005 Navigating the 12 Steps in the Land of Estrangement with guest Roberta Wasserman

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Hi, I'm Mark Whitlock, the author of the forthcoming devotional Beloved Strangers: Devotions and Prayers for Estranged Parents.
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I also write on Substack where I share not only some devotions and prayers, but also movie reviews, book reviews, and other content related to the challenges of being an estranged parent, being separated from our kids who've chosen to go no contact.
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And I'm privileged today to be sitting down with someone I've met via Substack.
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Her name is Roberta Wasserman.
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She's a trauma-informed therapist, coach, and consultant.
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She has more than two decades of clinical experience, and she's one of these excellent mental health workers in our world who is concentrating on family estrangement.
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She also concentrates on grief, trauma, and works with couples as well.
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And she draws from both personal and professional experience in her work.
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Now, one of the things that I love about Roberta is that she was one of the first to be certified as a family estrangement coach with Joshua Coleman.
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We've talked about his work here before.
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She's also a certified grief educator and is fully trained in the Gottman method.
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Roberta is also part of the Alienated Grandparents Anonymous organization.
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And we're going to talk a little bit more later about the Parents of Estranged Children organization that she's a part of.
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And today, in our time here on this podcast, we're going to talk with Roberta about her workbook, Living in the Land of Estrangement.
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It's a 12-step workbook for estranged parents and grandparents.
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Roberta, thank you so much for agreeing to be on the podcast.
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I'm so grateful to meet you today.
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It's a pleasure.
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Thank you, Mark, for this opportunity.
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And you got my attention with your term beloved strangers.
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I just find that such a um compassionate description of what's happened to families in our society today.
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Well, I appreciate that very, very much.
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Before we dive in, I'm guessing that most everybody who's listening has heard of the 12 steps, but not everybody has a really good concept of what they are.
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Could you give us a little bit of an overview, a 30,000-foot view at the 12 steps?
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Yes, so the 12 steps were founded in the um late 30s um by two professionals, doctors, who were alcoholics and they were not able to stay um clean and sober.
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So they created um this 12-step program.
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They found they could stay sober if they helped each other.
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And they worked on um this program that kept them sober, and it's helped so many people for decades now.
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And for me, I had lived experience in that I was born into a home.
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Um my father was an alcoholic, generational alcoholic, and um, so I was familiar with Al-Anon, which is a 12-step program that is very similar to AA.
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It's based on the same 12-steps.
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It's just Al-Anon is to help people learn how to live in a relationship with someone they love who's addicted to a substance.
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So, and then my um career took me to working in inpatient and outpatient and residential treatment centers with people that are were addicted to substances.
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So I was quite familiar with the medical model of the 12 steps.
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I knew the 12 steps.
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I had witnessed firsthand people who had been addicted putting their lives together and then families putting their family systems back together.
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So this past winter, after years of working with estrangement, it just came upon me that this really could be adapted and modified the original 12 steps to be specifically for estranged parents and grandparents because they are primarily the ones that are being left in the um emotional cutoffs, and they it's not what they would choose.
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So I just modified it for that population to be more specific to help them navigate what I titled Living in the Land of Estrangement.
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And we're gonna walk through those in just a second.
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For me, I had a bias against them.
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Uh I I had an uncle who was an alcoholic and was involved in AA, and I I had heard through popular media, through movies and and books and and television shows and that type of thing, I'd heard about those things, but I'd never really understood them myself until uh I became separated from my wife in 2012 and walked into a recovery group.
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I was recommended to go to this recovery group because uh from a friend uh who said, well, I said, that's not really for me, that's not my life experience.
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He's like, No, no, no, no, you need to go.
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And sat down, and while that group itself was not based on the the the traditional 12 steps from um from AA and how it's been used in in other um other arenas of life, uh I was challenged to do um I can't remember if what what number they gave me, but it was something like forty forty meetings in 40 days.
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Yeah.
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Uh something along those lines.
