Navigating the Foster to Adoption Journey with Jenell Jones

National Foster Care Awareness Month is May and over the years Parent Footprint listeners have asked us for more shows about foster care, foster parenting, adoption, and foster-to-adoption. Today on the podcast, Dr. Dan interviews adoptive parent and advocate Jenell Jones about foster care, adoption, and the foster-to-adoption journey as well as her personal experiences chronicled in her book Shattered. Jenell Jones is an early education entrepreneur specializing in providing high quality learning experiences for children who have experienced trauma in low-income areas. In addition, Jenell provides advice and experience to foster and adoptive parents based on her own experiences as an adoptive mother. In today’s interview with Dr. Dan, Jenell shares the joy and pain navigating the foster-to-adoption system for her daughter, Mercy. By the time she found a place in Jenell's family at 8 years old, Mercy had been bounced around with more than 20 placements, and her history of abuse and mental illness was not disclosed.  Jenell is a biological, adoptive, and foster mother, and these experiences shaped her ideas of motherhood and her parenting journey. Her honest reflections on the adoption and foster care system, mental health, and non-traditional families will help and inspire others  navigating this journey. For more information about Jenell please visit her website www.jenelljones.com. Email your parenting questions to Dr. Dan podcast@drdanpeters.com (we might answer on a future episode). Follow us @parentfootprintpodcast (Instagram, Facebook) and @drdanpeters (Twitter). Listen, follow, and leave us a review on Amazon Music, Apple Podcasts, Wondery, or wherever you like to listen! Don’t forget, you can hear every episode one week early and ad-free by subscribing to Wondery+ in the @WonderyMedia App. For more information: www.exactlyrightmedia.com  www.drdanpeters.com For podcast merch: www.exactlyrightmedia.com/parent-footprint-shop Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Om Podcasten

For anyone who has been parented, is a parent or dreams of being a parent, Parent Footprint with Dr. Dan teaches us all how to make the world a more loving, accepting and compassionate place -- one parent, one person and one child at a time. Every episode features a “Sitting Down with Dr. Dan” segment to help listeners discover ways to be the best version of themselves. With more than 25 years of experience as a psychologist, author and father, Dr. Dan Peters understands the key to raising happy and aware kids is for parents to seek the same joy and mindfulness in their own lives. Through diverse and timely discussions, every episode of Parent Footprint explores and explains how (and why) the way we were parented impacts the way we parent. Aimed at any parental figure in a child's life, Dr. Dan helps any caregiver lead with purpose. With over 200 episodes, Dr. Dan has hosted adolescent and child development experts, mental health professionals and of course, parents. Plus, he takes listener questions! Submit yours to podcast@drdanpeters.com and you may get an answer on a future episode. Parent Footprint With Dr. Dan is part of the Exactly Right podcast network that provides a platform for bold, creative voices to bring to life provocative, entertaining and relatable stories for audiences everywhere. The Exactly Right roster of podcasts covers a variety of topics including true crime, comedic interviews, science, pop culture and more. Podcasts on the network include My Favorite Murder with Karen Kilgariff and Georgia Hardstark, That's Messed Up: An SVU Podcast, This Podcast Will Kill You, I Said No Gifts! and more.