Coping with Stress :

Thanks to your help I went through a very hard time. Your help was invaluable.

– R. B. July, 2020

Adoption Services Program:

Our Transition/Social Worker, Ms. Betty Ann Streeter (a third of this distinguished trio) has our enthusiastic 5 star recommendation. She is truly one of the most incredible women we have ever met & we forever feel a stroke of luck that her phone number was the one we decided to call that first day.

She is kind, compassionate, & intelligent. She has an unbelievable way of listening to you and understanding how to help you. She draws on her years of experience not egotistically but uses this vast knowledge to help you come to a successful place in your life.

She was able to lead us successfully to achieve life goals we would never have achieved without her guidance.

Our entire family will forever believe in and care for this incredible woman!

– Nicole Saltzman Greenwood

We are forever indebted to Pat for helping us to realize our dream of becoming a family. She was a steady and reliable helper through the ups and downs of our decisions around becoming parents through adoption. She provided lots of resources and information on the various options available to us. We were very fortunate to be selected to be the parents of a beautiful newborn baby boy, who is now 6 years old. His birth mother, Angie, wanted an open adoption. Pat is incredibly knowledgeable about the adoption process and has her own adoption experiences. We appreciated her insights on open adoption as we embarked on an open adoption relationship with our son’s birth mother.

We must confess that at the outset of the adoption homestudy, we were not convinced that open adoption was the way to go, but Pat helped us to sort through our fears and concerns and learn about the benefits of openness. We felt we could ask her anything. We were very nervous about how things would unfold in the future since it was a new journey for all of us. And our friends and family were skeptical about how it could work. Pat was part of the meeting when we first met Angie. She helped us to work out the details of our plans for visits and keeping contact. She has also made herself available to us whenever we have questions or need some help. We now know how important openness is for all of us — our son, his birth mother and us. Our son is now 6 and he has known his birth mother all along. We thought originally we would have one to two visits a year, but Angie has become such a part of the family that we get together more often……usually around our son’s birthday, between Christmas and New Years, around Mother’s Day and sometimes for other special events, too.

We really like the fact that Pat has a group for adoptive families, called Families in Adoption. We have attended several of the meetings. It is a great way to learn about adoptive parenting and to share experiences. Our son has made some good friends among the children in the group and he calls them ‘his group’. Seems there is something very special for him about being with other kids who also were adopted.

– M. & S.

Loss, Grief and Bereavement Program:

As a family faced with the end-of-life of our matriarch, we reached out for support. Michaele-Sue Goldblatt was the highly-recommended professional who guided us through coming to terms with the death of our loved one. She gave each of us as we met, whether as a family unit or individually, a voice in the planning of the weeks and days to come and the journey we would begin of grieving.

At times it was necessary for long-distance family members to be present by speaker phone at the meeting, but they felt involved and supported as well. I am especially indebted that she met individually with our matriarch and gave her time and voice to discuss what was to come and identify what and who was important to her at her end of life.

Michaele-Sue made herself available every time we needed her and in a variety of settings- our home, the Hospital, her office, and by phone which was so helpful. The suggestions she gave us as we planned the Funeral allowed us to be very comfortable with our decisions and at peace as we moved forward in the days that followed. Our family is very fortunate to have had Michaele-Sue come into our lives at that critical time.

-B.L

Work with this client began in our Loss, Grief and Bereavement Program.  Just as we were ready to end after 5 months, the client began to face other challenges and major transitions in her life.  We continued to work together, ending the therapeutic relationship in January 2018.  I  (Michaele-Sue Goldblatt) was very touched to receive this from her.

“There aren’t enough words to express my immense gratitude for your presence and support in my life. Thank you for being so present with me every step of the way.”

– S.L