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And my my friend, the the mentor that I had during this time, took me to an open AA meeting, and I heard the 12 steps there, and then I began to be fascinated uh just by how clear they are.
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They are it's it's such a uh an interesting way to put it in a linear process, even though the 12 steps are not necessarily linear, but to to read them as a whole, just walk through that and realize, okay, that's that's what it looks like to make a comeback.
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That's what it looks like to go step by step and and see how the brokenness uh can be restored.
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So I'm really grateful for this and I look forward to um for you guys who are listening to uh get your hands on this and to work through it together.
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So I I thought it might be helpful if you would read uh those steps and let's just read through them together.
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If we were at a meeting, we certainly would would read the 12 steps, but if you could read the 12 steps as you've uh adapted them for uh strange parents, that would be fantastic.
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Okay, and there are 12 of them, so please um bear with me.
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So step one is naming reality.
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We admitted that we are powerless over our adult child's choices and that our lives have become unmanageable through grief, fear, or obsession with repair.
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Step two is restoring hope without illusion.
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We came to believe that healing, whether reconciliation occurs or not, is possible through support, truth, and self-examination.
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Step three, releasing control.
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We made a decision to release control over our adult child's narrative and timing and to place our trust in a process of growth we do not fully command.
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Step four, courageous parental inventory.
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We made a searching and honest inventory of our parenting, our intentions, our limitations, our wounds, and our blind spots, and the impact of our actions.
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Step five, we witnessed truth.
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We shared this inventory with a trusted other, taking responsibility for harm without collapsing into shame or self-defense.
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Step six, readiness to change.
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We became ready to release parental behaviors that no longer serve defensiveness, minimization, entitlement, overfunctioning or emotional withdrawal.
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Step seven, practiced humility.
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We humbly sought to grow beyond our limitations, recognizing that repair requires change, not persuasion.
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Step eight, relational accountability.
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We made a list of the ways our actions may have caused harm and became willing to make amends where appropriate and safe to do so.
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Step nine, making amends without agenda.
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We made direct amends when possible without pressure, self exoneration or expectation of reconciliation, except when doing so would cause further harm.
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Step ten, ongoing self-reflection.
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We continued to examine our reactions, especially entitlement, victimhood, or resentment and took responsibility when we were wrong.
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Step eleven, inner regulation and wisdom.
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We sought greater emotional regulation, self-soothing, and discernment through reflection, prayer, therapy, or mindfulness, learning when to act and when to weep.
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And lastly, compassionate service.
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Having experienced growth, we offered support to other estranged parents without fueling blame, ideology, or grievance and committed to breaking intergenerational patterns.
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Thank you for reading those.
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I appreciate that.
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In step one, we talk about how we admitted that we're powerless, and I've often looked at that as the idea of acceptance.
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And I think one of the things that estranged parents struggle with is accepting the fact that what we're going through right now is what we're going through.
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How do you counsel those in your practice and those that you know in life about accepting the circumstances that we're in related to being estranged?
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Well, certainly with estrangement, it's not what we would have chosen.
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And I have not met a single parent that could say, uh, this is I raise my children to grow up and do this to me to us and our family system.
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Um, you know, acceptance requires us to grieve.
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And we don't grieve well.
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Universally, uh, you know, grief is a human life experience.
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But particularly in America, you know, where everything is, you know, just be happy.
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The reality is life is painful.
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And when you're in the acceptance phase, particularly of not having a relationship with a loved one, a beloved stranger, you have to grieve what you do not have.
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You have to grieve what all your hopes, dreams, intentions, um, investment, everything that you might have poured in to have this expectation of a connection does not exist.
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That's a grief process, and grief is the pathway to acceptance of letting go, of being able to um admit that this is not what I wanted, however, um I cannot change it.
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I am powerless over another person, and so working on accepting that um the pathway to get there is through grieving.
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Right.
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I remember grief was the the major driving factor for me and the the reasons that I I needed to face uh a system of recovery.
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I I had I call them events, I'd had seven grief events in about three years.
