Tag: transition

The Life Cycle of a Home Assignment

by Rachel Hughes

Deputation, home assignment, furlough, visiting your passport country—whatever you call it—these trips are fraught with extremes of stress, joy, disappointment, encouragement, and all associated feelings. It’s a phenomenon unique to the missionary life cycle that significantly impacts our life journey.

During our almost fourteen years of missionary life, our family has completed six “home assignments,” and I’ve recognised some common stages, each with pitfalls and joys. Whether your experiences are similar or not, if you have mixed feelings about travelling to your passport country and engaging with supporters there, know that you’re not alone!

Looming in the Distant Future

The first stage is characterised by emotional discussions while searching for dates that suit each family member, our ministry partners here and there, our mission organisation, and our extended family over there. But the perfect time does not exist!

We face impossible decisions like dates that suit supporting churches but leave our kids missing out on major life milestones or that meet the needs of ministry on location but miss major extended-family events. Whatever we decide, it’s never ideal, and someone is disappointed.

The Now-But-Not-Yet Fog

In everyday life here in Japan we’re usually running at capacity, but as the time comes closer, details for there need to be planned. Deputation schedules, conferences, meetings, living arrangements, medical appointments, family events, school enrolments, car loans, and the list goes on.

For example, here I’m taking the kids to soccer, chatting with other mums, but the back of my mind whirrs away: How to keep fit over there? Can a soccer ball go in checked luggage? Can we borrow bikes? Would bikes fit in the car? What car? Oh, I have to text that person about that car. Oh no! Did I just agree to cook church lunch here this Sunday? Oh dear! Focus, here, now!

It’s hard to focus when half your brain is fixating on problems of another time and place. This stage is exhausting!

The Work-Not-Pleasure Planning Stage

Another difficulty in the detailed planning stage is the endless potential for disappointing the extended family. The fact that we’re coming for work can be hard to explain.

If we arrange to stay with one family member while in town visiting a supporting church, we have to apologise because—after scheduling all the home groups, youth groups, and other events—we have time for just one dinner with them. So, they’re upset we’re coming to stay but “they’ll hardly see us.” Meanwhile, other family members assume we’ll spend all that time with the other family and feel overlooked.

Weeks before we’ve even set foot in the country, we’ve already managed to offend a significant number of our extended family!

The Day

The travel day finally arrives. We survive the horrors of getting to the airport, get our luggage underweight (doing the last-minute shuffle between bags), survive security (losing a child’s beloved water bottle that somehow, after all our checking, still had water in it!), navigate immigration, (finding working, non-sticky pens for endless forms while a clinging child whines that they’re thirsty), get to our gate, then finally sit on the plane and catch our breath.

Then there’s transfers. More luggage to cart, more overtired, stressed-out kids to urge quickly through airports, more paperwork, more lines, more security—me spread-eagled in the machine, my husband in his socks, hitching up his trousers (the clingy child attached to his leg), repacking bags while searching for shoes and belt.

Eventually, we walk out into the bright light of our destination. The air smells familiar. The birds sound natsukashii. A car stops at the pedestrian crossing, and we bow instinctively, blush, and hurry across. We have arrived.

The Supermarket Readjustment (and other reverse culture shocks)

Very soon, we visit the shops for everyday items. There’s always some new shock, often what people are wearing (or not!). I remember thinking, “Oh, I can see that man’s feet!” and quickly averting my eyes, only to see another man in flip-flops, then realising with horror that the entire shop was filled with men’s hairy feet! Another time my son stopped, mid-aisle, threw his arms out wide towards an entire shelf of ketchup and tomato sauces and loudly exclaimed, “Tomato sauce! What would you like?! Red, red, or red!”

I’m often unable to make decisions and come out with a strange variety of items, mostly not what’s needed. I’m shocked by prices, bamboozled by variety, and invariably come away with fresh cinnamon donuts.

Getting Down to Business

By this stage, we have remembered how to function, are basically set up, and can start visiting the mission’s home office, supporting churches, and groups. We travel widely, but perhaps even if you stay in one place, you might also experience some of these common events of regular home assignment weeks.

“Tuesday night meltdowns” where family members take turns (hopefully) deciding they’ve had enough. The “When can we go home?” misunderstanding where a child asks to go home, we answer “Soon,” but they break down crying, “No, not that home, home-home,” and we have to explain it will be a few months yet. This last one is exacerbated when it takes place at your mother’s house, and Grandma realises her grandchild doesn’t think of this country as home.

Then there’s the argument-in-the-car-on-the-way-to-church combined with entering-the-church-to-be-confronted-with-a-larger-than-life-sized-poster-of-yourselves. For us, this argument often starts in the car with a child refusing to go to Sunday school, turns into a fight with one parent (despite our best efforts to be patient), who is then criticised by the other parent questioning whether that was the wisest thing to say under the circumstances, at which point the second child defends the first parent, the first child cries, and the parents fume while pulling into the car park.

We all get out of the car, promise whatever bribes will get our kids to cooperate and keep us sane for the next two hours, plaster on our best smiles and enter the lobby to be confronted with a picture-perfect poster of ourselves on the wall. Oh, the irony!

Another occurrence is the “sudden memory dysfunction.” After a few weeks of taking our show on the road, I experience a heart-pounding moment in the middle of a talk where I can’t remember if I’ve said the next point today or if that was at the other church last week. I panic, mouth open, hesitate, take a breath, then from the front row, my son’s little voice pipes up, reciting the next line.

But then I’m reminded of the joys of being on the road as a family. Our regular schedule in Japan has us all off in different directions, but for home assignment time, we get to be together. And my husband and I do enjoy working as a team, formulating presentations and considering how to communicate the nuances of ministry in Japan to an Australian audience. We make some awesome family memories.

The “How’s Your Host Country?” Degeneration

In after-church conversations, we hope for scintillating exchanges with supporters, comparing analyses of Australian and Japanese cultures and sharing strategies for gospel ministry that best meets society’s felt needs. But often we find ourselves talking to visitors or being shown photos of someone’s ski trip to Hokkaido or hearing about the stress of renovating a second bathroom and laundry room (clearly, the irony that no one in Japan has a second bathroom or a laundry room is lost!). Eventually, we descend into that classic conversation:

“How’s Japan?”

“It’s good.”

But then there’s always a couple of people who are clued in. “I don’t want to take too much of your time, but just wanted to ask, how is that little girl and her mum going? The ones from your music class who came to the church event last summer. I’ve been praying for them and would love to hear if you’ve seen them again?”

Or “How are you going with that university campus group that was down to just one member? I’ve been praying you’ll find more Christians on campus.” And we realise that though we’ve never met in person, they’ve been reading our newsletters and praying more faithfully for little Miki-chan and the campus ministry than we have! And this person thinks what we’re doing is valuable and important for God’s kingdom.

Our hearts are filled. We’re reminded to pray for Miki-chan, her mum, and that lone Christian on campus. We look forward to catching up with them all when we go back. We are encouraged!

The Finance Frazzle

Something I find very confusing and unpredictable about this stage is finance. Firstly, seeking financial support can be erratic. Some churches give massive amounts with very little prompting, while other churches give less than what it costs us to visit them.

Secondly, our personal finances are stretched. People often want to meet at a café, and prices add up. But without our own home, we can’t invite people over, and with no fridge to store leftovers, even our daily food budget becomes expensive. Then randomly, (often older) folk press money into my hand as they shake goodbye, saying, “This is just a little something for you to enjoy.” Such generosity fills my heart.

Travelling can leave us financially vulnerable. But it also gives us opportunity to experience the generosity of God’s family. Cars to borrow, houses to house-sit, offers of babysitting, dinner vouchers, a trip to the zoo, a youth group outing paid for. Over the years, we’ve received incredibly thoughtful gifts that remind us of God’s generosity through his people.

The Friendship Confusion

In between all the official visits, we’re helping our kids to continue with schooling, to maintain relationships with old friends they hope to return to, and to navigate new friendships which they know they’ll leave (so may not want to invest in, but feel really left out when they’re not included like not being invited to a birthday party). It’s a lot for young hearts to handle.

And it’s not only kids who struggle with friendships. I’m often grieved that some who were very close friends before we left have moved on and seem to have forgotten that we were close. But with a few good friends, we pick up where we left off as if no time has passed. And then there is the joy of new friends who show genuine care and interest.

The End-blur Stage

The last few weeks are often a blur of last-minute coffee catch-ups, tying up medical things, office meetings to plan our next few years, a few years’ worth of underwear and shoe shopping, and trying to get to the beach one last time. Then there is the packing, weighing, reorganising of paperwork, and plans to get to the airport.

After a restless night, filled with dreams of lugging kids and suitcases through unending corridors of unknown airports, we have another one of those airport-days. Finally, we walk out of the airport at the other end and breathe that familiar smell of “home.” Ah, the joy of sleeping in our own bed! We are exhausted! In the next few days, we gradually return to our usual schedule and greetings of “How was your holiday?”

I find the whole experience overwhelming—socially, emotionally, spiritually, even physically. The pitfalls, disappointments, grief, and stress all take a toll. But it’s wonderful to meet people who partner with us, who encourage us and share our kingdom goals.

It’s reassuring that our family want to spend time with us because they love us. It’s refreshing to go to church in my heart language, to hear Biblical preaching, and sing heartfelt praise in lively churches with thriving kids and youth ministries. It’s exciting to meet young adults with incisive questions considering a life of ministry and valuing our input.

The home assignment is an extremely stressful and demanding element in the cycle of missionary life but also a source of great joy, encouragement, and evidence of God’s blessing on our lives.

 

Originally appeared in the Spring 2025 edition of Japan Harvest Magazine (https://japanharvest.org/). Reprinted with permission.

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Rachel Hughes has been serving in Japan with her husband and their two children for fourteen years. She is involved in a variety of ministries, including music and English classes, family outreach events, youth group, prayer events, and various conferences.

Confessions of a Cultural Misfit

by Rachel Allord

I didn’t wake up that morning thinking I’d commit three blunders in rapid succession — Bam! Bam! Bam! — but blunder I did. Once again, I had failed. Failed to fit into my new London surroundings. I was trying, hard, but even so I stuck out like a duck in a pond full of swans.

