Voices of Adoption
Voices of Adoption
Podcast Description
Voices of Adoption amplifies authentic stories from across the adoption triad - birth parents, adoptees, and adoptive families - along with adoption service providers. Host Donna Pope, Executive Director of Heart To Heart Adoptions and Clinical Mental Health Counselor and her co-host Nathan Gwilliam, founder & former CEO of Adoption.com, create a safe space for honest conversations about the complexities of adoption. Birth parents share their journeys of love, loss, and healing. Adoptees discuss identity, belonging, and their lived experiences. Adoptive families open up about challenges and beautiful moments. Adoption service providers offer insights from their professional experience supporting families throughout the process. Each episode bridges different perspectives within the adoption community, helping listeners understand that every adoption story is unique yet connected by common threads of resilience and hope. These conversations don't shy away from difficult emotions or complex questions. Instead, they honor the full spectrum of adoption experiences with empathy and respect. Join us for stories that educate, inspire understanding, and remind us that every voice in the adoption community matters.
Podcast Insights
Content Themes
The podcast emphasizes themes related to adoption including birth parent narratives, adoptee identity, and the experiences of adoptive families, with episodes such as discussions on the emotional ramifications of adoption reunions, the impact of culture on identity for transracial adoptees, and the importance of understanding the statistics behind adoption practices.
Voices of Adoption amplifies authentic stories from across the adoption triad – birth parents, adoptees, and adoptive families – along with adoption service providers. Host Donna Pope, Executive Director of Heart To Heart Adoptions and Clinical Mental Health Counselor and her co-host Nathan Gwilliam, founder & former CEO of Adoption.com, create a safe space for honest conversations about the complexities of adoption. Birth parents share their journeys of love, loss, and healing. Adoptees discuss identity, belonging, and their lived experiences. Adoptive families open up about challenges and beautiful moments. Adoption service providers offer insights from their professional experience supporting families throughout the process. Each episode bridges different perspectives within the adoption community, helping listeners understand that every adoption story is unique yet connected by common threads of resilience and hope. These conversations don’t shy away from difficult emotions or complex questions. Instead, they honor the full spectrum of adoption experiences with empathy and respect. Join us for stories that educate, inspire understanding, and remind us that every voice in the adoption community matters.
Foster mom of nine Jessica Hanna made a childhood promise: any child in her care would stay until a permanent solution existed. In this episode of Voices of Adoption with host Donna Pope, Jessica shares how she gave up a modeling career, adopted six children, and launched a nonprofit fighting for child welfare reform in Washington State.
A Dark Staircase and a Three-Month-Old Baby
At 21, Jessica walked into a drug house to visit her foster cousin’s newborn son. She climbed a dimly lit spiral staircase and discovered a baby boy behind a door locked from the outside. He became her first son, Nick. Jessica walked away from a modeling contract, married her husband 40 days after meeting him, and began building a family.
A Family Built Through Faith, Foster Care, and Adoption
Within two years, Jessica was caring for four children under age three. Her family grew to include a preteen daughter bonded at a funeral, a respite baby who never left, a child adopted through Safe Families in Detroit, and a toddler who arrived after they told God they were done. Her philosophy: “We’re all adopted. Some of us just had to make extra stops.”
Fostering Change in Washington State
After returning from her husband’s medical residency in Detroit, Jessica found Washington’s 2021 Keeping Families Together Act (HB 1227) had shifted child welfare dangerously. She reactivated Fostering Change Washington, launched the Change the Story podcast, and fights for reforms addressing fentanyl exposure, placement disruption, and DCYF’s failure to protect vulnerable kids.
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Listen to Jessica Hanna’s full conversation with Donna Pope on Voices of Adoption and discover why one woman’s childhood promise may be the blueprint for protecting more vulnerable children.
Follow or Subscribe to Voices of Adoption on your favorite platform – Website: VoicesofAdoption.org | YouTube: @VoicesofAdoptionShow | Twitter/X: Voices_Adoption | Instagram: Voicesof_Adoption | Facebook: Voices of Adoption | TikTok: @Voices_of_Adoption | LinkedIn: @Voices-of-Adoption
Follow Nathan Gwilliam – LinkedIn: @nathangwilliam
Follow Donna Pope – LinkedIn: @donna-pope-41652ba
Follow Jessica Hanna – LinkedIn: @jessica-hanna-9aa6197b | Website: FosteringChangeWA.org | Instagram: @jessicahanna7751 | YouTube: @fosteringchangewa | Email: [email protected]
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