reading

HARVEST HOUSE PUBLISHERS

EUGENE, OREGON

Unless otherwise indicated, all Scripture quotations are from the Holy Bible, New International Version®, NIV®. © 1973, 1978, 1984, 2011 by Biblica, Inc.® Used by permission. All rights reserved worldwide.

Verses marked NLT are taken from the Holy Bible, New Living Translation, copyright © 1996, 2004, 2007 by Tyndale House Foundation. Used by permission of Tyndale House Publishers, Inc., Carol Stream, Illinois 60188. All rights reserved.

Verses marked KJV are taken from the King James Version of the Bible.

Italicized text in Scripture quotations indicate author’s emphasis.

Cover by Dugan Design Group

Cover photo © Stockbroker / Alamy

10 SECRETS TO BECOMING A WORRY-FREE MOM

Published by Harvest House Publishers

Eugene, Oregon 97402

www.harvesthousepublishers.com

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

McMenamin, Cindi

10 secrets to becoming a worry-free mom / Cindi McMenamin.

pages cm

ISBN 978-0-7369-6394-7 (pbk.)

ISBN 978-0-7369-6395-4 (eBook)

1. Mothers—Religious life. 2. Worry—Relicious aspects—Christianity. I. Title. II. Title: Ten secrets of becoming a worry-free mom.

BV4529.18.M378 2016

248.8’431—dc23

2015028996

All rights reserved. No part of this electronic publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, distributed, or transmitted in any form or by any means—electronic, mechanical, digital, photocopy, recording, or any other—without the prior written permission of the publisher. The authorized purchaser has been granted a nontransferable, nonexclusive, and noncommercial right to access and view this electronic publication, and purchaser agrees to do so only in accordance with the terms of use under which it was purchased or transmitted. Participation in or encouragement of piracy of copyrighted materials in violation of author’s and publisher’s rights is strictly prohibited.

Dedication

To the Only One who can calm the seas—as well as our fears—and care for what we love far better than we can: the Perfect Parent, the Lord Jesus Christ.

Acknowledgments

My heartfelt thanks to:

• My daughter, Dana, for your patience as I learned to trust God with all that I didn’t know about how to be your mom. You turned out wonderfully by His grace. And you really did make this job an easy one.

• My armor-bearing friends—Connie Boyd, Lisa Pacheco, Amber Paulsen, and Barbara Willett—for your encouraging emails and powerful prayers as I struggled through the writing of this book.

• My wise, insightful, and beautifully Christlike college friend, Joani Bell, for giving me practically a whole chapter when I was stuck and needed stories moms can relate to with teaching they can emulate. I hope to be a mom like you someday, Joan.

• My own mom, Joyce, for teaching me to trust in God and take my concerns to Him in prayer.

• My other mom, Sharon, for loving me, Hugh, and Dana as your own.

Contents

Dedication

Acknowledgments

The Choice Is Yours

1. What If I’m Not Doing This Right?

Secret 1: Partnering with the Perfect Parent

2. Be Careful

Secret 2: Realizing God Can Control What You Can’t

3. Why This?

Secret 3: Trusting God’s Unseen Work in Their Lives

4. Will They Ever Get Through This Phase?

Secret 4: Relying on the Unchanging, Immovable God

5. You’re Hanging Out with Who?

Secret 5: Giving Their Social Life to God

6. I Wish That Had Never Happened

Secret 6: Trusting God’s Faultless Filter

7. You Did What?

Secret 7: Giving Their Poor Decisions to God

8. You’re Breaking My Heart

Secret 8: Trusting God with Their Spiritual Foundation

9. I Wish I Could Do More

Secret 9: Surrendering to God Your Tendency to Rescue

10. You Want to Do What with Your Life?

Secret 10: Trusting God with Their Future

Appendix A: Drawing Nearer to the Perfect Parent

Appendix B: Daily Guide to Praying for Your Child

Notes

Parting Words of Encouragement

The Choice Is Yours

Imagine never having to worry about your children again.

That would be the life, wouldn’t it? No more sleepless nights, stressful days, or a stomach tied up in knots because of what your children are going through that you can’t control, or what might happen to them that you constantly fear.

I’m sure you and I would never worry at all if we could be assured that our children would be happy, healthy, and safe all their days. But life comes with no such assurances. And while I personally can’t promise the well-being of your children, I can offer you ten “secrets” through this book that I guarantee will change your life—and the lives of those you love—for the better.