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I lost both um my my mom and my dad, my my father-in-law at the time, my best friend, as well as two jobs that were incredibly important to me, and and then leaving a city that I'd lived in for a long time.
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And I I I was struggling.
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I was having I was going dark, I was imploding quite a bit in grief.
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And uh I remember thinking, uh, well, I I probably need help.
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And so I sought help and I didn't really blend, I didn't really gel with the counselors that I sat down with, and I I thought at the time, well, there they're man, that I'm just not a fit.
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Well, I don't know, I probably wasn't ready for counseling myself.
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That was probably what was really going on.
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And yet through the process, I I was able to finally grieve and realize that that grief had caused uh a lot of my pain.
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And one of the things I realized in that was that we we we listen to the Kubler Ross steps of grief.
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And and I in America we we think of those as linear, we think of those as we just we've got to knock them down, we're gonna go through these in order.
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That's not the case at all.
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Grief is more like walking through a dark forest.
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And each of those stages of grief is like a different kind of tree, an oak, a pine, a uh uh you know, a fig tree, etc.
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You got all kinds of trees there in the forest, you're running into them uh one one or another.
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So you may get to a place where you uh experience anger, and then maybe another one's a bargaining, and then you're back to anger, then depression, etc.
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etc.
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etc.
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You're back and forth as you as you make your way toward um getting through that.
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Where do estranged parents wrestle most with grief?
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What's the hardest thing that you've seen?
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I mean, well, we we acknowledge this before you even started rolling tape.
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Every single estranged parent has a different story.
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The the causes, the the journey, the length of time, all of those things are very different for everybody.
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But in general, what's one of the things that estranged parents hold on to and can't grieve?
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Um, I think one of the things is the great injustice as to what has occurred.
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Again, you know, every parent I choose to believe primarily strives to do a better job than what they received in their upbringing.
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I think universally um we look at how we were raised and we want more for our own kids, and we try, but we we still um don't we still miss the mark because one of the reasons is in our minds we're giving them what we may not have received, and yet they're a different person.
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They may be looking or needing something quite differently.
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Again, it's not about fault or blame, but I think parents get um caught up in the in the great injustice.
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There's nothing fair about an emotional cutoff from your child.
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There's there's nothing fair about it.
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I mean, even in my past as a trauma-informed therapist, if we worked with foster care or children that were removed with CPS, the goal becomes restoration.
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And when you deal with estrangement, it seems in our society today it's a forever life sentence without even an opportunity for redemption.
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So that I think parents fall into the injustice and the unfairness and get stuck in the anger and almost self-righteousness and the um the hierarchy of I'm the parent, they're the child, which they're growing into, they're launching into the world.
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They never really truly belong to us, right?
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They're launching right.
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So I think parents do get stuck there.
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And um, I think with a with someone that understands the ambiguous life experience, the ambiguous grief um of family estrangement with a skilled um professional, I think parents can be helped to launch and propel themselves forward regardless of reconciliation.
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You brought up foster families and how the goal with an initial foster placement is reconciliation and family reunification.
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And I I remember uh my wife and I are currently fostering children right now, and I sat down in uh this meeting in the in the training, and they went over that was the subject for the night.
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And when it was all over with, um I looked ashen and my wife looked over me and says, What is wrong?
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Are you okay?
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Are you sick?
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And I said, I said, no.
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I said, I I've been sitting here for the last two hours through this training going, so wait a minute.
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Foster kids have a process, they have documentation, and they have all of these people around them supporting them with one goal in mind, and that is within a set period of time there's going to be a reunification with the family.
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And I'm sitting here as an estranged father with nobody around me, with no process, with no documentation, and no expectation that I'll ever be reconnected with my children.
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Tragic.
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And I thought, wow.
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And um, so as we as I as we look at the stories of our our two foster children, they're very different in their stories, and I I just even though one will be very, very hard to see reunification happen, I have to be cheering, I have to be advocating for that because I know in my heart how hard and how painful it is for me to think about the fact that I may go the rest of my life without reunification with my beloved strangers.
