Take Heart

When Special Needs Moms Are Misunderstood

• Amy J Brown, Carrie Holt and Sara Clime • Season 4 • Episode 160

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Being a parent to a child with special needs comes with its own unique set of challenges, and being misunderstood is a chief issue. As Amy, Carrie, and Sara share their personal experiences and insights, they provide valuable guidance on responding with grace and resilience when faced with misunderstandings…even though they don’t do it perfectly every time. They discuss the balance of speaking the truth and advocating for their children without being intentionally hurtful to others and not feeling the need to explain everything, instead using their child's trauma as an explanation only when necessary. Join us for a funny and truthful episode about real life. 

Ep. 160; February 27, 2024

Key Moments:
[1:35] One thing we want to set straight about a misunderstanding
[4:06] People ask the most inappropriate things, even those in medicine
[13:40] The tension of mishandling comments and drawing boundaries around ourselves
[21:00] Trying to understand others' intentions in church and beyond 
[28:23] Why don’t more people understand trauma 


Resources:
The Place We Find Ourselves Podcast
The Allender Center Podcast

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Carrie M Holt: Hi there, this is Carrie, and I'm here with Sara and Amy. You're listening to episode 160. In this month, we're talking about being misunderstood. For some reason, being misunderstood or judged touches at our core. It brings out the mama bear in us, and we have this strong desire to protect our kids and ourselves. Sometimes, though, I know most people are coming from a place of not understanding or ignorance, but there are definitely family members and friends and strangers who don't get it. They try to dismiss our concerns and aren't willing or able to, for one reason or another, put themselves in our position. The first question that I have off the top of my head is, if you could pick one important concept, one assumption regarding your child's diagnosis that you would like to set straight for the record, what would you say? Amy, will you start us?


Amy Brown: How long do you have? Okay, I'm going to say this loud and clear. Trauma is real, and it has lasting effects. Trauma? I'm saying it. Don't let your friend, your mother, your mother-in-law, or your pastor tell you trauma is not real, and that it does have lasting effects on a child.


Kids with invisible disabilities look typical, so I think at times, not at times, all the time, people make a lot of assumptions about behavior. Sometimes people want to explain it away, “but you had her from birth, or, but now she's in your home, or X, Y, Z, and it's super frustrating to try to feel like you need a PowerPoint presentation to explain the effects of trauma on children and how that exhibits in their behavior.  That would be mine.


Carrie: I would say to anyone listening, if you would like to understand more about trauma, you need to listen to Adam Young's podcast, The Place We Find Ourselves, or the Allender Center podcast from Dr. Allender. We can put those links in the show notes because even educating yourself about it and what assumptions and things come from your own background and how you were raised can help you understand where other people are coming from and even how you parent. It's been super helpful for me. I think it's really important that we spread the word and that people start educating themselves more about this topic for sure. Sara, how about you? What record do you want to set straight about a misunderstanding?


Sara Clime: I was thinking about this and the first part of my notes is don't vent. 

Amy: Is that a note to yourself?

Sara: It is, it is. Because I think there are things that I think my son would want to correct. We just had to change medical providers, and we were walking out and he has not once ever said this, but he goes, “Wow, people talk to me like I'm actually a patient and I know what they're saying.” Why didn't you say something before? He goes, “Eh. It's probably because I didn't want to talk to him, but it is nice to be talked to.” I think a whole other podcast because there are things that bother them. I think that's why I wrote don't vent because this is more for caregivers. 


On that note, I would say the biggest misunderstood concept that I want to speak on is that others aren't entitled to know everything about my child or our life. If you wouldn't ask another child or a parent of a child at that age, don't ask it. It's none of your business. For example, I have had friends with daughters who have been asked about their daughter's time of the month and what their plans are. She was eight and that's none of your business. Would you ask another eight year old's mom if you're not friends with them? If it was my sister that would be different, you guys that might be different. These are virtual strangers we're talking about or people you might see for 45 minutes on Sunday. I mean this happens with people at church too.


I have had people ask about my son's reproductive abilities. Can he perform certain things? Can he do this? You would never ask me about that with my other child, my neurotypical or physically typical child. How do you even remotely think that that's acceptable? One of the things I pride myself on is that I do have comebacks very quickly. They're not always, sometimes I think I could have left off without saying that one. 


