Podcast: Play in new window | Download (Duration: 8:50 — 12.1MB)

Subscribe: Apple Podcasts | Android | Email | RSS

The Inside Out podcast is checking in with parents of young children to learn what they’re facing as they raise children in extraordinary times.   

“It’s really been like a blur of survival mode for nearly two years,” says Addison, NY-area Janet Mourhess. She and her husband are the parents of four children, ranging in age from pre-school through elementary school.  

“We just did the best that we could.” she says. “And we are continuing to just do the best that we can–and leaving it all in God’s hands. Because really, He’s the one that’s in control.” 

Kelly Smith and her husband are raising three preschoolers just outside of Syracuse, NY. “I pray for strength, every day, and a whole lot of patience,” she says. 

Both Mourhess and Smith have now been raising their children without a playbook for a large percentage of their children’s lives. As pandemic parents they’ve learned to explain disease and social distancing in simple words and have worked to maintain routines even as the landscape of school schedules, playdates, lessons, and activities shift–sometimes hourly. 

Through the challenges, both encourage other pandemic-weary parents that the God who made them and their children is both real and present. 

“Just know everyone’s struggling in one way or another,” says Mourhess. “But God’s right there with you. Whether it feels like He is or not right now, He is.” 

“I would tell any discouraged parent to give yourself grace and forgiveness,” Smith says, “because Jesus already did that for you.” 

Hear what Janet Mourhess and Kelly Smith have to say by listening to this 9-minute podcast.