Helping Adopted Kids Grow With Danny Huerta

This meeting is being recorded.

Hello everybody, welcome to another episode of the Thriving Adoptees Podcast. So today I'm delighted to be joined by Dan, uh, by Danny Huerta from Focus on the Family. Um, so welcome to the show, Danny. Let's pretend that we haven't been chatting for 10 minutes and haven't worked beyond that.

Thank you, Simon. Yeah, it's good to be on the show with you. Excited to dive into this topic.

And you know, with, uh, listeners, we've, uh, as some of the regular listeners know, we've had a couple of other guests on from Focus on the Family, um, Jim, Jim Delly, and Sharon Ford. And I just love what you're, you're doing, and we always have great conversations. You guys really know your onions when it comes to adoption. So, um, before Danny, uh, came to Focus on the, on the Family, he's got, uh, 25— well, I think 25 years in total, do you say, of experience of working with families and working with school districts and mentoring young people, um, and respite care. You talked about, um, kids in, in, uh, kids that were in foster care and stuff for you, and a placement agency. So a really great mix. I was going to use the word mélange, but it sounds slightly pretentious. Have you heard that word? It's like a French word for mix.

But yeah, for mix. Okay, I like it.

Yeah, mélange, right? It's— I don't normally do that sort of stuff, listeners, do I? Anyway, but, um, We're just going to dive in and really talk to Danny about what he's learned about the most important things adoptive parents need to know. So what comes to your mind, Danny, when you hear this phrase thriving adoptees?

Yeah, I just, I picture as a foundation to it, trust. That there's safety and trust. That's a thriving adoptee that has experienced patience from other people. They've begun to learn or have learned how to stop self-defeating and self-destructive type of behaviors, and they accept themselves as lovable and loved. And they're really working on resolving loss, abandonment, rejection, and moving towards a hope, a future. a new chapter, new— having new chapters instead of being stuck in one chapter. They're allowing themselves to, to close a chapter down, accept it as part of their story, and now they're, they're experiencing a new chapter that's difficult, yet it's creating a resilience that's based on trust and growth. And that's when I see a child that is thriving and going into adulthood with very positive momentum.

Positive momentum. I like that. I love it. I love that. Positive momentum.

Yeah. And one thought with that, Simon, is I love— I have— I've been obsessed with 3 words, 3 words that I just consistently think about and that my family has heard over and over again. And the first one's invitation. This idea that We have invitations all day long. And in this case, when a child's adopted, they're invited into this home. There's an invitation there. And there's an invitation for the parents to be transformed in that new relationship as well. But then there's a momentum that's brought into that relationship in the family. So second word's momentum. And it's these counter-momentums that we're experiencing all day long. So for instance, I'll give you an example. I go to a grocery store. Somebody comes in. They're in a bad mood. I run into their negative momentum, I can bring a positivity to it. Whose momentum is really going to take over in that moment? Is it my positivity or their negativity? What— which one is going to rule the moment? And really, it's about— we're dealing with each other's momentums. And in this case, a child that is being adopted brings a momentum, good or bad or both. And then as a family, we get to bring a momentum, an intentional momentum, and then we get to create momentums all day long. And then The last word is steadfast. The third one. How do we create steadfastness in our relationship and in each individual person? Steadfastness is a fascinating word to me because we don't tend to live in steadfast. We tend to live in whatever is comfortable and safe rather than what is steadfast, because that's what creates long-lasting satisfaction and deep-rootedness in people.

Yeah, wow. Um, I, I, I love the, uh, the positive and negative coming to which is, which is gonna win. And, um, a little metaphor, analogy, or whatever came to, to, to my mind when you said that, which is, um, like we go, we go into, uh, we go into a room, we go into, we go into a kitchen, right?

Yeah.

And the light's on, or it's a sunny day, whatever, you know, it's light in the kitchen. And it's when we open a cupboard and it's dark in the cupboard, but what actually happens is the light from the room rushes in.

