We know that grandparents enter situations of raising grandchildren for many different reasons including but not limited to drug use, overdose, and death of one or both parents. Please join us to hear from a panel of grandparents who are currently raising grandchildren. Hear from them about their success, their challenges, and advice that they have learned along the way.

Panel Facilitators:

Adam W. Carter, Ph.D. is the National Clinical Director for the NACG. He is a professional counselor and counselor educator who received his doctoral degree in Counselor Education and Supervision, with an emphasis in multicultural counseling, from The University of North Carolina at Charlotte. Adam has taught courses in CACREP accredited master’s level clinical mental health programs and doctoral level courses in counselor education and supervision and served as the Trauma-Informed Counseling Graduate Certificate coordinator at Northern Illinois University. During his time at Northern Illinois University, he founded the Center for Grief and Loss at the University’s Community Counseling and Training Center, where he provided clinical supervision and education to counselors in training. Adam has an ongoing program of research and scholarship that focuses on early childhood grief responses and preparing counselors-in-training to work with grieving children. Adam’s scholarly work also includes numerous peer-reviewed presentations focusing on topics such as trauma-informed counseling, play therapy, and developing research skills in counseling practitioners. His clinical experience is broad, having worked as a counselor and supervisor in community mental health clinics, in-home intensive settings, community advocacy agencies, and private practice. In 2014, Adam was one of two inaugural Scholars-in-Residence with the American Counseling Association and helped developed strategies for empowering clinicians to conduct single-subject design research in community settings. In the fall of 2020, Adam was acknowledged for his work in the field of grief counseling and death education by earning the designation of Fellow in Thanatology: Death, Dying, and Bereavement.

Kerry Bickford of Support After a Death by Overdose (SADOD) is a Grandparent Peer Grief Specialist with the Peer Support Community Partners. Kerry co-facilitates two groups (Nathan’s Circle and Consoling Partners) on Cape Cod. Her son, Nathan, died in August of 2018 and her work is dedicated to his memory and the memory of all others lost to substance use disorder.