We were on my son's make-wish trip and he is a huge World War II buff ever since he was little. He asked to go to Pearl Harbor, which we loved because we were convinced we were going to be going somewhere in the middle of Iowa to the world's biggest stock of corn or something.


Amy: No offense to people from Iowa.


Sara: We were going to be stuck in Missouri. I want to go on a canoe trip. It's something we do every summer. We just knew it was going to be something that a 10-year-old wanted to do, or however old he was. We were on the flight to Hawaii. 
If you've ever been on a Make-A-Wish trip, and you've had to fly or anything that would travel, they asked us to wear the Make-A-Wish T-shirt or buttons if you were actually on something that was the Make-A-Wish portion of it. My son had his t-shirt on, I had mine on, and we were walking out of the aisle to go to the restroom. I was taking her to the restroom and this older woman, bless her heart, I know she didn't mean anything by it, she like put her hand on her chest and just gasped and was very dramatic about it and said…”Is he going to make it?”


I kid you not. So, I was like, well, I sure hope so. Sorry, I caught myself. If this plane goes down, he's not the only one that won't make it, and I walked off. There was this gentleman three aisles back and he said, “Good for you, Mama.” But TJ looked at me like, what do you mean am I gonna make it? 


How can you not know that that's not okay? First of all, it's none of your business. We're on the same flight. We're not in the same family. It's a flight. I don't know you from Adam. You have no right to ask me that. So that's one of the things that I would, is that I wish people knew. You don't have the right to all the information, and that's not advocacy. Voyeurism and advocacy are two totally, you know, voyeurism and asking questions so you can better understand how to be a friend or an advocate for your family. That's one thing, but you don't need to know about my son's reproductive abilities to advocate or help my family.


Amy: Right, that's a good point, yeah.


Carrie: It's so funny to see, those of you who are listening, you can't see us, but our posture and our bodies when that mama bear starts to come out, it just changes, Because we're in like this defense; we've gotta defend our kids. For me having a son in a wheelchair and not being able to walk, and having a diagnosis since pregnancy. I hate that phrase, “as long as the baby's healthy” I remember walking around pregnant in Babies ‘R Us and thinking my baby's not healthy, so what does that mean? It's that whole idea that if you have a diagnosis, somehow you don't have value and worth as a person. If I could dispel any misunderstanding, any misconception, it's that. Sara, you say it all the time, a devastating diagnosis does not mean a devastating life. It does not mean that my son has less worth and value and doesn't deserve to be treated as a person with likes and dislikes. I'm sure we have moms who are listening, whose kids cannot verbally speak, and you probably experience this way more than those of us who have kids who can speak and can say, they treated me like a person. The kids out there who cannot verbally speak also still have emotions and feelings and they deserve to be treated as a person who has value and is created in the image of God. 


Do either of you have a story you want to share about when your mama bear comes out? I know, Sara, you talked about it in that situation when your mama bear comes out, right? I loved your response. Half the time, I don't have a response. I end up crying and getting angry and frustrated. How does it make you feel, and what would you have done differently in that situation? Would you have changed anything in that situation with a woman on the plane?


Sara: I remember I went back to my seat, and I was visibly shaken; I was holding it together because I can have a comeback in that moment, but I'm upset and I sat back down and my husband said, “What's going on? I told him I'll tell you later.” Even if my son was sleeping, I didn't wanna talk about it because I always remember as a child hearing my parents talk when they thought we were sleeping, and it's just stuck with me. Whenever I told him what was going on it took me a while to decompress from that. I immediately went to: was that unchristian of me to say? Was that catty? Was that petty? She didn't deserve that. She was just being sweet. Have I prevented her from being inquisitive about other people? I think you immediately go to that shame base, or at least I do. I go to that shame-based mentality of, how could I have handled that better? I remember thinking, I didn't punch her, I think I handled that well. 


Amy Brown: Good for you.


Sara: You feel defeated, you feel angry, and it's almost like you take two steps forward. I can do this. I got this gig figured out. I'm getting there. You don't have it completely figured out, but you think I'm good. I think I can do this. Then somebody says something like that. It can easily put you back to square one. I can't do this for the rest of my life. I remember when TJ was little, I thought, how am I gonna be able to do this for the rest of my life or the rest of his life? This is too much. It's too much to constantly be aware of. I don't think at that moment, I would have changed anything. There have been moments when I have not been so witty or sarcastic. There've been times where I've just been flat-out ticked and I have made that abundantly clear. 