Right, right.

Darkness doesn't rush out and make the room dark. The lightness rushes in. Yeah, so that's the natural order of things is this positivity. I've not got a better word for it than Trumps, right? We don't often use the word Trump, you know, on this show, clearly, because it may be divisive to the audience. 70% of the listeners are in the US, which is strange for a guy from the UK, right? Yeah, sorry, can I ask you? Thank you.

Your accent's fantastic. They love it here in the US.

So yeah, there's— I know there's— I think there's other reasons as well why there's— Yeah, there are many other reasons. There's many other reasons, but yeah, um, positivity over— positivity overcomes. Um, the, the other thing I want to— that I scribbled down is, um, the transformation of the parents. So I often— again, regular listeners will know, maybe get a bit cheesed off with me repeating this one— is one of my favorite, um, episodes of the podcast was with, uh, um, an adoptive mum who also runs an agency. She's, um, called Holly-Anne Petrie, and she came up with a title for, for her episode, which was Unpacking Our Own Baggage as Adoptive Parents. So this— and I did an episode yesterday on kind of self-awareness. So parenting is about the parents rather than the kids. It starts with us. And so you use this word an invitation for the parents to be transformed. And that sounded to me like change going on for the parents, changing the parents', uh, grounding, um, emotional intelligence, uh, spiritual intelligence, faith. I don't know, but what, what did you mean by that? Parents transformed? And what, what's, what, what's that about?

Well, there's so much there. I— we, we had my wife's cousin's daughter with us for a year, and I remember having a different momentum inside of me emotionally towards this young woman that came into our home. And I remember being very self-aware. What, what is happening inside of me in response to her behaviors, her decisions that are not part of what we normally do in our home, right? This is a new person coming in. Different from our family culture that we've put in. There's not automatic love. There isn't an automatic attachment right off the bat. And there was an invitation there, and it allowed me to go in first. Am I a healthy individual? Many times stress and other things pull out what's really going on inside of us as parents, and we can either step into that invitation and become rigid and say, no, this is who I am. And the other person needs to change, or I come in with moldability and adaptability. And that is such an important mindset to be flexible, to adjust to the person's world, story, emotions, thoughts, and being relational by going in there first, showing empathy and love for the person. And in that, allowing for myself to understand myself better.

Yeah.

I remember putting on my refrigerator, and my wife and I have done this, and I recommend families do this. Whoever is listening, give yourself 3 timeouts or 5 in the day and call timeout if you notice momentum not going the right way inside of you because you will know that as you are responding to behaviors in your child, there is so much more to the behaviors, but sometimes we get stuck in there and become reactive and we are triggered. Take a timeout. Make sure you're having the right momentum in your response towards that child, because many times behaviors will draw out triggers inside of you that are old, something inside of you that maybe you didn't know, you didn't realize. And whenever you notice that shift emotionally and mentally, stop for a moment and figure out why. Where did that come from? What am I reacting to? What's my goal? What's my purpose? What am I trying to accomplish? That creates a place of respect. And that's one of— adaptability and respect are both traits within the 7 traits of what I call effective parenting. Respect allows you to look inward, to actually see. The word spect in respect is where we get spectacles, right? The glasses. And so, you're seeing something. Re means looking backwards. And so, I'm going to respect the person in front of me. And as I do that, I am shaped to become a more patient, more loving, more compassionate individual, a more loving person. And, you know, something I'm asked a lot when I'm speaking is, what is a good parent? And all of us could have some subjective responses to that, but we assume if the kids are well behaved, they must be a good parent. But is that really true? Or is it a child that misbehaves a lot and a parent is responsive and able to be there and respond and direct and redirect and at the same time maintain warmth and love while their child is having to learn how to manage their behaviors? Is that a good parent? Or do we gauge it by their kids are perfect and so then they must be good parents? And so there's so much complexity to that because of personality differences, Trauma the kids bring in, and we need to understand that but not get stuck there. And then we need to, we need to, instead of judge parents, really encourage one another as parents. Every parent is growing. And some of them don't realize it or don't want it, but a healthy adoptive environment will have parents that are growing as a child is learning to love and trust and grow as well. It's a whole environment where there's just— there's growth happening all the way through, and that creates a loving culture, a healthy environment, uh, that's an adoptive— uh, in an adoptive home.

