Mary Juusela held a workshop for 27 adoptive parents in Zurich, Switzerland on topics relating to identity, integration, and searching for one's roots. With her knowledge from interviewing over 700 adoptive families and writing two books on the subject, as well as her own experience of being adopted, Mary was able to engage participants and facilitate a lively discussion of complex adoption issues. Participants found Mary's presentation and discussion of adoption-related matters to be enlightening and left with practical tools to apply in their family lives.

1. Testimonial of Yvonne Forster, MD for he committee board of Pro
Kind, adoption agency in Winterthur, Switzerland
Mary Juusela’s Workshop “Identity, integration and homeland journey”
We had the great pleasure of participating in Mary’s workshop held in
Zürich, Switzerland for a group of 27 adoptive parents in January 2015.
With eloquence, charm and humor Mary led the way through this day
and covered the topics „identity, integration and root-seeking“ in a very
engaging way. A gripping 2 hour introductory lecture was followed by
lively discussions during small group-work and sharing of new ideas
among all participants. Her knowledge as a scientist, who has
interviewed more than 700 Swedish adoptive families about their lives
and written two books about it, is enormous. This fact combined with
her own life story of being adopted appealed immensely to the
participants and made it possible to discuss complex or even painful
questions within the group. This unique combination is also very
enlightening to adoptive parents and helps us understand some of the
traits in our children. Mary’s respectful, considerate and well-formulated
thoughts filled our adoptive parents’ backpacks with tools we can use in
everyday family life. We can full heartedly recommend Mary as an
encouraging and very apt speaker about adoption related matters and we
would love to be able to follow her work and read her two books in
English in the near future.