The secrets in this book will help you eliminate worry, experience peace, and enjoy the task of parenting no matter how young or old your children are and no matter how much damage they might have done already. I’m not going to present “Ten Secrets to Make Your Child Behave” or “Ten Ways to Ensure They Never Get Hurt.” Nor will I suggest how to convince them to make the choices you’d prefer. Instead, I’m going to offer you a partnership that promises peace and a lifestyle of leaning on the One who can do far more for and with your child than you ever could.

I’m inviting you into a partnership with the Living God that will change the way you think and act. And in this partnership, you will find the means to a worry-free, stress-free life.

I realize that by writing those words I am making a pretty big claim. But you see, I’ve walked through some of the situations you already fear and I’ve talked with many moms who have already experienced some of the very things you dread. And we’ve all gone through these situations in a partnership with the Perfect Parent whom we are convinced has our lives and the lives of our children securely in His hands.

Granted, there are so many variables that exist to cause us to worry about our children—their personalities and behavior, their environment, their friends or lack of them, their impulsiveness, their attitudes, their weaknesses, and their disposition toward the things that could derail them from their goals…and ours. There is a world outside their door that is waiting to gobble them up when it comes to destroying their values, challenging their beliefs, and luring them into materialism, greed, and a selfish way of life. Will they make the right decisions in order to succeed in life? Will they be happy and content? Will they hold on to the values you teach them? How will they raise their own children someday?

And what can we, as moms, do about it anyway?

Megan, a mom of four children under the age of seven, says: “I worry so much about my children getting hurt or even worse, dying. I get scared and think the worst. Maybe it’s normal, but I don’t like that feeling. I worry about when they get older, what they are doing at school, and if their friends are having any negative influences on them. The worry is constant and my kids are so young.”

And Sue, the mom of a 19-year-old son, said she has always worried, almost obsessively, over her son’s physical safety.

“I worried countless times when he would be out with friends and I wouldn’t be able to reach him. My initial response was often a paralyzing and dreadful feeling of fear. Just when I thought I couldn’t take it any longer waiting to hear from him, he would text me. I would never wish upon anyone to experience the intense degree of fear I would feel. It was awful.”

But you and I were never meant to live that way.

Scripture says God has not given us the spirit of worry or fear, but of power, love, and a sound mind (2 Timothy 1:7). And a mom can have a tremendously positive influence on her child when she is exercising not worry or fear, but God’s power, love, and a sound mind.

I know that’s the kind of mom you want to be—one who relies on God’s power and love, and who has a sound mind.

Megan said, “My trust in God helps me to calm down, but I feel this trust in Him is stronger in other parts of my life, like my marriage and finances. I need to trust more in what God has planned for my children and their futures.”

Megan is not alone in how she feels. Many worried moms believe in God. They just don’t know how to connect their faith in God with their concern for their children. This book is written to share how you can take that step—one that will make all the difference in your life and your children’s. It will show you, in a practical way, how to trust God on a daily basis with what is most important to you.

Trusting God with your children is not just wishful thinking and hoping God agrees with your prayers. This partnership I want to invite you into is a lifestyle of leaning on the Living God who can accomplish all that we cannot, and who can determine what is best for your child when you and I only think we can.

Why the Worry Must Go

Let’s begin by looking at what worry does to us, our health, and our relationships.

1. Worry Stresses Us Out

Worry causes stress—and stress kills. Really, it does. Stress not only impacts a woman’s health, appearance, relationships, and overall quality of life, stress prematurely ages us. Worry is also linked to ulcers and other health problems. By choosing not to worry, you are investing in your health, which is a gift to yourself and your family.

According to a May 2014 Barna Research report, American moms are stressed, tired, overcommitted, and not sure how best to navigate work and family. While most moms with kids at home say they are satisfied with their family life (61 percent), for many it’s also the greatest source of stress. In addition, moms (20 percent) are nearly twice as likely as women without kids (12 percent) to become stressed to the point of physical illness.¹ And worry plays a big part in that.

2. Worry Pushes Our Children Away

One reason children tend to not tell their parents all that is going on in their lives (or not be completely honest with them) is because they “don’t want Mom to worry.”