So, um, as you were talking, I— something just— a memory came back to me from the past of, uh, somebody made a distinction between, um, responding and reacting. Yeah, responding and reacting. So another way, and another thing that we can look at in terms of our self-awareness is, um, did we respond or did we react?

Yeah.

You know, something happened, did we respond? Like, you know, count to 10 or whatever it is. You know, people say this stuff— who's got time for counting to 10? You know, the kids are going absolutely nuts. You can't But did, did we, did we respond or did we react? And, and, and if we, if, if, if we reacted, then that's probably an indication that something's— I guess to pull, to kind of, uh, pull something that you were saying back into, uh, back into the question.

If we— So Simon, on that, on that, what an exercise I love to do with families so you know if it's a response or reaction Because again, that can be subjective for some people and they can— it's hard to understand.

Oh.

Oh, did I respond? Did I react? What was it? What you want to look at is write down the different emotions you feel and then say, when I feel this, when I feel frustrated, I tend to do what? And look at your tendency. Ask your spouse, ask other people, when I'm frustrated, what do I tend to do? When I'm sad, what do I tend to do? And that will give you patterns of understanding to figure out, am I truly being reactive or responsive? And responding means I'm looking at the other person and I'm adjusting to what's needed in order to maintain relationship and be healthy in that relationship. Reacting is I'm protecting or controlling the moment because I feel uncomfortable with it. And so there's a distinction between those. What if I'm reacting? It's all because of me. I'm needing something, and so I'm going to do it so I regain control, I regain power, or I don't like your behavior, so I'm going to overpower so that you act a certain way because I don't like it. Responding is, I'm going to understand why you're behaving the way you're behaving. I'm going to step into that. I'm going to guide you in a loving way and connect. And just takes a lot more effort, a lot more understanding, but it's long-lasting. It creates a steadfast relationship. Because you're entering it with understanding rather than reactiveness.

Yeah. Uh, on that subject, we're kind of on that subject. I was listening to, uh, an adoptee on another podcast. Um, she's coming on the Thriving Adoptees podcast, so I was doing part of my research, I was listening to her, and, um, she talked about going to a, uh, a group with— of adoptive parents. She was facilitating a, like, a story circle or something to a group of adoptive parents, and one of the things that she heard from the adoptive parents is that there was anger amongst the adoptive parents, um, Towards their kids. And that was like, wow, I've never heard that. I've never heard that before. Um, and as you were talking about reactions, I was thinking about, yeah, what about that? What about when our reaction is anger to our kids?

Yeah, and those are shortcuts of our brain. That means we need to slow it down. Those timeouts are so helpful. Once you find yourself in an angry place, you have to figure out what is the actual emotion I feel. Is it I feel unheard? I feel helpless? I feel— there's an underlying emotion to that. And you're not always going to be perfect. This isn't about having perfection. This is about having insight into what is being brought out in you, because a healthy home means you have a A healthy parent that is building intentionally in the kids towards a goal. There's a structure to it. And there are these relational dynamics that you're having to navigate, and sometimes they go sideways. Anger is a great information giver. You have to figure out what is it in that moment that I am Truly reacting to, because it's not the whole thing. There's something in there that has captured your attention where you feel powerless, you feel helpless, you feel minimized. There could be a very powerful and very important thing that you need to understand about yourself that's been triggered by this child. Because ultimately, you're upset at something that the child is doing that's out of your control and power. And this is your way of trying to make it go quicker, more quickly. And so in this, you've got to pursue patience as you become a detective of your thought bubbles, your child's thought bubbles. And if you're able to see your child with gratitude, it helps soften that anger. Yet admit it with your child. You know, I feel angry towards you, and I'm trying to figure this out, because it begins to create trust. That you have emotions just like they do. If they're, if they're angry, it'd be good for them to tell you, I'm angry. And you go, well, let's figure it out. What, what is it? What's happening here? And let's, let's solve it. Let's be detectives in this because I care about you. I love you. I would die for you. And so let's figure this out. Let's take the time we need. Let's explore why this has popped up and what, what the purpose is of this emotion.