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Yes.
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Um I yeah, I know that um um you would advocate very, very heartily that people go systematically through the sections in your workbook and deal with each step individually.
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So I I I want to say that out loud so that if you're thinking about, hey, I can listen to this podcast and I can do a few things and I'll be better off.
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Um seriously, you you gotta go deep.
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I I I I went through the 12 steps in turbo mode and thought, I'm gonna get there and I'm across the finish line and I'm gonna be I'm gonna be okay.
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That's not the way it works.
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Not at all.
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And you go back.
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Exactly.
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You go back, right?
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I mean, it's not you're not climbing a ladder and you you it you it's not a destination, it's a journey, and it will be repeated.
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Like we will find, particularly for estranged parents, you might you might find my workbook and start working on it, and then you'll come up with uh one of your beloved strangers' birthdays, or a holiday, or you'll hear through the um grape vine that somebody's gotten married and you weren't invited.
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You will go back to step one.
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You will go back to that grieving of oh my goodness, here it is again, here it is again.
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So, yeah, you're absolutely right.
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Even though it is 12 steps, we're not climbing a ladder to get to the top.
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We are going to go through these life experiences as long as um as grief exists and grief is love with no place to go.
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You would not be grieving if you did not love those um estranged family members.
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Exactly.
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So, with that caution, I want to take us to step four and talk about what you call the courageous parental inventory, or what they call in 12-step programs the fearless moral inventory.
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So, what would how would you counsel us to do an inventory like this?
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Okay, um, this is um an empowering step, okay?
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It's usually hard to do, it's hard to look at yourself in the mirror at anything that um any ways that you have failed and to make a list of it.
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But the good news is that just like if you owned a store, you're not just gonna make a list of the things that are not good, you are going to also make include in that inventory all the good things that you know you did as a parent and you reflect back on your parenting.
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This is so important for people that are experiencing estrangement because the narrative is, and our society really fuels this that if you are cut off by your adult children, you abuse them.
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That's not based on truth, it's a false ideology that our society is running with, but you certainly made mistakes and you want to list those, but you also want to highlight all those good.
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Did they go on vacations?
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Did they have food?
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Did they, you know, were you there?
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Do you have those moments where you remember something that was so special, an intimate moment with a child?
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You make that list thorough, you go through because that will help you um have a balanced perspective, not this one-sided narrative where parents can fall into just crushing guilt, crushing shame.
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My child is not talking to me, and I, you know, based on something that I did, that can be like the view that you have, and it's not based on fact or accuracy.
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It's primarily if an adult child cuts off, it's based on feelings, right?
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Maybe something bad happened, but they're they're feeling um that the relationship is not working for them at the time.
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So with that inventory, you make sure you highlight the the good things that occurred as well.
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Very, very important.
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So it's it's it's naturally so hard to list all the good stuff.
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I mean, so many people that I've worked with in in in other 12-step programs where you've done the fearless moral inventory and we sit down and have that long conversation, which we'll talk about as as a step five.
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But why is it so hard to list out the good stuff and how do you how do you counsel someone who's struggling to get to the good stuff?
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Well, I think human nature, we have that uh def default to look at the negative and to look what's wrong.
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And even Gottman, a fully trained Gottman guy, he is so big on focusing on the positive perspective, which he will say that's not natural.
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You're going to do something that's not natural.
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So it's hard to list the good, but we want to give credit where credit is due.
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And especially when, as I said, the natural response, and I tell my clients all the time when they come and they're they're just falling apart emotionally due to the strange, you're having a natural reaction to an abnormal life experience.
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Universal, universally, we all believe it's the worst thing to happen to have to bury a child.
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That's an unnatural um order of life events.
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But estrangement is also unnatural.
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We are not meant to, we are meant for relationship and connection.
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We're not meant to be rejected, to be um estranged or ostracized.
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That's a that's a form of punishment from some cultures and history, you know, ostracize uh someone, it was just a very toxic way of of treating people.
