Welcome friends,

Month #3 of 2026 is here, and it feels like a turning point to me. I sense a quiet invitation woven into this season, not to rush, or force anything, or to pretend everything is fine, but simply to take the next honest step forward.

I was chatting with a woman this past week while on a hike. The theme of our conversation kept looping back into the topic of identity and insecurities and how life events can encourage or hijack them.

We explored questions like:

What does it really look like to step forward when relationships feel painful and boundaries have been ignored?

Maybe you, like us, have had your integrity questioned, and that has led you into a whirl of self-doubt. Insecurity still shows up for me.

The closer I get to my sabbatical and Camino journey, the more I notice it.

Fellow travelers who have traversed the Camino de Santiago trail in Spain say one’s pilgrimage begins the moment you say yes, and I’m discovering how true that is. It’s uncomfortable at times, yet it’s also an invitation to sit at the feet of my Savior and notice where I’m trying to carry everything in my own strength.

I leave for Spain in April. It is fast approaching. I look forward to meeting with the Lord as I take each step. Thank you for your prayers and the kindness so many of you have shown me. Your support means more than you know.

This week’s question:

My father is married to a very young person. She has no sensitivity regarding my relational boundaries, and as a result of meddling, has alienated me from family. My father protects her, especially when she plays the victim. I’m battling and panic when I think of it happening again. Talking to them doesn’t work.

LeAnne’s Response:

Dear sister,

I read through your note slowly about 10 times prior to sitting down and writing my response.

I didn’t rush it.

I let it sit with me.

I am sitting with you.

The word that kept coming to my mind as I read was one I have used before in my own writing and reflecting, and I’ve never shared it publicly. The word is “SPLACE.” It’s the desire to embody a place at the table. It is the courage to fully take up space. It acknowledges the weight of our humanity, and invites us to claim our true identity. Sadly there are times we feel reduced and other people can make us feel unwelcome.

As a daughter, I can imagine how disorienting this must feel—removed, shifted, almost erased, and somewhere underneath it all that quiet ache, “he loved me first, didn’t he”? How does that truth, that depth of relationship, just get set aside?

There’s something uniquely painful about watching a parent reorient their loyalty and feeling like your footing moved without your consent, connection, or input.

Sister, it doesn’t mean he doesn’t love you. However, it can feel like your position has been shifted and you aren’t sure where you stand.

I can feel the truth and the conviction in my body, mind, soul, and spirit as I share these next two thoughts. I love that your father is joined to his wife. I believe deeply in a husband cleaving to his wife. I don’t think divided loyalty is the answer. I am grieved to hear that you are not protected by him.

Cleaving to a spouse does not require erasing a daughter.

A healthy marriage makes room for both. When stewardship isn’t happening well, it leaves a wound. When you say you panic thinking about it happening again, that makes sense to me. The panic you speak of often isn’t about one conversation. It’s about a pattern repeating.

“Lord, you alone are my inheritance, my cup of blessing. You guard all that is mine.
The land you have given me is a pleasant land. What a wonderful inheritance!”
— Psalm 16:5–6 (NLT)

Your body remembers what it felt like to be dismissed, alienated, or positioned as the problem. Your body remembering doesn’t make you dramatic. It acknowledges your humanity. I’m going to name something that I’ve learned in my own life as recently as this last month.

There is a powerful pull in all of us to explain ourselves when we feel misunderstood.

Explaining yourself repeatedly does not create understanding when someone is committed to protecting their position. It’s exhausting. We explain to clarify, to soften, or to defend our heart one more time, so that we don’t lose our “SPLACE.” I wonder, sweet friend, if you’re carrying that exhaustion.

When one person speaks for the other, it minimizes a voice. When someone protects the other at your expense, it truly becomes nearly impossible to repair from inside that framework.Triangulation, manipulation, and all kinds of unhealthy things can become part of the pattern. Talking more, finding just the right words, doesn’t fix a family system that isn’t operating from health. Healthy breaths when all voices and thoughts are considered.

You cannot control how your father stewards this marriage. You cannot control how his wife behaves. You can decide how you will steward yourself inside of this relationship. You can choose to focus on what matters most. You can embrace the opportunity to return to strength and to allow strength to return to you

That might mean creating a quiet boundary for yourself.

A quiet boundary is not something that you announce in anger or shout from a mountaintop. It is something that you have an opportunity to create, cultivate, own and anchor internally.

In my grandmahood, motherhood, daughterhood, sisterhood, and within my friendships, I have the opportunity to embrace the truth that I am first beloved, and an image-bearer of the most holy God. You have that same opportunity.

Some boundaries I am finding helpful right now as I prepare for my sabbatical and as I honor my SPLACE in this wild and woolly world are as follows:

• I will state my position once. I will not argue it three times.
• I will not participate in conversations that become destructive or where I am dismissed, or devalued.
• If I am spoken about instead of spoken to, I will step back.

Refusing unhealthy relationship dynamics doesn’t require drama. It does require clarity.

This clarity comes from the Lord.

There comes a moment when explaining yourself stops being communication and starts being self-abandonment. Friend, I wonder if you’re nearing that line. I have found myself near that line, blurring that line, crossing that line, and rejecting that line. I invite you into exploration here. Where are you tempted to shrink, overexplain, or chase approval to keep your place, and what would it look like to remain steady instead?

If I stop clarifying, or continue to speak up will I lose my place entirely?

• Will I be rejected?
• Will I be left out?
• Will I be kicked out?
• Will I be uninvited?

Your SPLACE is secured by self-respect and by personal dignity. Your SPLACE is a gift from our Heavenly Father. Your SPLACE at the table, your SPLACE in a family, is not secured by overserving, or twisting yourself into a human pretzel to please others.

“Even if my father and mother abandon me, the Lord will hold me close.”
— Psalm 27:10 (NLT)

If someone chooses not to make room at the table for you, that is on them. That is their stewardship. That is not your failure, or a reflection on your belovedness. You are not unreasonable for wanting your place in the family honored, and you are not crazy for feeling the ache of being shifted.

So friend, What does strength look like for you? What does it sound like? Perhaps, it looks like walking in the truth, standing in your SPLACE, without chasing your worth. Maybe it sounds like speaking once and letting it stand.

You may not be able to change their dynamic. It’s their relationship. However, you can refuse to lose yourself inside of their marriage, and that is important work.

That is brave, that is bold, that is mature, and that is radiant. I look forward to hearing an update from you soon. Hold Fast!

Friends, where are you tempted to shrink, overexplain, or chase approval to keep your place, and what would it look like to remain steady instead?