Ep. 272: What’s Died and Come Alive in My Heart, Home and Business This Year

by | April 20, 2025

Ep. 272: What’s Died and Come Alive in My Heart, Home and Business This Year

by | April 20, 2025

The Fresh Start Family Show
The Fresh Start Family Show
Ep. 272: What's Died and Come Alive in My Heart, Home and Business This Year
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In this special Easter episode, Wendy Snyder opens her heart wide to share a deeply personal reflection on what has died and what has come alive in her heart, home, and business over the past year. With themes of rebirth, courage, faith, grief, advocacy, and radical love, Wendy invites listeners into her evolving journey as a Christ-centered parent and leader. This episode is both a sacred pause and a powerful encouragement to stop hiding, start rising, and live more fully in alignment with your convictionsโ€”even when itโ€™s hard.

Wendy speaks candidly about what it means to let go of people-pleasing, find deeper nervous system peace, and embrace faith that feels safe, affirming, and inclusive. Whether youโ€™ve walked a similar path or are simply curious about what it looks like to stand strong in your values while continuing to grow and heal, this episode will touch your heart and spark important reflection. It’s an invitation to rise into new life with grace, grit, and bold compassion.

Ready to rewire your money patterns, build systems that support you, and unlock the abundance waiting for youโ€ฆwithout hustle, sacrifice, or high-functioning financial stress?

Register TODAY for this incredible FREE 3-Day Workshop, Good With Money, with bestselling author, entrepreneur, and financial wellness teacher Kate Northrup.

Episode Highlights:
  • Grief and growth can coexist. Even in seasons of deep heartbreak, beauty, healing, and spiritual awakening can rise from the ashes.
  • There is sacred power in surrender. Letting go of what no longer servesโ€”old mindsets, expectations, rolesโ€”opens the door to fresh callings, new beginnings, and deeper purpose.
  • You are allowed to pause. Not everything needs to be fixed, pushed through, or perfected. Sometimes the bravest thing is to sit in the hard and let it shape you.
  • Divine timing is real. The path doesnโ€™t always make sense in the momentโ€”but what feels like a detour might be sacred redirection toward something even more meaningful.
  • Youโ€™re not alone in the wrestle. When your faith feels stretched thin, when you’re angry or confused with Godโ€”those moments donโ€™t disqualify you. Theyโ€™re holy, too.
  • Legacy is being rewritten. Healing generational pain isn’t just about parenting differentlyโ€”itโ€™s about embodying peace, presence, and purpose that ripple through time.
  • This journey is about wholeness, not perfection. Whether youโ€™re rebuilding from loss or growing through discomfort, your story is unfolding exactly as it needs to.
Resources Mentioned:

Follow Wendy on Instagram

Catch this full episode on YouTube!

Don’t miss out on Kate Northrup’s FREE 3-Day Good with Money Workshop starting April 17th. Register today!

Books/People/Episodes/Websites to explore as you learn more about being affirming and inclusive:
Books, Articles & Studies:

Podcast Episodes:

Experts & Thought Leaders Referenced:

Documentaries / Media Clips:

Unable to listen, or prefer to read along? Here’s the transcript!

00:01

Hello families. Happy Easter. Happy Easter. It is Easter Sunday on the day of the release of this podcast episode. And I am really excited to get this episode into your hands.  I’m a wee bit nervous too, because this is one of my more vulnerable episodes, but I’m also really excited.  I love Easter so much. You’re going to hear me talk about that in this episode,  but  this conversation that I’m having today with you, that is really just an authentic

00:30

honest share about the incredible amount of growth and healing that I have endured  or experienced, I should say,  over the last year has been just really, really profound for me. And I hope that it inspires you to lean into what type of healing and growth that you are being called into.  So the things I’m going to share with you in today’s episode is very personal to me, and it is the direction that I have.

00:57

really felt that small still voice of God calling me into. And so as you listen, remember that you probably are  maybe experiencing a different type of calling. I think everyone here at Fresh Start Family who listens to this podcast and enjoys learning with me, whether you’re  a student inside of our foundations course or a first-year experience program, or maybe you’re in  one of our higher level programs, or maybe you’ve just been listening to the podcast since we started this podcast three, four years ago.

01:26

But everyone in this community, I believe,  has a deep calling to upgrade their family legacy, to break painful generational cycles, to really expand and learn new tools  and grow and strengthen their family. And so much of the time, that means that you are going to be operating in a much different way than a lot of the rest of culture.  And so as you hear me share  my story, just part of my story of what it looks like,

01:56

to really anchor down into confidence around who I am,  specifically the type  of Christian that I want to show up  as. You’re going to hear me kind of talk more about what my faith journey has looked like today,  but also the type of parent I want to be, the way  I want to raise my children,  the way I believe is  really in line with my values and my morals and ethics as I show up  in the world every day that I have breath in my lungs.

02:25

that is unique to me and you have your own calling. And so everybody who’s here often really has this calling to, whether it’s no longer hurt and harm your children and force them into submission. Maybe you are in religious circles where that is taught, that is preached, and that is the norm. Or maybe you just grew up in a home where hurting and harming and shaming and yelling and reactive parenting and the…

02:53

lack of peaceful conflict resolution was the norm, and now you are choosing to do things different. Whatever it may be, I think a lot of us who listen to this podcast and are here for the conversation have that in common. And again, part of my job as one of your key encouragers in life, as your positive parenting coach, mentor, encourager, it’s really going to be to fill you up to be someone who can stand on their own two feet.

03:23

and care more about what you think than your mother-in-law.  Care more about what you believe and that intuition inside of you  that is calling you forward to show up in this one life we get to live  in a way that later, 50 years down the road, 60 years down the road, you’re gonna look back on  and say, I am so thankful  that I chose to live a life that was true to myself, not what other people expected of me.  And so that is the big message you’re gonna hear from me today.

03:52

Thank you so much for holding space for my story. Thank you for being the kind of family who sticks around even if you don’t agree with me on everything I believe 100%. I am interested in surrounding myself with parents and families and if you happen to be a family of Christian faith too, I’m interested in surrounding myself with people who honor people who aren’t 100 % perfect, mimic, you know, mirrors of them.

04:23

you get to have your own set of beliefs and I get to respect you for your set of beliefs  and I get to have my own set of beliefs and you get to respect me for my own set of beliefs, right?  And so thank you for being that type of family.  And for the  so many of you who are just, I think,  so happy to hear me speaking more about what you’re going to hear me talk about today  because you have been searching for more  healthy circles.

04:53

in  your faith journey,  then I’m so happy that you’re here  and you are not alone.  And together, the more we are outspoken about living a life that is  healthy, inclusive, full of justice and joy and doing work that we feel like is truly in line, again, for those of us who are Christians, truly in line with the life of Jesus,  then  the more other people get permission,

05:21

to also live a life like that and not live in fear  and hiding  and submission and suppression or just following along with the status quo because that’s what everyone else is doing.  The more we find courage to stand on our own two feet  and surround ourselves with other brave people who are choosing to really  become educated and confident  in,  again, not just

05:49

teachings we’ve always had, but our intuition, our  bodies,  the small still voice of God, the direction we’re being called into, the more we learn to trust that and surround ourselves with other people  who are practicing that ability too,  I believe  the more goodness and light we spread in the world and the more healthy circles  we’re going to see, especially in religion,  pop up in every city across this world. So  thank you for being here. Enjoy this episode and I hope you just have

06:19

the best  Easter ever.  Be present with your children. Know that I see you, I admire you, and I’m always over here cheering you on. All right, enjoy this episode.

Main Episode:

Wendy (00:08.109)

All right, this is our annual Easter episode called, what am I calling this one?

Wendy (00:23.724)

I am picture in picture mode closed to maintain.

Wendy (00:41.582)

Listed to prevent it from affecting the recording quality. Check your device specs and try again. Picture in picture mode. Okay, we don’t want that. Okay.

Okay, this episode.