Recently, we had a certain doctor, and you guys know exactly the story because I think I was angry. Now, we travel eight hours to a new facility because of this. This doctor completely shamed me. I know a lot about my son's diagnosis. Basically, at the end, she says, “Okay, we'll schedule something for six months. I said, “That's not gonna happen in this lifetime.” I looked at the nurse and said, “Thank you for being professional and not shaming a parent because you have no idea what that would do in the long run, especially with the patient sitting here; I didn't know if you noticed him or not.” Now, could I have handled it better? Maybe.


I don't think I could have handled it better. Could somebody else have handled it better? Maybe. But at that point, I felt I needed to stand up for my son.


Carrie: There's a tension there.


Sara: I think it's good to do that self-check of whether could I have handled it better. How can I handle it better going forward? I actually practice responses. If I am so angry, I need to count to five, and then if that doesn't work, count to five again. Then I have the right to say, I am really frustrated in this moment, and I need to step away from the situation. That's okay too. If they continue to push it, that's just another indication that they don't need to be in your life. Ynless you were intentionally hurtful towards somebody, you should think about changing a reaction unless you were cruel, which I'm sure I have been in the past. I thought I really can't do that again. 


Carrie: There's a difference between speaking the truth and advocating and just reacting out of: I'm going to hurt you because you're hurting me. I don't, in those instances, you know, you're not trying to hurt that person. You are telling the truth, like you said, and advocating for them. Amy, how about you? Do you have a story of when the mama bear came out and how did you evaluate your feelings and what happened?


Amy: Well, first of all, let me say that when I first saw these questions, I thought I felt a little bad. I would not have responded like Sara, not that Sara responded wrong. That's not my go-to. My go-to is not to immediately…


Sara: She's a hot mess.

Amy: Can you be my designated throat puncher? That's what I want to know.


Sara: You know how hockey has an enforcer? That one guy that he can skate and punch, and that's really only for two minutes. No, maybe, you know. No, no.


Carrie: Not that we are advocating violence on this podcast.

Sara: No


Amy: The idea of shame, like when Sara told that story, which is a daily experience when you have kids with invisible disabilities. When the principal shows up on a Saturday when your child's in second grade. (This is not a hypothetical situation. He's not coming to tell you she's student of the month). But she needs to be expelled; there's shame because your child has just had a behavior. From the outside looking in, you'd be like, this kid is not a great kid, right? It's hard to mama bear when you are feeling shame about behavior. That is so hard to do. 

When the principal showed up and told me she needed to be expelled, and then we had to go to a panel of parents to advocate for her to stay in school, You guys can't see Sarah's face. The enforcer's coming. 


Sara: I’m irritated now.

Amy: That is just one story of hundreds of stories. I've gotten better at handling those kinds of things and understanding, as I said earlier, trauma has lasting effects. My mama bear may not come out in the moment, but it will come out later in being mad and really being upset with the people. But I have to remember this. I don't understand what behavior they can control and what is trauma. I don't think it really matters. I really think that's the wrong question to ask. I know a lot of moms with kids with behavior issues ask what can they control. What can’t they control? We spend way too much time on that. If I don't understand it, how can I expect anybody else? They have no visual cues this child has a disability, number one. They have assumptions, number two. I don't understand it in a way that I can explain it, at least at that point.


I'm a little bit more forthcoming now about the effects of trauma. I understand it more. Looking back, and even now, I have to give myself grace that I didn't come out with dukes up. That's not my normal stance, but in my mind, well, that's what I should have done. I should have really right away stuck up for her. Giving myself a little bit of grace in that and realizing if I don't understand it, I have to give grace to the person (it's not easy) who is making an assumption about my child. 


I tell you, the one time that I do come out like a Sara (that's a new thing) is the assumptions that are made because my daughters are black. That is when I will come out like a crazy woman because I know. I know that's wrong. With the behavior stuff, it's a little bit more gray, but I'm shocked at the things people say because my daughters are black and assumptions they make about their birth moms, assumptions they make about our daughters. That does make me really mad and I will say something.