My family and I had been living in London for several months before I finally got the chance to sink my teeth into something that felt like actual ministry. Not just learning the labyrinth of London’s transportation network, or navigating the NHS, or demystifying the British school system — all endeavors that demanded time, energy, and prayer — but Real Ministry. That morning, I was to meet with two church women to plan an upcoming outreach event.

We had decided to meet at one of the women’s homes. As I stepped out my door wearing black joggers and clutching my stainless-steel tumbler of freshly brewed coffee, I felt a twinge of hope. Maybe we were going to make it. Maybe the chaos that came with moving our family overseas would begin to settle.

Back in those days Citymapper was my best friend, and as I navigated myself to the correct address, I ran into the other woman, also on her way. We exchanged greetings and the obligatory weather quips. Then she said, “Have you come from the gym?”

“No,” I said. Did I look sweaty? I wondered. Out of breath?

“Ah, so you are planning to go to the gym after our meeting.”

“No,” I said again, my confusion morphing into something like defensiveness.

“Oh,” she said. “I just thought . . .” Her gaze flitted to my legs.

I glanced at my joggers. Had I put on my clean, not too tight, not too baggy pair? Yes. Phew.

She smiled. “I normally wear jeans on a Saturday.”

Was there a deeper message behind these words? A hint as to what a woman my age in this particular neighborhood should be wearing? Or was I being paranoid? I shrugged. Produced a smile. “I guess I like to dress comfortably on Saturdays.”

Moments later, our host opened the door and greeted us. “Oh!” she said, surprised but cheerful, focusing on the tumbler in my hands. “You’ve brought your own coffee I see. I would have made you a cuppa, you know!”

Had I insulted her? Communicated that her coffee wasn’t good enough? Was I acting like an overly self-sufficient, rude American when I was only trying to save her the trouble?

We met in the lounge. They with their cups of tea, me with my barrel of coffee, exercise attire, and mounting shame.

An hour or so later as we were wrapping up and gathering our things, I realized I needed a tissue. We were all standing at this point, the two of them still chatting, so I stepped into the next room, the dining room, and swiped one from a clearly visible box on the table.

Conversation halted. I returned to my spot. They regarded me curiously before picking up their conversation. But it was there, a little look between them. A little too much silence. I didn’t want to interrupt! I wanted to shout. How was I supposed to know that as a first-time guest in a near stranger’s house I should have asked?

Strike three. And oh, how ready I was to be out of there.

Fast forward nearly eight years.

Now, both women are friendly acquaintances, and I realize their remarks and responses were genuine reactions to the moment, not intentional barbs. Were they hoping to cue me in to social etiquette and cultural protocol? Perhaps. But wasn’t that a good thing? Didn’t I want to acclimate? Didn’t I need a little instruction, even if it felt like nitpicking?

We’re only human. Having our slip-ups pointed out to us, no matter how minor, hurts, especially if we’re doing our best to hold our turned upside-down world together. We’re as tender as a sunburn those early months, needing heaps of grace from ourselves and others that we sometimes don’t give or get. And underneath all that self-consciousness and cultural confusion the question that emerges is should we change ourselves to fit in?

Giving up joggers and travel mugs is easy enough. But what about changing how we socialize? Serve? Lead? Parent? We’re called to die to ourselves, to ‘become like all in order to save some,’ but is this at the expense of utterly losing who we are? Becoming someone we’re not?

Every context, ministry, and individual is different — not to mention flawed — so there’s no one-size-fits-all perfect answer.  There is, however, perfect Jesus, and we look to him.

Jesus who “made himself nothing by taking the very nature of a servant, being made in human likeness” (Philippians 2:8). Jesus who strapped on sandals and stepped into a body that required food and sleep. Jesus who lowered himself to walk our dusty streets, humbling himself all the way to death so we could one day walk His streets of gold. That’s where we cast our gaze.

Yet in this utter humility, Jesus never forgot who He was: one with the Father. Yes, He gave up glory, but never did He waver in what we might call identity. He joined the sinner’s feast but didn’t share the sin. In complete dependence on the Father, He prayed with humility and authority and honesty.

He was meek and mild and compassionate. He picked up the basin and towel. Turned the other cheek. Turned the tables for the sake of his Father’s honour and submitted Himself a thousand times for the sake of a soul beside Him before dying for the world.

Some missionaries face martyrdom. All face little deaths of various kinds. Our rights, our way of doing things, our expectations are, one by one, snuffed out. And maybe even more surprising is the joy we find in the release.

We are not Jesus. We fall wherever it is God has planted us. We don’t have the same glory to give up. We can’t save, but carry His salvation, holding it out, person to person, country to country, wherever we go.

Through Jesus we know who we are, why we are here, and where we are going. Because of Jesus we pray with boldness and humility. He gently prods us to lay down the thing in our grip. Take up the basin and towel. Die to self, little by little, as we wait for glory.

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Rachel Allord serves in London, UK, and writes novels for both youth and adults. The Girl and the Green Hat (sequel to The Girl on the Tube) has just released through 10 Publishing. You can peruse all her books at rachelallord.com.

Coming Home: The Hidden Struggles of Reintegration

by Ken and Brenda Groat

As the airplane lifted off, the tears began to roll down. We were leaving a place that had become our home. We were leaving behind friends who had become more like family, familiar places, and a culture and a people we finally adapted to and fell in love with. And in our case, we were leaving behind our daughter, our only child, who was finishing up her post-graduate studies.

We lived and served in Israel for almost ten years. We did not have a sending church, but we followed God’s leading and sold everything we owned and moved overseas to serve in full-time ministry. Settling in to the new surroundings, the new culture and new relationships was a challenge. We quickly learned the public transportation system, enough language to order a coffee or a meal, and our new roles at the ministry we were volunteering with. I’m not sure I can count the number of times we purchased cottage cheese instead of the cream cheese we were supposed to get for a recipe, or vice versa.

Living abroad without being completely fluent in the language was a challenge, but we blended in and found our way. After living abroad for years, we grew close to other volunteers, and of course to many people in our adopted homeland. 

Returning to the U.S. was never something we thought about, but as our parents aged, we came to the conclusion that we needed to be close to them in case they needed help. Giving notice to the ministry we served with was difficult. Packing up what we could afford to send back to the U.S. on a pallet was even more difficult. I’m not sure if giving a one year notice and having that amount of time was good for us or not, but we thought it was the right thing to do for the organization.

As our departure date approached, we began to experience the lasts; the last time we would go to our favorite restaurant, the last time we would see these particular friends, the last time we visited this special place, the last time we closed the door to our apartment, then finally the last time we hugged our daughter and said goodbye until she finished her university studies.

We were almost silent for the hour-long ride to the airport, then waiting for our flight at the airport seemed to take forever. As we took our seats on the plane, a sense of dread set in. But we knew this dread. The few times we left our adopted homeland for trips back home, we experienced this same dread. This time, however, was different; this time we knew we weren’t coming back.

Being back in the U.S. was strange. Of course our family and friends were happy to see us, and we were happy to see them, but it felt, I don’t know, different. No one could possibly understand what we had experienced, so conversations were shallow. We gave everything we knew, everything that was comfortable for us to serve abroad, and almost no one wanted to hear about what we were so incredibly excited to share. 

When we returned, we had to start over completely. We didn’t have jobs waiting for us. Apart from family, we had no place lined up to stay. We had no vehicle, no car insurance, no health insurance, no furniture, no cell phone plan that worked in the U.S., no church to support us spiritually. Fatigue quickly set it.  

People were not the same as we remembered, and the culture was different. In our case, the stores were overwhelming. It was difficult to walk into large American stores with so many choices for nearly anything we could want. We returned to an America that was very different then when we left it. Family dynamics were not what we expected. We were outsiders and no longer had a community of people that we could rely on.  

Few people understood what we were going through, except those who had returned before us, and they were also struggling to adjust to their new situations. Depression was easy to fall into. We had given everything to follow God and now we felt like we were being kicked to the curb, punished or forgotten.

We struggled for a long time, but eventually things became easier. It still doesn’t quite feel like home, but we are adjusting to the new normal. We have come to realize that we will always miss our adopted homeland, and we may never feel completely at home in the country we grew up in.

Reintegration takes time and intention. Something that helped us was to speak about our experiences with others. You can read articles on A Life Overseas, make the effort to find others with shared experiences, and talk with people who supported you while you were abroad. As someone who has given of yourself for perhaps years to improve the lives of others, it’s not easy to openly talk about what you’re going through and make the conversation about yourself, but it’s necessary and it’s worth it.

As we worked through our reintegration and talked with others around the country who had similar experiences, we realized there is a need for a landing place where you can work through your thoughts and emotions with people who have lived through it. From our first-hand experience, Return Again was born. It was created to be the landing place that we desperately needed but couldn’t find. 

Based in Central Florida, Return Again aims to provide temporary housing, access to vehicles, and—perhaps most importantly—a compassionate community for ministry workers during their transition back to the United States. Although we’re still seeking the right location to build and are awaiting full funding, we can still provide many services and resources to help returnees. 

Whether you’re on deputation, furlough, or returning permanently, Return Again offers practical resources and emotional support during one of the most challenging seasons of your life. Because coming home shouldn’t mean coming home alone. You gave everything to follow your calling. Now it’s time for someone to be there for you. Learn more at www.returnagain.org.

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Ken Groat serves as the Deputy National Director for Bridges for Peace USA. He co-founded Return Again Ministries with his wife of 33 years, Brenda. Together with their daughter, they served in Israel for nearly a decade.

Death Bloom (a message of hope for times of transition)

by Amy Straub

Fourteen years ago, as my husband was completing his graduate studies, he was offered a teaching position at a college in Southern Africa. A few months later, he traveled there for a survey trip and came home brimming with excitement.

After weighing the risks and rewards of the opportunity before us, we said goodbye to my native state of Minnesota and relocated to Zambia with our two toddlers, both still in diapers. The change of climate alone was a shock to our systems, and many months passed before our bodies and souls began to adjust to our new surroundings.