Wendy (01:02.682)

called just scroll down here

Wendy (01:17.218)

This episode is called my annual Easter episode, What’s Died and Come Alive in My Heart, Home and Business this year. Let’s do this. Let’s do this.

Wendy (01:33.102)

Hello families and welcome to my annual Easter episode. At the time of recording right now, it is Lent and many of us spend this time of year just preparing our heart for Easter. One of my favorite holidays of the year. And man, I love Easter so much. I love Christmas, yes. I love Thanksgiving. I love my birthday. But man, Easter holds a special.

place in my heart. There is just so much goodness that comes out of Easter. feel like it is such a joyous part of the year for me. And yeah, it just is one that symbolizes rebirth and light returning and fresh starts. And y’all know I love a good fresh start. So yeah, it’s just a time of year where I really find myself reflecting.

and looking at the past year and really asking myself, okay, what has died, so to speak, this last year? And because of that, what has there been room to grow provided, so to speak? And I have so much to share with you this year. I’ve recorded the same episode now, I think for, this is my third year doing this, and I really enjoy sharing my heart with you.

And so I hope you will enjoy this episode and I will tell you that this will have a lot of faith-based elements in it because my faith is such a big part of my journey as a positive parenting educator and family life coach. The work I do day in and day out to support families and parents and children. I really am a child advocate at my core. I just help children through helping parents, but everything I do,

is affected by my faith. so this episode, as I share these things with you today, is going to have a lot of faith elements. And if that interests you and you want to hear more about that and that sounds cool to you, stick around. I’m so happy to have you here. It is a big one where I’m going to share some vulnerable things with you. And I think you’re really going to enjoy it. And I will also say that if you’re just not into the faith discussion at all,

Wendy (03:53.314)

That is so cool too. We have over 250 episodes here at the Fresh Start Family Show now that you can go dive into. We’ve got so many strategy episodes around strong-built kids or compassionate discipline or setting firm limits. We’ve got so many beautiful episodes with authors and experts that are not faith-based at all. So if you’ve been harmed by faith or religion or if it just repels you, I just want you to know that I get it.

And that’s okay. And for those of you who are interested in this episode and are excited to dig in and have conversations around faith, evolving faith and what has my specific journey looked like for the past year for sure, but really over the last three, five, even decade, last 10 years of my life as a Christian and as a Christian business owner, as a Christian mother, then yeah, stick around. It’s gonna be so, so good. Okay, so when it comes to Easter,

I mentioned it, but I want to just dive a little bit deeper into what it means to me. So when we look at the death and resurrection of Jesus, it is just the most beautiful story about rising from the ashes and finding beauty after dormancy. And the resurrection story is just so, so beautiful. a long time, I wanted to get a tattoo, which I still do.

I don’t know after this tattoo on my right, my right forearm. I don’t know if I can do another one, but I still want another tattoo. But I always wanted this most beautiful picture of Jesus with the crown of thorns and just a portrait that was so beautiful. And we actually had a sushi chef or or waiter the other night that we got his tattoos, his tattoo artist’s name, because we were like, dang, that is the most beautiful portrait of Jesus.

we had ever seen. But recently, the reason why I bring this up is because recently I’ve actually been thinking that maybe my next tech too is a tattoo of the stone rolling away when they realize that Jesus was not in the tomb anymore, that he had risen, that death could not take him down, that death was just one part of the story, but it was not the story. The resurrection was the story.

Wendy (06:17.014)

And so now I’m just picturing this beautiful tattoo on my left forearm that includes lots of flowers and birds chirping in the trees nearby and the stone being rolled away and the tomb being empty. And that’s really the feeling I get when I think about Easter because we do live in a world where there is so much darkness. had…

A very close family tragedy this year where our little cousin who we love so much, she’s like a daughter to me and slash little sister. She’s like a big sister to my kids. She had a full term stillborn and it was one of the most intense and also beautiful experiences we’ve ever had in our life. The ability to stand beside our cousin and her husband as they traveled through this grief journey, as they continue to travel through this grief journey, my

my opportunity to give my first eulogy ever at a memorial and to have that eulogy before a baby boy. it was intense. And it also grew my faith in the most beautiful way. But there are, you know, double wars going on right now. There is just so much division in our country. There are still so many children being

hurt and harmed and hit on the daily, often combined with doing it in the name of God, with parents thinking they are really, you know, living this godly life. Like there is just so much darkness and so much sadness and so much death, and so it can feel so heavy to be a human. And so I just love the Easter story and what Jesus showed us through His death and His resurrection that

it’s not the end, even death is not the end. And so it’s part of my story that I’m gonna share with you today includes some pretty heavy stuff at the, you know, mid to end of the year last year in 2024. And now I’m just realizing that not only did it not take me down, but it made me stronger. And so we’re gonna get into that in a little bit. But right now as I look out the window,

Wendy (08:32.846)

at my new office, which I’ll tell you about here in a little bit. And I see a bird sitting on the palm tree right out in front of me. can hear the birds chirping in the early morning. The tulips from the bulbs that were planted, you know, deep in the ground that have been dormant all winter are starting to pop up in our neighborhood and bloom the day the light is getting longer. And so…

of the days, know, now our sunsets here in San Diego at like 7 p.m. So when I do my daily hike with my pups up to the ocean front top where I watch the sunset every night, it’s late, right? Like the days are getting longer. There’s just hope. There’s fresh starts. It’s in the air, right? And so for me, I’m just sinking into looking at what has bloomed this year in my heart, home and business. So.

For me, I am someone who really has rooted down into my original roots as a Christian, which is in the denomination called Disciples of Christ. Now there are so many denominations within Christianity, and I am now able to see how I’ve taken a little bit of a fun little tour around a few of them. And what’s so cool is that when I first came to know God, which I’ll tell you the story about here in a little bit,

I found God, I found Christ in a Disciples of Christ Church in my college town in San Diego, Pacific Beach, California, which if you don’t know is like super party town. It’s where you live when you’re in college. It’s actually where my husband is working now, which is kind of funny because it’s like to be back in the town that you spent your college years in when I was at San Diego State University and he was in art school is just kind of funny.

but this little beautiful white church on the corner called me to it. And that is where I came to know God and it was a Disciples of Christ Church. So I’ll tell you more about that in a minute. anyways, just, now back at a church that we are now at recently, which is again, a Disciples of Christ Church. And we are just realizing how it is just perfectly us. It always was us. And now that we’re back home, it is still.

Wendy (10:51.38)

us. But really just we view Lent as a time for spiritual reflection, repentance, which is basically just looking at where you might’ve fallen short of the glory of God in the past and coming to the table with personal responsibility and saying, Hey, I’d like to change this. I’d like to grow closer to you, God. Or I realized this is an area where I wasn’t listening, right? Like some

Some people use the word obedience. I don’t usually because it has so many awful, harmful, negative connotations that have been used over the years. I’m all about like using that word in a positive term, but I just like to use the word listening to God’s guidance a little bit better. But as we prepare for Easter, it’s often includes a lot of prayer. A lot of people love to do, you know,

a like a lent study, so to speak. There’s sometimes fasting where you’ll give up something like social media or some type of food or alcohol or whatever. And there’s also could be acts of service. So maybe, you know, this year I’m more in the past, I always gave up something. And this year I’m in more of like an abundant expansive mode in my life where I am looking at increasing my acts of service.

during my Lent preparation for Easter instead of more of like what’s felt like a constricted mode in the past of giving something up. But giving something up is great too, and it can be really beautiful for growth. And so this is all kind of stuff we practice as Christians in the denomination of disciples of Christ. And it’s also not mandatory, not mandatory at all based on scripture. And so this can be a time when it really deepens your commitment.

as a Christian, can be a time where there’s personal reflection, I said, repentance, just taking responsibility of areas that you realize you still need to grow in, in your faith. And it just helps us focus on Easter and really decide what type of actions we want to take in this season of rebirth, right? And so…

Wendy (13:00.3)

I want to just start with an update on where I’m at in comparison to where I was at last summer, when a lot of growth really started to happen for me in radical ways. As a mom, as a business owner, yes, but really as a Christian, some really big stuff went down. And I think what might be cool for you guys to hear, because I always love hearing testimonial stories of like, how did you?

come to know God? Or how did you decide to be someone who lives like a Christ-centered life? I love to hear those stories, so maybe you’ll enjoy hearing mine too. I’ve shared this a little bit on social, but I’ve never shared it in the podcast, so I thought today would be a cool time to do that. So if we go back, back, back, back in my faith story, I’ll share with you a little bit about what my background looks like. So I was actually not raised in the church.