00:23:07.599 --> 00:23:22.880
So just knowing that um we are wired for connection, and when you experience estrangement, you go into deep shame, guilt, self-condemnation.
00:23:23.039 --> 00:23:33.440
Um, so really working on claiming, uh even though it's not a natural experience, really work on claiming what was right and what was right about your parenting.
00:23:34.319 --> 00:23:43.920
That that's so true, and and let's just acknowledge that the the process of grieving a child that's been lost to death is painful and and difficult.
00:23:44.160 --> 00:23:46.240
We didn't know we never would want to lessen that.
00:23:46.480 --> 00:23:55.519
The the grieving process of an estranged parent is just different because as you brought up, there's the graduation that occurs anyway.
00:23:55.759 --> 00:23:59.359
It's not that the graduation doesn't occur because the child has passed away.
00:23:59.599 --> 00:24:03.279
The graduation doesn't occur in your life because you're not there.
00:24:03.440 --> 00:24:04.240
It does occur.
00:24:04.400 --> 00:24:10.880
It happens, they cross the stage, they receive the diploma, their photographs and meals and gifts, and you're not there.
00:24:11.119 --> 00:24:13.599
Same with a wedding or the birth of a grandchild, etc.
00:24:13.759 --> 00:24:14.000
etc.
00:24:14.640 --> 00:24:23.359
Even typical everyday stuff like a promotion or a new car, moving into a new home, all of those things continue on without us there.
00:24:23.519 --> 00:24:26.640
And that that's a very different different and difficult grief.
00:24:26.720 --> 00:24:30.799
And I'm glad that Roberta that you brought those up and brought us some highlights for that.
00:24:30.960 --> 00:24:40.400
One of the things we think about when we think about getting back to the um the inventory is is step five as well, where we share it with a trusted other person.
00:24:40.880 --> 00:24:44.559
Are you who who are you recommending that that other person be?
00:24:44.720 --> 00:24:51.279
And how do how do we prepare for that meeting where we share the the stuff from step four?
00:24:51.680 --> 00:25:03.279
So the typical um 12 steps, they would have a sponsor, someone that has worked the program longer, has been in the program, really understands it.
00:25:03.359 --> 00:25:07.680
So and they've also have already done their own four steps so they understand it.
00:25:07.839 --> 00:25:11.920
They're not gonna have a response of any type of condemnation.
00:25:12.079 --> 00:25:16.880
I wouldn't want any estranged parent to set themselves up for further harm.
00:25:17.039 --> 00:25:21.039
You do not take this four-step and go to your estranged child.
00:25:21.200 --> 00:25:25.839
You do not go to you know social media and put it out there.
00:25:26.000 --> 00:25:28.799
You find a trusted individual.
00:25:29.039 --> 00:26:01.759
So that can be um, for some people, it can be within the uh close family, it can be a professional, it can be a therapist, it can be a coach, um, it could be with um, you know, perhaps a religious uh organization, a faith system that has someone that is um skilled and available to accept those kind of um confessions, so to speak, or it can be another estranged parent that has been doing it longer.
00:26:01.920 --> 00:26:09.599
You know, there's there's any some people it's they're newly estranged, it's been a year and they're just starting the workbook.
00:26:09.759 --> 00:26:12.960
There's other people that have been haven't heard from their child in 10 years.
00:26:13.200 --> 00:26:16.480
So those those are the ones that I would recommend.
00:26:16.720 --> 00:26:29.279
But finding because there's an actual healing power in confessing these things to and having it witnessed, um, there's a healing component that occurs.
00:26:29.839 --> 00:26:30.079
Yeah.
00:26:30.240 --> 00:26:34.640
Talk talk a little bit more about that, the confessional nature of it and the healing component.
00:26:34.799 --> 00:26:42.720
What what have you seen in some of the folks that you've worked with when they've they've shared the inventory and what what's that experience been like for them?
00:26:43.119 --> 00:26:51.119
It's very healing because um we are um meant to be fully known, right?
