October '24 in the SMP

Oct 09, 2024

Parent Survey Follow-up:

A HUGE thank you to those who filled out the Parent Survey I emailed out two weeks ago!! I’ve made some progress but am still working to communicate with the parents who requested to hear back from me. Please remember to keep an eye on your spam folder since I’ll be emailing from stoicmom@protonmail.com and many servers route protonmail out of the main inbox.

Also, to those who’ve engaged in deeper levels of support through the SMP (currently the community or coaching, and also podcast interviewees) who used the survey to share updates, gratitude, and words of encouragement, I want you to know that I was flooded with gratitude myself as I read through your comments. You’re amazing and I so appreciate you!!

Some definite themes emerged from the responses that I’d like to share:

First, I’m heartened by the number of parents who indicated that even though they see the world differently than their children, they still enjoy them! Parenting coach, Scott Noelle, insists that one of the greatest gifts we can give our children is to enjoy parenting them, and Dr. Gordon Neufeld encourages us to generously embrace our children in all their messiness and to convey our delight in them.

I also want to acknowledge just how difficult this can be–especially, if you truly are not experiencing this type of fondness for your child. I want to say this is hard and all your feelings of frustration, anger, betrayal, and even disgust if that’s present for you, are valid and justified. And, if you’re wanting to salvage the relationship, it might be important to seek some support or find other ways to work through these difficult emotions, so you can see and feel something more connecting when you look at your child.

Over 70% of survey respondents indicated that “if there were a way to be in healthy relationship with my child(ren) while still being honest and true to myself” that they’d be “very interested in learning about it and trying it out.”

There was also a considerable amount of interest in group coaching, so I’ve begun exploring what that might look like and how to best offer support to more parents in this way. It seemed a no-brainer that the focus of this group coaching program ought to be how to be in healthy relationship with our children while still being honest and true to ourselves! Not only do I think anyone who really wants this can work toward healthy, authentic relationships, I believe it’s vitally important both to our personal wellbeing and that of our family units.

What I’m currently imagining, is that through a small group coaching format, participants will be supported to develop Guiding Principles and Practices to navigate relationships with their grown children in a way that supports both connection and personal integrity. When I launched the SMP Center, it was clear that mamas needed a mom-only space to support each other through this circumstance and I was happy to be able to provide that. I’ve had some recent inquiries about what might be available to dads seeking similar support, and I think this group coaching offering might be the answer!

So for any parents of adult TI kids who would like to express interest, weigh in on how this offering is structured and what components are included, and receive a priority invitation when it’s ready to launch, you can opt-in to that correspondence (if you haven’t already done so) by following this link:

Podcast, Playlists, and YouTube

I currently publish all podcast episodes from this Substack (stoicmom.substack.com). The first episodes were recorded in the Spring of 2022 and things look very different now at the SMP! For so long, episodes were published pretty randomly—basically when I could get someone I felt aligned with the SMP culture to agree to be interviewed, and then when I was able to get the editing/producing/publishing tasks accomplished in between writing articles, coaching clients, and launching and managing the online SMP Center.

I’m now trying to meet a weekly publication schedule and sometimes I fail at it (like this last Sunday.) There are also different types of episodes so it’s still a little unpredictable.

Sooo, with that in mind, I’m hoping to clear things up a little (rather than make them more confusing; I guess we’ll see.) Here goes:

Currently there are the conversations along the way episodes that are broken into two categories:

Professionals who I believe have expertise that can help you regain solid ground and reframe this circumstance in a way that supports you to learn and grow from it. These are pretty intermittent as it’s still challenging to find a good fit with someone who is willing to come on the podcast. You can identify these episodes in the podcast archive by guest’s full name and title, and sometimes there’s a Q&A episode that follows the main conversation.
Mamas who have found healthy ways to navigate this destabilizing circumstance of parenting trans-identified adolescents and adult children; mamas whose stories and strategies may inspire you. Here I typically use only first name which are usually pseudonyms or online handles and it’s noted in the subtitle: conversations with stoic mamas along the way. There is a navigational tab for these episodes on the SMP Substack.

The Attachment Matters series that I co-host is also published here for now. In this series, Rose and I discuss the Neufeld model of attachment and maturity and how to apply the model to the challenges of parenting trans-identified kiddos. These episodes are currently recorded and published every 3rd week. The next AM episode will be a Q&A and it’s scheduled to publish Oct 20.

Here is a link to instructions if you’re needing support to listen to any of these conversations on your favorite podcast player. The podcast is currently searchable and you can subscribe through the Substack app, Spotify, Pocket Casts, and YouTube. Search “The StoicMom Project” to locate the podcast.

Substack does not currently offer me a way to sort the different types of conversations into playlists for you other than to create a page and manually add the titles (like I’ve done for the conversations with stoic mamas.) This also means they’re intermingled on the other podcast players.

However, YouTube makes this really easy. So, if you like playlists, I’d encourage you to subscribe to my YouTube channel which would also support me to help get the free SMP podcast content in front of more parents who could use it. Liking the episodes, as you probably already know, also helps tremendously!

So, I’m crossing my fingers this was helpful? Maybe it was just TMI? If you have more questions about the podcast, please use the comment section and I’ll do my best to provide more ease when it comes to accessing this audio content.

First Guest Post!

Walk With Mom recently hit the Substack scene with her beautiful article published over at Reality’s Last Stand. Some SMP community members alerted me to it and I got pretty excited at how aligned her approach was with the SMP. Imagine my excitement to discover that I already knew this wise mama! I was so grateful when she excepted my invitation to guest author a piece for The StoicMom Project and to agree to let me engage with her piece in a response piece. Both were well received and widely read by the SMP audience, but in case you missed those, here are quick links:

The Third Path: Supporting My Trans Identified Daughter by Focusing on Connection by Walk With Mom

Who do they need us to be? Updated thoughts on responsibility by Stoicmom

I couldn’t be more thrilled with the way the SMP is growing and the impact it’s making on the parent experience! As we head into the final stretch of 2024, a year that continues to challenge humanity and test our resilience, it might be more important than ever to turn inward and notice what type of story you’re inhabiting—will you recall it as a tragic tale or a Hero’s journey? Have you already written the ending or does your curiosity remain intact? I hope you hold that pen yourself.

The StoicMom Project