While I was writing my book When a Mom Inspires Her Daughter, I asked daughters ages 12-40 about their relationships with their moms. Through their answers, I discovered that many daughters, regardless of their ages, said their moms worried about them too much. They knew their moms cared for them, but it concerned them, and at times annoyed them, that their mothers worried so much. By choosing not to worry, you are investing in your relationship with your children as well.

3. Worry Models Mistrust to Our Children

Worry says to our children and others, “God can’t work this out.” Therefore, worry is the sin of having no confidence in God. I know that you, like me, aren’t consciously thinking those words when you worry. But it’s what we’re communicating.

You don’t want to display that type of mistrust to your children. How you live will, to a great degree, impact how your children live. What you worry about, they will tend to worry about. On the flip side of that, where you put your trust will greatly impact how they will choose to handle situations in life too.

Even if your children don’t imitate your faith or degree of trust, they will know where they should place their trust. Your choices—including whether you decide to worry or trust God—will speak louder to them than any lecture. Your choices will influence your children’s choices well into their adulthood.

The Root of Worry

We tend to think that how much we worry is an indication of how much we love our children. But it is actually an indication of how little we know God. Because the more we get to know God as the all-knowing, all-loving, all-wise Perfect Parent, the more easily we will be able to trust Him with what is most important to us and experience peace—even if, right now, you…

• lose sleep at night worrying about where your child is.

• are fearful when it comes to your child’s health or well-being.

• find yourself replaying past situations in your mind and thinking you could have responded to your child in a better way.

• are fearful of what the teenage years will hold for your son or daughter.

• are a single mom (or a mom who feels like she’s raising her children alone).

The Journey Ahead

In this book you will hear from moms who have experienced what they thought was the worst, but saw the Lord come through in amazing ways. And in every chapter, you will discover scriptural principles and practical guidance for eliminating worry from your life and experiencing God’s peace.

You will also get a chance, at the end of each chapter, to apply what you’ve learned individually, as well as in community with other moms. The section called “Becoming a Worry-Free Mom—in Community” is meant for you to work through with another mom or two who also struggles with worry. Or, you can recommend this book for use in a group setting at your church or in someone’s home. One of the fastest and most effective ways to give up a destructive habit like worrying is to come alongside others who can share accountability to one another.

Finally, each chapter ends with my prayer for you, or a prayer you can say yourself to help you grow in wisdom, knowledge, and intimacy with Christ so that you can be a worry-free mom and a wonderfully free woman.

Key to making all this happen is having a willingness to surrender your worries to the Lord. How does that happen?

The ABCs of Surrender

• A - Admit you do not have control over your child’s life. Yes, you can control his or her form of entertainment, friends, and environment for a while. But as good of a monitor as you may be, your child will eventually make decisions on his or her own. And those decisions may, at times, grieve your heart. So give up that quest for control right now by saying aloud, “I am not in control of my child’s life. God is.”

• B - Believe God wants only the best for you and your child. Sometimes we fear that God will ask something of us or our children that we’re not willing to give. When you understand that God loves your child even more than you do, and that He loves you more than you can imagine, there is peace in placing yourself and your child in God’s hands. After you’ve admitted you don’t have control, take the next step and believe that His control of your life, as well as your child’s, is truly a good thing.

• C - Commit yourself to a deeper knowledge of God. I strongly believe that the extent of our worry is directly related to how well we know God. Notice I didn’t say our worrying is related to how well we trust God. The reason is this: When we truly know Him and understand all that He is capable of, we can’t help but trust Him. Through familiarity and intimate knowledge comes trust. So commit yourself right now to reading through this entire book, completing the application sections, and getting to know God better than you ever have before. As you do, your worries will fall by the wayside. And you’ll have a new, healthier habit: trust.

The Choice Is Yours

Are you ready to depend on God to do the heavy lifting with the worries that are weighing you down? You can choose to be controlled by your circumstances (and keep worrying), or you can yield yourself to the One who controls all circumstances.

Choose to be controlled by the still, small voice of the One who can still any storm…the One who beckons you to be still and know that He is God over everything, including your children.

Choose to partner with the Perfect Parent.

What If I’m Not Doing This Right?

Secret 1: Partnering with the Perfect Parent

If you’ve ever thought What if I’m not doing this right?, you are not alone.