00:26:51.359 --> 00:27:05.680
And to be able to share who we are and have as David Kessler, who was um the grief expert with Elizabeth Kiebler-Ross, um, he talks about you need your grief needs to be witnessed.
00:27:06.000 --> 00:27:21.039
So just letting to be able to receive, I use this often in my um therapeutic um notes and and the profession is reflecting unconditional positive regard.
00:27:21.200 --> 00:27:28.480
So someone will come to you and they share the worst of the worst of themselves, and they're still received with acceptance.
00:27:28.799 --> 00:27:31.839
So again, that's very, very healing.
00:27:32.480 --> 00:27:33.039
That's great.
00:27:33.200 --> 00:27:34.960
Thanks for thanks for sharing that.
00:27:35.200 --> 00:27:42.799
And as the last part of our interview that we're we're looking forward to, the time when we'll close this interview as we do with all other interviews.
00:27:42.880 --> 00:27:46.880
I want to tell you more about uh Roberta's work and how you can get in touch with her.
00:27:46.960 --> 00:27:51.599
But before we get to that stuff, I want to talk about the idea of making amends.
00:27:51.680 --> 00:28:04.880
Uh it shows up in the 12 steps in steps eight and nine, the idea that we've made a list of ways that we've harmed others and that we're seeking to make amends for those, and then we actually make those amends.
00:28:05.680 --> 00:28:11.279
Uh that can be a very scary proposition to to go forward.
00:28:11.680 --> 00:28:19.839
What is why do they use the word amends and what's the difference between amends and apology and and and all of that?
00:28:20.000 --> 00:28:28.000
Walk walk us through kind of the the worldview, if you will, of twelve steps and approaching someone that you've hurt.
00:28:28.640 --> 00:28:33.440
So um a vi again a tremendously courageous step to take.
00:28:33.599 --> 00:28:52.880
Um in the land of estrangement, if you have been um asked for no contact, or certainly if there's ever any legal uh restraining orders or anything of the sort, do not go to the person and give your amends.
00:28:53.200 --> 00:28:55.680
Amends is a form of repair.
00:28:56.240 --> 00:29:01.279
And if we are not given the opportunity, it's more than just an apology.
00:29:01.440 --> 00:29:16.400
Apology is words, amends is action and putting in and making changes and being able to go to the person and to acknowledge and validate that harm has occurred, um, regardless of intent.
00:29:16.559 --> 00:29:27.839
And again, this is so important with the land of estrangement is it we as parents generally go through life not intending to harm our children, however, harm it occurs.
00:29:28.079 --> 00:29:55.200
So being able to focus on the the impact of our choices or our lack thereof caused a wound or caused pain, and to be able to amend that, repair that, to s to acknowledge that that happened and don't get into explaining, you know, well, this is what I met, because that dismisses the um the power of the amends.
00:29:55.279 --> 00:29:58.160
The amends is really taking responsibility.
00:29:58.960 --> 00:30:16.319
However, um we really have to be aware of our motives when you get to these steps, because many parents do an amends letter with an underlying expectation that the relationship will be restored.
00:30:16.480 --> 00:30:18.160
That doesn't always happen.
00:30:18.640 --> 00:30:20.880
Um, you know, for a lot of reasons.
00:30:21.039 --> 00:30:46.319
Sometimes the adult children are not ready, but there's an another um uh theory in the estrangement ideology world that the goalpost just gets moved because they still need um the distance for them to continue to live their lives and so they may create more reasons within.
00:30:46.400 --> 00:31:03.200
Um, and I'm not saying this is not about judgment and this is not about condemnation on their choices or their way of doing life, but it it can be happen, it can happen unconsciously that the goalpost just gets moved, and so that one amends is not enough.
00:31:03.440 --> 00:31:14.400
So I really caution parents to really make sure that you are able to give this gift without any strings attached, and that may take time.