Every year, Zambia endures a full six months without rain. This was one of the most disorienting changes we experienced in our transition to the Southern Hemisphere. We’ve been here over a decade now, but this prolonged season of drought still leaves me feeling as barren as the dusty roads and dead grass around me. By the time dry season reaches its scorching crescendo every October, I feel like a heap of bones, sun-bleached and brittle. 

As a Midwestern transplant in Africa, it comes as a shock every year to witness the local flamboyant trees burst into bloom at the peak of the blistering drought, when my own soul is sapped to its core. Northern roots are known for their hardiness, but when they’re exposed to relentless heat and dehydration, they wither faster than a wildfire ravaging an open prairie. I’ve always wondered how these sub-tropical trees find the reserves to produce such vibrant petals when everything else is shrouded in dust.

Mercifully, Zambian culture is as warm as her climate. The love we found in our new friends was the life-giving stream that sustained us in those early years. We brought two more babies into our cross-cultural world, completing our family tree. As our branches leafed out, our roots deepened and acquired a toughness to match the difficult terrain.

Life in this country provides frequent reminders of human powerlessness. A normal day here may include (but is not limited to) up to twenty hours without electricity, an unreliable and contaminated water supply, police and government workers that expect bribes, and debilitating illnesses delivered by tiny mosquitoes and microscopic parasites. Together, they scream: “You have no control here.” We can’t so much as switch on a light or use running water without permission from unseen others. Chaos reigns, and we do our best to pick up the pieces and stay alive in the process.

But paradox is alive and well here, just as it is everywhere else on earth. Along with the frustrations we face in Zambia, there is a haven of reliable beauty unique to this place, and I’ve turned to it again and again to keep me grounded. This refuge is my garden: a leafy, tropical blanket that enfolds our home more beautifully each year, my care emboldening its encroachment onto the lawn that my husband prefers to keep clear. 

In Zambia, gardening isn’t limited to a brief seasonal window like it was in my native country, with only houseplants surviving the long winters. In this world, the alchemy of leaves, sun, soil, and water is a sustainable source of wonder. Plants that were confined to decorative pots in my childhood home now spread freely as ground cover around the edges of the lawn.

There’s a running joke among local plant lovers that you can put a stick in the Zambian soil and it will sprout leaves. When the rains return, gardening is more an effort to control growth than to encourage it.

We’ve enjoyed mangoes, avocados, bananas, sugar cane, guava, and passion fruit from our own yard, and our flowering trees and bushes are home to an incredible variety of songbirds and pollinators. I’ve learned to compost and amend impoverished soil. I have planted palm seedlings that now tower over me, propagated trees from seed pods collected by my children, mounted orchids and epiphytic ferns to tree branches, turned neglected trash heaps into shaded walkways with vined trellises, and I’ve learned so much in the process. Cultivating this piece of earth has filled me with more satisfaction than the literal blood, sweat, and tears it has drained from me.

Zambia’s unique climate has given me the opportunity to notice the habits and growth patterns of fascinating plants and trees that I had only ever seen in the glossy pages of National Geographic magazines. Acacia trees, with their distinct umbrella-like shape, line the highways. Fever trees with thorns as long as your fingers pose a threat to barefoot children who venture too close to their fallen branches. Massive, prehistoric-looking agaves line the properties of our neighborhood, their tough, jagged leaves providing security from intruders as well as stunning symmetrical beauty.

I’ve admired these drought-tolerant plants for over a decade, but I recently came to love and identify with the agave on a deeper level. Its life cycle demonstrates a survival rooted in surrender, and this wisdom has become a personal anchor in a season that has hit our family like a whirlwind.

I say this because our life in Zambia is coming to an end. We’ve been planning on a study leave in 2026 for my husband’s PhD in intercultural education — his next step towards deeper cross-cultural engagement in this place he has grown to love so much. But we have been fighting for our health for so long that we’ve been forced to recognize that the battle is no longer sustainable, and we’ve raised the white flag earlier than expected. Our love for Zambia and the work here remains unchanged, but resistant tropical diseases and worsening environmental conditions have taken their toll on our ability to function.

We’re facing one of the biggest transitions of our life so far, not only because we will be uprooting our family again, but because we have experienced significant relational breakdown over the past several years that has left us even more adrift than when we first arrived, young and earnest, on African soil.

When we moved to Zambia, we had a clear purpose, and communities on both sides of the globe surrounded us in support and encouragement. Now we’re standing in the dark, mid-step, unable to see where to safely plant our feet next. The once solid ground beneath us is crumbling, but as I write this, we don’t have a new purpose or place yet. We have lost our sense of home on both sides of the world, and all we can do is wait.

I understand now that waiting feels a lot like dying. It is a slow starvation of hope. In this season of loss and grief, the agave’s singular approach to death has broken over me like an invitation into a new and significant purpose, a way to make meaning even out of the emptiness of forced dormancy.

The agave genus includes hundreds of species; most of which are monocarpic, meaning that each plant blooms only once in its lifetime. Before it dies, the agave uses all its remaining energy to produce a huge flower spike that towers nearly thirty feet in the air. One day, I rounded a corner in our neighborhood and was shocked to see a small tree that had not been there before. That “tree” was an agave death bloom.

The death bloom is the last act of an agave plant’s life, and it produces thousands of seeds and small new plants that ensure the continuation of its species. As it dies, the agave explodes with new life.

Our own human life cycle has some significant parallels to this pattern. I suppose it isn’t surprising, as we also belong to the natural world.

In my childbearing years, I was encouraged by an experienced midwife that when a laboring woman reaches the point of exhaustion and she believes she can’t go on, it almost always signals that she has entered the phase of labor called transition: her baby is about to be born. As she reaches deep for her final drop of energy, her former life ends and both mother and child are born into a new life together, their cries of agony and victory blending into one.

Ariel Lawhon writes that “A woman is never more vulnerable than while in labor. Nor is she ever stronger.” Humanity has endured for millennia because mothers willingly and powerfully break open again and again in life-relinquishing surrender.

And like a sunset mirrors the dawn, the end of life echoes its beginning. Similar to the transition a mother endures in childbirth, the passage into old age is a renewed opportunity to progressively pour ourselves out for others as we make the journey from this life into the next.

Our days on earth are considered meaningful to the extent that we leave behind an accumulated inheritance of love. One of my favorite lines in the musical Hamilton asks, “What is a legacy?” The answer paints an eloquent picture: “It’s planting seeds in a garden you never get to see.” To pour out our love is to scatter seeds that will sprout and bloom long after we are gone.

As I studied the agave’s practice of self-propagation in death, a new awareness dawned on me. I realized that the trees here don’t flower despite the drought; they bloom because of it. When death approaches, the greatest act of defiance in the face of annihilation is to produce more life.

As my family faces the closing of this chapter in our story, we are exhausted and feel like we can’t go on. We are in transition, and it’s as grueling as labor and as mysterious as death. The weight of uncertainty feels impossible to carry any longer. My eight-year-old daughter says it feels like being inside a dark tunnel. We can’t see where we’re going, but we have to keep walking to find the light again.

When I learned about the agave’s striking death bloom, I realized that even in this death of ours, as excruciating as it is, we have the power to choose how we navigate the transition.

One possibility is to close ourselves off from a world that can be so cruel, develop a hard shell, and shrink inward in numb self-protection. I know this choice well, because I have wrapped it around myself like a dark cocoon for months. Why open myself to the incessant drumbeat of misunderstanding and criticism? Endings are painful enough without having to defend your decisions or explain the circumstances again for the thousandth time, all while being sick.

We are reeling from the prolonged loss of health we’ve experienced this past year, as well as the loss of relationships, loss of home, loss of trust, and loss of a sense of identity that follows the disintegration of hopes and dreams. It feels nearly impossible just to drag myself out of bed some mornings. Self-protection feels like the most sensible choice when everything around you is imploding, when relationships that once felt secure have turned into land mines.

But another choice remains. Like the dying agave, we can expand outward in vulnerable surrender and self-sacrifice, scattering the seeds of our love wherever they find soft ground. We can connect with friends. We can reach out, even in our limited capacity, in support of others who are struggling with their own version of pain. We can laugh. We can make music, art, and memories. We can leave little pieces of ourselves in the hearts that remain open to us. We can hold on to each other more tightly, in the deep understanding that grows in the soil of shared heartbreak.

If you have suffered, you understand how much courage this second option requires. But self-propagation over self-protection is worth the emotional and physical labor, even if we don’t get to see the flowers with our own eyes. Knowing they will one day bloom and continue the life-giving cycle is enough.

For months, I’ve been unsure how to respond when someone politely asks how I’m doing. It seems crazy to say I’m fine, but it would be equally absurd to attempt an honest answer. Very few people who greet you are prepared for a genuine response.

Those who want the unfiltered story are such a gift. A close Zambian friend and I have shared our actual realities with each other over the years, growing in our transparency and trust as time has passed. Our struggles couldn’t be more different, but how they feel is the same. Impossible. Insurmountable. Devastating. Now we jokingly ask, “How are you?” and respond “Fine!” and we laugh and laugh. And then we hold each other and cry.

As I spend my last days in this city that we have called home for so long, the city where I raised my children and have grown up myself, I notice death blooms everywhere. I marvel at the colorful petals boldly defying the dust. They are beautiful reminders that death can be navigated with intention. Life and its passing seasons can be relinquished gracefully and with loving purpose. Instead of raging or collapsing, I can become comfortable with discomfort and stay present in my pain. I can soften, open, and love, even as I leave.

I think have an answer now, at least in my own heart, when someone asks me how I’m doing these days.

The truth is, I am dying.

So I will surrender to the breaking open and undoing. 