Every one of us has wondered, at one time or another, if we’re up for this task of mothering or if we’re just messing up our kids.

What if I’m not involved enough in their lives?

What if I’m holding them back?

What if I’m too strict?

What if I’m not strict enough?

What if my own dysfunction is rubbing off on them?

No, you’re not the only mom who wrestles with insecurities and thoughts that you’re in over your head. And you’re not the only mom who beats yourself up when your children behave badly, when you discover they were in an unsafe situation, or when they make a choice that breaks your heart. As moms we blame ourselves for not being able to discern their every need, for working too much and seeing them too little, for being on the phone when we should be in their faces, and for not knowing the latest when it comes to what might be in their food—or in the air—that is now linked to causing cancer.

We blame ourselves, feel the guilt, and believe we are solely responsible for how they turn out.

Kelly, a young mom (who, in my opinion, has it together far more than many moms I’ve observed) worries about how she is raising her only son, three-year-old Dexter.

“Since I’m a natural worrywart, I have many concerns. I worry that he will pick up our bad habits. I worry that we could be doing more to help him be successful in the future and be all that God intended him to be. I worry about whether or not we are building a good foundation for him to develop a relationship with God that he can depend on.

“I also worry about how he treats others and if he is learning respect. I worry that his happy spirit might diminish. I worry that we are too hard on him or provide too much pressure, and that we give in to his demands too often. I worry too about what effect it will have on him with all grandparents, cousins, and immediate family living long distance from us, and about the type of environment he is growing up in and how different that is from my and my husband’s childhood experience. I worry about the food we eat and how all the new additives and sugars might affect his development and his ability to learn.

“As he approaches grade school, I worry about the exposure to peer pressure and what questions he might come home with; playing sports and the competitiveness even at young ages; affording the type of schooling best for my child to learn and reach his full potential; and managing a school schedule with both working parents. I also worry about our ability to steer his interests in the right direction and give him the best opportunities to explore, making sure there is time to be a kid and play.

“I worry about navigating what he sees and hears in the world. Obviously, we go out, get on planes, go to malls, and visit other people, but once he goes off to school he’ll be exposed to different values.”

Sometimes Kelly even worries about what Dexter worries about—his fears at noises in the middle of the night, his thought that bad guys might enter the house while they’re sleeping, and so on. And sometimes she’s worried that her concerns are causing him to worry.

“Many times he can sense when I am upset or worried, which I worry that I shouldn’t project in front of him.”

Oh the cycle of fear, worry, and guilt that we put ourselves through!

The Weight on Our Shoulders

According to a 2014 Barna Group report, the average woman who is a mom is stressed because of all she believes she should be able to do:

There is a new reality for women in the 21st century—it’s a different world with different goals than it was even a generation ago. As little girls, today’s women didn’t grow up with only dolls and toy kitchens and princesses and visions of idyllic domesticity and motherhood behind a white picket fence. They were given these, but also given a little plastic doctor’s bag and a coloring book full of potential careers to choose from.

“You can be anything you want, child.” It’s a message of empowerment and it’s beautiful. But, as many of those young girls grew up, a message that was once meant to convey opportunity has begun to feel like a pressure cooker. What once was “You can have it all” has now become “You need to have it all.” You need to have the perfect job, the perfect husband, the perfect house, the perfect kids, the perfect play dates and craft nights and date nights and do-it-yourself Pinterest projects and #nofilter Instagrams.²

We are told we can have it all. And we want to have it all. And we want to do it all, provide it all, and get it all right. As my friend Stephanie Shott says in her book, The Making of a Mom: “It’s pretty hard to be all and do all when you’re really just overwhelmed by it all.”³

We place such heavy expectations on ourselves that we end up becoming stressed-out moms carrying unbearable loads. And yet God never expected us to live that way. He never put any expectation on us to do it all. He meant for us to depend on Him to do the heavy lifting. That’s why He put commands before us like…

• “Be still, and know that I am God” (Psalm 46:10).

• “Cast your cares on the LORD and he will sustain you” (Psalm 55:22).

• “Come to me, all you who are weary and burdened, and I will give you rest” (Matthew 11:28).

• “Take my yoke upon you and learn from me…For my yoke is easy and my burden is light” (Matthew 11:29-30).

• “Be anxious for nothing, but in everything by prayer… let your requests be made known to God” (Philippians 4:6 NASB).