So I now feel like this very intense calling to help any parent who’s interested in breaking painful generational cycles, upgrading their family legacy, using firm and kind connection-based parenting tools to strengthen their family and gain cooperation in ways that are dignity and grace and relationship-based, right? Like, but and. We use the word and here a lot, not but and. I…

just have developed such a passion for helping parents who were raised with unhealthy religious teachings or high control religious teachings that has turned into a lot of evangelical upbringing, parents come to me to break the chain. So I have, you know, just developed this passion for helping people who again were raised with a lot of pain, shame, humiliation, corporal punishment,

fear, fear was like such a big part of the parents who were raised in these high control religions. And I see it day in and day out, the detrimental harm to human souls that that creates. And I also see day in and day out the beauty and the rising from the ashes of what happens when parents have the audacity and the courage to heal their family lineage and

Wendy (15:26.144)

to not repeat those same things with their children. And so this has just become really cool for me, even though I do not have that history. I think a lot of times when you become a parenting coach, I now train parents to become parenting coaches. Our full mastery program just officially closed the doors. We have an incredible cohort of students this year that are training with me on a deep, intensive mentorship level to become

parenting coaches certified in the Fresh Start Family approach, but many of us, we are most comfortable teaching from an angle of where we’ve been ourselves, right? But for some reason, and that’s usually my story, I help a lot of parents with strong-willed kids who got themselves into a pickle, so to speak, with using just hand-me-down tactics, fear, force, know, punishments to try to get these incredible strong-willed kids to cooperate.

And it just doesn’t work. So many of the parents who find me, they fall into like that same story. They’re just five, 10 years behind me, right? I’m 14 years into this work now. But what’s so interesting is when it comes to my faith experience, I was not raised with any type of religious trauma upbringing, meaning I was not raised in high control religion. I didn’t even go to church as a kid. And what’s so cool is that as I’m writing my first book, you know, I’m

It’s an interesting process and I keep taking notes every time I think of the areas where I really want to make sure I’m celebrating my parents for all the things that they did that was like, boom, amazing. I’m so thankful, right? Of course I write in my book, hey, I’m going to do this different than how I was raised. And that is a matter of respect, not of disrespect. that’s what I teach my students too. But there are a lot of things my parents did really

freaking great. And one of them was my mom had a huge heart to not indoctrinate me into a similar system of fear that she grew up in when it came to religion. my mom grew up in a very strict religious Catholic, Irish Catholic upbringing. And she went to a school where there was nuns and she would get hit on the hands with rulers. And she also speaks very highly.

Wendy (17:47.862)

of some of the nuns, so I know that they weren’t all bad. And so it’s been cool over the last few years to ask her to tell me stories about what were the ones that were really cool, you know? But I’ve heard a lot of stories about what would happen to these kids in her school if you got out of hand, right? And so something happened within my mom’s journey within her faith that she really got rubbed wrong by religion.

And so as she grew up, she became very cynical about religion and she just knew. And she told me, I remember like probably, I don’t know, five, 10 years ago, she was like, well, I just did not want to raise you in like an indoctrination of, and I remember at the time, this was before I really had this like big transformation. The last few years in my faith, I remember being like, mom, relax, like preschool, like that certain preschooler taking me to church, wasn’t going to do that to me. Like, why are you so intense? You know? And now I realize what.

she was talking about because it’s one of the biggest things I thank her for. Because I see the difference in the way I approach my faith and the way I help others heal from their harmful religious upbringing is very different. Like I, I, I, yeah, I had fear and force in my home, but it was like kind of just the classic.

American, not even only American, now that I work with students all over the world, it’s very worldly. Like just this classic misbelief that you have to make your children feel worse in order to make them feel better. Sorry, in order to make them behave better. That’s just kind of worldwide. And then you add in religious indoctrination where it’s like, no, it’s godly to hurt and harm your children. Corporal punishment is what scripture tells you to do, which is so false and not true.

But once you add that in, like the layers of jacked up-ness that it does to a human is so heartbreaking. And so, yeah, I had some fear and force in my home. We had spanking. But it wasn’t combined with the religious fear-based stuff. Like I have a friend, Chrissy Powers, who has been on my show. She grew up as a pastor’s kid. And every time she was hit, it wasn’t like that she was just getting hit.

Wendy (20:05.906)

was that she was getting hit and then it was because she had disappointed God and that she had disappointed her dad and her dad had to harm her. This was the message that she was given. He had to harm her in order to be a good godly parent. And she was the reason why he had to hurt her. So as he was crying afterwards, there’d be this layer of like, this is your fault. You’ve disappointed God.

And when you disappoint God and when you disobey God, there’s always this chance, right? There’s always this conversation too of like hell and it’s just a lot of layers that really jacks up a child. And so I’m so thankful that my mom protected me from that and that she was so passionate about that. So fast forward, I didn’t go to church growing up and around 12 is when I had my first experience with religion or

meeting Jesus, so to speak, but I think Jesus would have found me without this experience. don’t think, like, I don’t look at my friend and think, thank God she introduced me. Like, no, I know that there was always going to be a way that Jesus would, we would meet and that I would come to find him. But I used to think, you know, my friend Megan, who, you know, maybe she introduced me to Jesus, but she would take me to church when I was 12 years old and I would watch her family.

And they were my first experience of what I describe as an air quotes scary Christian. And this is someone who is really intense. Usually in my experience, they’re involved in the evangelical world and they believe it is their mission to not let anybody go to hell. And so they’re very intense and they are often very hypocritical. Like I watched this family.

And we were very, very close, like best friend for many, many years. But I watched their family, they would fight and like, I mean, they would fight like cats and dogs in their house. They were just like very, very intense. And then they would like go to church and be like, you know, compassion and peace and all the things. And then I also watched as my friend, Megan Wood, we would…

Wendy (22:24.878)

Our other best friend, her name was Meredith, we would get around and I remember we’d go to Meredith’s house and 12 years old is always all about the sleepovers when you’re a girl. And so we’d go to Meredith’s house. We would watch Saturday Night Live and we’d stay up late. And it would always come down to Megan making sure that she asked Meredith if she wanted to give her life to Christ and if she didn’t, because our friend Meredith was Jewish. And she always made sure she told her every single week because she thought it was her responsibility that she’s going to go to hell.

if she doesn’t give her life to Christ and that she’s been led astray by this Jewish religion and blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. And then we’d turn around and we’d play the Ouija board and Megan would act like a total hypocrite. And back then, whatever, I just kind of was like, Megan, you’re so intense, whatever. But now that I look back, I realized that the entire time I was so uncomfortable with this scary Christian approach to trying to make someone, air quotes, a believer.

And it never set right with my heart. we would always, like, Meredith would just kind of laugh it off. But I look back now and I’m like, my God, how did she even stay friends with Megan? But we just tolerated it. And then the hypocrisy, right, of like playing the Ouija board and like, blah, blah, blah. So that was my first experience with the scary Christian. And I think that solidified, like, ooh, I think deep down I was like, I am drawn to Jesus, but I don’t want that.

And so fast forward, I moved from Maryland to San Diego and was living in Pacific beach where I mentioned this little white church on the corner called PB Christian just kept calling me towards it. And I was like, hmm, I’m gonna walk in there, say hello, found my way there, ended up getting baptized, was very involved there when I was in college. I was like one of the only people in my early twenties. Everyone was way older.

