This week we're discussing Helping Our Kids Grow Through Challenges.

Most solo parents spend a lot of energy learning how to survive their own hard seasons. But at some point, almost every solo parent faces a different kind of challenge: watching their kids go through something painful and not knowing how to actually help. Not just show up, but show up well. The instinct most of us bring to that moment is to do something. Fix it, explain it, or find the resource that finally makes it better. And more often than not, that instinct gets in the way.

What kids need from their parents in hard seasons is rarely what we expect. It's usually quieter, slower, and less about having the right answer than we'd like. And for solo parents who are already carrying their own grief or transition while trying to hold things together for their kids, learning to offer that kind of presence is a real and ongoing challenge.

Robert Beeson, Founder and CEO of Solo Parent, and Elizabeth Cole, single parent, sit down with pastor, author, and co-founder of For Girls Like You Ministries Jonathan Pitts, and his oldest daughter Alena Pitts Franklin. Jonathan became a solo parent to four daughters in 2018 after his wife Wynter passed away suddenly. Alena, his oldest, shares her perspective on those same years now as an adult and author of the devotional God Is: 60 Days of Learning Who God Is to Understand Who We Are. Together they offer an honest look at what kids actually need from their parents in hard seasons, what it means to grow alongside your children emotionally, and how to trust that God is working in your child's story even when you can't see it.

Key Insights from This Episode:

• Presence, not answers, is what children in hard seasons actually need from their parents. Sitting with your child in their pain, without rushing to fix it, communicates something words rarely can.
• You don't have to be emotionally healed to parent your kids through their healing. Shared humanity isn't a parenting weakness. It builds the kind of trust that holds through the hardest seasons.
• God is not absent from your children's story just because you can't control their outcome. He works through people and circumstances you didn't plan, and your kids are not solely dependent on you to find their way through.

Resources Mentioned in This Episode:

• My Wynter Season: Seeing God's Faithfulness in the Shadow of Grief by Jonathan Pitts
• She Is Yours: Trusting God As You Raise the Girl He Gave You by Jonathan Pitts
• God Is: 60 Days of Learning Who God Is to Understand Who We Are by Alena Pitts Franklin
• For Girls Like You Ministries
• The Emotion Wheel / Eight Core Emotions Framework
• The U Diagram / Friday-Saturday-Sunday resurrection framework (therapist Adam Young)
• Dr. Chip Dodd - Emotional Stability

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