Wow. So it's almost like the anger is a, a rumble strip, um, saying that something's going off, something's going off somewhere. And, and, uh, and to use your word, it's an invitation. It's an invitation to explore some underlying emotion that's underneath that, and it's an invitation to explore that With your partner, um, you know, and if appropriate with the, with the child, I guess. I don't know, um, if it's age appropriate, if you feel it's appropriate in the moment. Um, yeah, it's, it's, it's a rumble, it's a rumble strip. Yeah, it kind of seems to me to be.

Yeah, you know, so each child has certain psychological needs that they come in with, and just realize that as parents. Kids come in with, whether adopted or not, they They're coming into the room invited with these psychological needs. And one of them is a sense of competence. They want to feel competent at things. And sometimes there are certain emotions that pop out if they don't feel that, like they feel, man, I'm always failing. You're always criticizing me. I can never do anything right. Some adopted kids feel that way, especially if they're comparing themselves to the siblings where they think they're more loved. Another one is just a sense of worth. They want to feel like they are valued and worthwhile, and they've already entered the home Probably feeling like, yeah, I'm kind of worthless. You know, somebody gave me up and you guys are taking me in. And they initially come in with that. So how do you foster that? Hey, you have worth. Let's move on from that conversation and go to, since you have worth in our home and you're competent, we need you here. We need you all in on the invitation to be part of our home. And that gives a sense of belongingness. And just know if any of those 3 are coming into question in their own brain, They feel worthless, if they feel they're not competent, if they don't feel like they belong, there will be, there will be strong emotions coming out because these are core psychological needs. And as a person, you may go, where do these emotions come from? Where, what's going on? Explore those core needs and say, huh, I wonder if, if some of those have come into question, all 3 or one of them, and how can I reassure And then move to the current problem and help them shift their momentum of the emotion. Because emotions are huge momentum shifters and guiders, and we want to bring the brain to regain that momentum that's needed in order to maintain a healthy connection.

Yeah. The other word that came to me as you were answering the last question was grace in terms of our being kind on ourselves. And a lot of people talk about, you know, a lot of people talk about adoptive parents' expectations of their kids. You know, that's been a theme that a lot of people, a lot of the guests have talked about in the past on this podcast. But, but, or, and, you know, if— what about our, our grace for ourselves? What about being kind on ourselves? You know, how, how kind do you see adoptive parents being on themselves? Are they, you know, like, are a lot of them— clearly there's going to be a scale, right? But I'm guessing there's quite a lot of them. I think for a few I know, quite good at beating themselves up, right?

