Jeanette Yoffe, MA, LMFT   

Jeanette Yoffe, MA, LMFT, is a licensed psychotherapist, author, and nationally recognized speaker with over 20 years of experience specializing in the treatment of children, adolescents, and families connected to foster care and adoption. As both a clinician and an adoptee who spent six years in foster care, Jeanette brings a rare and deeply personal understanding of the lifelong impacts of early trauma, loss, and disrupted attachment.

Her dual lens of lived experience and clinical expertise allows her to teach with compassion, authenticity, and clarity. Jeanette is the Founder and Executive Director of Celia Center, a nonprofit supporting all members of the foster/adoption constellation, and Clinical Director of Yoffe Therapy a group practice dedicated to trauma-informed care. She is also the creator of numerous trauma-focused interventions widely used by therapists across the country.

Clinicians attending this training will benefit from Jeanette’s creative, experiential approach, learning practical tools that can be immediately applied in clinical practice to support emotional regulation, strengthen attachment, and build resilience in highly vulnerable youth populations. Her workshops are known for being engaging, hands-on, and deeply transformative, providing both clinical insight and emotional resonance.

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Mending the Broken Compass: Creative Interventions for Traumatized Youth in Foster Care and Beyond          

Description:

Children and adolescents impacted by foster care often navigate the world with a shattered internal compass disoriented by trauma, loss, and disrupted attachment. In this dynamic, trauma-informed workshop, Jeanette Yoffe, LMFT, also an adoptee, former foster youth and seasoned therapist offers practical, creative, and developmentally attuned interventions to help clinicians guide youth toward safety, connection, and emotional regulation. Participants will explore expressive, sensory, and narrative-based techniques that address core trauma symptoms, build resilience, and restore a sense of self, based on her latest book The Traumatized & At-Risk Youth Toolbox. Through real-life case examples and hands-on demonstrations, attendees will gain actionable tools to engage children and teens in foster care, adoption, and other high-risk settings. Walk away with a renewed sense of confidence, creativity, and compassion for doing this critical work.

Learning Objectives:

At the conclusion of this presentation, participants will be able to:

• Identify one of the core psychological impacts of complex trauma, disrupted attachment, and grief on children and adolescents in foster care.   
• Explain the 5 F’s (fight, flight, freeze, fawn, flop) on how trauma responses manifest in behaviors commonly seen in foster and adopted youth.
• Apply at least eight creative, trauma-informed interventions that support emotional regulation, identity formation, and relational healing.
• Utilize expressive arts, narrative, and somatic-based techniques to help youth process early attachment injuries and foster care-related grief and loss.