I — and my family — will bloom. And we will live on.

~~~~~~~~~~~

Amy grew up in Minneapolis, Minnesota, as a homebody with no desire to leave her native state. That all changed when she married Ben, a Canadian TCK with a travel bucket list as large as the globe. Together they moved to Kitwe, Zambia, where they have served for the past thirteen years at Central Africa Baptist University and in their local Zambian church. They have four kids who have enjoyed their many adventures around the world. Amy enjoys reading, writing, gardening, deep conversations and shared meals with friends, and exploring new countries with her family.

Transitions Are Like the Chapters of a Book

One day perhaps I will write a book about life as a cross-cultural mission worker. Some parts of cross-cultural life certainly make for a gripping storyline, although a surprising amount of mundane, life-admin would undoubtedly come in-between. Each significant transition would form a new chapter.

As I look back over these last twenty years of cross-cultural transitions, I see common themes and plot threads to many of the chapters. Throughout, God, the author of all of our life stories, is writing a beautiful and complex narrative of his love and faithfulness through each transition and chapter. Christ, the author and perfecter of our faith (Heb. 12:2), is present throughout the narrative and powerfully at work, writing for our good.

My narrative started in the UK. In adulthood there are a handful of short chapters on the coast of north-east Brazil, and since meeting my husband more chapters in Abyei, South Sudan. We are currently in a ten-year-long chapter in rural inland Brazil. Interwoven within the narrative are regular visits to South Sudan, and the addition of two new characters, our young TCKs.

I have never experienced so many changes and transitions simultaneously or in such quick succession as my family and I have in these cross-cultural move chapters. Some of the transitions were the result of our own decisions; some were unexpected or made by others. Some we prepared for, others we didn’t see coming, or were gradual and so we didn’t recognise were happening until we had the benefit of hindsight. In the life story of global mission workers, change is a constant and certain theme.

A chapter is a chunk of a narrative, not the whole story, and it leads us on in the plot arc. Just so with transitions, which make up a section of our life narrative. Transitions are like book chapters: they have a beginning, middle, and end. Each transition, like each chapter, has its own mini plot arc but is also part of a bigger story which unfolds as you read to the end.

 

The Beginning

The Transitions Bridge is a useful tool for understanding the stages and emotions of cross-cultural transitions. Transition is a move from one reality, or chapter, with its routines, characters, and plot arcs, to another. An initiating event or decision is the first step in leaving or moving onto the transition bridge.

My husband and I have found that transition starts when we first resolve to move or make a change; it begins with our mental shift from staying to going to something new. We have been in seasons of discernment where one or both of us have had to hold back on allowing our minds to make that shift. In imagining what could be if we made a certain choice, we turn the page and read ahead, pre-empting a decision and mentally starting a transition.

We need to learn to discern when the author is beckoning us on to the next chapter. Firstly, by keeping in step with the Spirit (Gal. 5:25), by being in tune with God, the author’s intentions and script. Turning the transition page to the next chapter is a spiritual journey of faith.

As a couple and family we also need to keep in step with each other, or to continue with the book metaphor, to read at the same pace. We intentionally remain in the same chapter to discern together, and with others, where and when the author has written the next chapter. Psalm 139:16 says, ‘All the days ordained for me were written in your book before one of them came to be.’ Our stories are a part of God’s bigger redemption story, which He has already written, and is working out throughout history.

Our focus shifts from the present to the future as we emotionally prepare ourselves to leave or transition. We can expect and plan for increased stress, anxiety, experiencing grief and loss during transitions, even whilst we feel excitement, joy, and energy at entering into a new chapter. I remember strongly experiencing regret and grief during a cross-cultural transition as a young single woman; twenty years later I often still experience a complex web of other emotions as I transition.

 

The Middle

It is normal to experience a series of different emotions throughout the transition period, before, during, and after a move/change, not just during the emotional farewells on the days leading up to and following departure. I regularly do emotional check-ins with my young TCKs using art, journaling, the transitions bridge, and other transitions tools to prepare them, and myself, and to process as we go.

Some characters and scenes remain important throughout a narrative; others mark a particular time but do not feature later in the story. There is wisdom in identifying which chapter we are in and in discerning what and whom we can and should take with us to the new chapter. Likewise, there is wisdom in knowing what to leave behind.

The end of a chapter and start of a new one is a good time for intentionality in reflecting and editing by debriefing. In some transitions we can make a prayerful choice of what and how to hold on to significant items, places, memories, and relationships. Other transitions are forced on us, a chapter we never wanted to end, and a new chapter we never would have chosen to start. A pre-packed ‘go’ bag, a memory box, and a safe place to which we regularly return, are a few ways we have tried to prepare for sudden chapter changes, whilst processing grief and loss can come both during and after.

 

The End

Global workers often consider ourselves to be professional movers. We have lived this chapter before. However, there is no timeframe for transition. We can be surprised when we perceive, after years of a globally mobile lifestyle, our slowness to adjust, or heightened stress and resistance to change.

Whilst each experience of transition is different, transition preparedness can help. Each member of a family may grieve and adapt to a new chapter at their own pace and in a different way to each other. Even within the same family unit each member may take a different timeframe to adjust and settle to the new normal.

Knowing the author, His writing style, and His greater narrative helps us find our place in his story. His redemptive, transformative story is written throughout our story. He tells His story through each chapter of our own story. Sometimes stories need to be written down so they are not forgotten. Let’s trust Him as we enter a new chapter. Let’s tell our story in a way which acknowledges and credits Him with authorship and leads others to the writer of all our stories.

Rediscovering Home: When the Familiar Feels Foreign

by Mari Eygabroad

“Welcome home!” I heard the words, but they didn’t feel right. I stood wide-eyed. Were we home? The whirlwind of events over the last month darted through my mind. My heart sank, unsure of what to say. “Thank you” was all I could muster.

The word “home” is supposed to bring comfort. We weren’t there yet. We landed in the US just a month earlier after months of packing and a forty-two-hour trek around the globe, toting as many belongings as we could fit in action packers and checked luggage. We were still adjusting to the ten-hour time change, didn’t have our own space, our kids were sharing an air mattress, and we were all living out of suitcases until our rental house was ready.

Looking back, it took several years of living in Lesotho before it felt like home. We didn’t fit into that culture, but we also didn’t fit in in the US anymore. Maybe anywhere. But isn’t that right where God wants us? “Home” is where He wants us to be. No matter where we are, home is where we are together with God.

By about our third year in Lesotho, we were settled. Most things had become comfortable but not necessarily familiar. We adopted a year-round school schedule, providing our kids with a regular routine that only deviated when we were sick, on break, or on vacation.

We built our community, meeting regularly with friends for coffee or meals. We participated in team gatherings and our home church, and my husband attended regular men’s breakfasts. We gave and received love. Conversations went deep, discussing heart issues, morals, and values. Small talk had no place.

Almost a decade had passed since we began living life overseas when the Lord put it on our hearts to consider returning to America. We thought of so many reasons why we shouldn’t. Nothing was pushing us out of Lesotho. We loved the people, our community, the pace of life, and the ministry we were doing. But one thing remained: God was calling us in a new direction.

So we prayed. A lot. We also invited others to pray with us, which was one of the best decisions we made. We yearn for the wisdom and counsel gleaned from the experiences of others who have walked this path before. After bathing the matter in prayer and receiving a great deal of encouragement and counsel regarding repatriation, we felt prepared to return to the US.

The number one thing we learned from the experiences of many others is that getting plugged into a church and building a community can be a challenge. Though we were returning to our “home area,” many of our friends had moved away. So, we knew we would be building a new community from scratch. We wanted to be intentional about finding a church, so we began scouring websites and attending online sermons as we researched churches in the area where we planned to live. Although we were unable to make in-person connections, we still gained a sense of the church environment and its pastors.

We decided we would attend a church with a homeschool co-op near our rental home. Being comfortable with the pastor and his messages allowed us to feel more at ease about committing to that church. The church has proven to be a solid, biblical church, and we have been able to connect with some smaller groups without hesitation, which would have been a concern if we were unsure of which church we wanted to call our home church.

Initially, we wanted to keep a low profile — just be normal and not play the missionary card too early. However, when attending a small church, people know you’re new, and a straightforward question like, “Where are you from?” opens up a whole can of worms. That’s when I also learned that not everyone is fascinated with our life as missionaries.

It’s challenging to reduce a decade of life into a few sentences. We discovered that we would only be able to share our life overseas with a select few people. Thankfully, we have friends who have been on this journey before us, and they have been great at listening to our stories. It can be a struggle to find friends who genuinely want to hear about your life, so it may become necessary to find a counselor or a repatriation mentor who understands.

Developing relationships has been a slow process. Friends meeting regularly is almost unheard of, and creating depth in a relationship seems tantamount to torture for some people. I cherish the few people I’ve found who desire more serious relationships, but my husband and I both long for that one person we can call our “bestie.”

One of the things we looked forward to when coming back was the opportunity to be involved in church and for our kids to participate in sports or other activities. We dove into quite a few church activities. Although we loved the Bible studies, having more than one a week, in addition to youth group and small group, we realized how quickly those activities can fill up our calendar.

Understanding that packed schedules and constantly on-the-go friends are part of the culture, I’ve realized the importance of not only adjusting my expectations but also protecting my own schedule so I would not get wrapped up in the pace myself. That’s when I resolved that our first few years would be our “try and see” years.

A wise counselor once told me that it could take several years to find a rhythm and establish a routine upon returning. I am beginning to see the truth of that statement. Within the first year, we transitioned from full-time homeschooling to homeschooling plus a co-op and then to private school.

With all the transitions and newness, we’ve discovered that our kids, what some would call Third Culture Kids (TCKs), though resilient, are different than most American kids. We’ve had many tearful discussions around the dinner table about what we miss about Lesotho and the struggles we’re facing. Our son was upset one day after a schoolboy laughed at him because he didn’t know what the phrase “cut the cheese” meant. A seemingly minor colloquialism, but to him, it was a stark reminder of not fitting in. It’s important to encourage our kids that it’s okay to be different while still allowing them to express their emotions.

We’ve also had many joyous conversations about what has been good. Being in school has provided both educational challenges and social awakenings for both of our kids. Having the opportunity to connect with other children has made us realize how significant a role their social life will play in their development. They are forging their own paths and developing their own relationships. Some of their uniqueness and quirks will remain intact, while others will fade away.

It will take some time for all of us to adapt as we continue to learn what it means to live in the US. We will prayerfully enter into church ministry, carefully select activities and events, and continue with patience as we develop new relationships. In trying to establish a routine, I’ve learned that the rhythm of life in America seems seasonal — just as we were beginning to feel we had a good rhythm, along came summer break and bored kids!

When the time comes for you to return to your home country, remember to give yourself time and grace. As you research churches in the area where you’ll be living, try to get plugged in earlier rather than later. Also, understand that past friendships will be different, even if you’ve kept in touch. As you’ve lived, grown, and changed during the time you’ve been away, so have they. Even if you have a few friends to reconnect with, you will likely still need to build a new community around you.

And if you have children, check in with them. They are adapting to everything new on an even larger scale. Our kids only knew Africa. America is an entirely different experience. Children need to have a safe space to process their struggles and successes. Even if their emotions seem irrational to us, they are still real to them.

Moving overseas, you expect things to be difficult, so it seems strange to think things would be so challenging upon returning to your home country. But more and more people find their return more difficult than their departure. So let the Lord be your guide. Invite people to pray with you, pray as a family, and seek counsel from others who’ve walked this road before you. The journey is long. You’ll need some help along the way.

