The Bitter and The Sweet Podcast

One of your favorite guests and mine (bestselling author Mary Marantz) is back for a conversation you're going to love!

If you're feeling stuck and ready to go all-in on your purpose, Mary's new guided journal, "It's All Been Done Before (and Other Lies Fear Told Me): Practical Prompts to Quit Playing Small," is a great tool to help you fight back against fear and do just that.

Join Mary and I as we talk about the way we speak to ourselves (and how we would never speak that way to anyone else), breaking the motivation/defeat cycle, the patterns that keep us stuck, and walking in our purpose, even when we feel afraid.

LINKS

Connect with Mary on Instagram

Get your copy of Mary's new guided journal, It's All Been Done Before (and Other Lies Fear Told Me)

Get your copy of Mary's book, Underestimated: The Surprisingly Simple Shift to Quit Playing Small, Name the Fear, and Move Forward Anyway

Visit Mary's website

Connect with Kayla on Instagram

Visit Kayla's website

It is Pregnancy and Infant Loss Awareness month, which can often feel like something sad but distant...until it becomes part of your story.

It is part of my story, and part of the story of many of our friends we've had here on The Bitter and the Sweet podcast. As we walk through pregnancy and infant loss awareness month, I wanted to bring together parts of my conversations with friends who have been there and understand.

You'll get to hear from two dear friends of mine, as well as part of my own story of grieving the baby I lost to miscarriage and what that looks like now, years later.

Whether you have experienced pregnancy and infant loss or a different kind of grief, I hope you walk away from this episode knowing that you may never be the same, but you will be okay. There's hope here, always.

LINKS

Connect with Hannah on Instagram

Connect with Carried Ministries on Instagram

Listen to Isaiah's story on Episode 9 of The Bitter and the Sweet podcast

Listen to In Our Losses, We Are Carried- Episode 56 with Hannah

Listen to How to Grieve in a Healthy Way- Episode 57 with Hannah

Connect with Kendall on Instagram

Listen to Living Whole in Our Bodies After Loss- Episode 41 with Kendall

Listen to Episode 58- Then and Now: Grieving a Miscarriage with Kayla

Connect with Kayla on Instagram

If you've ever been wanted to just give up, this conversation is for you!

Today's episode is a conversation I got to have with my friend, Kaitlin Chappell Rogers. Kaitlin and I met at She Speaks back in 2019, and I'm so thrilled to have her on the show celebrating the launch of her brand new book, She Just Won't Quit.

Kaitlin is on staff at Proverbs 31 Ministries, wife to Caleb, and mom to three little boys. She is the host of The Comeback Couch podcast and the author of multiple books, including her latest, She Just Won't Quit: Embracing the Practice of Everyday Perseverance.

Kaitlin and I got to talk about if perseverance is something we are born with or something we develop (or both!), building resilience in our kids, telling the difference between burnout and just being tired and when there is something else like a mental health condition at play, and practical ways to build perseverance.

LINKS

Connect with Kaitlin on Instagram

Get your copy of Kaitlin's new book, She Just Won't Quit

Connect with Kayla on Instagram

Leave a review on Apple podcasts

When you look up and realize you've taken a wrong turn or gone down the wrong path, how do you find your way back to God?

My friend Ashley Martin and I got to talk about it, and I'm excited to revisit this conversation with you today.

Ashley is a teacher turned author and speaker, who has battled alcoholism and addiction, and who has been in recovery for 12 years now.

Join Ashley and I as we talk about:

• Ashley's story of recovery and finding her way back to God

• why we walk away from God to begin with

• how getting clear in our calling helps us fight shame

• things to look for and pay attention to if you are concerned someone you love may be struggling with alcohol

• practical ways to find your way back to God

• what Ashley would say to the person who is believing the lie that God doesn't want them back

LINKS

Listen to Ashley's second episode: Alcohol Recovery, Faith, and Finding God at Rock Bottom with Ashley Martin- Episode 80

Get your copy of Ashley's book, Lost No More

Connect with Ashley on Instagram

Visit Ashley's website

Connect with Kayla on Instagram

Visit Kayla's website

Become an email friend

What do we do with the space between what God could do and what He chooses to do? Where is He in our grief?