Sara Clime: I think that's really, I mean, I think that's a really good point too, especially for people who are in your situation who are caregivers and parents to children with behavioral, mental issues or disabilities. I have a cute little blonde-headed child in a wheelchair who has a terminal disease. Nobody's going to come and say he's expelled. In fact, he hit two teachers on a scooter because he won't slow down, and they say it’s just TJ; he's fine. They're going to get out of jail free card every single time because they don't want to be the person who does that. But with behavioral issues, it's so misunderstood. As you said, you would go to bat if they made any comment about them being black. 
Would you go back and tell yourself it's okay to go to bat for the behavioral as well, because even though you can't prove it. Whenever I gave the example of that doctor who shamed me, she was shaming me on things that had to do with MS, Multiple Sclerosis. My son has MD. One of the things I said was, “If you can get the acronym correct, we'll continue this conversation.” I was so angry by the end of it, but like I had scientific data. I knew what was right for my son. I had 10 years behind me. But we have probably people listening who are in the beginning stages. They think I don't know what to do. That's where you go back on that mama bear instinct. There's nothing like a mother's intuition. We talked about last month that caregiving and parenting are two totally separate things but there's a lot of crossover too.

Would you do it differently in the beginning if somebody said people don't need to understand the behavioral aspect of it for you to advocate, or is that maybe a personality thing?


Amy: I think I would do it differently. I think it goes back to what Carrie said, regardless of their behavior, their skin color, whether they're in a wheelchair or not, they are people made in the image of God. People just need to stop making assumptions about them. I've often wondered if they see my child's skin color and their behavior and make assumptions about those two together. I do think once I toughened up a little bit. If I could go back, I would be more mama bearish, I guess more advocating because you're right, they're made in the image of God. They're people. They may be behaving in a way that makes you uncomfortable. Trust me. It's making me uncomfortable too. I'm not just la-di-da. I think I would have probably advocated from that stance as opposed to the PowerPoint presentation on why they're behaving this way. Cause people still try to talk you out of it. I have friends who love me who still try to talk me out of their diagnosis because they see a glimpse of positive behavior. I don't know why people do that with invisible disabilities but they try to give you all these reasons why they don't think what you say is causing the behavior is causing the behavior. I don't understand that. But so I think coming about it from, well, whether you understand or not, they are people made in the image of God, and you really don't have the right to say anything.


Carrie: I think one of the things you're both saying is, I mean, we're all different people. So we all have different ways of reacting to these situations where we are misunderstood and definitely based on our child’s situation. I think, you know, for me, and obviously, Sara and I, our kids are a little bit similar in that we're dealing with medical. I've heard so many stories through the years in medical situations where doctors, nurses, or therapists don't listen to the parents. Amy, it's probably the same situation for you. They are going off based all on their own assumptions, and they're not actually listening to the parents saying, “this is what I'm seeing now.” Are there parents out there who are making up their kids’ diagnoses? I know Munchausen syndrome is real.


I don't even know if I said that properly. I get that. But for the most part, we need who we're dealing with in medical situations, school situations, and church situations to listen to the parents because they do know what they're talking about. My next question is, what about this occurring in a church setting, and what did you do? 


I mean, I think honestly, a lot of times I think our first reaction in a mama bear situation and being misunderstood is anger. I don't think that's necessarily bad. I mean, anger sometimes gets a bad rap. But anger and fight or flight is what causes us to be able to react and advocate. It's anger over the injustice. God gets angry over injustice. We know he's full of righteousness and justice. Obviously, He's perfect, and we're not. Do either of you have a story about a church situation and maybe how you handled it?


Amy: I'll go ahead. It's been several years ago, one of my children was acting out in church, and a woman came up to me and said, “My kids would never act that way.” 


Sara: Good for you, Karen.


Amy: Once again, Sara is so ready to go to bat for me in every situation.


Carrie: She is our enforcer.


Sara: You can hire me for any outing. The dysfunctional parrot on your shoulder.


Amy: I was mad and hurt and embarrassed that my kids were acting out yet again in church because it's not like nobody notices. It's not like they act out quietly in the bathroom where no one can see them. I remember saying to her, well, I'm so glad because that means your kids didn't grow up with the trauma that my kids did. Now I think earlier in my journey, I would not have said anything. It felt kind of good that I said that, but once again, and I don't mean to be a dead horse, we see negative behavior, and we have a very right and wrong kind of mindset. We cannot in our brains understand. Here's a common example with kids that come from trauma. If a kid's sexually abused, they may act out - a small child sexually. That's not the fault of the parent who is parenting that child. They came from trauma. Maybe they were adopted out of foster or whatever or whatever when they were in their birth families. I mean, that's not okay behavior, but we immediately put a moral value on it when in this situation, this is trauma. People have a really hard time not slapping a moral code on a child who steals because maybe they were starving. I have a kid who lied. He could lie and you'd believe everything he said because when you live in an orphanage and something gets broken, the kid who lies the best is the kid who doesn't get beat. That's just the bottom line. 