Yeah, I would agree with that, Simon. And some of them, if their kids are acting out or there are big issues, they start to self-blame because they're— it just— the brain naturally does that. We just self-blame when things aren't going right. And what's tragic is sometimes I'll see 2 parents begin to blame each other, and that's just not helpful. It's not helpful to be blaming. It's resolving and figuring out what culture do we have in our home? How do we get to a healthy place? What really are the issues? What are really the problems beyond the behaviors? Because behaviors are just the surface of it all. What's really underneath that? What are the emotions? What are the thoughts? What are the perceptions? What are the beliefs? Let's go into that. And so for parents, if, if they go towards a shameful place as a parent, what happens is you You start to self-protect, you avoid, you, you go to old patterns like teenager patterns, you start to react like a teenager to your child. That's just not helpful. And so for a parent, make sure you're patient with yourself on the fact that bringing a child into an environment in an adopted type of dynamic is hard. It's difficult. You're taking on a challenge, yet it's amazing. It's beautiful. It's love at its finest. You're, you're deciding to love another person and to bring them in, and you want to, you want to sacrifice everything for that child. And they may not always be grateful, and they may misbehave, and they may actually make you feel like you're a bad parent. Step back and say, wow, I've taken on a big challenge. Good job. And make sure you begin to bring life-giving words not only towards yourself but your spouse. You guys are a team. And one exercise that I love to do with that is just using a chalk marker and writing life-giving words in the mirror. Many times as parents, we beat ourselves up in the mirror. Kids do that. That's a place of battle within our own minds of who we are. Who do we really think we are as we're stepping out of the bathroom? out of the mirror. Do we really see someone we love there in that mirror? And what you can do is, is write to your spouse, hey, I noticed these things I love about you. Or it's your adopted child, just say, here are the things that are beyond performance that I love about you. And you're bringing life into their narrative where their mind is wrestling. And you as a parent, start with you first if you're struggling with this. Write some words that are kind to you, because the invitation is for you to be the mom or the dad, and they need you all in. If you have a hard time loving yourself, you're gonna have a hard time loving your child. Yeah.

So one of the things that I came to in this, in this kind of arena, um, albeit me and my wife haven't got any kids, but that there's that, there's that, uh, the self-blame, that kind of, that negative, the negative voice in our heads that we've, that we've all got, right?

Yeah.

And what one of the distinctions I, I got to somewhere on this, and it's still very much work in progress, right? It's that if I try and fight that, that voice in the head, it just, it's like an argument, it just escalates. It's like an arms race, right? But if I ignore it, it's some— it somehow is somehow easier. It kind of, you know, like when you don't push against something, when, when you don't push back, it's the end of the argument. It's the— um, I don't know, am I making this clear? Does that, does that make any sense to you? Um, what, what have you found? Have you come across anything in, in this area? What have you found?

Well, I mean, it's natural for us to self-blame because that's the easiest, right? It gives you a sense of control over something. Um, yeah, it depends on the personality. And also, I would say gender, male, female, the way we handle self-blame is different. Men tend to want to ignore it. Women have that battle. They count on people that they trust. to speak into that and they'll talk about, man, I feel so insecure. I feel, I feel, you know, I'm not doing good as a mom. And then they get some good encouragement from their girlfriends and man, you see a change in them. Whereas guys, we're just not as open with that. We're not. We just try to deal with it on our own. We ignore it. We do other things. But what I see is, I see more men Pop. Just all of a sudden they yell, they're angry, boom, it comes out because they've just been stuffing things and they, they pretended to be patient and all of a sudden it just is the end and boom, you know, they blow up. Whereas I've seen more women that are able to dialogue in a very open way their journey of struggle with their own brain, their own mind, their own love of who they are, their own competence as moms. they tend to wrestle with that in a very healthy way where they don't have as many explosions where they have to backtrack and say, you know, I'm sorry. They're able to gain a good, healthy traction on the fact that, yeah, imperfections and all, in my weakness, I am able to be strengthened by this because I'm okay with that. I'm admitting that because my child has weaknesses and I still love them. And so I have weaknesses and I'm going to love me. Just because I have weaknesses doesn't mean I don't love myself. And you begin to create a healthy culture in your home that weaknesses and all, imperfections and all, love is the centerpiece of our home. Whereas guys tend to think, I need to perform well, I need to be on top of it. And when things are feeling out of control, all of a sudden there's like a— there's just an anger and avoid— or an avoidance. I'm going to work more. I'm going to be gone more because I feel more competent there, and there's less openness on the fact that they have these insecurities that they're carrying around as dads, especially in this realm of being an adopted dad when they're not feeling loved or affirmed by their kids.