That pastor, Brian, who I love so much, ended up marrying Terry and I. And I just really grounded myself into my faith there. And it felt very healthy and beautiful. I led youth group there for young adults. And even then, I remember doing traditional evangelical things. I remember taking my youth group to one of Billy Graham’s huge things in like, Qualcomm Stadium was like a huge stadium.

Wendy (24:50.158)

And I just remember even back then being like, this is weird. I don’t feel like this is really me, but this is, I think I’ve heard, maybe you’re supposed to do this. And I just remember like, oh, so that was kind of like my first part of my journey to listen to my intuition, but I didn’t listen back then. I just kind of still, I was figuring it out, right? So fast forward, we ended up moving out of that town, 45 minutes north and

That’s when I started to dip my toes into evangelicalism and was invited to come to a new church up there. And we ended up spending the next 10 years in the evangelical church. And it was a mega church, very, very, very big church. I’m so thankful for my time there. I met so many friends. One of those friends was our children’s, children and family ministry director.

who at the time just really challenged me to get involved, but like on a very, very consistent basis. And I am so thankful for her. We’re still, she’s still one of my dear, dear friends of this day. She’s now a professor and is just teaching incredible political science classes and just doing really, really important work in the world. She’s also become an evolving Christian like myself. We have very similar values. So that’s just so great. She’s an example of a great friend that I met there.

But after about 10 years, Terry and I, and really I’ll backtrack during that time too, I really made my way with creating a positive parenting ministry there. So I taught for years and years and years. I got my foot in the door. I’m so thankful for the opportunity I had there to teach. I ended up teaching for probably about seven years where I held positive parenting classes. I ended up doing just big workshops for them.

on positive parenting and how to align, why positive parenting is so aligned with scripture and the gospel and all the things. And during that season, there was a lot of pushback. There always is, if you’re a Christian family and you’re practicing the work that we teach here at Fresh Shirt Family, there’s always gonna be pushback that’s infuriating. And so of course there was pushback there, but I worked through that and that felt.

Wendy (27:09.396)

really, really good. And by the time that 10 years, you know, as by the time I was there for about a decade, I was feeling really, really comfortable teaching there, even though there was still always resistance. Like every time I would teach, there’d be a, you know, you know, I’m thinking of like a few where we had, we’d have like 75 people there and there you’d teach about compassionate discipline. And then the hand would fly up when it was time for Q and A. That’s like, I love this, but

like when does the chancla come out, which I learned is like the Mexican paddle for spanking, or there’d always be like, this is great, but you know, at some point, like you just gotta like tell this kid who’s boss. And like, you could tell that these, so many people were still really ingrained with the belief that scripture tells you that you have to hurt and harm your kids to be a godly parent. And so,

I would always like, by the end of my tenure there, so to speak, I was able to compassionately and just calmly help those families understand why it was scripturally sound to actually not hurt and harm your kids and how logical consequences and compassionate discipline was super effective and is actually what the Bible is teaching you when it comes to disciplining your children. But I still could always feel there was like something in the air there that I was like,

I still always kind of felt a little bit like an outcast. And I just always took it as, I’m just the one that’s teaching positive parenting here, right? So I always had a big amount of support people, but then I also had like people that I’m just like, are you giving like, are you secretly? I don’t know. I could just feel it. And so about a year, you know, 10 years went by and we, this is towards the end of that 10 years, I started to get involved with my life coaching organization who at the time,

The name of that organization is called Your Infinite Life. I studied under them for 14 years. The whole time I’ve been studying positive parenting. I was also studying with this beautiful life coaching organization who became my mentors. And at the time as certified life coaches, it was required of us right after George Floyd’s death, right at the, I think it was the beginning of the pandemic. We are our lead mentor and owner of that organization. Her name is Pam Dunn.

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She required us to dive deep into diversity, equity, and inclusion work. And she really brought in some very qualified, incredible experts and mentors to guide us through the learning and the expansion model of what it looks like. For most of us, we’re just like these white people. And we were just dropped into this incredible learning journey that was about three years for me. And it was very, very intense, stretched me.

so much. And at the end of that three years, I was like, wow, I felt like a completely changed person. So as time went on with that training, I, Terry and I just realized, okay, there’s some things here that we’re starting to feel out of alignment with at our evangelical church. And I started to understand also the difference between evangelical Christianity and other.

Christian denominations. And I did not understand that before. When I taught at Fresh Start Family, I would always say things like, how would I tee it up? know, sometimes I would say when I was teaching or recording a podcast now, I like to call myself a Christ follower because I always felt like there was a hesitancy to say Christian because I was worried that someone was gonna group me into the grouping of like the scary Christian or…

the people who I realized had done so much harm and were, in my opinion, really misrepresenting scripture, right? So I always teed it up like that. But then as this season came to an end, I started to realize, what I’m really realizing is what is taught and practiced oftentimes in the evangelical circles is very different than the other circles. So long story short, we decided to leave that church and find a church in our hometown.

We live at the beach in San Diego and we had found this other church and we were like, oh my gosh, this church is smaller. It seems more us. It felt very, very inclusive and welcoming and cool. mean, just the music. And when our kids went to youth group, it was just like really fun. And we just met so many wonderful people and just

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fell right into a rhythm of loving worshiping and just being at this church. And we really were thinking, OK, this feels more us. And as time went on, I was so happy to be offered the opportunity to develop a parenting ministry there. So I started teaching classes.

And it was so good and everything was going so good. And I was actually invited to come back and teach for the second year. We were there for about a year and a half. And the second year, they were like, my gosh, we want you to come back and teach. Again, we love what, you know, the feedback was really, really good from families who had attended my first year of teaching there when it came to the positive parenting stuff that we teach. And then the shoe dropped. Is that the way? Is that the saying?

The shoe dropped. And come to find out that while I had been sharing just more and more of my heart after being so entrenched in the diversity, equity, and inclusion work and meeting so many people from oppressed groups where I started to realize that I no longer wanted to brush it under a rug and not speak up for the groups of oppressed people. I just didn’t want to brush it under a rug anymore. And so I started to feel this very big conviction that felt

very divinely called to speak and to not be silent about things anymore. Now, I had already been doing that in my career because I believe that, as I mentioned, I am a child advocate to my core and I see children as the most oppressed group in the entire world. If you want to look at oppression, look at children, the way they are treated. Every time someone’s like, my God, this is happening in the world. There’s another 500 million

school shooting here in America and it’s like, what are we going to do to fix it? Change the way you raise children. Don’t hurt and harm them as they’re growing up. Don’t treat them like they’re second class citizens. They deserve a voice. They deserve to be respected. They deserve to grow up in safe environments. I could just cry. That is why I do what I do. I am a child advocate to my core and in my opinion, they are the biggest oppressed group in the world. And

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What I realized as I started doing my training and expanding my understanding of why it is so important to have other forms of representation and advocacy for other oppressed groups, like my passion for that started to build. Right to my right of me, I have a framed picture of a million white sheep and then right in the middle is the black sheep.

Like that’s kind of how I roll in life. If there is one person being oppressed, I cannot sleep at night if I don’t use my voice to support them and help them. So in my world, what I realized as I expanded and evolved as a Christian, anyone that was being hurt and harmed and I could see it and I understood it and realized what was happening and I had the knowledge and also the privilege, it was no longer an option not to speak about it.

I had always been very outspoken around, let’s not hurt and harm kids anymore and call it godly, right? I had been on a million podcasts by then and like really was comfortable doing that. But the new area that I was building my confidence in was speaking up for the queer community. During this end of our stint or our season at the evangelical church within my equity, diversity, equity and inclusion trainings,

I just started to get to know so many incredible queer people who were living the most beautiful, happy, healthy lives and who shared their stories with us during this three year period where I was studying of the most immense suffering and pain that they had endured, not from being gay, but from the oppression and the attack and the dropping from being

of a family or the judgment or the exclusion within their churches. Like I just heard so many stories and became not just like I know people, but became friends with people who were gay and also became a mentor and friends with people who had trans kids. And I started to realize like, dang, it’s

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I can’t stay silent about this anymore, and I have to expand my learning here. So I felt called to do a deep scripture study. Now, I had been in deep Bible study with my pastor’s wife for, I think at that point, like two years at my old evangelical church. And I love that. And this particular family that I studied with, they were very, very deep in their convictions that…

being gay and living a gay life is a sin. If you choose to live that way, you are living out of sin. And they had a lot of family who were gay and that they were choosing to love them, right? Like say they love them, but then not really accept them. So they’re like, we love you, but we believe you’re living in sin. And I watched that and I was like, I was always like, that’s odd. And I remember asking one day like straight to my good friend.

