The Lisa Show

For many women, there is no version of starting over more difficult and overwhelming than unexpected childlessness. Many plan on being parents, and even base their identity around that plan. So when unforeseen circumstances make having children impossible, they have to start over--not just with their life plans, but with how they see themselves. In this episode of the Lisa Show's series on Startin...

As a parent, it can feel like every waking moment is dedicated to taking care of the people who need our help. There's always another diaper change, or soccer practice, or choir recital, or meal to make, and there doesn't seem to be any time left over for ourselves. So how can we make and keep friendships with anyone other than our partner? In this episode of the Council of Moms, Lisa is joined by...

For many full-time parents, starting a family may have cut short plans to finish a degree or pursue the career we'd always thought about. Or maybe, we realize decades later that the career we chose isn't what we want to do anymore. Whatever the reason, going back to school later in life can be intimidating, unknown, and downright expensive. So what does starting over look like as a non-conventiona...

We're constantly surrounded by horrible, heartbreaking news from around the world. There is so much war and cruelty that it's hard to avoid. But for our kids, their often hearing about these things without being old enough to truly understand what they're hearing about. And not to mention everything else a kid is dealing with while trying to figure out who they are and who they want to be. So as p...

When Ashlynn Mitchell’s husband came to her and said he wanted a divorce, her whole life turned upside down. Suddenly her goals, dreams, and hopes for the future changed, and she didn’t know if she could go on alone. Ashlynn shares how reevaluating her life goals, rebuilding trust in herself, and nourishing self-love helped her along on her long journey of reconnecting with herself after divorce.

As parents it's not uncommon that we spend so much time focusing on taking care of the kids, putting food on the table, and making sure life doesn't fall apart at the seams that we don't find time to work on our own social circles. So what do we do when the kids are becoming independent and we have a little more free time, but it's been years since we tried making a new friend? In this episode of...

In November 2008, Lara Love Hardin was arrested in her suburban home. Her habit of pretending to have a perfect life had led to an opioid addiction, which had imploded her life completely. Now, she’s a bestselling author who has worked with Oprah and the Dalai Lama—and most importantly, she no longer has to pretend. In this episode, Lara shares her story of starting over after drug addiction.

In this week's Council of Moms, Lisa is joined by Lavonne Wells, Shari Lyon, and Brittney Phillips to answer a listener-submitted question: What do you do when your teenager doesn't seem to care about school, and you can tell they're heading down a difficult path?

Whether we like it or not, almost all of us will find ourselves in the position of wanting to start looking for love at some point in our lives. Maybe it's after a summer fling as teenagers, or maybe it's after the end of a decades-long marriage. For Shannon Jenkins, host of the Starting Over podcast, it was after deciding to leave a toxic marriage with her young son. In this first episode of The...

In this holiday edition of the Council of Moms, Lisa sits down with Kacy Faulconer, Gina James, and Katie Craig about intentionally creating and maintaining holiday traditions. They discuss Christmas music, making memories, and family time.

Whether we hear about it or not, lots of parents are very judgmental of the way other people raise their kids. We're all trying our best, but that looks so different from family to family, and it can be so easy to fall into the trap of thinking everyone else is doing it wrong. So what do we do when someone criticizes the way we're parenting? And how can we be better at not doing that ourselves? Li...

In the last episode of The Lisa Show’s caregiving series, Lisa explores a topic inseparable from caregiving: spirituality. How does caregiving change relationships with God? How can we reconcile faith in a loving God with the suffering of our loved ones? Lisa talks with Sheila Welch, Kara Ryska, David Schenck, Aisha Adkins, and Jillian Benfield about how caregiving can reveal miracles and change o...

Lisa is joined by Jillian Benfield and Usha Tewari in a conversation about how to find community, how to build community, and how to leverage the strength of a community to make life better for all caregivers. Featuring Billie Short, Elizabeth Miller, and Shana Jones.

