When a child suffers, their parents do too. When their suffering takes the form of substance abuse, mental illness, self-harm, suicide attempts, incarceration, or some other...
Can Parents in Pain Still be Grateful?
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encouragement
Advice From a Parent Coach: Natural Consequences Can Bring Change
Welcome guest blogger, certified parent and life coach Cathy Taughinbaugh. Cathy provides support for families who struggle with substance use. In this blog post she writes about...
How Can Parents in Pain Correct Stinking Thinking?
Are you a parent who suffers from stinking thinking? Do you beat yourself up believing you must have done a terrible job because of how your child turned out? They abuse...
Defining Moments in Parenting
I trudged into my 12-year-old daughter’s bedroom after we’d had yet another argument to the shocking discovery of self-inflicted cuts up and down both of her forearms. My stomach...
Learning to Respond When Your Child Practices Self-Harm by Kirsten Panachyda
A Learned Response “Mom, I need your help.” Nicholas’s face looked drawn and pale. His left sleeve was pulled up and his right hand cupped the skin of his forearm. I took a deep...
Pondering the Long and Hard Seasons of Parenting
Welcome today's guest blogger, one of our teammates, Beth Denhof. Several years ago, after a hard season in my marriage, I sat with a good friend and mentor as I staggered...
Disappointed Parents: You Never Know What God Might be Up To
Life is full of surprises and disappointments. We never know what we're going get, like Forrest Gump’s momma said about a box of chocolates. Some surprises are good. We’re...
The Why Question: Finding Purpose for Pain
Why did this happen to me? Why didn’t God protect my daughter from developing an addiction or mental health problems? Why weren’t my prayers answered? When will this end? What...
Former Porn Addict, Now Mom, Shares How She Overcame Her Addiction, Part 2
Welcome Christy Adams as a guest blogger for me again this week. She offers hard-earned wisdom from personal experience on a difficult topic, pornography. When I was a young...
Former Porn Addict, Now Mom, Shares 6 Ways to Protect Your Child, Part 1
Today's post is a real life account about an issue that has become an epidemic among youth and young adults today—pornography. Adults of all ages also struggle with porn. This is...
4 Ways Parents Can Live With An Unsolved Problem
As parents we have a special relationship with our children...or we hoped we would. We have a deep emotional connection with them along with a strong sense of responsibility for...
Parents of Prodigals Look for Purpose
These are highlights from one of our support group meetings. At the time, we were going through the book, Parents with Broken Hearts by Bill Coleman (on the book list on our...