Joe Soll

 

Joe Soll is the author of Adoption Healing ...A Path to Recovery, a former adjunct professor of social work at Fordham University He is the director and co-founder of the Council for Equal Rights in Adoption (CERA), an international, non-profit organization consisting of over 470 adoption agencies, mental health institutions and adoption search and support groups in 8 countries, representing over 500,000 individuals whose lives have been affected by adoption. CERA is dedicated to educating the public about adoption issues, preserving families and reforming current adoption practices. Mr. Soll is also director and co-founder of Adoption Crossroads in New York City, an organization that helps reunite and gives support to adoptees, birthparents and adoptive parents.

The director and founder of the Adoption Counseling Center in New York City, Mr. Soll is also an approved adoption counselor for the United Kingdom Department of Health, co-organizer and co-chair of the New York State Adoption Agency Task Force; a member of Matilda Cuomo's 1993 Advisory Council on the "Adoption Option"; past executive board member of the American Adoption Congress, a trustee of the International Soundex Reunion Registry and an advisor to the Center for Family Connections. Since 1989, Mr. Soll has organized and coordinated six international mental health conferences on adoption attended by mental health professionals.

He has been an expert witness in court about adoption related issues and has lectured widely at adoption agencies, social work schools, mental health facilities and mental health conferences in the U.S. and Canada. Mr. Soll has appeared on Radio and Television over 300 times, given over 150 lectures on adoption related issues and has been featured or quoted in over five dozen newspapers, books and magazines. He was portrayed as a therapist in the 1993 NBC Made-For-TV movie “The Other Mother”, and recently played himself in the 1998 HBO Special “Reno Finds Her Mom”. He was just featured in the 2000 Global Japanese Network documentary, “Adoption Therapist: Joe Soll” Visit Mr, Soll online at http://www.adoptionhealing.com/

 

Adoption Healing “presents a clear, comprehensive, and theoretically consistent approach to address the issue of healing in adoption... this book should be required reading by anyone serious about attempting to resolve emotional conflicts in adoption." Robert Andersen, M.D. and Rhonda Tucker, authors of The Bridge Less Traveled

 

 

Pageonelit.com: Who were your earliest influences and why?

Joe Soll: The earliest influence on me (about 8 years ago) was Karen Gravelle, the award winning author of "Where Are My Birthparents" who suggested that I write my book.....I had never considered writing a book before that time.


Pageonelit.com: Why did you write ADOPTION HEALING ...A PATH TO RECOVERY?

Joe Soll: I wrote my book because there was not one single book on adoption that gave information on healing from the wounds of separation of mother and child.

 

Pageonelit.com: Tell us about ADOPTION HEALING ...A PATH TO RECOVERY?

Joe Soll: The first half of Adoption Healing ...A Path to Recovery, explains the effects on the psychological development of a baby who loses her mother to adoption at the beginning of her life from before birth through adulthood. The second half offers methods of dealing with and healing from that loss at different developmental stages, primarily using Inner Child work.. There are exercises for the reader at the end of each chapter and resources for support groups and additional readings.



Pageonelit.com: In ADOPTION HEALING ...A PATH TO RECOVERY you say, 'For the child, the state of 'limbo' is a land of no reality.' Please explain.

Joe Soll: Most adopted children live with a family that will not acknowledge the tremendous loss experienced by the child when she lost her mother at birth. Most adopted children are told they are special, chosen and lucky. The inner world of the child is filled with pain, anger and sadness at her loss and the outer world is negating those feelings. The child is therefore in limbo, between two worlds, not having her own reality being validated.

 

Pageonelit.com: At book signings, what do readers say to you about their interpretations of ADOPTION HEALING ...A PATH TO RECOVERY?

Joe Soll: Most adopted people will say, "You wrote the book for me.....how did you know what I felt like?" Most birthmothers will say, "Now I understand the child I gave up for adoption, now I understand his behavior at our reunion"

Most adoptive parents will say, "Now I understand why my child behaves the way she does"

Sadly, some people will say they don't want to believe what I have written is factual because it is a painful truth.

What do they like about the book? The clear explanation of the behavior and development of the adoptee and the suggestions for healing.

 

Pageonelit.com: Tell me about your publishing experience -- Is it a difficult process to publish on your own?

Joe Soll: My experience of self-publishing was wonderful. My publisher is someone I had known for a long time, a woman who had lost a child to adoption, someone I trusted. We worked well together and she was very supportive. The day the truck arrived with thousands of "my" books was a day of pride and accomplishment. All the people who helped me, friends who edited, designed my cover, were there for me all the way. It made my experience wonderful.

 

Pageonelit.com: Are you working on a follow up? Or something totally different?

Joe Soll: I am currently working on ideas for a similar book to help heal women who have lost children to adoption, using the same principles.

 

Pageonelit.com: What was the last book you read?

Joe Soll: "The Truth Will Set You Free: Overcoming Emotional Blindness" by Alice Miller (All of her books have helped me in my work)

 

Pageonelit.com: Do you have any hobbies?

Joe Soll: I do the Times of London crossword puzzles daily, which helps build my vocabulary. I paint portraits of people and animals which gets me in touch with unconscious emotions and my own inner child and allows me to write down new ways of working with him. I enjoy sailing which gives me even more time to spend with my inner child and explore fun things to do with him, which is an important part of my work.