Susie McGavin, MFT

Adopting With Love Founder

Susie is a licensed Marriage and Family Therapist with over 12 years of experience working with children and families. Her work with non-profit programs has given her insights into the world of foster, adoptive, and kinship families and the challenges they face. She has purposefully joined organizations that will offer ongoing education and insights into the world of adoption. Susie also has the unique experience of being an adoptee and enjoys sharing her positive adoption story. She and her husband also have a positive experience of growing their own family through open adoption and have a wonderful relationship with their daughter's birth family.

Susie worked for Sunny Hills Services, a non-profit agency in Marin and Sonoma counties, where she worked directly with children and families in day treatment settings, emergency shelters and group homes, and kinship services. During her tenure at Sunny Hills Services, Susie provided clinical trainings to residential counselors, clinical supervision to interns and trainees, assisted in the production of agency training and promotional materials, served on the agency's Health & Safety Committee, and also serves on the steering committee for KINS.

Susie's Background Also Includes:

  • Individual and Family Therapy
  • Intensive Behavioral Intervention
  • Family Advocacy & Support
  • Parent Education
  • Trainings and Workshops
  • Facilitating Support Groups
  • Youth Mentoring Programs
  • Program Development
  • Resources & Referrals
  • Home Certifications

Memberships:

  • CAMFT California Association of Marriage and Family Therapists
  • PACER Post Adoption Center for Education and Research
  • AAC American Adoption Congress

Board Memberships

  • Steering Committee Member: Kinship Initiative Network of Services
  • Board Member 2007-2008: Junior League of Napa-Sonoma
  • Advisory Board Member: Santa Rosa Junior College, Foster & Kinship Care Education

Community & Volunteering:

  • JLNS Junior League of Napa-Sonoma
  • Chi Omega Alumna (Iota Delta Chapter)
  • Petaluma Mother's Club

Who's Behind Adopting With Love?

We are Susie and Paul from Northern California. We have first-hand experience in the journey of open adoption and we are fortunate to have grown our own family by . . . Adopting with Love.

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We've met so many wonderful people along our journey. We wanted to create a place for people to exchange valuable and hard-earned lessons about adoption and parenting. By sharing our sucesses, our challenges, and our best parenting tips, we can learn from each other, find support, embrace open adoption, and celebrate our growing families.

We are not quite ready to fully host websites for adoptive family profiles at this time, but we have listed some adoption website hosts on our birthmother page.

Even though we have already adopted, we continue to post our own website for others to see as a sample site. Visit our adoption website.

Why Develop a Website?

Frankly, we found the need to have a project to work on while we were waiting to adopt. Just like sowing seeds for a plant, there is a waiting period before the plant appears. It's awfully dull and tiring to just stare at the dirt hoping something will appear any second, so it's good to find something else related to do until the sprout appears. This website is was adoption related project to keep us on track, provide hope, and create some excitement about the little sprout that grew in our hearts.

Who Designed This Website?

Paul owns his own business, InterSight, developing computer software and web applications for large companies. He and Susie collaborated on creating this web site using open source software - software that shares many of the same values of sharing and respect that is the foundation of open adoption.

Susie uses her education and training in counseling pyschology and is the main contributing writer and editor for the site. She also has a background in graphic design, so she makes it pretty and adds the fluff!

Kimo and Sabi, the adopted family cats, are our muses for keeping it warm and fuzzy and they remind us to have fun! See more photos of Kimo and Sabi at our adoption website. Once you enter the website, select Photo Album, then select Picture Purrr-fect.

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Website Updates

This website will always be growing and changing as we add more content and make revisions. We're open to your comments and ideas - anything that will help this site grow and meet your needs. Feel free to email Susie at studiosusie@gmail.com.

Disclaimers

Adopting With Love does not provide adoption related services such as facilitation, counseling or legal services. Adopting With Love is not an adoption agency. If you are a birthmother and are considering placing your child through adoption, or a family who is considering adoption as a way to grow your family, it is essential that you acquire the services of an adoption professional who you can trust to guide you through the adoption process.

Visit the Birthmother page for a list of:

  • Adoption Agencies
  • Adoption Attorneys
  • Adoption Facilitators
  • Adoption Outreach Specialists
  • Web Hosting Services for Waiting Families

Adopting With Love provides many links to other web sites as a public service to you and it is impossible for us to constantly monitor what is on each of the sites we link to. Adopting With Love is not liable for any damages that result from following any of the links provided.