June '25 in the SMP
dealing with the wreckage
June in The Tapestry
The SMP continues to evolve and change and hone how we support parents navigating the challenging cultural terrain of gender and identity with their children.
The construction in the online community (for moms only) is coming along and we’ll hopefully wrap up this major 2025 remodel by end of June, fingers crossed! Much gratitude to our current membership for their patience and support through the changes. <prayer hands>
We’ve adopted a weaving theme in this private coaching community to reflect the intentional story work we do in there, and renamed it: The SMP Tapestry. Please note that it is still part of the StoicMom Project. I’m hoping by adding Tapestry to the name, it helps to distinguish the community (housed on the Mighty Networks platform) from this Substack.
All of it contributes to our mission at the SMP to support parents to navigate this cultural phenomenon with as much grace and dignity as possible, keeping families whole (even if currently disconnected,) and strengthening our inner resources to increase compassion and connection.
Attachment Matters
Rose has launched the new Resources and Reflections content on the Attachment Matters Substack—which I’ve been cross-posting to the SMP Substack. This will soon be for paid members only as will the opportunity to submit questions for our Q&A episodes. Our first S2 Q&A is scheduled to record July 1. If you’d like to submit a question for Rose and me to answer, you’ll want to become a paid subscriber to the Attachment Matters Substack (details coming soon on how to submit questions!):
The Wreckage
If you have a trans-identified child and recognize the potential hazards of the identity, there’s a good chance your family has endured harm: to the integrity of the family system; to its members’ health whether that be physical, mental, emotional, spiritual or all of the above; to the relationships among your family members; to your sense of self and trust in institutions, etc.
So many ways that families have been harmed. So much loss; so much to grieve. Grieving is not only important, but necessary for your health and your future.
Anger is also important to the healing process. Anger is protective and it gives us the energy and drive to assert our boundaries and make changes in our lives. Mamas will use that anger to protect their children, their families, their dignity.
Many will also use it to shield their hearts and prevent the sadness that grief requires to do its necessary work on us. It’s normal to experience anger when we endure intense loss. It often stems from a sense of unfairness, frustration, and helplessness.
If this anger keeps us stuck in the thought that something that is happening shouldn’t be happening, we’ll remain victims of the circumstance. Instead of processing our loss and all the difficult feelings that come with that, we’ll project our discomfort into the world and be chronically driven by fear and anger. Both will wreak havoc on our health and our relationships, and ultimately the quality of our lives.
It’s important that we find ways to process these emotions and environments where our grief is allowed, where we feel safe to let our tears of futility and loss flow so that we can experience the resulting sense of restoration and new creative energy. It’s from this more grounded and renewed place that we operate more effectively, with more compassion, and with access to new possibilities that we couldn’t see through our lens of fear and anger.
How scary is the sadness that awaits you? How would it be for you to pick through the broken things, letting the tears flow as you take stock of your losses? How does it feel to allow the knowledge that life is never going back to the way it was before disaster struck? What would it be like to accept this and start rebuilding something new, more resilient, more rich?
Yes, the harm happened. It was devastating and terrifying and tore through your life like a hurricane wrecking all in its path. What happens now? How long do you sit in the wreckage, cursing the disaster, trying to figure out how to make the hurricane pay or how to repair that which was shattered?
Does your anger still feel really important, maybe the most important of the painful feelings? Perhaps, it’s keeping you focused on ensuring hurricanes stop happening, because they shouldn’t be wrecking people’s lives like this!
I know many are reading this and objecting to the metaphor of a natural disaster like hurricanes when we’re talking about something that seems more controllable: human behavior.
Is it possible that this belief protects us from the pain of recognizing that this is an illusion? That control of others has always been limited and tenuous? And that to hold others responsible for our own pain is equally ineffective over the long term?
Accepting this truth can feel unbearable—that our control was always limited, and that the world doesn’t work the way we thought or hoped it would. But grieving our losses while taking honest responsibility for how we meet this reality may be what finally liberates us from fear’s hold.
The harm is real and damage has been done, there’s no doubt. Yet victimhood is a frame of mind; one that keeps you chained to the tragedy, and also one that it’s possible to free yourself from.
It can seem really frightening, even not okay, to consider no longer experiencing the relentless stress and angst that tends to take up residence in us after a tragedy–especially when the damage it caused is undeniable. As I mentioned above, if anger or desperation continues to feel like the most important part of the experience, you’re likely not ready to let go of the protective function of these feelings.
Wherever you are in your process—resistant, raw, raging, or on your knees—you’re not doing it wrong. However, if you’re feeling weighted down, devitalized, and like nothing you’re doing is working anymore, maybe choosing to try something different could begin to restore your sense of agency—and self.
As a Jungian trained coach, I have an understanding of how the psyche protects us from what seems like unbearable truths. With special interests in human attachment models and the power of faith, plus being the mother of a trans-identified young adult, I bring a unique set of insights and supports for parents navigating the darkness of this moment, with the possibility of finding a way through.
If you’re open to the idea that there can be lightness and joy again, and you’re willing to look inward to find the way, the SMP wants to help you move in that direction.
I’ve opened up some discovery sessions if you’d like to talk through your personal situation and see if there are SMP offerings that might support you where you are. These are complimentary sessions, and I’m afraid I’m only able to offer four of them at this time.
You can schedule here (if spots remain available): book a discovery session with StoicMom.
“God breaks the heart again and again and again until it stays open.”
-Hazrat Inayat Khan