~~~~~~~~~~~~

Mari served as a missionary for eleven years in Lesotho, Africa, with her husband, a pilot/mechanic with Mission Aviation Fellowship (MAF). During their first few years living in Africa, her family faced many hardships and tragedies. After searching unsuccessfully for resources that could have prepared her for what they experienced, God put it on her heart to write the book she wished she’d had, and Living Uprooted: Encouragement for the Missionary Wife was born. She and her husband returned to the US in 2024, where they now train and mentor new missionaries. You can find her online at marieygabroad.substack.com.

Are You Ready to Welcome New Missionaries . . . Again?

Finally, on the last of four plane rides, after over thirty hours of sporadic naps during travel, our three-year-old slumped into a deep sleep. I would have rejoiced, except I knew we’d have to wake him up in less than an hour when we landed at our new home. Besides, who has time to rejoice when you’re holding a squirming six-month-old, praying that the pressure in her ears doesn’t bother her as much as last time?

Touch down. And my boy slept on. The plane stopped at our gate. And my boy slept on. We struggled to get our carry-ons out of the overhead compartments. And my boy slept on.

“I’ll just carry him off the plane,” my husband offered. But upon being scooped up, my boy woke up, and with him, a torrential outburst. Weeping and gnashing of teeth about describes it – the weeping on our part, the gnashing on the part of the other passengers.

My husband carried our out-of-his-mind-tired child all the way to baggage claim, and by that time, more than just tears had soaked his shirt. We found fresh clothing for both of them and eventually got our son calmed down.

I can’t imagine how long Dan and Cindy had been waiting for us, or the disheveled mess of a family that they saw, but their warm welcome suggested no hint of impatience or surprise. In fact, Cindy offered to take my infant daughter so I could comfort our son. We immediately felt seen and cared for by this couple, and a special friendship began.

We arrived at our rented house and found the kitchen pre-stocked with basic foods we recognized plus some tropical fruits we didn’t. Upstairs, a travel crib was set up for our baby, and beds with borrowed blankets were prepared for the rest of us. We slept that night in utter exhaustion but also deep gratitude for the warm hospitality we felt already from our new community. 

Dan and Cindy told us about neighbors with young kids who wanted to take us out for lunch the next day, a fellow school-teacher who would bring us soup for dinner, and two other families who would have us over for a meal later in the week. We were given a car to borrow for a few days, helped with navigating the nearby market, and taken on several shopping trips.

We were undeniably welcomed, and it made all the difference in our transition into life in South East Asia as a young family. This welcome didn’t happen by accident, though. It was prearranged and thought-out. Our international school knew the importance of hospitality, especially when someone is new to the field, and they utilized co-workers, neighbors, and parents from the community to build an all-encompassing welcoming team.

Beyond the organizational structure, however, it was obvious that each person wanted to help us and get to know us. We weren’t a cog in a machine; we were family in Christ.

I know many of you did not have a welcoming committee. Maybe you were the first to your field or your team leader was on home assignment. Maybe your transition got lost in the ministry hustle and you had to hit the ground running, sink or swim. And if that was the case and you’re still working overseas, then all praise and glory to God. 

For many people, though, whether or not they feel welcomed into a community is indicative of their longevity on the field. Humans were created to belong. So how can we, the stayers, prepare both physically and spiritually to offer hospitality to new missionaries?

Here are a few ideas you can use as a starting point, adapting them to your particular field and situation.

  • Gather a hospitality team. Acknowledge that this isn’t a one-person job.  In fact, the new missionary might click better with someone else, so aside from lightening your load, giving them relational options is a win. They’ll be able to pick up different ways of navigating their new culture and surroundings from a variety of people who each do life uniquely.
  • Provide airport pickup. Sure, taxis are an option, but there’s something significant about being greeted at the airport by a teammate or neighbor who cares. Those first moments on the ground can be both exhilarating and daunting, but they should also be a place of connection.
  • Take them to get a phone plan. I don’t need to tell you how useful these pocket monsters are. Help them set up their phone right away, and they can instantly contact you, call home, order food, get a ride, navigate the city, and translate their host language. Prioritize this and help them get it done.
  • Provide food to eat right away. Whatever you can provide that will give them easy,, immediate food options will be a blessing. Contact them ahead of time to check on food sensitivities and have fun. Surprising someone with a stocked fridge is as good as filling your kid’s stocking for Christmas. The joy on their face is worth it!
  • Offer help and recommendations for shopping. Do you remember the first time you tried to figure out not only where the nearest store was but also what in the world was in those huge white bags? Now, of course, you know it’s MSG, not sugar, but your new friend doesn’t know that yet. Accompany them on shopping trips to the grocery store, the local market, and the home goods store. You can grab a few of your own needed items while you’re there (plus show off your language skills).
  • Welcome them into your home. Aside from the obvious piece of connecting at a deeper level than at a restaurant, allowing a new missionary into your home will provide inspiration for them on how to settle abroad. They’ll see that you’ve hung pictures on the wall and feel permission to do so themselves. They’ll ask where you got this, that, and the other thing, and they’ll leave feeling filled in more than just their belly.
  • Give them emergency numbers. Print out a list they can hang on their fridge with both emergency responder numbers and local friends who are happy to help if they have car trouble or house issues. Who can be a translator for them if they need someone? Who is a trusted teen that could babysit for them? And, of course, make sure they have your number, too.

These ideas are relatively simple, but I’m not going to pretend they are easy. The difficulty in welcoming someone lies not so much in the heart of hospitality (I’m sure you already value this from your own experiences), but in the reality that once you welcome someone and invest in them, you start a relationship. You grow attached. And eventually, you’ll say goodbye. 

You’ll find yourself on the opposite side of this cyclical expat life and have to work on releasing them well (or saying farewell yourself). And that cycle hurts. We know the grief of it all too well, don’t we?

But is it worth it?

Is it worth it to invest in a new relationship when, in all probability, you’ll have to say goodbye in a couple of years as one or the other of you leaves the field? You could also ask if it’s worth it to invest in local relationships when many of them will fizzle out without any obvious kingdom fruit. Or if it’s worth it to learn a new language, or uproot your family, or sell your home, or start a new ministry, or leave it all behind to follow “the call.”

Is any of it worth it? I don’t know–who am I to try to measure those things? But I do know that He is worth it. Jesus is worth it all. And although every new investment and every act of obedience is a risk, He is worth it. He wastes no worship, no tears, no pain. The outcome is in my Savior’s hands, not my own. That’s why we can keep putting ourselves out there in hospitality, trusting that He who is both the beginning and the end holds us in this messy middle of hellos and goodbyes.

As many of you welcome a new influx of teammates over the next month, I pray that you will open not only your schedules, but also your hearts to them. Remember your early, awkward days full of questions, and, mostly, remember that both you and the newbies belong to the one who is Faithful and True. His open arms are wide enough for all of us.

Co-Grieving Loss with Your Repatriated TCK

We didn’t have words for TCK loss back then. Not when I left Cameroon at nineteen and stepped onto U.S. soil as a stranger to my own country. But just because there weren’t words doesn’t mean the ache of loss didn’t burrow deep. Nineteen and newly repatriated felt like drowning in a sea of people who looked like me and talked like me but didn’t know the red-earth-Africa that shaped me. 

I hardly recognized the girl I became in the wake of losing Cameroon, my best friends, and everything that felt familiar. That season was one of the hardest – and one of the unhealthiest – of my life.

Now, after the years have fast forwarded to an empty nest, I find myself looking back, not just at my own story but at theirs. I think of my children, my third culture kids, who built rich and beautiful lives on South African soil, their home. How will they handle letting go? How will they carry the weight of leaving behind the people and places that shaped them?

When I saw Megan Norton’s invitation to write a letter to my recently repatriated TCKs for her upcoming book, Letters Now Sent, I knew exactly what I wanted to say. I know the grief of leaving a place that tattoos an indelible mark on your soul. As their mother and as a TCK myself, I want to co-grieve their losses of saying goodbye to a life they loved in South Africa. And I know where I want them to root themselves now, as they step into adulthood in the U.S.

This letter is a new beginning with new language for parents of TCKs. It is my way of opening the door to a safe and sacred conversation with my young adult children—one established in love, shared understanding, and the kind of hope that reroots through the cracks of even the hardest losses. While their reactions to my letter are deeply personal and honey to my heart, I can tell you that this budding conversation was met with warm reciprocity and open arms. 

A letter to Elaina and Sawyer Danforth, 2025 (republished at A Life Overseas with permission) 

My two dearest toasted marshmallows,

You are eighteen and nineteen now. University carries a steep learning curve for everyone, but especially for the ones like you who left home, country, and friends to be grafted back to the place of your heritage. 

As second-generation TCKs, you belong to a tribe that your father and I know well. Your childhood was formed in the womb of the cradle of humankind, in KwaZulu-Natal, and it ended abruptly on the other side of a plane ride to the United States. But the things that formed you there still sing in every crevice of your mind and shape the way you see the world. 