The moral police who come around, that's really frustrating, especially in church. I understand it a bit. Once again, we go back to trauma and churches understanding trauma and not ostracizing a family because their kids have behaviors that they think are morally wrong. 


Sara: I had to compose my thoughts on this. This is what I've had to tell myself so many times is, I don't know what is in that other person's heart. She could have been coming at it from a place of…she could have been coming out of a place of positivity of some sort that we don't understand. I hope that she's not, I'm gonna go shame her because that's ridiculous. I always have to remind myself that I don't know what's in that person's heart. That helps calm me down sometimes, but there's sometimes it doesn't.


Carrie: Out of the depths of the heart, the mouth speaks sometimes. 


Sara: Just because people have good intentions, I know I've had good intentions before, but have said some really boneheaded things. I'm glad when people redirect me on those. It's painful at the moment. I'm embarrassed at the moment. I feel guilt at the moment. But hopefully, out of all that, it redirects behavior. 

Carrie: Can I just say this, though? I think in that situation, Amy, you spoke truth and love, right? Like you didn't get into a debate with her. You spoke the truth about trauma and walked away and gave her something to think about. I think that's beautiful. 


Amy: I will say, though, I want to say one more point is that all the moms I know that have kids with behavioral, they don't feel comfortable at church because that's the most judgy place sometimes. That is unfortunate. That's not generous. That's not the grace of God. That really hurts. That makes me mad. I get Mama Bear in defense of these other moms who are younger than me and haven't walked this road. I want to say to the church, have some grace here, people. That's what we're supposed to be about. Unfortunately, not every church, but I've some of the stories I've heard from moms. It just really breaks my heart.


Carrie: I think that comes back to the misinformation about trauma and not equipping ourselves. Barb Stanley at Wonderful Work. She does a great job of walking through training for all the church workers about behavior and how to handle and how to talk to families and all that kind of stuff. We need more and more education and training on that kind of stuff. I think that's really important. 


I'd like to wrap up with this last question. I don't think we can always control what those initial fight-or-flight reactions are. 
The anger and all of that, when we come into a situation where we are put in a, put in a position of advocating or defending or all that. But a lot of times, as you said, Amy, we can feel shame and regret and frustration with ourselves because maybe we didn't react in the right way. How can we walk away from that situation and help ourselves or equip ourselves for future dealings with that? What I'm talking about is, what's a healthy way to react to ourselves later on, and what's an unhealthy way that we react to ourselves when we have had a mama-bear confrontation with somebody over a misconception.


Sara: I have learned to go with the path of least resistance when it comes to those situations. By the way, I know I've used the phrase mama bear, even in this thing. Why are we bears when we advocate for our children? This is such a tangent, but men are called involved dads. We're like the bear that's hibernated, and I was all fat coming out, angry, hungry. I digress.


Sara: One of the things that I have learned to do is the path of least resistance.  Sometimes that is keeping my mouth shut. For me, I know I just have a ready comeback. Sometimes in that moment, I have to pause. I have to count to five, and what is coming out of my mouth going to further the advocacy for my child or this person who they contact later? That's one thing. I know I've talked about it on here before, but I don't know if we've talked about it for a while. That's why I made up the stupid cards. Again, I want to put it out there, if I've handed you a stupid card, it's not because you said something stupid. That's not the reason why. It's just become that moniker for it. Basically, it is a picture of my son with his diagnosis, and somebody says something; that's why they came about, was people would say some really hurtful things. Telling their child that we must not be as blessed as them because my son has what he has. That was the turning point for me. Making up these cards was for me because at the moment, if I know Jesus will not come out of my mouth if Jesus is going to facepalm after I speak (there she goes again), that's when I get out those cards, and I just hand it to then. There's no explanation. That helps me, and I feel like I can advocate, but I can also at least come away being as kind as I can in that moment. 


Another thing that we have done from the very beginning is we talk to everyone. We are proactive. Can we come talk to you about our child's diagnosis? It's school staff, it's church leadership. If you say, I really want you to understand my child better because I know you want to serve him as the Lord intended. Can we come talk to you guys? What are they gonna say? No, if they do, maybe you need to find a new church. I don't know. I don't know your situation, but being very proactive, I think, helped us in the beginning too. 


