I am so happy to welcome Rachel Martin to the show. Connecting with people has been the greatest part of this show and I am so glad to be connected to Rachel. She has 7 kids and after a divorce, she was a single mom for 7 years. We talk about navigating that sense of loss with her kids after her divorce and advice for the woman who is in the middle of marriage loss. We talk about how she climbed out of a mountain of debt, how gender roles affect how we handle money and advice on changing the narrative around the phrase "cutting cost". If life has ever felt less than you imagined, this conversation will be an encouragement to you.
I am launching a Pateron page for the show which is a great and easy way to support the show financially and in return, you will receive some bonus content. For simply $3 a month, you will receive some deleted questions from each guest and for only $7 a month, you will receive those deleted questions along with a new segment called Ask The Expert where I will ask David Thomas and Sissy Goff questions about raising boys and girls. Go to patreon.com/survivingsarah to become a patron today!
I am so happy to welcome Courtney DeFeo back to the show. Courtney is an OG Surviving Sarah guest making her first appearance on the show back on episode 18. She is such a creative entrepreneur who has a big heart for helping others. She is an author and podcast host for the Treasured Podcast which is a great resource for moms of girls. Courtney has partnered with Parent Cue from Orange to create a resource for moms and tween girls so that is the basis for our conversation today.
We talk about raising tween girls, the areas in which we feel inadequate to help, and even the area that we struggled with as tweens. And since we are in the throws of the holiday season, we talk about ways to make the holidays less about what we receive and more about what we give. Courtney shares some very practical and helpful ideas to light up your community during this holiday season.
We are celebrating 200 episodes and 4 years of Surviving Sarah!!! It’s hard to believe that the show has existed for so long. It has been such a fun ride and it has afforded me opportunities that have been incredible. In this episode, I answer listener questions like how I produce an episode, how I juggle mom, kids and home, who my dream guest would be and what’s next for Surviving Sarah.
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I am so happy to welcome Tricia Goyer back to the show. To me, Tricia is one of those women that I just want to be around. She is a wife, mom, author, speaker, and podcaster. You may remember her from a previous appearance on the show where we talked about how to calm angry kids. This time around, we talk about her book The Grumble Free Year which documented a challenge that her family took to live a grumble free life for a whole year. We talk about what triggered her to take this challenge, ways that we all grumble that we may not realize is grumbling and some very practical help and phrases to say to help yourself and your kids to be grumble free.
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I think a lot about the struggles of my youth and how I never thought I’d still struggle in the same ways. But newsflash, I’m 41 and still struggle in some of the same ways—it just looks a little different. But as I am growing up, there are things that I truly no longer want to live by. There are things that I’m finding in my life that have dominated my thinking for far too long. One of those is perfectionism. In this episode, I talk about how perfectionism meets my fear of failure and how I am learning to embrace my authentic self by practicing failure.
I am happy to welcome Sarah Beckman back to the show. I always enjoy welcoming guests back. Sarah is an author and speaker who recently became an empty nester. So you know I capitalized on sitting with a mom further down the road from me and asked for some advice. She shares some really great advice for us moms who are in the tween/teen years. So have your mental pen and paper ready. Then, we talk about her latest book “Hope in the Hard Places: How to Survive When Your World Feels Out of Control.” We talk about why its so important to give yourself permission to grieve and feel during the hard times, precautions around social media during those times, how sometimes our faith prevents us from seeking what we need while walking through a hard season and some practical tips to help you get to the other side of a hard time.
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Today, we talk about a tension that many of us feel. I think that many of us feel pulled between work and motherhood. We want to find the magic formula to be able to do it all—work all the hours and do (and be) all the things with (and for) our kids. Sarah talks about that tension and what has helped her.
I am so happy to welcome Natalie Taylor to the table today. She is a Certified Financial Planner, Professional and Behavioral Financial Advisor who is passionate about helping people cultivate a plan for their finances based on their values and goals. She is also a wife and mom who lives in my favorite place, Santa Barbara. I am so excited to share this conversation with you. I found it extremely helpful and I think you will, too.
We talk about 3 common pitfalls that we fall into with our finances. And with that topic, we talk tips for budgeting, advice about how to avoid debt or get out of debt, and how to align our finances with what we value. Plus, she turns the table on me and coaches me on the subject of values and finances.
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If you’ve been listening to the show for awhile, then you know how much I benefit from the research, teaching and writings of Brené Brown. One thing that Brené does every week for her email subscribers is something called TGIF. That stands for…
TRUST // GRATEFUL // INSPIRED // FUN
Each week, she talks about what she is trusting right now; what she is grateful for; what is inspiring her; and what’s fun. TGIF.
So for this episode, I thought it might be fun to do that here in regards to August. I want to look back over the month, and talk about what I’m trusting for, what I’m grateful for, what I’m inspired by and what’s fun.
I am happy to welcome my good friend, Amberly Deavours to the table. Amberly and I go way back—we’ve known each other since college. We have seen each other walk through a lot of life. She is a normal mom just like you and just like me except I sorta feel like she’s got some hidden superpowers because she is a mom of 5 who drives a 12 seat passenger van. Amberly is a certified FASTer Way to Fat Loss coach and we talk about what it looks like to take charge of your health. We talk about her journey with mental health and physical health and how it's all connected. She shares how motherhood wasn’t what she expected, how she battled anxiety and depression, how she finally took charge of her physical health through the FASTer Way to Fat Loss and why she’s so passionate for women to do the same.
Click here for more information about the FASTer Way to Fat Loss
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This week is the last installment of re-releases for our parenting series. And I picked the second conversation I had with Jennifer Walker from Moms on Call. Jennifer has played a big role in helping me as a young mother. There is just something about her that makes you feel like you can do this hard thing called parenting. This episode is all about surviving toddlers (which honestly, listening to it is relatable to surviving tweens, too) heaven help us. If you want to hear more from Jennifer, she was one of my very first guests! You can listen to Episode 6.
We are still in the summer series of re-releases of parenting episodes. I am excited to put this conversation back in your ears! This was the first conversation between me and Wendy Speake in which we have a big conversation about the big emotion of anger. We discuss all the internal and external triggers that we have as moms. There is so much helpful content packed into this episode. And if you want more from Wendy, she came back on the show on Episode 46 to talk about creativity and motherhood.
I'm excited to put this conversation back in your ears! This was my first conversation with Sissy Goff from Daystar Counseling Center. We talk about raising girls--anxiety, parenting different personalities, how to assume the best in your kids and how to develop our girls' self-worth. You can check out more episodes with Sissy over at the Raising Boys & Girls podcast.
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