Are you sure Jesus speaks about that? And she was like, yeah. And she was just like so convicted to share all these reasons. And we never really got into it. And that was a two year stint. And during that two year stint that I studied with her, and it was so beautiful, I definitely strengthened my relationship with God. And we read the Bible front to back many, many, many times. Like it was incredible. I grew so much. And I also realized over and over again during that two year stint,

There’s stuff that I’m really on a different page on. And I remember the day that I got a call from her. was like, right about when we were about to go in our second year of study together, and it was a very, very small group. It actually turned out just to be her and I, our second group, our second year. And she was like, hey, I just want to make sure you know. I know you’re so passionate about what you teach, and I really want to do another year of study with you because I love our friendship and blah, blah, blah. But she said, I did just want to let you know, we are going to choose to continue to spank our children because we do believe it’s godly.

And I just wanna make sure that’s not gonna get in our way of our friendship. And I remember just my heart sinking and being like.

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And of course, it’s not going to air quotes get in our way of friendship. But it was just one of those moments where I realized, okay, like the division is happening and I will continue on because I did love her so much. I still love her. But it was just becoming more and more clear that she was choosing to take, take a different angle of scripture understanding than I was. And so as that came to an end,

I decided on my own that it was time for me to do my own research and for me to study scripture in a way where I was given an opportunity to really make my own decision around whether being gay and living out a gay person, gay marriage, all the things is air quotes living in sin. And so I found the most incredible pastor. Her name is Meredith Miller. She ended up coming on our podcast. We have one of the most controversial.

podcast, episodes we’ve ever had in my life. I’ll share more about that in a minute. But I studied with her for, I think our study was like four months or something. And we did a deep dive with so many incredible people. There was professors in the group, there was theologians, there was pastors, there was just normal folk like me, right? There was teachers, there’s just so many incredible people. And we would come to the table, we would study with Meredith.

She presented in the most incredible way of not like, hey, I’m gonna make you believe one way or another. She really taught in a way that was like, hey, here’s the facts, here’s the scripture, here’s what culturally has been, this has been teed up as, and here is the reality of like what was also going on socially, culturally. This is other things that you’re gonna wanna consider when you read these scriptures.

that will help you make a decision one way or another, but it’s not just this, you know, black and white, so to speak, like, because a lot of people read scripture around, you know, hitting and harming your kids and think, yeah, that’s so easy. Of course, that means you hit and harm your kids and you’re a great parent. If you do, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no. Like, please, please, please, like, educate yourself on a deep level, not just with the books and the pastors and the theologians that tell you,

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Are you like, of course this means being gay is a sin. No, actually educate yourself and hear different perspectives and then make up your mind, right? There are so many theologians who are affirming theologians and pastors that you get to do your homework and then make your decision instead of just having the information from one angle. And so I started to see more and more friends that I respected.

sharing things that were like, hey, I used to believe this and now I’m realizing this is not actually, absolutely like no doubt about it. Like it’s not that easy. Actually, it takes more thought. It takes more understanding. It takes more, you know, education around different types of interpretation of the Bible. And I’m not going to get totally into it, but if you want to learn more, you can go to Meredith Miller. She has a sub stack.

And she has that study around what it means to be an affirming Christian. She has that study within her sub stack. So you can go find Meredith, listen to her podcast. She’s an incredible kids pastor. That’s what she spends most of her time doing. She’s very active on Instagram. And then she also has a church. I think they’re up in Pomona that is a fully affirming church. And she’s a pastor along with her husband. And she just does incredible work in the world. But if you want to, and there’s so many books, we’ll make sure that we put them.

in the show notes for this episode. But Meredith is a great one if you want to dive into that study, that Bible study that again, it’s about like a one, if I’m remembering right, it’s about a three month study that we did. And when I came out of that, I was just like, okay, I am 100 % convicted that being gay is not a sin, living out a gay life, a happy gay life.

healthy life as a gay person is absolutely not a sin. And when I started being public about that, people lost their minds. When I emailed out Meredith Miller’s podcast episode, we normally, know, when you’re an online educator like myself and when you are an entrepreneur and you have a podcast and you have a public platform, all the things like, it’s very common for people to…

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unsubscribe, which is what you want. You don’t want people to stick around who aren’t interested in what you teach, right? So every week we usually get like, you know, say we have an email list of about 20,000 people. Every week we’d get about 30 people who unsubscribe and we’re like, great, go find a teacher that you really resonate with. The day we sent out Meredith Miller’s episode about what it means to be an affirming Christian, and we had a beautiful conversation about that, we had

400 people unsubscribe in 30 minutes. And on top of that, we had the most intense and hate-filled emails I have ever gotten in my life around how I am the devil, how I am leading people astray, how I am a false teacher and prophet, and like people lost their minds. And so that episode aired and then probably like the new church that I was at, they had

actually heard about that episode and we had had a conversation around it and they had been like, okay, cool, but you’re not teaching your opinion, right? And I’m like, no, I’m a parenting teacher. I’m gonna teach people, you know, parenting stuff. And this is just something that I’m outspoken or something I’m public about because I’m no longer gonna brush it under a rug. And so if somebody asked me, I will share with them my opinion, but I’m not gonna try to indoctrinate them. I’m not gonna try to make them believe something different.

get to make their own decision. But I am going to let them know that they’re safe if they have a child who is expressing that they’re gay at, you know, whatever age and that they are safe within my presence. They are safe within our group. They are safe to explore and educate themselves. And that was okay at the time when I when I had a conversation with the associate pastor. And so, again, I built this

volunteer ministry there. was so beautiful. But then the next year when I decided, hey, I’m going to pop up alive and go live on my social, on my Instagram feed, just to say, hey, happy pride month. Here’s my journey. I shared similar things to what I’m sharing today. It’s on my Instagram account to this day. You can go check it out. And it was like, you know, a 30 minute live or something where I was just like, hey, happy pride. This has been my journey. I now am 100 % affirming Christian. That means that I don’t just tolerate and say I love.

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people who are queer, I actually practice fully affirming them for who they are. Because what I learned during my three years of diversity, equity, and inclusion work, and especially with the queer community, is that it is actually not loving to tell someone, I love you and I accept you, but I actually don’t accept your humanity. I am not gonna fully support your wedding. I don’t believe you should have the same rights. And I believe that you are living in sin.

Right? It’s actually not loving. And to say that it’s loving is actually extremely offensive to people. And I understand that there are many teachers out there who will tell you that it’s loving, that it is actually loving. Right? So again, this episode today, I know people really get their panties in a bunch when we start to talk about this. But part of me talking about this is…

is ending this like, we don’t talk about it, right? Like, what is that Disney movie of Bruno? We don’t talk about it. No, well, we talk about it here at Fresh Start Family. It’s important. I have seen the data. I understand how many children are, and young adults are now so much like riddled with anxiety, depression, and so much more likely to die by suicide who are raised in homes where they are not.

affirmed and accepted when they, air quotes, come out of the closet. And I have just chosen to no longer be part of the group that piles on to that hurt and harm. So now I will say it clearly right now, in case anyone is confused, and we had a podcast review of actually a student that I love deeply and that is doing incredible work in their home. But they

wrote something that made me realize, okay, maybe I haven’t been clear enough. And this is part of this episode right now. I’m gonna bring it back full circle here. I’m gonna land the plane for you guys. This is part of what has died this last year and is being rebirthed to something different is really being scared of people and judgment. I’m done with it. I’m done. I am no longer operating from a place of not

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using my voice and being truthful to who I am and what I believe because I fear being hurt or excluded. Like, it’s done. It’s done. So I’m going to say it very, very clearly right now. I am a fully affirming Christian. That means that I have done my homework. I have studied Scripture with trusted pastors, theologians, experts, professors, thought leaders.