God wants to do a work in you and me as we rely on Him for help with a task that, at times, seems daunting.

The Root of Our Insecurities

There are a number of factors that can contribute to our parenting insecurities and make us moms who worry.

How We Were Raised

Many moms I interviewed for this book were insecure about their mothering abilities because of how they were raised. For example, Kadee, a young military wife stationed in Japan with three young girls, says she prays for the assurance that she’s doing “a good job.”

“I didn’t have godly parents and my husband didn’t either, so we don’t really know what we are doing when it comes to raising godly children,” Kadee said. “I just hope and pray that we are doing good by our children and they are being well taken care of.”

Do you ever look at what you didn’t have and wonder if it’s causing a deficit in your children’s lives too? If you had a mom who never spent much time with you, it might be second nature for you to keep to yourself and your work and not spend much time with your own child. Or if you experienced very little communication with your mom, it might be difficult for you to talk with your child on a deeper level. If you were verbally or physically abused, you might be afraid that those negatives will surface in your own parenting (we will explore this further in chapter 6). In whatever way you were raised, you might feel that it impacts your ability to be a good mom.

Our Children’s Needs

We also tend to feel unsure about our mothering abilities because of certain needs our children have. Maybe you have a child with special needs, or you gave birth to a set of twins when you weren’t expecting any more children, or you have a child with a temperament similar to or unlike your own. Maybe you’ve adopted a child with deep-seated insecurities and abandonment issues that you aren’t sure now how to deal with. Maybe you have a child with ADHD or food allergies or some other condition that requires an inordinate amount of attention that you wonder at times if you can even give. Those situations, and others like them, can make any mom feel intimidated and discouraged.

How Our Children Are Behaving

We can also doubt our ability to parent by the way our children behave. Unfortunately, none of our kids behave as instructed 100 percent of the time. All children have minds of their own and will, at times, do the strangest, stupidest, grossest things. And as we stare on in horror all we can do is gasp…or pray. See if you can’t relate to some of these worries or concerns, all of which I have heard numerous times, by the way, over the past 20 years of ministering to moms:

“I can’t understand a word he says. How will he ever succeed in school?”

“He eats every wretched thing he finds on the ground. How will he ever live past four years old?”

“He can’t keep his fingers out of his nose. And he can’t keep those boogers out of his mouth!”

“I don’t know where she heard that word. She certainly didn’t learn it at home!”

“I never imagined she would do such a thing. I did not raise her that way.”

“I can’t believe she got another tattoo!”

“All I have to do is breathe and I embarrass them. What gives?”

“I never thought I would be saying that about my own child.”

“Who would’ve thought my child would _____________?” (Maybe by now you can fill in the blank with your own unexpected reality.)

If your child seems out of control right now, you may be feeling as though you are unqualified for what is to come in the days ahead.

What Others Are Saying

Sometimes we end up worrying about our inadequacies—or questioning our parenting abilities—based on what others say to or about us. Jamie, a mom of six children (three of her own and three she inherited from her husband), says, “I continually tell moms, especially new ones, that there is no one way to be a good mom. All moms are different and all children are different. If there was a single right way, everyone would be doing it. It’s easy to feel guilty and beat yourself up as a parent. All you can do is pray, read Scripture, and make the best decisions you can.”

God Understands Your Concerns

When it comes to how you were raised, your children’s needs, and the seemingly difficult task before you (whether you’re caring for an infant, toddler, child, teenager, or young adult), I’m sure you’ve heard well-meaning people say that God gave you that child “because He knew you could handle it.”

I won’t suggest, however, that God “knew you could handle it” and that’s why He gave you the kids you have. That would imply there is something intrinsically great in you and me that enables us to be amazing moms. I will venture, instead, to say, “God knew you wouldn’t be able to raise your children without Him,” so He put those kids in your care (and made you the mom that you are) so you would lean in close to Him and depend on Him every step of the way.

That, my friend, is the first secret to becoming a worry-free mom: entering into a day-to-day reliance on the One who knows all things and through whom you can do all things (Philippians 4:13).