Do those, um, gender— or what, to what extent does— I'm sure it's— I'm sure the answers are yes, and what's the way out, I guess. Sorry, I'm, I'm spiraling here. Um, to what extent, to what extent are adoptive parents aware of those gender differences that you described, or does that, does that create more friction between— does that sometimes create more friction between the, between the mum and dad?

Yeah, I call it marinting, marinting, where there's, uh, the parenting stuff begins to impact their, their marriage. And yes, there's Generally, the narrative, the way it goes, at least in the counseling offices, the wife will say, hey, I wish you were home more, or I wish you were more open about your feelings. You seem to be, you know, your fuse seems to be a little shorter. Then he says, hey, you know, if you just, if you cleaned up better, if you did, the house just seems messy all the time. I don't like— and all of a sudden there's this blame to each other. bombs, just going at each other verbally. And if they could both really be open and acknowledge their fears, that they don't want to do this wrong, and that they're trying their best and kind of accepting where they're at and then teaming up. If that could happen, then you create healthiness. The other one is self-protection. Once, once the mom and dad go to self-protection, that I've I want to feel competent. I want to feel worthwhile. I want to feel like I'm doing this well. Then that's when you see the, the hurt going back and forth, and that creates more of an opportunity for an adopted child to divide the home and to get in a place where they're feeling like, this is not going to be safe. I'm probably going to lose this home too. And it creates more behaviors for them.

Yeah. So, I mean, so far we've, um, talking— we've been talking quite a lot about sort of like, uh, psychological and emotional stuff, and, uh, especially psychological side of parenting here. Um, I'm wondering, you know, clearly your organization, you, you're people of faith, and I'm wondering what, um, what can you bring from that side, um, that's perhaps deeper than the psycho— psychological side that, um, helps this— helps parents, uh, accept this information to be transformed, this, um, curiosity, this willingness to change, you You know, we hear a lot about— don't we hear all this time about kids' neuroplasticity and that's the way, you know, they're open to change. Kids change, parents change, neuroplasticity, we all change. What can you bring from the faith perspective that's perhaps a different perspective than the mainly psychological perspective that we've Addressed so far?

Yeah, I mean, one of them that I, that I hone in on is the attachment side. And ultimately, if you're a person of believing in God and Jesus, you were adopted into that family, essentially. And, and it gives you an understanding of being loved regardless of who you are, your background, you're loved. Yet there's a, there's a relational component to it, a commitment from the person that's loving back. But there's a sacrifice from the initial going in. Now there's a verse that I love to think about when I'm thinking about adoption or even in parenting. It's in Isaiah and it says, he keeps him in perfect peace whose mind is stayed on him because he trusts in him. Trust is such a powerful word. Who do we trust in and why? And why is trust so important? So that one, it says, because you trust in him, you have perfect peace in your mind. And it says, trust in the Lord God forever, for he's an everlasting rock. And so that foundation that is secure, that is steadfast, out of that trust, we will be able to find peacefulness in our mind. And what we have found is that when you're peaceful in your mind and your emotions and your thoughts, you're able to be relational and connect with people. That's what adoption is all about. Are you allowing yourself to be loved, and are you loving back? In that you— in that self-regulation, that regulation yourself, and in your trust in a God that loves you, out of that you can freely love another person with, with free refills. You don't need a person's love back. You can freely give it. And if a per— if a parent is able to give that, Out of that faith in God saying, hey, I can pray, I can have this eternal love that, that, that I, that I flow out of, then I can love this child wholeheartedly because I was loved. And, and in that I create a deep, deep attachment and bond with the child, and I give them a connectedness with, with the Heavenly Father as well through that relationship. And there's so much within, I believe, within Scripture that gives us some powerful thought in the idea of invitation and what it looks like in adoption, the momentum and the steadfastness. And one place I love, Simon, where Jesus— it's one of the few times he just stands up and cries out and he says, hey, whoever believes in me, as the Scriptures have said, Out of his heart will flow rivers of living water. If a parent approaches it like that, boy, there's transformation. You're steadfast no matter the behaviors in your child. You're steadfast and you're loving and you're saying, I'm here for the endurance because I have this faith in Christ. There's a steadfastness that really creates a solid ground for trust and attachment to be able to grow.

