19 I Finding Peace with Parents Who Don't Fully Accept You

Disagreeing with your family is nothing new. But in the last decade, as life and politics in the U.S. have become increasingly polarized, so have many of our families. Jedidiah Jenkins felt this kind of division in his family from a young age when he realized he was gay in an evangelical Christian environment. Now an adult, Jedidiah has figured out how to maintain a loving, supportive relationship with his mother despite their ideological differences. In this episode, Jedidiah shares how to set boundaries with a parent and how standing your ground with love can lead to deeper understanding.

Read Jedidiah’s book: Mother, Nature: A 5,000-Mile Journey to Discover if a Mother and Son Can Survive Their Differences

Listen to the full conversation with Jedidiah and his mom on his podcast Question The Self.

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Episode transcript is below. Transcripts may not appear in their final form.
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Julia Winston: I'm Julia Winston and this is Refamulating, a show that explores different ways to make a family. 

Today we dive into one of life's most meaningful and nuanced relationships: the one between parents and children. Specifically, we'll be hearing the story of an adult man navigating his evolving relationship with his mother. The punchline? It’s complicated.

My mom used to tell me that being a parent doesn't come with an instruction manual. Well, here's the thing – neither does being someone's child. The people who raise us become our first teachers in what it means to be human, for better or worse. Our parents lay the foundation for how we view the world, how we form relationships, and often, how we see ourselves.

Some of us are blessed with relationships that flow easily, marked by understanding and acceptance. Others navigate waters that are much more turbulent, where the relationship carries a lot of cracks and wounds. Many of us find ourselves somewhere in between, experiencing both moments of meaningful connection and painful disconnect with the people who brought us into this world.

Jedidiah Jenkins:  If you have mother abandonment, like that is just a primal wound. So I don't have that. My mom is not abandoning me, which is key. And she's a delight to be around.  But the challenge is that her political beliefs are diametrically opposed to mine. And her religious beliefs injure me and are the tradition from which I escaped. 

Julia Winston: This is Jedidiah Jenkins. He’s a writer and author, and he’s written a lot about his relationship with his mom, who is also a writer. The big difference between them is that Jedidiah is gay, and his mother is an evangelical Christian. 

Jedidiah and his mother have very different views about religion, politics, and sexuality. But…they also have a very loving relationship. Jedidiah calls her one of his favorite people. His latest book, Mother Nature, is about a cross-country road trip he took with his mom when she turned 70 to see if they could survive their differences. It turns out they could, but it’s required them both to accept each other, in spite of their differences.

Jedidiah Jenkins: I've had to learn to navigate and push back on like some of the narratives from the gay community of like, if they don't accept all of who you are, kick them to the curb, like partial acceptance is not acceptable. That is like a real message, and I'm like, that is not true. That is actually a very small minded way of seeing people.

Julia Winston: At a moment when families everywhere are grappling with deep divisions – not just around sexuality, but across every fault line of belief and identity – many of us are asking ourselves hard questions about how to maintain relationships with people we love but disagree with. 

There's no single right answer, and sometimes creating distance is the most healing choice. 

But Jedidiah's story invites us to consider another possibility: what happens when we stay? 

Julia Winston: So first I'm curious to hear about your family and your life growing up. What, what did your family look like? Paint a picture for us of your childhood.

Jedidiah Jenkins: I grew up in Middle Tennessee. as a kid I was on a farm south of Nashville. And so I grew up playing in the creek, catching turtles, like, running around in the woods. It was unbelievable. My parents got divorced when I was very young. Maybe four or five. I don't have a memory of that. I like have flashes of them being together, but my dad was also a travel writer and so he was gone, so I don't really, I do not have a conscious memory of the trauma of divorce at all.

I just like suddenly had two Christmases and like, great, okay, this is just what people do. I have an older sister, a younger brother, and then eventually a younger half sister. And it was a great, Tennessee is a great place to grow up, like. I had a great time. 

My mom had custody, so my mom was just a great caring mother. She had a lot to deal with. My older sister was a wild, rebellious, like monster to her. And my little brother had pretty serious health problems from the jump. So I was kind of the middle child who was not forgotten, but I didn't want to rock the boat because it felt very tenuous to just make it through the day, which I think has really greatly impacted my life and my personality that I don't want to ask for help and I don't want to be a problem and I figure things out on my own because especially like, you know, with sexuality, those things and those questions might start to arise, you know, between 7, 8, years old. And that was really when my family was in chaos and my brother and sister's problems seemed so obvious and mine was really more just questions and then those questions would really get answered on Sunday morning at church or at school with the way kids teased. 

And so the questions that I was quietly asking the universe were answered through bullying, through mean comments, and through pastors at the pulpit. Which is a very uniquely challenging thing for a queer person because your otherizing and your otherness is private that you want to hide. Whereas, you know, if your otherness is skin color and you're at the lunch table, you can find somebody that looks like you and go sit with them. But queerness is this uniquely insidious problem where that's the opposite of what you want to do. If someone is showing those signs, you don't want to be associated with them because that's social suicide. So it's even more alienating in such a sad way. So all that to say, I like, I really think that's what turned me into a writer and a creative and an artist because the world was not made for me and I was like, okay, well, I could either rage against the machine or I could commit myself to understanding how the machine works so that I can survive.

Julia Winston: So what was the arc of your own relationship with your identity as a queer person and how did that play out in your family?

Jedidiah Jenkins: I knew something was different in third grade. I knew what it was called in seventh grade and I knew that it was bad and I kind of thought it would go away. And then by like, I would say middle of high school, I realized that it doesn't go away and it has, it's an identity. By the end of high school, I realized I should tell people because I think I am this thing, like it's not a phase, like it's here to stay. And I've never been attracted to a female in any way other than giggling and like gossiping. And so I decided, cause I, I knew, I always knew I was going to California for college.