We’re putting the finishing touches on the last two episodes of our Caregiving series, and we want to make sure we’re telling those stories exactly the way they deserve to be told. So while we’re making our final edits, we wanted to share with you a special caregiving story from our sister podcast, Constant Wonder. Prem Jauhar was a world-class agricultural scientist—an inspiration to his son Sand...

Every year it feels like there's a new kind of phone, a new social media app, or some new tech that our kids want to try. And as parents, it can feel impossible to keep up with. What is safe for them to use, and at what age? Is it even possible to protect them from the harmful influences on the internet? In this episode of The Council of Moms, Lisa talks with Gina James, Emilie Starr, and Julie Ta...

Any caregiver will tell you that maybe one of the harshest realities of taking care of another person is just how much time you spend dealing with the "system"--meaning meeting with doctors, making calls to insurance providers, emailing pharmacies, working with government programs, and handling all of the logistical pieces necessary to support someone who needs it. It can become a full-time job in...

As parents, it seems like every year there's a new trend that becomes the absolute priority for parents. One year, it's cleanliness. The next, is early literacy. The next, it's formula, or not formula, or whatever the current conversations says? Who can keep up? In this episode of The Council of Moms, Jeanette Bennett, Brooke Hoopes, and Amy Hackworth join Lisa to discuss the things that they wish...

Many caregivers feel the approach of inevitable change to their role, and an "end" to the way life looks and feels right now. Lisa is joined by Emilie Campbell, Richard Lui, Barbara Karnes, Elizabeth Miller, and John Sovec to explore the nuances of transitioning to the "after" stage of caregiving, whether that looks like empty nesting, transitioning to residential care, or becoming a "Godspeed Car...

A lot of parenting advice out in the world makes one key assumption: that you're an active and involved parent who has a drive to get better. But for many, if not all parents, there comes a time when burnout hits a climax and it can be easy to forget why you're trying so hard in the first place. So what do you do? Host Lisa Valentine Clark chats with fellow parents Suzanne Clark, Colleen Harker, a...

When you're spending all of your time taking care of another person, it feels like everything else in your life comes second to the needs of that person. Family, friends, jobs, everything can take a backseat when you're in the trenches of being a caregiver. But when caregiving stretches from weeks to months to years, life without those other relationships can become much more difficult and unfulfi...

When kids grow up and leave the house, it can be so hard to know just how involved we should be in their lives. We don't want to be "helicopter parents" to grown adults, but we also don't want to completely give up on trying to protect them from harm and help them make good choices. So how can we as parents support our kids' mental, emotional, and physical health, while also letting them spread th...

You wake up at 4 a.m. freezing cold, trembling, and with a feeling of despair. What's happening here? Caregiver burnout can look different for everyone, ranging from quiet chronic fatigue, to drastic health declines, as the physical, mental and emotional toll of caregiving reaches critical mass. In this episode, three caregivers (Mishka Sibert, Susanne White, and Rach Wilson) share their unique ex...

With a teenager at home, it can always feel like you're doing something wrong as a parent. You're asking too many questions, you're enforcing too many rules, you aren't involved enough or offering the support that they need. It can be a particularly complicated stage of parenting. So how can we know when we should "helicopter" parent our kids and establish more boundaries, and when should we back...

It's a phrase that is all too familiar to every caregiver. Some well-meaning person, in an attempt to show their support, will say, "Let me know what I can for you!" While on the surface it may seem like a helpful thing to say, for the caregiver, this phrase is often just a superficial act that only serves to increase the amount of stress on their already-full plate. So what SHOULD someone do when...

When you're taking care of kids, it can feel impossible to do everything that you want to do in a day. There's taking the kids to school, exercise, making meals, working, cleaning, shopping, picking up the kids, taking them to practice, helping them with homework, keeping up with friends, running a side-hustle, and THEN you're also supposed to somehow have your own hobbies and take time for self-c...