And I do not believe that being gay is a sin. So that means, yes, if I am coaching a family and they were to come to me, which they never have, by the way, we’ve coached thousands and thousands and thousands of families and I’ve never ever once had a family come to me and be like, hey, what do I do? My 13 year old has come out of the closet and they say they’re gay. And I believe that is because of this weird, we don’t talk about it.

No one wants to talk about any of this, even though as Stella, who is in AP psych right now, told me the other night, she was like, hey, mom, guess what? There’s actually a statistic about how many people are gay in the world. And she’s like, and who knows if this is accurate or not. This is coming from my 17 year old. But she’s like, yeah, it’s about 3%. So every three out of 100 people are gonna say, hey, I’m attracted to the same sex, three out of 100. So I have helped thousands and thousands of families to this point and I’ve never ever.

had a family come to me and say this. And again, I believe it’s because of this stupid silence around this subject. People are so scared of being judged and excluded. And especially if they’re Christian, they’re so scared. But I am here to tell you that you are safe here. If that is you or if you have a friend or a family member, you are safe here. And if a family were to come to me, I would coach them to fully affirm their child.

Jen Hatmaker has done so much incredible work in the world, especially after her little girl came out as gay. If you’ve never, we’ll put it in the show notes, but her episode with her daughter, once she was, I think she recorded the episode with her daughter when she was like 19, 20 years old or something. But if you know Jen Hatmaker at all, she was a very, very, very entrenched, thick evangelical author, thought leader, and she…

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evolved. She has changed into just a more, I will say, just a non-evangelical Christian, that’s what I’ll call it, and her episode with her daughter about what it was like for her little girl to be raised in this environment where she knew she was loved, but she was not fully affirmed and she was not able to feel like she could have the relationship she wanted with Jesus and be truly her, which she knew from a very young age that she was gay.

changed my life. That one episode changed my life. Sarah Bessie’s article, Penny in the Air, changed my life. I’ve just met so many incredible Christians, strong Christians, who are like, I’m not going to be part of that hurt and harm anymore. And so I went live and I guess our head pastor at our new church found out and he didn’t even have the courage to talk to me directly. He sent

our associate pastor to talk to me, I got a phone call and I just knew it. I knew it in my heart that this was going to be about this live that I had done during the month of June of 2024. And sure enough, I was told that they were scared that I was going to be leading people or their words were that I was going to confuse people and that they basically wanted me to take it down. And they wanted me to like,

like, you know, not, I forget their exact words, but they were not comfortable with me having a platform and me saying these things that I had come to this spot where I was an affirming Christian. And, and so I just was like, Holy smokes, this is actually happening. And, and I was like, are you really sure you want to do this? Like, I’m, I am a straight woman doesn’t even drink alcohol, and I teach people how to not hurt and harm their children. Are you sure that I’m the one that you want to label as unsafe? And they were basically like, well, you know, we do this out of love. we just, you know, the long story short, is I got the same treatment as anybody who is publicly gay gets in the evangelical church. And that is in case you’re not aware, because I wasn’t aware of this for years and years and years.

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And for a long time I was like, it’s not my problem. And then I realized, ugh, I can’t be like that anymore. But I was treated the same way. Whereas if you are gay or now, come to find out, even if you are not gay, but if you are an affirming Christian who has a public platform, you are not allowed to volunteer, you’re not allowed to lead, you’re not allowed to work, you’re not allowed to be in the worship band.

Tim Whitaker at the New Evangelicals had a similar thing happen when he became outspoken on a public platform. And it’s just crazy to me that, but if you were someone who really believed that scripture taught you that it is godly to hurt and harm and hit your children into submission, if you look at the Bible and you think that’s what it means, so I’m going to practice hurting and harming my kids for the first 18 years of their life.

then you would be wildly accepted at any evangelical church. You would be allowed to lead, you would be allowed to volunteer, you’d be allowed to play in the band, you’d be allowed to work there. You are golden. But if you are simply someone who affirms the queer community and says, heck yes, if I had a gay child, I would go to their wedding, I would not just love them, but I would say you are perfectly designed just as you are and accept them with all my heart. Man, people lost their minds.

Anyways, that’s the story. So on that phone call that day, a rush like my throat closed up in the biggest way and I was like, my God, this is happening. And so I just said, okay, like there’s no way that I’m going to take that down and there’s no way that I’m going to change my belief system. And I’m so sad, but like, I wish you guys well. And we hung up that call. And again, I like felt like I could barely breathe and

I started grieving like I had not grieved ever in my life. this is gonna end realizing this is gonna be a longer episode. So you might have to come back and listen or watch this in two episodes, which is fine. you know, going through losing a family member this last year, our little cousin who feels more of like a nephew to me, his name was Brooks Taron.

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That was very intense grief. But before that, I had only experienced grief on this level when I lost my English black lab. His name was Tank. And when I lost him, when he died, my God, I grieved for weeks. It was like, I remember I’d be swimming laps. I wasn’t really into swimming at the time. And I would have to stop and tread water because I was crying so intensely that I couldn’t breathe if I kept swimming, right? And I had not felt grief

like that until this church thing happened. And I got this message from this church that’s like, you are not welcome here. You are not welcome to be part of our volunteer crew. are not like you’re you’re dangerous. Your family’s dangerous. And, you know, their words were different. Of course, the message comes through as like we we love this is our way of loving. But it is so intense to be on the other end of it and to be like pushed out and to realize like you don’t belong.

in your local church that you had found a home in that your children were so happy at. They were going to kids ministry every week. They were just so happy. Their best friends were coming with us. We were just in such a groove. And to be like, no, you’re not welcome. And also, I think in that moment, the grief hit me of like, if this is what I was feeling as a straight woman.

Imagine this is like, it felt like, you if I have 1 million hairs on my head, it felt like the pain was like one hair, one pinkiness, one pinky nail-ness of the pain that the queer community must feel when they are told, you are not welcome here. You can come, you can tithe, you can sit in the pews, you can give us money, you can listen, but if you go to lead a Bible study,

or if you want to volunteer to serve coffee or be in the band, or if you even try to get a job here and you don’t sign that document that says, you know, I also believe in what they call a traditional sexual ethic. Come to find out, traditional air quotes is like something that is up for interpretation. I’ve learned so much about what actual tradition is. I’ve learned so much about indigenous cultures and how the queer

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folk in indigenous cultures were celebrated. were like, they had this special honoring that they did. Like, there’s just so many examples of like, tradition actually being honoring, but in the evangelical world, most people, if they go to serve or whatever they’re made, you have to sign this document that says like, I adhere to this traditional sexual ethic. And so if I was feeling this pain, I mean, I was…

sobbing to the point where like I felt like I couldn’t breathe after I hung up the phone. And I was just like, it hit me that if I’m feeling this, I was almost grateful in the moment because I was like, this is what a tiny fraction of what the queer community must feel to not be fully accepted. And being a teacher that knows what like psychology is when it comes to why people misbehave, why people behave certain ways, why

why there is anxiety and depression and what causes someone to have revenge misbehavior. And like, I study human behavior. So I understand basic human needs. The need to belong and the need to feel powerful are the two, and the need to feel unconditionally loved and the need to feel valuable. Those are some of the base human needs that drive all human behavior. And so I was feeling this hit of belonging that was just like, wow, even

even someone like me can be pushed out and discarded like trash. And so anyways, I was sobbing and I just decided at the time I was very active on Instagram and I decided just to throw up my camera and film me for just a few minutes. And I thought, hey, you know, maybe the world needs to see what they’re fricking doing when they do this. Because if that’s me as a straight woman feeling this level of pain and sadness, and I think

The set, the deep grief I was feeling in that moment was also on behalf of the entire queer community. Again, three out of a hundred. So millions and millions of people in this world who have experienced this type of pain. But if, if I was experiencing that, I just felt this like, maybe I should share this. And so, you know, was also feeling pretty spicy that day because that’s part of my personality and strong willed. And if someone tells me I can’t, then

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most of the times I’m going to double down on doing that anyways. And so a part of me was like, you know what? Fine. I’ll go find someplace that’s going to fully accept me and allow me to serve Jesus, you know, and do what I do and do what our family does. And I just knew it in that moment I’m going to go. But I also wanted to share with the world. So I threw up an Instagram reel and I just said, hey, this is what it feels like. This is what exclusion feels like when you are pushed out of a church that has been your home for a year and a half.