00:31:14.559 --> 00:31:28.880
You have to that's one of the benefits of this workbook is that this workbook states clearly that this is for the estranged parent or grandparent to heal themselves regardless of the outcome.
00:31:29.039 --> 00:31:33.279
It's not a pathway to do this, therefore to have their relationship.
00:31:33.440 --> 00:31:55.119
And I that's so important because true mental health, um authentic definition of true mental health is the ability to live your life regardless of what other people are doing, and to be able to take responsibility for your own feelings, your own mental health, your own well-being, regardless of the choices of others.
00:31:55.359 --> 00:31:57.519
So, and that's a journey.
00:31:57.759 --> 00:32:04.160
That's a journey because people hurt us, and and the pain of estrangement is excruciating pain.
00:32:04.400 --> 00:32:20.319
But people, just like people can move through life after having to bury a child and go on, we still have the possibility of a relationship, so that's all the more reason to carry on.
00:32:20.480 --> 00:32:24.720
Um, so you have to do the work to be able to do that.
00:32:25.839 --> 00:32:56.720
In 12-step groups, where uh you we get to steps eight and nine, and uh we're looking at there may be opportunities where uh making the amend might do the other person harm, or the other person has passed away, or um any number of circumstances, and they have a phrase called living amends, and that is where you do something to acknowledge the wrongdoing that that that occurred and and you do something as a living amends for that situation.
00:32:56.960 --> 00:33:04.400
Is that type of amends ever called for uh for in the strange parent, strange child relationship?
00:33:04.799 --> 00:33:05.440
Absolutely.
00:33:05.599 --> 00:33:14.000
I think um, particularly if you were given a legal document, a restraining order, if you reach out, then you're gonna have legal consequences upon yourself.
00:33:14.079 --> 00:33:28.000
You have we have to respect the autonomy of our adult children, even if they're making their own mistakes, they have a right to make their own mistakes, they have a right to self-determination and how they're gonna live their life and who's gonna be invited in it.
00:33:28.240 --> 00:33:34.799
So if you are powerless over that, you you aren't even able to make an amends to your child.
00:33:35.039 --> 00:34:04.559
You can um you can find ways to give to others, you can become a better person yourself, you can work to even when speaking about your child, let's say you go out in public and you see um someone that knows the estranged child, there's a difference between berating your child to someone else or speaking about them highly, regardless of what they're doing.
00:34:04.799 --> 00:34:15.280
So just knowing that in yourself, you can make a living amends by saying, Um, oh, I know they're they're doing very well, and that makes me happy, or something like that.
00:34:15.440 --> 00:34:25.519
You know, not not not to be in authentic, but to be able to speak more positively versus um derogatory in their absence, right?
00:34:25.679 --> 00:34:34.960
So that those are the kind of things I'm thinking of living amends, and just being a better person and being able to treat any other children, right?
00:34:35.360 --> 00:34:51.119
There's a lot of times there's other siblings that aren't estranged, and being able to honor them and be with them fully present, not carrying the uh weight of the past into that relationship, just different things like that.
00:34:51.280 --> 00:34:58.159
And certainly that's something that could be explored um when the dynamics present themselves.
00:34:59.840 --> 00:35:01.599
We're coming down to the end.
00:35:01.760 --> 00:35:08.079
I wanted to uh remind everyone that you can both follow Roberta and myself on Substack.
00:35:08.159 --> 00:35:11.440
If you haven't been on that platform before, it's delightful.
00:35:11.679 --> 00:35:17.519
This is a place where people are actually expressing thought and are thinking about the thoughts that are expressed.
00:35:17.679 --> 00:35:23.760
So you can come to Substack and follow Roberta Wasserman or follow me, Mark Whitlock, there on the platform.
00:35:24.000 --> 00:35:32.559
We've been talking today about Roberta's excellent workbook called Living in the Land of Estrangement, 12-step workbook for estranged parents and grandparents.
00:35:32.800 --> 00:35:41.199
I will be linking from the show notes uh to uh and you can find that in whatever app you're watching uh or listening to this podcast.