Repatriation is a season when the losses of the familiar sink in hard for TCKs. And these are the years when you become aware of your roots, the ones that have been transplanted to new soils and now feel wildly distinct and out of place. The places of your childhood are the places where your formative and deepest roots grow. And the soil of South Africa no longer surrounds or supports you. 

You’ll remember from working on our farm that a transplanted plant often wilts for a while. It is learning to survive in a new and unfamiliar environment. Its roots aren’t sure what to make of its new home. They don’t know whether they can unfurl and take new life or whether the newness will be hostile to growth. Repatriating TCKs are the same. 

While my roots in South Africa will never be as deeply formative as yours, I am here to co-grieve your losses with you. I did the same as a nineteen-year-old with my Cameroonian roots. And your father did too, at eighteen with his Congolese and Central African roots. 

Some losses are obvious. Our imperfectly perfect little farmhouse and the stability of its cracked walls. The foamy blueness of whales flirting between the horizon and the Indian Ocean. The oneness of our multicultural, multi-lingual farm family. The wind-whipped cheeks from four-wheeling wild past giraffes. The saggy eyes after Minecraft all-nighters with friends. The laughter with your non-blood sisters farmsteading in the mountains. The crispy-edged pancakes hot off the griddle every Saturday morning. The seasonal ebb and flow of subtropical downpours and droughts. 

But some losses are hidden. Some, you won’t even know you miss until you come across them years later. And you’ll be caught off guard by a sudden feeling of home. Hidden losses are the sounds, smells, and invisible things that God sprinkled into the backdrop of your childhood. They are the things that you didn’t even know weren’t everywhere on planet earth. Until they weren’t. 

Your hidden losses don’t have to make sense to anyone else. They don’t even have to be pleasant. But something about these background sounds and smells had a profound impact on developing the unseen part of who you are today. And we honor those gifts by naming them. 

The background sound of your childhood is the cry of hadedas filling pink southern skies and beckoning your sleepy eyes open. You didn’t even know the sound was missing until that first morning in a Midwest dormroom when the synthetic shock of an alarm clock demanded your attention. 

It is the faithful singsong Xhosa greeting “Molweni” on your proud farm stoep. It is the mourning doves telling each other off gently and sternly. It is the inexplicable peace of violent rains threatening to crash right through tôle roofs. It is the baying of hounds, whether to threaten skelems or to give chase to dassies, outside your burglar-barred window. 

It is the South African flavor in which people have always said your name. It is the twisted, segregated history healing in real time through the harmony of church songs in English, Afrikaans, and Zulu. It is the comfort of our family’s age-old call to meals that reaches back to the recesses of your first independently held spoon, “On va prier.”

The background smell embedded in the roots of your childhood is a eucalyptus flame licking Karoo lamb ribs on the braai. It is soft buttermilk vanilla steam from an Ouma rusk dunked in Five Roses tea. How can something be so moorishly crunchy and goopy at the same time? It is the barely-there salt in the air where the Indian Ocean laps at the sky. And yes, it is even the familiar sewage plant every time we try to hold our breath at that bend in the highway by Uvongo.

Your roots will fumble around in this new place of red, white, and blue for a while, figuring out what is friendly soil and what isn’t. And this is the time. Dit is tyd to close your eyes, take a breath, and rediscover the power of your one unshakable tap root. It is your deepest root. The most formative one. The most familiar one. The most stabilizing one. It is your one root that pushes far past all the others, past every good and rocky soil, reaching like life depends on it, to the source of life. Water. Living Water. 

It is in Living Water that you’ve always found life and truth and all that is good. When everything around is unfamiliar, this source is the familiar. 

You’ll find community in the taproots of familiar people planted there too. And you’ll come to know new people who are automatically family because their taproot seeks life in the same place where yours does. This is the good stuff, my toasted marshmallows. 

While your secondary roots stumble around and try to make sense of star-spangled life, sink all your energy, all your questions, all your everything into your taproot’s source of life. It is the one and only thing that will never change no matter where you go, how far you fall, or how unfamiliar everything else seems. 