Yeah. Wow. To me, as you were saying that, as you were saying that, um, it seemed to me that that's something to perhaps, um, I don't know whether you— I guess you would say pray on or meditate on and let that kind of, um, infuse into you, right?

Mm-hmm.

And because it's one of those things, it's far more like, you can look at it at 2 levels. You can, like, it's a bumper sticker, or it's a deep in your soul thing. So I've come up with this, and the reason that I say that is because I came up with this thing this morning. And it's, it's a new word. It's called, uh, it's called a sminsight. Sminsight, right? So you're the first person to hear about sminsight.

Nice.

So it was, it was originally, um, it was, uh, semi-insight, but I thought that didn't sound quite as cool. Well, I thought it sounded pretty cool, but then I came up with— well, I saw swimming this lunchtime, it's a sminsight. So A sminsight is really a half-believed truth. So it's something that we get in our head but not in our bones.

Yeah.

It's theory rather than belief. It's a concept rather than a felt, embodied experience.

Yeah.

And, and, and one of the— I guess one of the things when we're putting out so much on one of these, uh, one of these podcasts is that there's so many great ideas and great, yes, I can take that, but they, they, they don't have any oomph behind them. They don't have any power. until we kind of take them in. And I guess that's what, you know, I went to a religious school, you know, we did, we sung hymns each morning and we kind of, we listened to lessons, but we didn't take— maybe it was just me, I didn't take a lot in. And I'm just wondering if you can speak into that in terms of A perhaps a religious take on spin sites or anything that comes off the back of what I've just said.

It's so true. Religion is really about the brain and the theory and the— and that we get stuck in there, that there are these certain rules where we're trying to control the, the outcome. We're trying to— it's all about ourselves. Where it becomes a spiritual relationship is where it's out of love, right? So if you're thinking through what that would look like, it's Let's say these kids were throwing rocks at a house and one of them throws it, looks at his friend and says, hey, why aren't you throwing rocks? Are you afraid that you're going to be in trouble with your dad? The response from a Christian that would be relational with that Heavenly Father would be, no, I'm grieved by that, what that would do to my dad. It's not about what's going to happen to me. It's about what it's going to do in my relationship with my dad if I choose to do this. Many times we, we go into, into a spiritual realm on this, this God that just wants to punish people, that is just looking to see when people fail, and then boom, there's a punishment that comes in. And, and, and that's, that's not a relational place. That's out of fear and anxiety, and it's all about me, and I want to protect. Self-protection is not a relationship. A place of relationship is when I make this choice. Is it going to build a closer bond, closer relationship, or is it going to separate me further? We tend to see love as this place of rules, especially within the context of the Bible and Christianity. There's all these rules when it's really a recipe for being a loving, connected person. And sometimes that means sacrificing some things we we think we need to do, we say, huh, I can say no to that in order to be a relational human being and non-selfish. Boy, it takes so much to, to, to get our selfishness out and learn how to truly love people. And so imagine if in your home as an adoptive family, you created a culture, an environment that has support, that has empowerment, that has boundaries and expectations out of love, out of warmth. There's a use of time that has purpose to it. And then out of that, you're creating an internal growth in a person where they're committed to learning about things, they're committed to positive values that the boundaries and expectations shape. And then you're trying to create a relational, competent, social human being that has a positive identity as a person, as a person of worth. And it's all based on this humility that I, I am an imperfect human being. I'm not better than other people. Man, do I want to love and be loved. And that begins to help us learn how to take what's in the Bible and all the stories and broken stories and really put it into the heart and practice where we become life-giving. Not as we're better than someone else, but, man, I want to love you and I want to love you forever. I want to be with you in heaven forever. That's the concept of Scripture and the fact that people say, why would Jesus allow— why would God allow all pain and all this stuff to happen? He's provided the answer to what sin ravages. And he's saying, I want to be with you guys forever. So I'm going to die on the cross. I'm going to resurrect in this law of good and bad and good and evil. in and being able to pull us apart where we reset and have eternity together. It's a love story. Let's jump into it and let's create within our home a love story where we have that sacrificial place. And it begins with a husband and a wife giving the biggest gift of being able to learn to love each other and maintain a solid home. That's really where it begins from, from my perspective, from a psychological perspective. Over and over and over again, the environment where, where mom and dad and how healthy they are makes a huge difference, whether they're adopted, whether they have 10 kids or 1, or they have a strong-willed child. It starts with mom and dad and where they're at in their relationship, but also in their health.