Sara: And then counting to five, handing them a stupid card or not. I have at moments when somebody has said something really, really horrible and I knew I couldn't say anything. I remember one time in a grocery store, somebody said something horrible, and my son kind of looked at me. Even after I was talking about with that doctor, got out to the car, and I told TJ; we need to pray. So we prayed for that doctor, and we prayed for that person at the grocery store. Sometimes it is prayer that, please let them understand that what they said is hurtful. Please speak to their heart, because it wasn't my responsibility to. In a way, I'm teaching my son, II love you, and I can advocate for you, but there are some times when it's not my responsibility to set that person straight. We would say a prayer like that. It was very heartfelt. That's always helped, too, is to pray in the moment. If I need to do something else, or if I need to apologize for my behavior, please make that abundantly clear to me. 


Carrie: Amy, how about you?


Amy: I had a lot of conversations with my therapist about this because me and my feeling like I need to explain everything to make the shame glare not come at me and my child. I think what I have learned is to be able to say something similar to you. She comes from trauma. She's got some issues. If you'd like to know more about it, I would love to have a conversation. I stop it there because I don't need to be telling them everything. I think sometimes you want to justify why this is happening. But that's helpful to me to go, not everybody deserves to know all this. If someone really truly wants to know, then that's somebody worth talking to and investing in because they may be an advocate for your family. As far as how I've handled things and gone back and how could I be nicer to myself, well, I'm always way too hard on myself. So I think it's important as we talk about shame and guilt to name what happened, name the story you're telling yourself, and name the truth. I could be in that situation, let's say, with the principal. (Well, I could have so many situations.) I shouldn't have said that I'm bad, or I should have said more. The story I'm telling myself always is I could have done more. In reality, it was a really bad situation. And in a bad situation, when somebody's coming at you with accusations, most of us don't know what to do. And to be able to name that and go, yeah, I'm a good mom. I think I would tell myself you are a good mom, whether you were quiet, whether you were rude. That doesn't change what kind of mom I am and how I care for my child. I think that's something I would go back and tell myself again and again because I think I got in this little whirlpool of shame.


Carrie: I think that's so true because a lot of times what we react to tends to be, it tends to trigger something in ourselves of a lie that we've believed about ourselves: our worth and our value as a mom; how good of a mom are we because there's this misunderstanding or there's this misconception. 

I think asking God for help, and I think also just deciding on those situations when you're going to be proactive or reactive. Sara, when you're constantly encountering people who are saying, “Well, why does he walk sometimes and why does he not at others or it must be nice that you can pick and choose whether you walk or not.” There’s the idea of the sphere of influence, right? If it's a stranger on the street, they might not deserve our time, but if it’s a friend or someone at church, then I think it's that conversation. As Amy said, if you want to know more. I know one time my counselor said something similar to me. If you listen to the podcast for very long, you know how angry and upset I get about parking situations. But she said, “What can you do to equip yourself so you feel empowered in those situations?” Think about that when you, or you and your child, or your teenager or adult child, are coming across situations where you're misunderstood, or there's judgment, or there's assumptions made, how can you equip yourself to engage in that situation? Maybe it is coming up with three things that you can respond. Maybe it's having a card that you put on a car to educate someone about how their parking is ridiculous. It's that speaking love and truth phrase. This is why, if you'd like to know more, I would love to have a conversation with you. I think when we can, first of all, be kind to ourselves and show kindness, the reaction of anger over the injustice is very normal, and I think God-given the fight or flight, right? Then there are the ways that I can equip myself as a mom to be this loving advocate for my child and know and give ourselves grace that we're not always gonna do it well and right. 


Sara, I don't know if it was this episode or the last collaborative, but Jesus overturned the tables. Sometimes, I think we have difficulty discerning that through scripture, right? When anger, showing anger is okay, when it's not okay, all that kind of stuff. Amy, will you close us out with prayer?


Amy: Lord, first of all, thank you for this conversation. Thank you for the people that are listening that they will be encouraged by what we're talking about today. It is hard when we are misunderstood when our children are misunderstood, and that is an emotion that Christ is aware of in his life. Lord, we pray that you give us wisdom and grace, wisdom to know when to say something and when to not, and help us to continue to advocate for our kids. Help us also not to live in shame but to live knowing that you love us and see us and that you're walking with us. Amen.