Taprooted to the Source with you,

Mom (Anna Danforth)

~~~~~~~

Inspired by Ruth Van Reken‘s book Letters Never Sent, Letters Now Sent will be a collection of letters from TCKs, parents of TCKs, and system leaders to share personal stories about their experiences with TCKs, being a TCK themself, and/or raising TCKs. This book is a fusion of both memoir and anthology written in a specific “Dear [name]” format. 

Here is the Google Form link to submit a letter with additional details about length and content prompts: https://forms.gle/jQyzq3TtFqfyznvCA. The deadline to submit a letter is March 31, 2025, and the book will be launched in July 2025 at Ruth’s 80th birthday celebration. Families in Global Transition is hosting the 80th Birthday party in Chicago on July 26, 2027, and registration will be live on their website soon. You do not have to be a member of FIGT to register for this event.

When Roots Don’t Stay Rooted

Somewhere along the way in this globally mobile life, I subconsciously and mistakenly adhered to the idea that other people – the non-globally mobile folks – don’t move. Our life is so chaotic in its never-ending transitions that I, apparently, fell into a false belief that no one else does what we do, not even a little bit.

Who else goes back and forth regularly between passport country and country of service, packing up belongings with practiced precision? To be on the move is part and parcel of the expat life. As we’ve spent the past several months in America for our home assignment, I’ve felt validated in the uniqueness of our globally mobile life because several people have told me as much. “You move around so much. We can’t imagine doing that.”

While it’s true that most people don’t move around so much, it’s also true that people do move. Which is what I apparently forgot, or didn’t want to believe, because it was better for my emotional well-being to lean on the assumed stability of those who stay put.

People who stay put offer an anchor to those of us who move around. When the anchor is pulled up, we don’t always know where to land anymore. 

So when my parents told us they’d decided to move from my hometown – the only place I’d grown up and the only place our family had landed during home assignments in the States – I suddenly realized how much I’d depended on their stability to extend itself onto us. Their rootedness had offered roots to us too, an anchor that I never imagined being pulled up.

I recently reread the story of Cain and Abel and found myself gobsmacked by Cain’s curse. While the first part is bad enough – the ground will no longer yield crops for him – it was the second part that haunted me: “You will be a restless wanderer on the earth” (Genesis 4:12b).

The curse of Cain was to wander the earth, to be rootless, to have no particular place to call home. What a curse! To not know where you belong, to be unable to put down roots and thus consign your children to the same rootlessness as you with no sense of home. It’s no wonder Cain responded with, “My punishment is more than I can bear.”

The Lord’s punishment was just, as are all His judgements, yet I can’t help but feel empathy for the world’s first murderer. I never could have understood such a consequence before becoming a wanderer myself, albeit by God’s calling rather than His consequences. But what a shock to realize that God’s calling on my life was another person’s punishment.

Being unable to answer the question, “Where is home?” is a unique struggle that few people face. As expats, we sometimes even wear the struggle like a badge of honor, often reminding ourselves of the profound and comforting quote from Tolkien: “Not all those who wander are lost.”

Although Tolkien clearly meant that the journey can be its own end where we find meaning and purpose, and although I believe that to be true, it’s also true that some of those who wander are indeed lost. Some are wanderers, by definition, because they don’t know which way will lead them home.

That is how I feel. I am a wanderer, lost, unable to answer the question, “Where is home?” My answer to this question has become nearly as confusing and convoluted as my children’s answer, which attempts to explain that their parents are from different states and where they were born is different than where they live when they’re in America which is different from where they now live in Kenya which is different than where they used to live in Kenya.

Part of the problem is that American culture doesn’t clearly define “home.” In the culture where we live in Kenya, “home” is where the family hails from. No matter where you may travel or end up living, your home is at the shamba, the “home place” where your family has lived for generations. Granted, it’s relatively easy to define since most of the family doesn’t move anywhere – subsistence farmers tend to stay put. 

Still, it’s deeply entrenched in a person from the day they’re born that home is the land where the family is from, and anyone who does leave (for a job or school or whatever else) can come home anytime and be welcomed and feel at home. Furthermore, it’s expected that everyone will be buried at home, at the shamba. No matter where you are when you die, you should be buried at home to rest there forever.

I’ve acquired enough of an appreciation for this aspect of Kenyan culture to wish that my own American culture was more like it. It’s fairly easy for a Kenyan to answer the question, “Where is home?” I wish it were that easy for me.

The one place on earth that I feel most at home is my parents’ house, the one they are moving away from. If I were Kenyan, I could be buried there, preferably by the pond where the pine trees grow.

As I was processing and grieving the upcoming change that means I’ll never set foot in my childhood home again, I confessed to our kids that my parents’ house is where I feel most at home in the world. Our son instantly questioned me. “You don’t think [where we live in Africa] is home?” Well, yes, I do. But also, no. It certainly defines “home” for all five of us together, but would I want to be buried there? Probably not.

Even before the current rootlessness I feel, I’ve spent years helping our third culture kids think about home this way: “Whenever we’re together, we’re home.” Or another iteration: “Wherever we’re together, we’re home.” Home is not a place, but the people we are with.

As I cling to my people through this transition, I’m reminded that no matter how rooted or rootless we feel on this earth, not one of us is truly at home here. As C.S. Lewis so succinctly said, “We were made for another world.”

Psalm 90:1 says it best: “Lord, you have been our dwelling place throughout all generations.” Even those who have a shamba to return to where the family has lived for generations will never fully be at home. Our home is not a place, but a Person. The Lord alone is an anchor that will never be pulled up. His promises to me – to love me forever and never leave or forsake me – are the only roots I need.

In the same stanza with that famous Tolkien line about wanderers is another line: “Deep roots are not reached by the frost.” Deep roots – the deepest of roots – will not be reached by whatever in this world attempts to freeze them. Deep roots in Christ are not reached by the transitions of others. They are not reached by an inability to answer the question, “Where is home?” They are not reached by any fear or grief or loss of place.

Deep roots remain rooted. What a comfort that is to this sometimes restless wanderer.

Photo from Pixabay

 

Transition Stress and TCKs: What does “normal” look like?

by Lauren Wells

“We haven’t seen our boy act like himself in over a year. We sometimes get glimpses of the fun, playful kid he used to be, but most of the time he’s like a shell of his old self. We don’t know where the kid we knew went.”

Fifteen months earlier, these parents had moved across the globe to a new country and culture. Their oldest son had started attending a local school while the younger siblings who weren’t yet school age stayed home. 

“We knew it would be a big transition for him,” they said. “We worried when he seemed to get more and more withdrawn, but we kept telling ourselves this was the normal transition stress everyone warned us about. But it’s been over a year now and it’s just gotten worse.” 

I wish I could tell you that this is the only time I’ve had a conversation like this with parents, but it’s not. The phrase “we figured it was just transition stress” is one I’ve heard many times in my work with hundreds of parents. 

When my colleagues and I work with families prior to a move or to train schools or organizations about family care, a topic we cover is how to distinguish between  “normal” transition stress and when it has gone beyond that. This preventive approach keeps normal transition stress from growing into a long-term state of emotional unhealth which will eventually turn into a crisis. 

So, what is normal transition stress for children? At what point should adjustments be considered because the transition stress has gone beyond a healthy limit? Knowing how to distinguish between healthy transition bumps and long-term adjustment issues is a critical part of preventive care. 

Red Zone/Green Zone

When my company (TCK Training) talks about transition stress for Third Culture Kids, we use the concept of Red Zone/Green Zone. When we’re in the Red Zone, our brain is flooded with stress hormones. This isn’t concerning for a short period of time, and in small doses it can actually be part of resilience building. While a developing brain shouldn’t be exposed to those stress hormones too consistently or for too long, during a major transition it’s normal for everyone to be in the Red Zone for a while.

What the Red Zone looks like for children/teens:

  • Uncharacteristic behavior challenges 
  • Being overly emotional
  • Appearing down or withdrawn
  • Being extra clingy to a parent 
  • Developmental reverting (accidents after being potty trained, sleep regressions, using baby talk, needing a comfort item they had grown out of, etc.) 
  • Development of new stress-induced habits (hair twisting, biting lips or skin, etc.) 
  • Not enjoying activities that used to bring joy 
  • Lack of ability to learn new concepts (this often shows up as  difficulty meeting academic milestones, such as reading, if those concepts are introduced while the child is in the Red Zone, or lower grades than the child’s typical performance)
  • Long periods of numbing/distracting behaviors (e.g. spending hours on an electronic device, consistently choosing to read for hours instead of spending time with family/other children) 

While these behaviors are all normal during a transition season, some behaviors require immediate support even during the normal Red Zone window of transition: 

  • Any sort of self-harm 
  • Suicidal ideation (or any statements that imply that they wish they weren’t alive)
  • Extreme physical aggression toward others 
  • A pattern of undereating or overeating 
  • Depressive or anxious symptoms that interfere with daily functioning

If your child experiences these symptoms at any point it is important to seek immediate professional mental health support.

The Green Zone

In the midst of Red Zone seasons like major transitions, planting “Green Zone moments” is important. This brings the child’s brain momentarily above water. While they still may be mostly in the Red Zone, consistently bringing in Green Zone activities can speed their progress out of the Red Zone.

Green Zone moments can include: 

  • Body movement (going for a walk, playing a sport, etc.) 
  • Anything rhythmic – rhythm regulates the brain (music, dancing, coloring, etc.) 
  • Talking about why this transition feels so hard (allowing them to share and/or giving them language for why they’re feeling this way) 
  • Laughing 
  • Deep breathing 
  • Experiencing something that feels physically comforting (a favorite food, a cozy blanket, a special treat, etc.) 
  • Quality time with a parent, sibling, or close friend 

How Long is Too Long?

After a major transition it is common for children to be primarily in the Red Zone for three months. During this time it is important to implement Green Zone moments for/with them. After three months, we typically see that children have fewer Red Zone days/moments. They begin to act more like their normal selves, trending toward a more consistent Green Zone state. When this is happening, we begin to see that: 

  • They can identify friends they like to play with 
  • Getting ready for school in the morning isn’t as difficult  
  • They talk about things they’re looking forward to
  • They want to join activities that brought them joy in the past or that tap into their skills or talents 
  • They are beginning to feel more confident about how to succeed in school
  • They seem to have a more positive outlook 
  • They are laughing and smiling more 
  • They are doing “Green Zone moments” without prompting 

Most often at around 6-9 months after a transition, the stress has eased and children are in the Green Zone more regularly.

What If It’s Not Getting Better?

The shift from Red Zone to Green Zone may seem slow and drawn out, and even in the best circumstances it can take time. If after six months a child doesn’t seem to be trending toward the Green Zone, we have moved beyond normal transition stress. At this point, professional support for the parents (and possibly the child as well) may be helpful. 

Shifts need to be made so that we can prevent the child going deeper into the Red Zone. The following questions can help determine factors that could be contributing to prolonged transition stress. You can begin making small shifts to see if they begin to make a difference. In the home, for example, you might schedule consistent one-on-one time with that child. In the environment, you might add an activity outside school hours that they would enjoy. 

In the Home

  • Are they receiving regular, positive attention from their parents? 
  • Do they feel they can talk about their emotions and feel heard and comforted? 
  • Do they feel physically safe? 
  • Are they sleeping well?
  • Does the family smile and laugh together often? 

In their Environment

  • Do they have access to activities that would give them Green Zone moments? 
  • Do they have potential friends in their class/school? 
  • Is their teacher a factor that is putting them in the Red Zone?
  • Are there specific stressors that they or you can pinpoint? 
  • Are there adults other than their parents investing in them?

Understanding the progression from Red Zone to Green Zone that happens during a transition season can help parents to monitor their children’s stress levels during times of change. Not only does this knowledge prevent children staying in the Red Zone for an unhealthy period of time, but it also gives parents strategies for improving family health and tools for making adjustments to get each family member on the right track if it doesn’t seem to be happening naturally.

There is so much hope in knowing what normal looks like and having tools to help your children when their transition stress goes beyond that point. To learn more about going through transitions of any kind, especially as a family, check out TCK Training’s self-directed Transitions Course.

Photo by Michał Parzuchowski on Unsplash

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Lauren Wells is the founder and CEO of TCK Training and the Unstacking Company and author of Raising Up a Generation of Healthy Third Culture Kids, The Grief Tower, and Unstacking Your Grief Tower. She is an Adult TCK who spent her teenage years in Tanzania, East Africa. She sits on the board of the TCK Care Accreditation as Vice Chair and is part of the TCK Training research team focusing on preventive care research in the TCK population.

What 7,300 Moons in Africa Taught Me

An outline of banana leaves framed the inky, glittering expanse that August night so long ago. My father raised his face to the moon and asked his father in heaven, “Lord, how many more moons will I witness in the African sky?” It was this farmer’s first night in Cameroon at the beginning of a Bible translation assignment that would span the next several decades of his life. With his homeland behind him, hundreds of moons would cross the Cameroonian sky before he would see an Iowa moon again. I was seven.

I have now witnessed over 7,300 moons in the African skies between my childhood and my adult life. Here are the stories I wish I could go back and tell that farmer the night he stared at the hollow moon and considered the cup he bore. 