00:35:41.280 --> 00:35:47.679
You can find those show notes there and be able to click out to Roberta's Practice, her book, uh, her other organizations.
00:35:47.920 --> 00:35:55.440
And before we went on uh to press record today, Roberta, you mentioned uh an organization that you speak at and volunteer for monthly.
00:35:55.519 --> 00:35:56.800
Would you tell us about that?
00:35:57.119 --> 00:36:02.480
Yes, this is called Um Parents of Estranged Adult Children International.
00:36:02.719 --> 00:36:06.480
So PDAZ International.org.
00:36:06.719 --> 00:36:12.159
Um that was founded by an Estranged Mom uh in 2017.
00:36:12.320 --> 00:36:16.400
Her name is Amy, and it has grown to over 5,000 members.
00:36:16.719 --> 00:36:22.960
So it is uh a free group, a support group that has meetings throughout the week.
00:36:23.119 --> 00:36:27.840
Some meetings in different states um have in person.
00:36:28.480 --> 00:36:36.639
I volunteer once a month, the first Tuesday of the month, to speak about the workbook, and we speak about the subsequent step of the month.
00:36:36.800 --> 00:36:38.239
So we are now in September.
00:36:38.400 --> 00:36:40.719
Tonight I'll be speaking about step nine.
00:36:41.119 --> 00:36:53.119
The the group you have to register through um that organization to be sent the link to attend, but it's a free support group with lots and lots of resources.
00:36:53.679 --> 00:36:54.559
That's fantastic.
00:36:54.639 --> 00:36:56.000
I hope that you'll take advantage of that.
00:36:56.079 --> 00:37:02.559
There's nothing like being able to sit in a circle with others and and wrestle with uh with these challenges.
00:37:02.719 --> 00:37:06.239
So um take a chance and and uh look for that.
00:37:06.320 --> 00:37:12.000
You can find a link to the Parents of Estranged Adult Children International again in the show notes.
00:37:12.159 --> 00:37:15.679
Um Roberta, thank you so much for being a part of this podcast.
00:37:15.760 --> 00:37:23.119
I've enjoyed chatting with you, and I I believe that this workbook is going to be so helpful to so many estranged parents.
00:37:23.280 --> 00:37:24.960
So thanks for being a part of today.
00:37:25.280 --> 00:37:30.000
Thank you, Mark, and I appreciate the opportunity and I appreciate the work you're doing as well.
00:37:30.559 --> 00:37:31.280
Thank you.
00:37:31.599 --> 00:37:40.800
As is tradition, uh we we close this uh these these podcasts in prayer for estranged families, and you brought up an excellent point.
00:37:40.960 --> 00:37:45.760
So if you would, would you introduce what you're going to do as our prayer and then and then pray it here at the end?
00:37:46.079 --> 00:37:46.800
Yes, thank you.
00:37:46.960 --> 00:37:53.920
So in the workbook, every step ends the chapter with the serenity prayer as is universally known.
00:37:54.159 --> 00:38:00.880
God grant me the serenity to accept the things I cannot change and the courage to change the things I can and the wisdom and the difference.
00:38:01.039 --> 00:38:20.800
However, many people do not know that the original author of that serenity prayer is um his name is Reinhold Niebar, and he wrote an extended version, which is the original one, and I just thought we could close using that to honor him and his contribution to this.
00:38:21.119 --> 00:38:21.679
Absolutely.
00:38:22.480 --> 00:38:34.320
God give us grace to accept with serenity the things that cannot be changed, courage to change the things which should be changed, and the wisdom to distinguish the one from the other.
00:38:34.559 --> 00:38:59.119
Living one day at a time, enjoying one moment at a time, accepting hardship as a pathway to peace, taking, as Jesus did, the sinful world as it is, not as I would have it, trusting that you will make all things right if I surrender to your will, so that I may be reasonably happy in this life and supremely happy with you forever in the next.
00:38:59.360 --> 00:39:00.000
Amen.