And I just said special thanks to all of these people who have helped me find my steadiness and my grounding being an affirming Christian. And I am so sad to go. I thanked the church for an incredible year and a half. We grew our faith so much there. We had so much fun. Our kids, I believe, grew their faith. We just were really, really happy. I said, and we can’t stay in a place that…

that won’t allow us to be a fully functioning member of the church because we are affirming Christians. And long story short, that reel went viral. I was not expecting that silly little reel to go viral, but it did. It ended up having, I think, close to, I don’t even remember at this point, whether it’s a half a million or a million views. And what was crazy was in the first day of this reel going viral, the amount of support that came in

instantly, like instantly, within minutes of me posting this, was so beautiful. And it’s something I never would have known about if I wouldn’t have had this massive painful thing happen in my life. People that I respected so greatly, contractors of ours, people that have giant businesses in the health and wellness sector that I knew were Christians, but I had no idea had gone down this same affirming path. And also like people that were just like,

instantly in my text, leaving me voice memos, you’re not alone. Same thing happened to us. We left the evangelical church. We ended up making our own study group. And now we have this like 20 person home church that we do, you know, again, contractors that were like, my God, we left and we found the Episcopal church. Like, you’re not alone. Trust me, you’re going to be okay. And just the virality of it going off of like support, support, support, support, like community members.

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friends, you name it, it went off. And then two days later, the trolls hit. And somehow the people who were just very, very concerned and wanted to make sure I knew how wrong I was and how I had been led astray, that’s how it started.

So it was very intense and then it turned into really gnarly messages being meant like left of like, you idiot, you leftist, you liberal, like how dare you think you’re a Christian? And then it turned into like really gnarly stuff. I’d say by like day seven, I was just like blocking and deleting because every time there’d be a comment of aggression, I’d…

click into a profile and it’d usually be like some type of patriot eagle and then someone with a machine gun. And I was like, holy shit, this is gnarly. People, I’m telling you, lose their minds over this conversation. And I am not going to brush it under a rug.

So for weeks, I ended up just blocking and deleting. And you can find that post if you wanna dig into the past of my reels on Instagram. But it also, it was intense and it was scary and it was like, whoa, holy smokes. This is really a thing on both sides, right? Like my eyes had been opened to.

not just the gnarly trolls and people who were practicing a very different kind of Christianity than I was, but also to the level of support and people who were like, there’s a whole world out there that is not this scary Christian nationalism or just very high control, again, a lot of times evangelical type of circle going on, and you are welcome. Come over here, we’ll help you.

Wendy (01:04:05.368)

Quickly, I started to realize that there was other options and within a few days, I realized that for that one church that we had found a home in and that we were really happy in, but ended up leaving, that was one non-affirming church. What I found out was there was five churches within a one mile radius, Christian churches who were fully affirming, that we could move our family to.

And that was so eye-opening for me because I had no idea. I just always thought this was like air quotes Christian thing to hit your kids and call it godly discipline. And also to, you know, tell gay people that they’re going to hell and that, you know, you better like repent, blah, blah, blah. And then I realized, this isn’t a universal Christian thing. This is a, like I said, an evangelical thing. So we ended up getting an invitation to come to

a new church up in Oceanside, California that is fully affirming. My good friend, Chrissy Powers, who I mentioned earlier, she invited me up here and a whole bunch of people on that thread were like, hey, check this out. I ended up connecting with them. We ended up coming to this church and now are so happy. We’ve been here for probably eight months or so and I’ve never felt more connected. I actually even got offered to have an office in this new church and it feels so good to finally be someplace where

You can tell just the vibe here, like no one is advocating for hurting and harming their kids, first off. It’s 150-year-old church. Our building is 100 years old, like stained glass, like you’ve never seen before. One of my neighbors, that’s like basically a co-work for those of us who rent offices here, one of my neighbors is an Episcopalian priest who is…

church planting in the area and he’s renting an office here until he can. And if you know anything about the Episcopalian denomination, I’ve had a lot of students from that that I’ve gotten to know over the years, fully affirming. Also Bishop Buddy, I think that’s how you say her last name. She was the priest who at the new presidential inauguration service, she’s the one who looked right in the new president’s eyes and begged him to have mercy on the queer community and to end the attack.

Wendy (01:06:23.476)

on them. Like she just delivered such a powerful sermon that day. So that’s one of my neighbors. Another one of my neighbors is like come to find out is like the co-lead in a anti-Christian nationalist punk band, which is just, if you know anything about our family’s love of rock and roll, that is so meaningful. We’ve become good friends with our pastors who are a husband and wife team. Our children and family ministry director is my other

roommate, so to speak, and she’s amazing. We’re just so happy. We’re so happy. And my soul has never felt more at ease. to wrap this all around and bring it full circle, what I have realized died last year is this like really caring more about what other people think and feeling like I had to fit in and feeling like I had to adhere.

into a round peg when I have clearly been my whole life a square peg, it had to come to an end. And so this church blow up thing ended up being one of the biggest blessings of my life because I no longer believe that I have to fit in in ways that I don’t fit in. And I know so many of you listening right now, even if you’re still here and you’re not religious, thank you for being here. But even if you’re here and you’re religious, like you…

I hope that you’ll relate to this because even if you’re like, okay, Wendy, know, this, this, this whole affirming thing, I’m not there. It doesn’t call to me right now. You probably know what it’s like to be in a circle that is like, you’re crazy for not hitting your kids. You’re crazy for practicing compassion, discipline. you’re getting lured in by the world of air quotes, gentle parenting, which is unbiblical. You’ve probably seen the articles that go around. You probably have felt what it’s like.

to be threatened to not be part of the group, to be told that you’re not a real Christian, right? Like all these things that go on in these high control circles, that is just insanity. It’s insanity. And I just want you to know that you’re not alone. And there are places out there, I’ve learned so many of the Presbyterian churches in our area are fully affirming, don’t practice hitting and harming their kids.

Wendy (01:08:41.206)

so much of the Lutheran, so many of the Lutheran churches, obviously so many of the Episcopalian churches, and so many of the Disciples of Christ churches, which is where we are now, which is wild because again, full circle back to the church denomination that I found my faith in. So God knew what He was doing. And I think last year, as there was this death of pleasing others and

staying restricted and in any type of fear mode of using my voice, especially because I have a public platform, that had to end. And the grief and the sadness and fear was part of that healing journey. And I just, to feel the immense amount of support from my team, my family, who is so ride or die with me, right? Like my husband has always been ride or fricking die as this thing was going down in the church. He did not grow up religious and he was just like,

honey, I’m with you 100%. If we need to leave this church, we will leave this church. And I was like, we do, we gotta leave. And he was like, cool. My kids were like, cool, mom, let’s go, right? Like to have ride or die people in your life that aren’t the group that you’re like scared of not pleasing or fitting into is so beautiful. But it really has been a season of letting go and caring more about what I believe and what God believes and what I feel God is calling me into, then

feeling like I needed to hide any part of myself. And so I hope that inspires you that if you feel any type of whisper or calling within your soul, I just want you to know that there’s something called the double bind. And this is what I’ve learned in my nervous system, healing and regulation work is that the double bind is like the thought of I have to, but I can’t, right? Like that’s a perfect example. So an example in parenting is like, I have to stop yelling because you feel like

shit every night when you your head on your pillow and you’re like, who have I become? I’ve literally become my own mother. I swore I wasn’t going to repeat it and here I am. I have to stop yelling, but I can’t. That’s an example of a double bind. I learned that from Sarah Tacey, who’s been on our show. She’s one of my nervous system healing teachers too. She’s incredible. this year is really when it came to a head. I feel like this is like the analogy of the most awful pimple that was just like begging to be popped. And finally, when it fricking popped,

Wendy (01:11:05.304)

felt so good. was like embarrassing at first. And I was like, no, there’s like pus coming out of my zit. It’s a really weird analogy. But now it was, was, it’s this feeling of like, God, buildup and the pus is gone. And now I can just be me. I’m not worried about fitting in. I can stop hiding, right? And I’ve been able to step forward with clarity and courage more than ever before. I’ve drawn closer to God. And so I continued on.

around the holidays and early in this new year to get support around giving less fucks. Like I, that was the thing. Terry and I recorded an episode as 2024 came to an end and I was like, this is my big takeaway. This is it. Like I hear you God. God’s like, Hey, by not listening to me, essentially I see that as sin. I see that as like disobedience, right? Like when you aren’t like, when, when, when I call you into something, I want you to trust me.