Yeah. Okay. Wow.

Yeah.

There's so much that, um, we could do another hour, couldn't we, Ben? Um, I'm conscious of time. Is there anything that I've not—

Yeah, Simon, let me, let me give— because I know that there's a lot that I've thrown here. And I, I feel bad if I've confused anyone or if I've overwhelmed anyone. But here's one I love to give a picture of what steadfast love could look like and break it down to these, these simple steps for family. First one is, when a child comes into your home, Is everything provided, right? Are there clothes, food, all that? Because that comes into question for an adopted child, right? That's the foundation. From there, how relational is our home? Do we play? Do we take time to laugh? Do we take time to connect? Do I carve out time to be relational? Out of that, do I have— do I take time for guidance? Do I take thought to guide this child because I care about their future? future and I love them. Then out of that, do I give meaningful direction to their life towards a positive identity? See, so there are levels. You start off with everything is provided. We have a relationship. We can have fun together. We can connect. Out of that, I give you guidance. Then I give you meaningful direction of dreaming for what the future can hold for you in your life and I dream with you and we get excited and then the last one is— You're this person that I absolutely love and care about, and helping them shape their identity. And that's when you help them become a healthy adult. What a road of all these levels. And you and I kind of touched a little bit on each of those places. I tend to start most parents off with that 7 Traits of Effective Parenting on themselves. I wrote a book on that. There's an assessment on our website if people want to just kind of start thinking about it. They can go to focusonparenting.com. And then also, we've got other resources there, articles, things you can interact with. But it could be a good place to start on— as we've talked about, it starts with you, your health. As you go into those 7 traits, my belief is that you're going to create a contributor rather than a consumer. A consumer is going to have all these rights, right? An adopted child's consumer is going to live in the victim place. The world should be this. They owe me all this and just angry and sad and traumatic and they stay in there. Contributor is that has happened and out of that, I can contribute to the wellbeing of other people. I can contribute to this world. In that brokenness, I develop resiliency. I can give hope to others. There is a contrast in how the narrative continues to go and I believe it starts with the 7 traits of you as a parent guiding a child towards that. So, Simon, that is kind of a brief, just boom, just throwing it to you. And love, love being on the show with you, Simon, and your heart for these families. I can just see it and hear it in your voice. Thank you for having me on the show with you.

Thank you very much. And we'll put a link on to focusonparenting.com in the show notes and you can pick up some of these resources. Thank you for coming on, Danny. You've been an absolute star. You've given me a lot to think about. This is what I'm going to have to listen— I don't like listening to my own voice, right? So this is what I'm going to have to listen to because you've Uh, you've dropped so much, uh, wisdom, shared so much wisdom in the last hour or so. So it's been brilliant. Thank you very much for coming on.

Thank you, Simon. Appreciate it.

Thank you, listeners, and we'll speak to you again very soon. Cheers. Bye-bye.