“Dad, a few weeks from now, under this very moon, my brother will fall deathly ill from malaria, his feverish body folded in a wool blanket. Your desperate prayers will be driven by the crushing story of the two young sons your friends lost to malaria earlier this year. My brother will look small and skinny, and you’ll be scared. Take courage. God will heal your son, and Mom will nurse him back to health. God’s grace is sufficient for you.

“Under this tropical moon, Dad, my imagination will spring to life chasing tales and adventures across hundreds of pages in hundreds of books with the help of a kerosene lantern and a healthy diet of Vivaldi playing in the background. God’s grace is sufficient for you.

“The moon will be weak the night you lay your exhausted head down after pulling lifeless men, women with bodies broken open, and babies with legs twisted backwards out of a horrific taxi accident down the street. Brace yourself. It won’t be the last time you do this. God’s grace is sufficient for you.

“The light of this moon will peacefully fall on the volcanic mountain ranges around our home each night, and your children will close their eyes to the sound of your and Mom’s voices filling our cement hallway with humble prayers uttered from your room, over each child, each family member, each Cameroonian family member. God’s grace is sufficient for you.

“This moon will faithfully mirror the sun night after night from the first word you learn in Nooni till the day you write your first speech in the previously unwritten language. God’s grace is sufficient for you.

“By the haze of this equatorial moon, I will memorize the deeply furrowed lines in the faces of my Cameroonian mamas as they rotate roasting ears of corn by the fire of their mud brick kitchens for their white child. God’s grace is sufficient for you.

“The moon will light up the sky every Friday night when Mom lovingly folds pizza dough on her rickety kitchen table and us kids pick out our favorite movie. You’ll whistle your way out under the stars to fire up the generator for our weekly huddle of six around a 9-inch screen. God’s grace is sufficient for you.

“The moon will shine a little brighter in your world as you sit in your prayer chair and ponder the gift of Mom. You’ll burst with pride watching her skillfully raise a family in a foreign land, make excellent food from scratch, trek mountaintops in a skirt and boots, navigate impossibly rutted roads like a pro, and work with a people you’ll come to love to write the rules to a language that’s never been written. She’s pretty great, Dad. I’ll learn what a woman can do by watching her. God’s grace is sufficient for you.

“A sliver of this moon will dampen sad and heavy the night that our family experiences a Big T trauma that will forever shake our lives. Dad, the sun will come up the next day, but there will be a lot of hard moons after that. God’s grace is sufficient for you.

“The rays of this moon will pierce through a burglar-barred window the night that I will find freedom and love in Jesus Christ as a 16-year-old under your roof. God’s grace is sufficient for you.

“By the glow of this moon, a boy I met in geometry class will take me hippo-watching along the banks of a muddy river in the Central African Republic. Did you know that hippos grunt so loudly you can hear them a mile downstream? It will be amazing, Dad. You’re really going to like this boy. God’s grace is sufficient for you.

“Dad, a few years later, our trusty moon will cast light on a red clay path for that boy from geometry class as he steadies his shaky legs and musters up the courage to knock on your door. He’s going to ask you if he can love me forever. You’ll be glad you said yes. God’s grace is sufficient for you.

“This orb will pierce the sky with light and a never-ending message of hope through our family’s most tear-stained bitter nightmares and our sweetest toasted-marshmallow dreams. God’s grace is sufficient for you.

“This moon will dance like glitter the night the last verse of scripture is translated into the Nooni language, breaking open access for people to read God’s word in their heart language for the first time. They’re the same people who, four decades earlier, wrote a fervent plea in the language of colonizers for their mother tongue to be developed in written form. God’s grace is sufficient for you.

“Thousands of moons later, I will also look up at the unchanged luminous sphere, but this time it will be framed by the outline of macadamia trees on a farm in KwaZulu Natal. I will have just sung my own babies to sleep and herded my Irish Wolfhound to her blankie. I’ll think of you and Mom, and I’ll start my own mooncount on foreign soil as an adult. Oh, and Dad, the boy from geometry class is the best thing that ever happened to me. God’s grace is sufficient for me.

“Dad, whether it’s your first moon under the unpolluted Cameroonian sky or your eight hundred and thirty-first moon choked out by harmattan winds, you will find that God’s grace is sufficient for you. 7,300 African moons later, I came back to tell you that the moon at this angle is beautiful. It’s going to be an integral part of our family faith story. I’ve wrestled with the same moon, and I’ve found the same thing. God’s grace is not only sufficient, but lavish, for me.”

Beyond Reverse Culture Shock Part 3: The Journey of Post-Traumatic Growth

by Shonna Ingram

Welcome to Part 3 of our series, where we’ll explore each re-entry season in depth, uncovering how to apply the principles of post-traumatic growth and offering specific resources for each season of the journey. (If you missed them, you can read Part 1 and Part 2 at these links.)

The concept of Post-Traumatic Growth hypothesizes that while trauma inflicts deep wounds, it can also create change. Through the post-traumatic growth journey, individuals can uncover new strengths, gain new perspectives, and explore new possibilities. More importantly, it can help them find restoration and a deeper connection to God. By embracing the post-traumatic growth model and committing to the journey, missionaries can discover their next step in ministry.

While not all individuals experience trauma during re-entry, a trauma-informed perspective acknowledges the possibility of trauma. In the following sections, we will explore the different facets of the re-entry journey, shedding light on the experiences and challenges missionaries may encounter along the way.

Season 1: Return (Pre-Departure and Arrival)

This phase of re-entry is covered extensively in most re-entry literature, which focuses on “saying healthy goodbyes” and “preparing for landing.” As we discussed in Part 1, ideally, missionaries have time for pre-departure preparations; however, unforeseen circumstances may disrupt this. Regardless, the Return phase marks the start of settling back home, from pre-departure readiness to initial arrival and approximately six months after they arrive.

Pre-Departure Preparation: Typically starting nine to six months before departure, this phase involves logistical, emotional, and mental readiness. Prioritizing intentional farewells, addressing logistics early, and engaging in reflection is crucial for a smoother transition.

Initial Arrival (0-3 months) Preparation: This season can be especially hard if there is no pre-departure preparation. This phase addresses practical responsibilities like housing, transportation, and internet service. It is important to be aware of the emotional undercurrents accompanying these responsibilities.

Extended Arrival (3-6 months) Preparation: This phase sees missionaries exploring life in their home country, navigating ongoing adjustment, and settling in. Challenges may persist despite time passing, inviting reflection on overall well-being, family dynamics, career trajectory, and how to manage continued reverse culture shock.

Regardless of the circumstances surrounding your return, you may grapple with the complexities of leaving behind your life overseas. You may exhibit a range of behaviors indicative of trauma responses, including fight responses by asserting control over your circumstances, fleeing from overwhelming emotions, freezing by looking like you are in indecision, or engaging in fawning behaviors to appease others. Being aware of these normal responses is essential in finding effective support during this transitional phase.

During the initial Return season, consider the following strategies:

  • Find a comprehensive checklist outlining essential tasks and considerations for preparing to return home. This checklist should encompass logistical arrangements, emotional preparedness, and strategies for self-care. Check out our free checklist here.
  • Beware of circumstances surrounding your departure so that you can ensure that you receive the assistance needed to navigate the complexities of re-entry effectively.
  • Foster awareness of the first re-entry season among other missionaries and support networks. This way you can better anticipate and address the challenges that arise in this season.
  • Create environments that validate your re-entry experiences.

Starting with these tips will help ensure that the journey to your home country can be done with confidence. 

Season 2: Restore (Navigating the Space in Between)

The Restore phase follows the initial adjustments of re-entry, representing a crucial period. This season involves navigating space between two life chapters and may span from a few years to a lifetime if not addressed.

During Restore, you may confront a range of emotions and experiences, including ambiguity, waiting, and uncertainty. Particularly important to address during this season are family dynamics, career shifts, and overall well-being. 

This phase presents unique challenges, such as supporting children through their adjustment and navigating shifts in faith. If done well, it can prompt spiritual growth while addressing unprocessed emotions, trauma, or even positive life changes.

Navigating this transitional phase involves a fluctuating journey, marked by moments of feeling stuck and longing for clarity, especially when neither the overseas nor passport culture feels entirely familiar. Questions about identity, purpose, and belonging may arise, prompting individuals to grapple with their new realities and search for their place in their communities.

Taking a trauma-informed approach to the Restore season is vital, considering that you may be wrestling with hidden traumas during this phase. Common trauma events observed during this season include: 

Acute trauma, which stems from one-time events like theft or accident.

Compound trauma, which arises from insufficient time to process between smaller transitions or smaller one-time events.

Survivor’s Guilt, which occurs when a person survives an event or leaves others to fend for themselves (this happened during the pandemic, especially if the worker had to leave national friends and coworkers behind). 

Moral Injury, which occurs when individuals have to act against their values, such as breaking laws to achieve certain objectives or witnessing others do so.

Unresolved childhood attachment issues, which lead individuals to feel unsafe or insecure.

It is imperative to be in a supportive environment where you feel empowered to address these parts of your journey in this season. 

During the transitional Restore season, consider the following strategies:

  • Adopt a holistic view of well-being and recognize all areas of physical, emotional, and spiritual health.
  • Be a part of a supportive community where you can find understanding and encouragement. Check out our Restore groups. 
  • Address traumas effectively. A team of counselors or coaches specializing in re-entry trauma, older couples, pastors, or organizations familiar with the re-entry space can all be helpful here.

It’s crucial to create a supportive environment where missionaries feel empowered to address trauma and to work from a post-traumatic growth model effectively as part of their journey toward restoration and healing during the Restore season.

Season 3: Rebuild (Developing the Next Step)

The Rebuild season marks a significant shift in how we spend our time, being able to move beyond the hard places, trauma, or liminal space that held us in a Restore season. This is when our brains shift out of survival mode, allowing us to move forward with openness and curiosity. We integrate past experiences, accepting the present while still allowing space for grief. It is also a time to embrace the future with hope.

Key areas of focus during the Rebuild season include cultivating cultural awareness, unfolding one’s faith journey, and embracing growth and transformation. By reflecting on your re-entry journey, leveraging your international experiences, setting new goals and aspirations, and embracing change and adaptability, you can step into a future filled with purpose and fulfillment in your passport country. 

During the Rebuild season, our attention shifts towards narrative development within the post-traumatic growth model. Utilizing resources such as re-entry workbooks and seeking guidance from coaches or trusted friends, individuals can explore their new values and motivations, recognizing both their strengths and areas for growth. Through the process of crafting a new purpose statement and adopting a forward-thinking mindset, you can actively shape your new narrative to cultivate growth and resilience.

During the Rebuild season, consider the following strategies:

  • Explore your renewed purpose and possibly consider further education or training to align with your values to foster a profound sense of purposeful living. You can also join a Rebuild group.
  • Engage in meaningful work or ministry opportunities, which offer avenues for personal and professional growth.
  • Explore new avenues of service, whether through pursuing new job opportunities or engaging in cross-cultural ministry endeavors. 
  • Foster connections within the community, whether through church involvement, professional networks, or volunteer opportunities, as this is essential for building strong support systems and facilitating a smooth transition during re-entry. 

As you start the Rebuild season, you can embrace new opportunities and navigate this transformative phase with confidence and purpose.

You Don’t Have to Go Through Re-entry Alone

As we wrap up our series, remember that you’re not alone in this journey. My consulting company’s new Re-entry program is dedicated to providing resources for each season of your re-entry journey. Whether you’re navigating a season of Return, Restore, or Rebuild, we’re here to equip you with the tools and insights needed to support yourself or others through the re-entry process. From comprehensive digital courses to engaging in small group discussions, we offer a space where you can find understanding, connection, and support. Our team of experienced coaches is ready to walk alongside you, offering guidance and encouragement every step of the way.

If you’re part of an organization with a member care program, consider how you can further support your missionaries by becoming a trained re-entry coach yourself. And if you know someone who could benefit from our resources and community, please don’t hesitate to reach out.

Our supportive community is continually growing, so whether you’re planning your return to your passport country, you are still in the process of transitioning back, or you are seeking guidance in retirement, we’re here to assist you. We would love to help you navigate this journey. 

Not sure what season of re-entry you are in? Sign up to take the free quiz.

Our next groups start April 25th and May 3rd. 

Connect with more re-entry resources at shonnaingram.com/resources.

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Shonna Ingram is the founder and director of the Renewed Hope Approach, a program that provides a practical approach to post-trauma care. She’s been in ministry for over 20 years and spent eight years in Africa as a missionary. Shonna is a Board Certified Master Trauma-Informed Mental Health Coach specializing in career, self-development, and spiritual formation, and she has trained hundreds of people in over 30 countries to integrate mental health into a biblical framework. Her heart for people in the re-entry season led her to create her second series, Your Re-Entry Path, as a way for them to figure out their next season, whether inside or outside of vocational ministry. She is mom to four amazing adults.