When Your Child Walks Away: Loving Without Losing Hope | with Erica Wiggenhorn

What happens when we’ve prayed, parented, sought counsel, tried to do everything faithfully—and our child still walks away?

In this deeply personal conversation, Stephanie welcomes Bible teacher and author Erica Wiggenhorn to talk about Loving Your Wayward Child, a book born from Erica’s own painful experience of loving a son through seasons of turmoil and even complete separation.

Listen here:
Watch on YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/gospelspice 

Together, Stephanie and Erica explore a particularly painful kind of grief: mourning someone who is still very much alive, while never knowing what tomorrow may bring. Erica describes how fear can quietly move us toward isolation, fixation, manipulation, or simply trying to escape the pain. She also challenges the “formulaic Christianity” many of us absorbed—the assumption that if we parent faithfully enough, our children will inevitably make the choices we hoped they would.

But Scripture offers something far deeper than a formula.

From the prodigal son to Cain, Erica traces the presence of a God who remains at work beyond what a parent can see or control. Our children may move beyond our reach, but they never move beyond his.

This conversation makes room for grief without surrendering hope, and for honest questions without abandoning faith. Ultimately, it invites us to entrust both our children and our own wounded hearts to the God who knows the end of the story—and who is tenderly present while we wait.

MORE ABOUT “LOVING YOUR WAYWARD CHILD”

https://ericawiggenhorn.com/lovingyourwaywardchild

For the Mom Who's Been Up Since 3 a.m.

You’ve read the books.

You’ve listened to the podcasts.

You’ve prayed until you ran out of words.

And your child is still walking away.

You’re terrified of saying the wrong thing—so you say nothing.

You feel like a failure, but you can’t admit that to anyone.

Other Christians assume you must have done something wrong.

You haven’t. And you’re not alone.

Most books about wayward children are written after the happy ending. This one isn’t. Erica Wiggenhorn wrote Loving Your Wayward Child while still in the trenches—not knowing how her own story would turn out.

This is not a parenting advice book. You’ve already poured out every last drop of your parenting heart. This is a lifeline for your heart—biblical perspective, emotional tools, and practical strategies to help you stay spiritually grounded, emotionally healthy, and relationally connected to your child when both connections feel impossible.

This book will help you:

• Stay anchored in faith when hope feels foolish
• Recognize the four default reactions that keep you stuck
• Receive courage to make bids for connection– even if you’re afraid your child won’t respond
• Process grief, fear, and shame without drowning in them
• Build practical daily habits that sustain you for the long haul

MORE ABOUT ‘MOMENTUM”

https://ericawiggenhorn.com/momentum/

Your child is going their own way, in a direction you would never choose, leading to disruption and separation in your relationship.

But what if you found a new pathway for connection, where you could both move forward, together?

The Momentum Conference provides a safe place to rest, remember you’re not alone and receive tools and perspective empowering you to stand strong in faith and pursue healthy connection with your child.

God is for you, for your family — and together we can cling to His promises and find hope.

What is the Momentum Conference?

Momentum is a Friday night through Sunday morning getaway with a balance of biblical teaching, practical help, group connection and time to pursue individual rest.

The weekend schedule has been designed to lavish love, impart resources and provide hope to moms who are walking a hard road with their teens, young adult, or adult children.

Freedom to pursue preferential activities provided by the resort promises a time of rejuvenation as well as a mental, emotional and spiritual reset.

MORE ABOUT ERICA WIGGENHORN

Erica Wiggenhorn is a Bible teacher, author, and Proverbs 31 Ministries writer who has spent years helping women encounter God through Scripture. Her Unexplainable Jesus & An Unexplainable Life Bible Studies have been read by thousands of women all over the world in churches, small groups and military installations.

But this book isn’t about her expertise. It’s about her experience.

Erica is a mom whose son’s choices have taken her to places she never imagined—emergency rooms at midnight, months of silence, and the kind of grief that doesn’t have a casserole ministry. She wrote Loving Your Wayward Child not from the other side of a victory lap, but from the middle of the story—because she believes the moms who are in it right now can’t wait for a happy ending to find hope.

When she isn’t traveling the country connecting with women at retreats, conferences or church groups, Erica makes her home in Arizona with her husband Jonathan.