I got to have an incredible conversation about these things and more with a new friend of mine, Lisa Appelo.

Lisa is the mom of 7 who found herself as a sudden and unexpected widow. She writes about God's faithfulness in the hard places, and so though our stories our different, Lisa and I became fast friends. She is the author of two books, including her latest, God of Comfort: A Devotional Journal for the Grieving Heart.

Lisa and I got to talk about her experience with sudden loss, grieving while parenting, the space between what God could do and what He did do, and experiencing God as the God of Comfort.

LINKS

Get your copy of God of Comfort

Connect with Lisa on Instagram

Visit Lisa's website

Connect with Kayla on Instagram

Visit Kayla's website

Leave a review on Apple podcasts

What is grace? How does it meet us where we are?

This is the conversation I was so excited to have with a new friend of mine, Katie M. Kelley about her new book, Grace Will Be There: Finding God in the Life We Aren't Ready For.

Katie M. Kelley is a mother of eight in a beautiful blended family, a writer, teacher, and learner. She is a contributing writer to the Coffee + Crumbs blog as well as one of the podcast's co-host, and the author of multiple books for children and adults.

Katie and I got to talk about defining grace (this word we throw around so often!), what we miss about grace when we try so hard to be "good," the agency God has given us to participate in our own healing, and what faithfulness looks like.

LINKS

Get your copy of Grace Will Be There

Connect with Katie on Instagram

Visit Katie's website

Connect with Kayla on Instagram

Visit Kayla's website

Leave a review on Apple podcasts

September is National Recovery Month, and in honor of that, we've got a very special conversation for you today with my friend, Tara Norbeck.

Tara is an author and speaker whose newest book, Dear Mom of an Addict: Ten Truths You Need to Know to Parent Your Addicted Child and Reclaim Hope, was born out of what she has learned over years of parenting her son, who battles addiction.

Tara and I got to talk about her realization that addiction had entered her family, the difference between privacy and secrecy, navigating the chaos consequences of other people's choices, putting our hope in the person of Jesus vs in circumstances changing, unconditional love with conditional support, and much more.

There is something so generous about books and conversations that come from suffering, and Tara is wildly generous with her story for the sake of sharing hope and helping other families dealing with the fallout of addiction.

LINKS:

Connect with Tara on Instagram

Visit Tara's website

Get your copy of Dear Mom of an Addict

Connect with Kayla on Instagram

Visit Kayla's website (and become an email friend!)

Leave a review on Apple podcasts

It's our second birthday insert confetti poppers + party horn sounds and we are celebrating BIG around here!

Joining me for our second birthday celebration and EPISODE ONE HUNDRED is my favorite person, my husband, Garrett Cook, for a conversation all about celebration.

Garrett and I got to talk about why we need celebration, different perceptions about celebrating that keep us stuck, when to celebrate, and celebration when you're grieving.

You could be anywhere and could listen to anything, and I'm beyond grateful you spend time with me each week.

Happy 2nd Birthday, The Bitter & the Sweet podcast! The best is yet to come.

LINKS

Leave a rating and review on Apple podcasts

Connect with Kayla on Instagram

Visit Kayla's website and become an email friend

Because of Jesus, we walk in freedom, and yet we are called to walk in self-control. What does this look like to hold both?

In this short episode (less than 10 minutes!), I'm sharing a personal story of growing in self-control and two questions to ask when you're weighing self-control vs. freedom.

LINKS

Visit Kayla's website (become an email friend there!)

Connect with Kayla via Instagram

Leave a review on Apple Podcasts

If being hard on yourself is your default setting, this is your invitation to try something different.

In this short episode (less than 10 minutes!), we are talking about how Jesus describes Himself, where we see God's gentleness in the Old Testament too, and how the gospel invites us to come home to God.

Jesus Himself is gentle and lowly, and because He is, we can be too.

LINKS

Leave a review on Apple podcasts

Connect with Kayla on Instagram

Visit Kayla's website (and become an email friend there!)