Don't Mom Alone Podcast

I’m excited to welcome back Mo Isom Aiken   to the podcast. She writes and speaks powerfully about how God has redeemed her own brokenness and set her on a path to challenge, encourage and equip other Christ followers. In this episode we talk about how each of us was made for true intimacy with God on a heart level.  “The ultimate will of the Father is to know him intimately and to be known by him...

When it comes to learning differences and special education diagnoses, it can feel overwhelming and defeating to see your child struggle. My guest Kerri Irvin is a dyslexia specialist who has worked with countless children, teens and adults to help them thrive and embrace their learning differences.  “It amazes me the gifts that God provides for all children, alongside their challenges. For every...

“What’s something you’ve grown in but at different speeds?”. After collecting listener questions, this question stood out to my husband Bruce. So instead of doing a general Q and A episode (in honor of our 22nd wedding anniversary), we decided to discuss Bruce’s journey in learning how to identify what he is feeling, labeling it and sharing it with others.  Listen to how we learned to process our...

David Thomas and I talked for SOOOO long in our interview because he's the BEST. The last part of our convo was specific to handling screen time with boys. The DMA team figured we could shorten the main episode by releasing this part separately. Of course, David and I did not cover every angle of managing technology (people write whole books on that topic). But I hope it helps you feel less alone...

Understanding the emotions of boys is a challenge no matter the age. Anxiety that presents as anger or distraction. Depression shows up as low-grade irritability. David Thomas returns to the show to answer listener questions about all things boy. David is a family therapist and director at DayStar Counseling Center in Nashville. He has lots of experience counseling families and children and has a...

The topic of racial inequality and the need for reconciliation and education on race in America is a BIG. It can seem overwhelmingly big when it comes to teaching our kids how to be allies for people who are different from them.    My guest Kirsten Watson breaks down why we shouldn’t shy away from these conversations, but how to show our children the importance of diversity and how to righteously...

My guest Jackie and her husband David always thought they would foster and maybe adopt. After starting a family of their own, fostering siblings for a time and having twins, a viral photo of a malnourished orphan in Ukraine changed everything.  As Jackie and her family prayed for the boy to be adopted and cared for, God spoke to her heart. “There were plenty of reasons that we could come up with,...

Have you read the whole Bible? That was the question my guest Tara-Leigh Cobble struggled to answer while talking to a pastor friend. As she thought back through her life growing up in a Christian home, being involved in church and now working in full-time ministry and she couldn’t say for sure that she’d really read ALL of the Bible.  So she started a chronological reading plan to read it all, ev...

Sissy Goff is one of our favorite counselors to have on the show and she’s back with us to talk about her new guide for helping teen girls with worry and anxiety . But beyond that she offers hope and help for all of us as we experience hard emotions in the midst of this pandemic. We talk about strategies for working through worry and anxiety for different ages and stages of kids and for us as moms...

Amber O’Neal describes herself as a homeschooling mama using Charlotte Mason principles in an atmosphere where “Charlotte Mason wears an afro.” She joins me to talk about how she unexpectedly found she loved homeschooling and working to help her kids love themselves and others. “The Holy Spirit is the supreme educator and the Holy Spirit will speak directly and work directly with our children just...

Harville Hendrix, PhD and his wife Helen Hunt, PhD have been helping couples for years as therapists, authors and speakers. They are on a mission to share the concepts of safe conversations with the world. They join me to share how their method can help us have more effective in-depth conversations with our spouse and children. This works every time. It works with parents, with children and couple...

Our kids begin to feel and respond to shame as early as 15 to 18 months of age. Those early moments can begin a lifelong struggle with feeling unworthy, inadequate and unlovable. Shame also disintegrates us (separating our thinking brain from our feeling brain) and isolates us from others.  My guest is Dr. Curt Thompson, a psychiatrist and expert on the effects of shame and how to find freedom fro...

I love Kirk’s realistic approach to parenting. He understands what your home dynamics are like. And gives practical tips. After listening to today’s episode you will have at least three different “tricks” to apply. Most of all, I’m thankful for the new perspective he has given me. Kirk helped me recognize how emotionally invested I was in my boys’ behavior and freed me from the need to regulate th...