And when you’re hiding or when you’re covering up or when you’re not using your voice, that is not listening to me. Right. And so that is like my version of being here today is like my version of repentance of that and saying, God, thank you for your grace with me. As I learned to care more about what you think and what I think than the scary Christians in the world who are going to disown me and throw me to the curb like trash.

and tell me I’m not a Christian and tell me that I’m the one hurting and harming children. I care more about what God thinks and what I think and about what specifically the three out of a hundred children who I learned are so much susceptible to suicide and ending their life than, again, the kids who are fully affirmed. had, when I left that church and that reel went viral, I had

someone very close, I’ll just say very interconnected within the church who is a practicing therapist. And she messaged me right away and she was like, thank you so much. Thank you so much for speaking up about this. She said, out of all the caseloads I see, I help a lot of people. work for a certain practice that was like, whatever. She said, out of all the people I see, of mostly young adults,

Wendy (01:13:26.978)

The people who are closest to suicide and ending their life are the ones who were raised in non-affirming evangelical circles where they were told, we love you, but we hate your sin. And she was like, thank you. Thank you so much for not staying silent on this anymore because these children need you.

And so I’m willing to take the hits. I don’t care anymore. I’ve taken the hit and it’s okay. A shit ton of people left me. And you know what? There’s a good chance we’ll have even a more committed crew of community listeners and people within our community this year, because this type of conviction I believe is magnetic.

and I hope that it gives you permission too.

Wendy (01:14:26.478)

to stop suppressing your voice and to stop trying to act like something that you’re not, because you don’t need to.

There is a whole world of people who will support you.

Wendy (01:14:43.094)

and support your curiosity and also your convictions deep down in your heart, your soul, and your moral compass. So.

what I’ve let go of to wrap this up. Some things I let go of this last year as I continued to dive into deep mentorship around giving less Fs.

about listening to my intuition, I’ve decided to quit the news. What I realized was that the nervous system, it felt like trauma that was a hit every single day that I would watch the news around like the heartbreak of the world. Like I just needed to take a break. So I quit the news, I quit social media. I am now pretty much disengaged from social media because I follow so many social justice accounts that it was heartbreaking to me every day.

I had enough data that I was like, I just got to continue my work and care less about what other people think and what’s happening. Now I stay abreast to the news. let myself watch Sunday morning every week and I am in conversations, but I am not exposing myself to the nervous system hits every single day, all day that social media and the news was hitting me with. I followed my heart and stopped drinking. It’s been two years now.

but I like am getting better at listening to my intuition. I said no to people pleasing, right? Staying quiet. We’ve talked about this. This whole episode has been about that. And I’ve really been able to break the whole, I must, but I can’t. And now I feel like I am living a life that is like, I must and I will, if that makes sense. And so what’s been birthed is the most exciting part. And that’s how this all ties back to Easter is I have a new faith community that actually aligns with my soul.

Wendy (01:16:33.462)

I have a new office space at the end of this episode. I’ll do a little walk around if you want to stay. I’ll have my editor kind of, you know, edit that in so you can see what my new office and the beautiful everything out there looks like. So you can see what a fully affirming Christian church looks like. I have a new book deal. I’ll be writing my first book that’ll come out in May of twenty twenty six.

Yes, it’s 2025. Yes, May of 2026, the same year my daughter graduates from high school, called Fresh Start Your Family, Powerful Parenting Strategies to Bring Peace to Your Home and the World. I finally feel like I have nervous system calm from living totally in alignment out of the double bind. I’m sleeping well at night knowing that I’m living my values and protecting those who need advocacy. I’m stronger than ever in my commitment to advocacy for children, for people of color.

for indigenous people, the queer community, no matter how many evil, woke, bitch messages I get. And now I’ve actually learned to disengage and detach from those. They no longer rock my soul like they were before, and it feels so, good. And I just feel like I am now in complete alignment between purpose, passion, and leadership. And so if you have listened this far, thank you.

being here. Thank you for caring about my story. But Easter to me is about rising. And I want you to ask yourself, what is dying off in your life that needs to go? And what’s blooming that you may not have even noticed yet? And maybe this conversation has led you to kind of look at it and think to yourself, huh, I’ve heard this small still whisper to go study this topic and look at what scripture says about it. Not from just like, here’s what all these very loud

very intimidating pastors and theologians will say, but also what do the margins say? What do the oppressed say? Like study all the angles and then make your own decision. And what is one brave step you can take this week to walk more fully in your purpose, even if it’s scary? So I’m pretty sure this episode is going to air right after Easter. So it is the season of rising and rebirth and new life. And if

Wendy (01:18:55.722)

you find something and this this episode really resonates. I would love for you to email me or DM me. I still check DMs on Instagram. My team helps me keep up there even though I’m not engaging and partaking in social media. We still check our DMs there. I’m at fresh start wendy on Instagram emails wendy at fresh start family online.com. Please save yourself if you’re going to send me a

You know, I’m not even worried. I won’t even speak to that anymore. I do have a team that goes through my emails. So I don’t get the ones that like want to rip me a new one anymore. Thank goodness. We’ve learned to like really protect my energy here at Fresh Start Family and like really engage with the people who are like, thank you God. I’ve been looking for, you know, other Christians who are more aligned with my way of Christianity, right? Like those, those are the messages we engage with.

And so I just want you to know you’re not alone. You are not failing if you feel like there’s areas in your life where you’re living and hiding or when you’re, or where you really feel frozen and you’re in fear of judgment or losing people or not belonging within your circles. And I just want you to know that you are doing wholly hard work as you raise your human souls. And as you look at big issues like this, right? Like the whole affirming conversation that has made people’s heads explode this year, it may seem distant.

And it may seem like it’s not my problem, right? But just know that again, as Stella taught me, three out of 100, three out of 100 families who are listening to this podcast are going to have a kid that says, hey, mom, dad, you know, I feel like I’m gay. And so, you know, why not? Why not figure out how you feel about that? Why not explore? Why not, like, actually have the courage to look at that and decide for yourself how you would approach that if it were to happen in your family?

And so that know that I’m here to support you. I’m so thankful for every single one of you that listened to the show. and yeah, that’s what my Easter is this year. So thank you, God, for this community. Thank you, God, for this podcast. Thank you for this platform that I get to share my voice, share my convictions, share my opinions. You know, these are my opinions and it is okay to be a Christian with different opinions. And I think the world has lost sight of that.

Wendy (01:21:16.034)

and I pray that you feel peace in your body as this Easter season rolls out, as the tulips bloom, and as the baby birds hatch, and as the days get longer, I do pray for peace and just lightness in your soul. Thanks for listening. I’ll see you back for the next episode soon.

If you have a question, comment or a suggestion about todayโ€™s episode, or the podcast in general, send me an email at [email protected] or connect with me over on Facebook @freshstartfamily & Instagram @freshstartwendy.

 

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