The Source of Our Confidence

We all have some sort of baggage or dysfunction in our past. (Think about it—what family is truly 100 percent functional?) And all of our children, to some degree, have special needs or require additional time, or have their bad behavioral moments (no matter how old they are!). The reality of life is that you and I, and our children too, are broken individuals who will experience temptation, make the wrong decisions, endure a season of rebellion, and so on. But here’s your confidence: God not only selected you to be your children’s mom (whether through birth or adoption), but He knows exactly what you struggle with in relation to what type of child or children He’s given you. And He has a way of even orchestrating the circumstances you and your child go through so you will learn to partner with Him to get through this journey.

All through the Bible, we read stories of how God chose seemingly incapable individuals to accomplish great tasks, and we can be encouraged to know God can do the same in our lives.

For example, there is Moses—that Hebrew baby who was set adrift on the Nile River so he wouldn’t be slaughtered by the Egyptians, and was rescued by Pharaoh’s daughter to grow up as royalty in the palace. He was chosen to be God’s deliverer of the Hebrew nation. But it wasn’t because he was educated in Egypt and had close ties to the Pharaoh. God chose Moses after he had been away from Egypt for 40 years, herding sheep and getting to know God a little better. In fact, Moses claimed to be “slow of speech” (which may mean he stuttered or didn’t speak well in public), and yet God made him to be His mouthpiece to the intimidating Pharaoh of Egypt.

Moses was no Toastmasters’ graduate. He wasn’t a guy fully confident in his abilities. That’s probably why God chose him. In fact, Scripture calls Moses “more humble than anyone else on the face of the earth” (in the King James Version he’s called “very meek”).⁴ Now, if I were going to assign someone the task of delivering hundreds of thousands of people out of the hands of a powerful and oppressive nation, I wouldn’t exactly pick the meekest person I knew. Yet God wanted someone who would fully depend on Him for the task at hand. God wanted someone who would readily admit the power was not his own, but came from God. God wanted an incapable human for a superhuman task. So He chose a weak vessel into which He could pour His vast strength.

I believe God wants to do the same with you and me. I believe He wants you to fully depend on Him as you raise that strong-willed, high-need, attention-deficit, tantrum-throwing, or nerve-wracking child in your home.

Yet there are certainly times we wonder if even God realized what He was doing when He made us moms.

Seasons of Doubt

Kadee felt the heaviness of the question “What did I do wrong?” when her second daughter, Lily, was two years old and diagnosed with “failure to thrive.”

Little Lily wasn’t gaining weight as rapidly as she should have for her age, according to a chart used by medical professionals that determined optimal height and weight at various ages.

“I feel like a horrible mom,” Kadee told me in a text when she received the news. But Kadee wasn’t a horrible mom. She had two little girls, thirteen months apart, and the older one was a voracious eater and the younger one wasn’t. Lily wasn’t complaining about not getting enough food. She certainly wasn’t starving. She just wasn’t keeping up with a specific growth chart. And because Lily wasn’t making a fuss about it, wasn’t sick, and apparently wasn’t starving, her “condition” pretty much went unnoticed.

The doctor prescribed a special diet and close monitoring of how much Lily was eating. The family drastically altered their mealtime routine to make sure Lily was eating the proper amount of the proper types of food. Within a month, Lily was gaining weight appropriately and the pressure lessened with each month that followed. Kadee now has a third child and told me recently that when little Eliza turned two, she was also diagnosed with “failure to thrive” and Kadee was told to go through the same routine all over again.

I’ve heard that same story repeatedly—a common situation in the babies’ developmental years that is easily remedied and yet moms carry guilt about it, not realizing many other babies also go through the same “disinterest in eating” phase.

Stages of Life

Many of our insecurities about parenting surface because we find ourselves in a situation that is new or different. As a result, we feel as if we’re in a circumstance no one else has encountered or will understand. But Scripture tells us in Ecclesiastes 1:9 that there is nothing new under the sun.

During my daughter’s early teenage years, I remember saying—out of frustration—“I don’t know how to do this. I’ve never parented a teenager before!” (Now that must have been real comforting for her to hear, don’t you think? To have a mom who admits she’s clueless. Either that, or it made her feel she had some sort of edge over me.) That was the day I went into my study, closed the door behind me, got down on the floor, and called upon God—the Perfect Parent—who has gone before me into every stage of life my daughter will live through, and every stage of parenting I will experience. That’s when I went to the God who knows the future for help one day at a time.

Raising our children is all about helping them navigate the changes and stages of life. But those changes and stages can throw