Adoptee Beacon

Estrangement Support Group

This is a support group for adult adoptees experiencing any level of estrangement. Adoptees will lean into thinking critically about the nuanced layers of estrangement. Together, with the support of Adoption Mosaic facilitators, participants will:

  • Practice compassionate assertiveness and learn strategies to maintain boundaries with extended family and communities;

  • Reflect on how estrangement may impact them, financially, emotionally, and socially;

  • Discuss the complexity of reconciliation, both with others and with themselves;

  • Take steps towards growing and healing.

2025 DETAILS

Wednesdays, 5:30 - 7:00 pm (PT) on Zoom
March 5, 12, 19 (skip 26 for Spring Break)

April 2, 9, 16, 23, 30

May 7, 14,21, 28

Cost: $290*

*Payment options and limited community support funds available.

Laura Batt

Laura Batt

Consultant

(she/her)

Laura Batt was adopted domestically as an infant and raised in a closed adoption. Laura has been in reunion with her biological family for 25+ years.


Laura is a birth/first parent to her oldest adult son. She is parenting another teenage son, and young child with her significant other in Oregon.


Laura has a master’s degree in social work. She has worked in adoption and parenting support for 18+ years, supporting people to continue to parent their biological children. For families who opted to make an adoption plan, Laura supported birth/first parents and adoptive families with planning an adoption, creating open adoption plans, and providing post adoption support. Laura worked as a therapist in a community mental health setting and is currently a perinatal social worker in a medical setting. Laura completed an adoption therapy certificate and has a certification in perinatal mental health.

Becca Flatt

Becca Flatt

Course and Group Facilitator

(she/her)

Becca Flatt (she/her) is a Mixed Race, Black and white, closed, domestic infant, interracial adoptee. Becca’s biological family and adoptive family mirror each other; however, Becca, being mixed race, does not share the racial identity of either set of her parents. Becca identifies as a recovering compliant adoptee.


Born in Salt Lake City, Utah, and raised in San Jose, California, Becca was raised in racial diversity while being raised without racial mirrors. Becca was also raised in adoptee isolation. It wasn’t until Becca was 28 that she started the search and reunion process that she recognized the importance of being in a community with other adoptees. Becca has spent her entire adult life trying to understand the human condition and the importance of identity and mental health.


Becca Graduated from The University of Southern California with her Master’s in social work and a concentration in mental health in 2014. Becca provides mental health treatment to transracial, interracial, and same-race adoptees of color. Becca is also an adoptive parent dedicated to discussing and participating in relationally focused adoption.


Over the past 20 years, Becca has gone through estrangement and reconciliation with her adoptive parents. Through her lived experience, she understands how devastating estrangement can be for all parties involved.


She hopes to help adoptees and adoptive parents learn how to navigate the grief, trauma, desperation, shame, and fear that often accompanies estrangement.

FAQs

  • Yes! If you are experiencing any level of estrangement with birth/first family, adoptive family, and/or other members of you communities, then you are absolutely welcome to register.

  • Yes! We offer Adoptee Beacon once per year. Sign up for our newsletter to be notified when registration opens for the next one!

  • The group's facilitators are two adoptees who bring their professional training in social work, years of experience working in adoption, and lived experiences as adoptees to the group. The cost of the group helps us compensate the facilitators for their time and expertise.