This episode originally aired in Nov 2016 Today’s guest is Christy Nockels, Dove award winning musician and mom to three children. In 2006 she made the God-led choice to step away from the music industry, for a time, to pour into her family. In 2016 she released the solo Christmas album, “The Thrill of Hope”. With a blend of classic Christmas carols and original pieces, she has crafted a beautiful...

This is episode originally aired in Nov of 2015.  Our copy is duct-taped and well-loved. . . My oldest son beamed telling me how he’s read the whole Bible in a couple weeks. . . It’s sold almost 2 million copies. . . Children (and adults) have been wooed by the story of their Great Rescuer. Of His ‘Never-Stopping, Never Giving Up, Unbreaking, Always and Forever Love.’ And now “The Jesus Storybook...

"We can feel isolated – that’s real, but we can’t stay there. We have the entire trinity on our side, the Father loving us fiercely and making a good plan, the Holy Spirit interceding on our behalf, our coheir Christ interceding and making a way for us. Don’t believe the lie that it’s all on your shoulders, and it’s all up to you and you have no clue where to go or what to do.  He is a very big Go...

Between the pandemic and uncertainty of this last year and all the pressure of the upcoming holiday season, there is a lot of potential for conflict. My friend and mentor Lynn Hoffman is here with some timely advice on how to engage in this inevitable conflict in a healthy way. We talk about doing some inner work when you feel hurt by someone or see conflict on the horizon and Lynn shares some sto...

You know who is coming to town. The big man in the red suit is everywhere this time of year and each of us grew up with different traditions on how to engage with and celebrate Santa.  My assistant Sarah-Jane and I chat about what it was like for each of us growing up with and without Santa and how we acknowledge the jolly yuletide figure with our kids without taking the focus off Jesus. Sarah-Jan...

As a mom of three small children, author and podcaster Tsh Oxenreider found Christmas a bit overwhelming and as Charlie Brown would say, “too commercial.” Year after year she found herself dreading the season and looking for simple ways to refocus the holiday on the things that mattered most.  After living overseas for a year with her family and switching to a more liturgical church, Tsh found the...

Do  you  ever  find  yourself  replaying  and  reliving  the details of the deepest hurt in your life? My guest today has endured a devastating, public heartbreak – and she has wrestled with the lingering,unresolved pain which followed. Author and speaker Lysa TerKeurst joins me to share part of her  journey of  learning to forgive what you can’t forget. “I don't want to make this sound more clean...

As a long time believer, my friend Molly just couldn’t see much value in prayer. With her always on-the-go personality and her full life raising three boys with her husband, taking the time to sit in silence and pray seemed unappealing. Besides, doesn’t God already know what’s going to happen?  But, something shifted in a big way for Molly as she started to learn more about the Holy Spirit and met...

With the heaviness of 2020 weighing on so many moms, I thought this week we should share a few laughs. My assistant Sarah-Jane Menefee joins me to share some funny mom stories we’ve experienced and stories that listeners submitted.  We’ve got everything from simple misunderstandings to funny church stories to the ever-popular and unavoidable poop stories. I also share a tip on one way to remember...

Several listeners recommended Dr. Rosaria Butterfield as a guest on our recent survey. I’m so glad you did! Dr. Butterfield shares about her former life as a lesbian and professor of queer theory. In a quest to understand why Christians hated her, a neighbor introduced her Christ. Now she is an author, speaker, pastor’s wife,  adoptive mother of four and gospel advocate to her neighbors.  She is p...

Whether we like it or not we have habits that define our lives. We have habits that determine when we wake up, how we spend our time and where we focus our energy. Joining me today to talk about how to establish routines and healthy habits is my good friend Kat Lee.  As the founder of Hello Mornings , Kat is all about helping people have a life-giving morning routine every day in as little as thre...

Marriage can be really hard. You start out so in love and excited but over time the daily strain of work, home, and parenting makes it challenging to connect with your spouse. Add a global pandemic and the strain is just overwhelming.  My guests Brent and Janis Sharpe are both Licensed Marriage and Family Therapists who have been married for 42 years. They are passionate about helping couples have...