Visit the Families Rising resources or other websites to learn more about specific disabilities and challenges that are more common in adoption and foster care.
Attachment/Reactive Attachment Disorder (RAD)
- Families Rising Webinar: Healing from Food Insecurity: Beyond the Stash
- Association for Treatment and Training in the Attachment of Children (ATTACh)
- Attachment and Trauma Network
- Nurturing Attachments
Attention Deficit Disorder (ADD)/Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder (ADHD)
- Families Rising Article: ADHD Treatment Options Prove Effective
- Families Rising Article: School & Adoption: Navigating IEPs, IDEA, and Special Services
- Children and Adults with Attention Deficit Disorder (CHADD)
- The National Attention Deficit Disorder Association
- Oppositional Defiant Disorder (ODD) Resource Center
Conduct Disorder
Developmental Delay
- CDC: Developmental Screening
- Encyclopedia of Children’s Health: Developmental Delay
Intellectual and Developmental Disabilities
- American Association on Intellectual and Developmental Disabilities (AAIDD)
- The Arc for People with Intellectual and Developmental Disabilities
- Autism Society
- Autistic Self Advocacy Network (ASAN)
- CDC: Developmental Disabilities
- National Associations of Councils on Developmental Disabilities (Find your state council.)
- National Down Syndrome Adoption Network
- National Down Syndrome Society
- United Cerebral Palsy
Fetal Alcohol Spectrum Disorder (FASD)
- Families Rising Webinar: Fetal Alcohol Spectrum Disorders from a Trauma Lens
- Families Rising Article: The ABCs of Back to School with Fetal Alcohol Spectrum Disorders (FASD)
- Families Rising Article: The GFCF Diet, FASD, and Adoption: Food for Thought
- Families Rising Article: FASD: Advocacy Advice from the Experts
- Canada FASD Research Network
- FASlink—Fetal Alcohol Disorder Society
- FASD United
General Disabilities
- Families Rising Article: Detangling Diagnoses for Foster and Adopted Youth
- Center for Parent and Information Resources Center
- National Black Disability Coalition
- National Disability Rights Network (NDRN)
- Parent to Parent USA
- Parent Training and Information Center (Find your state parent center.)
- Resources for Access, Independence, Self-Advocacy and Employment (RAISE)
Learning Disabilities/Educational Issues
- Families Rising Article: School & Adoption: Navigating IEPs, IDEA, and Special Services
- Council for Exceptional Children
- LD Online
- National Center for Learning Disabilities
- PACER Center
- Understood
- Wrightslaw (Special education law, education law, and advocacy for children with disabilities.)
Mental Health
- Families Rising Webinar: Understanding the Acting-Out Behavior of Your Adopted Children
- Families Rising Article: Post-Adoption Services: Meeting the Mental Health Needs of Children Adopted from Foster Care
- Families Rising Article: Retrace Developmental Stages to Help Older Children Heal
- American Academy of Child & Adolescent Psychiatry
- Bazelon Center for Mental Health Law
- The Bipolar Child
- Child Mind Institute
- A Home Within (Free therapy to youth who are or were in foster care.)
- Lives in the Balance
- National Alliance on Mental Illness (NAMI)
- National Federation of Families for Children’s Mental Health
Sensory Processing
- Families Rising Article: Behavior and Sensory Processing: Two Sides of the Same Coin
- The Out-of-Sync Child
- Raising a Sensory Smart Child
- STAR Institute for Sensory Processing Disorder
- Managing Sensory Overload for Children With Special Needs
Tourette Syndrome
- National Institute of Neurological Disorders and Stroke
- National Tourette Syndrome Association
- Tourette Syndrome “Plus”
Trauma
- Families Rising Webinar: Helping Children Heal from Trauma: What Parents and Caregivers Need to Know
- Families Rising Webinar: Helping Children Manage Feelings and Behaviors
- Families Rising Webinar: “I’ll Tell Them When They’re Older Because…” Talking to Children about Their History
- Families Rising Webinar: The Teen Years: Brain Development, Impact of Trauma on Growth, and Parenting Strategies
- Families Rising Article: Supporting Maltreated Children: Countering the Effects of Neglect and Abuse
- Families Rising Article: The 3-5-7 Model—Helping Children Work Through Grief
- Families Rising Article: Therapy Plays an Important Role in Adoptive Families’ Lives
- ChildTrauma Academy
- National Center for PTSD
- National Child Traumatic Stress Network