Patricia Irwin Johnston
Biography
Patricia Irwin Johnston, M.S., is Perspectives' publisher. Pat has been writing and speaking and advocating about infertility and adoption issues for 20 years, beginning as a long term volunteer in Indiana coalition building and with RESOLVE (for which she chaired the national board of directors for three years) and including several years on the national board of Adoptive Families of America. Pat is a frequent contributor to many magazines and newsletters. She has written several books and edited the poetry anthology Perspectives on a Grafted Tree. Pat and her husband Dave are the second generation of their family to extend it beyond infertility through the adoption of three children.
http://www.perspectivespress.com
Publications
Articles
The Financial Impact of Adoptive Parenthood
But what about after the placement?... For the infertile, family building is expensive business! After several years of supplementing patchy health insurance coverage for medical treatments and then... [more]
Top Five Hot Buttons Not to Push!
These are examples of amazingly insensitive comments heard recently by members of INCIID's Adoption Waiting Room Internet bulletin board. Names have been changed to protect both the guilty and the... [more]
Promoting Attachment through the Senses
Babies under a year old are highly sensory beings. Because their primary intellectual task during the first few months of their lives involves learning to use all of their senses and developing motor... [more]
The Announcement
Melika and Ahmad and Nancy and Fred are two couples I know well. Both families have been hoping for a child for years, and they've been working actively on that. Melika and Ahmad have gotten pregnant... [more]
Adoption and Adoptive Families: A Bibliography
National Organizations Offering Information and Support to Adoptive Families and Prospective AdoptersAdoption Council of Canada, P.O. Box 8442, Station T, Ottawa, Ontario K1G 3H8. Phone 613-235-1566. [more]
Infertility and Medically-Assisted Alternatives: a Bibliography
National and Regional Organizations Offering Infertility Support and InformationRESOLVE, Inc.(1310 Broadway, Somerville MA 02144, telephone 617-623-0744) is a U.S. national nonprofit network of 50+ ch [more]
Infertility and Aftershocks
To set a tone for discussing the aftershocks of infertility, let me share a passage from the novel Baby, a story about the impact made on an entire family by an infant's death. It's written by the... [more]
On Getting Real
In recent months, like some of you, I've had the interesting experience of participating in Internet newsgroups and commercial on-line groups discussing adoption. The culture on the Net is different... [more]
Adopt-A-Confusion:
People who are involved with adoption issues on a daily basis are becoming increasingly concerned about the negative impact of programs taking an "ADOPT-A-" theme which have proliferated since the... [more]
Sibling Attachment
Research shows that for those who have brothers or sisters, sibling relationships - whether healthy or unhealthy, loving or antagonistic - are the longest-lasting and most constant intimate... [more]
Speaking Positively Using Respectful Adoption Language
Respectful Adoption Language (RAL) is vocabulary about adoption which has been chosen to reflect maximum respect, dignity, responsibility and objectivity about the decisions made by birthparents and... [more]
The Guy on the Street and New-Tech Babies
Media interest in advancing reproductive technology has once again piqued the general public's interest in the ways infertile people form their families. Parents who have used ARTs or third party... [more]
What Should We Tell the Kids?
Should our children know about our infertility? If so, what should they know and when? Many infertile people who want to become conscientious parents are thinking ahead about how their own... [more]
Instant Family? A Case Against Artifical Twinning
An introduction.... I'm about to open an unpopular subject among infertile couples trying to build a family, a subject often met with angry defensiveness by people who have already built their... [more]
The Commitment
What's wrong with this picture?... Bob and Alice met through a popular dating service. Each had signed up-a bit reluctant at first-at the urging of friends. Each worked carefully on a "personal... [more]
