Parents who are raising kids with a history of trauma often carry a quiet question: “Will my child ever really be okay?”
The new HopeConnect™ Resilience Series is designed to answer that question with a confident yes—rooted not in wishful thinking, but in the character of God, the latest clinical insights, and real stories of healing and growth.
Introducing our Resilience Series
Resilience is not about pretending hard things never happened; it’s about learning, over time, to “grow through” adversity rather than simply “bounce back” from it.
For children who have known separation, loss, abuse, abandonment or chronic stress, resilience looks like discovering that trauma is part of their story, but not the final word on their identity or future.
Our Resilience Series will unpack how parents and caregivers can help kids move from surviving to truly overcoming.
One small, faithful step at a time.
Throughout our Resilience Series, HopeConnect™ will feature insights from Overcoming by renowned psychologists Nicole Gilbertson Wilke, Ph.D. and Amanda Hiles Howard, Ph.D., and published by CAFO, our strategic partner. Overcoming is a powerful resource at the intersection of science, trauma-informed care, and the real and lasting hope of God’s Word.
Drawing on research, real-life experience, and the truths of Scripture, Overcoming reminds parents and caregivers that God meets children in their pain and can weave even severe hardship into a story of purpose and redemption.
Meet Dr. Marie LeBranche
To guide this series, HopeConnect™ is honored to introduce Dr. Marie LeBranche, a clinical psychologist and Licensed Marriage and Family Therapist with extensive experience walking alongside children and families impacted by trauma.
Dr. LeBranche brings together evidence-based trauma-informed practice with a compassionate, Christ-centered perspective, helping caregivers understand both what is happening in a child’s brain and what God is doing in a child’s heart.
In each article, Dr. LeBranche translates complex concepts like attachment, regulation, and post-traumatic growth into practical steps caregivers can use in everyday moments at home, in the car, or at bedtime, to name a few.
Her writing highlights how small, repeated experiences of safety, connection, and truth-telling can literally reshape a child’s nervous system and how you can help restore in them a sense of real and lasting hope.
The Power of God’s Word in Healing
A central theme of the Resilience Series will be how God’s Word speaks into trauma with clarity, comfort, and courage. And how you can instill into the hurting hearts of your child.
Scripture shows again and again that suffering never has the last word for God’s children. Christ is near to the brokenhearted, sets the lonely in families, and can bring beauty from ashes.
While the Resilience Series will honor clinical wisdom, it will also emphasize that ultimate resilience grows from knowing there is a God who sees, loves, and has a good plan that trauma cannot erase.
You can expect each article to offer a:
- brief, trauma-informed insight grounded in current research.
- simple, real-life practice you can try with the children in your care.
- passage of Scripture and a short, guided prayer to anchor both you and your child in God’s promises.
If you are parenting, fostering, or caring for a child who has walked through hard things, this Resilience Series is for you.
As you journey with Dr. Marie LeBranche and glean from the wisdom of Overcoming, may you discover again that in Christ, trauma is never the end of the story — and that, together, you and your child can learn to live as overcomers.
KEY TAKEAWAY
With the power and hope of God’s Word, we, as parents, have the power to help raise resilient children.
ACTIVITY
Waiting well is challenging for most children. Teach yours to take advantage of God’s seasons of “not yet” by playing Patience in the Pause.
Find this game and more now in the Everyday Moments™ activities collection!
APPLICATION QUESTIONS
- Where in my life can I prayerfully ask God to increase my child’s resilience?
- Is there an area in my own personal life where I could use more resilience?
KEY VERSE
“Faith shows the reality of what we hope for; it is the evidence of things we cannot see.” ~Hebrews 11:1 (NLT)
PRAYER
Dear Lord, please use this series to guide me in my understanding and application of how to be an effective parent, and please increase my faith in You and Your promises. In Jesus’ name, amen.
