialization, and learning.
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You are here because you want the best for your child and family.
Adoptive families and children thrive when provided with the extra nutrients needed for their exceptional circumstances.
Adoptive Health provides therapy and support that is adoption-competent, neurologically-informed, and focuses on strengths and partnership.
Sensory Profile Assessment and Report
A regulated sensory system is the basis for feeling safe in the world, and forms the foundation for our ability to function socially, emotionally, and cognitively. Early losses and developmental trauma can damage the sensory system, leaving it vulnerable to over- or under-sensitivity.
Each child who works with Adoptive Health is assessed with The Sensory Profile ™, a standardized assessment that aids caregivers in understanding the child’s sensory processing patterns and shows how sensory issues might be affecting daily performance. The results of the assessment, along with clinical and parental observations, are used to generate a child's unique sensory profile. The profile is used to suggest sensory supports, environmental adaptations, and accommodations to augment functioning in areas of difficulty.
Susie is happy to coordinate with your clinical mental health counselor, school personnel, IEP team, or other caretakers to provide sensory support ideas and accommodations regarding areas of sensory need.
SMART-informed Work Space
Sensory inputs are the building blocks for behavioral and emotional regulation. We all respond to sensations with adaptive behaviors. We move away from sensations that make us feel afraid or uncomfortable, and we seek out sensations that make us feel safe and nurtured. Movement, touch, rhythmic activities, sight, and sound reach the deepest part of our brains. Adoptive Health works with children and families in a SMART workspace utilizing an array of therapeutic equipment, such as weighted blankets, balance beams, fitness balls, and crash pads, in shared play to support children’s natural ways of regulating their bodies and their emotions. SMART rooms are especially helpful for children, as treatment does not rely on language or awareness as an entry point for therapy. The treatment blends movement and relationship to help the child regulate and learn to widen their window of tolerance for both positive and negative emotional states.
The regulation tools your child develops in the SMART room can easily be adapted to home and school settings. Caregivers can participate in play as well, offering a safe and engaging forum for attachment and relation-building.
Developmental Tasks of Adoption
Childhood is filled with developmental tasks such as developing role models, beginning to separate from parents, and establishing a unique identity.​ Adopted children often have to put in extra emotional effort to work through tasks because they have a more complicated journey behind and ahead of them. They also have additional developmental tasks due to adoption.
Adoptive Health provides activities for children and families to help work through these tasks over the span of a child's development.
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Ongoing Parent Support/Coaching
Adoptive Health knows that children and families benefit from longitudinal support on their adoption journey. When things are going well, we are only a phone call away. When you have a question, concern, or issue you would like to discuss, we are happy to schedule an appointment.
Curated Training for Groups and Professionals Available Upon Request
Adoptive Health loves to spread the word about adoption-competent caretaking and sensory information. The more each of us becomes familiar with the needs of those around us, the sooner we can make the world a kinder and gentler place.
Let’s Work Together
To contact Susie Wallace please email
adoptivehealth@gmail.com with a little information about your family and your needs.