And so I basically made sure summer before I went to college, I told all my best friends. But my friends were like thinking people like we had a Bible study, but it was like. It was really like a philosophy club. It was unbelievable. So anyway, I told my best guy friends and they were all so supportive and we love you and we don't care, like. I told all my friends, it was unbelievable.

But I didn't tell my family. I mean, my mom had made it clear that, like, being gay was wrong. But she'd never talked to me about it. And so, I would say my freshman or sophomore year. Might have been my freshman year, in college. My sister, older sister, was getting married and my mom, like on the phone, just asked me. She said, do you think you'll ever get married? And I said, I don't know, mom, that question's complicated. And then she said, are you gay? And I was like, oh my god, I'm being bamboozled.

Uh, uh, uh, yes. And it was just, she cried, and, uh, like, of course, she had wondered, since I was, like, very little. Mothers always know or have some knowledge, but she just prayed so hard against it, because in her world view, it's It's just a sin. It's like separation from God, because that's not what God wants. It's a hard life, all these things. Then like I told my siblings or maybe she told my siblings and they seem totally fine with it.

And then my dad called me and was like, I don't care. You can be exactly who you are. He said, I just hope you don't make being gay your whole identity. Like you're more than that, which now I see was probably like interwoven with some like homophobia and femophobia and like, just don't be one of those annoying gays, like be one of the ones that's quiet about it. And so really it was just my mom who wasn't down. 

Julia Winston: His mom was not supportive of his sexuality, but she didn’t reject him as a person, or as her son. And I know that sadly, that’s not always the case. Many queer people are mistreated and rejected by their families. But Jedidiah still felt love and support from his mom in other ways, so he didn’t want to walk away from their relationship. 

Julia Winston: let's go into your relationship with your mom a little bit. I'm curious to hear more about the nature of your relationship with your mother. Talk to me about what makes you close. In what ways do you feel close to your mom and in what ways do you feel distant from your mom? 

Jedidiah Jenkins: My mom is an amazing woman in spite of her damaging beliefs, which she believes are the end all be all. My mom and I get along really well because she is funny and curious and bright. She wants to like, go on a road trip, see where the waterfall is, go into the antique store, talk to the lady and ask where the best pancakes are, like, we share that in common, and she's just this bright shining light.

Plus the fact that she has like unwavering undying motherly love for her kids. Like if I need something, she would dig up Mount Everest to dust to help her children. That's a profoundly valuable understanding to move through the world with as a kid, like when you go off on your own and you're a young adult, like to know that there is a plan Z that if like all hell breaks loose, you can go to your mom if you run out of money. If you get arrested, if you get injured, like she will be there. If your house burns down, she will be there. And I've always lived life with that knowledge. And quite a few people do not have that. And that is like a permanent wound, no matter how tough you are. If you've been like, if you have mother abandonment, like that is just a primal wound. So I don't have that. My mom is not abandoning me, which is key. And she's a delight to be around. But the challenge is that her political beliefs are diametrically opposed to mine. And her religious beliefs injure me and are the tradition from which I escaped. 

Now, do I believe that God has a plan and like trusting in God for, for the days and like you are not in control and like the all, all those things I believe. And I think that's so beautiful and a wonderful pragmatic way to live your life. But atonement for sins, man is wretched. We are meant to burn unless you follow the words of this book. Like. No, I actually find that to be harmful and to use their language evil. And so, I mean, and that is, that is the most important thing in her life above her children, above all is her relationship to God through the lens of Christianity.

So that's a big rift. And so I've had to learn to navigate and push back on like some of the narratives from the gay community of like, if they don't accept all of who you are, kick them to the curb, like partial acceptance is not acceptable. Basically, if they don't love you as you are, they don't actually love you. That is like a real message, and I'm like, that is not true. That is actually a very small minded way of seeing people, and it's actually using the tools of the oppressor on, on the oppressor, as the oppressed, which is just, I think, unwise. And that was just like something it took me a long time to realize but that is like where I stand today It's like I'm just not gonna move through the world like that,

Jedidiah Jenkins: And I remember in 2000, oh God, I should really know this, but when, when the Supreme court basically approved gay marriage as a thing we do in this country, I remember watching the news so ecstatic and I saw like mothers and sons crying and hugging and I saw like. My friend, my gay friends, like celebrating with their moms. And I remember having like a really deep melancholy about that of just like, wow, that will never come from me. Like I will, this major part of me, one of the largest parts of someone's life, which is who they love and potentially spend their life with. We'll just not include her. So that was, that's always been a challenge. 

Julia Winston: Yes, that at the core of that's really kind of at the core of this conversation that we're having. And I think what is really important for us to talk about, especially when we talk about family dynamics, is that it could be all or nothing. It could be. all Jesus Christ and, um, homophobic perspective or all kick them to the curb if they don't support you. But there is this entire world that could invite much more love and nuance and understanding if we were to embrace it just a little bit more, which is not all or nothing. It's not black or white. It's not binary, and so that's what I'm really curious to hear more about you from like the journey for you of understanding these extreme perspectives that would actually lead you to have a real rift with your mother. What were some of the key moments for you that you understood that there are these extreme perspectives and how have you found your perspective in the middle there?

Jedidiah Jenkins: I have to always give the caveat of that like my mom is A hoot. My mom is an angel, so funny, so sweet, not belligerent, not cruel. And like, these are things like, when I've met people with mothers like this, that are just vicious, cutting, belittling, self righteous, sanctimonious, and I'm like, I don't know if I could be that way, like, I don't know if I could be who I am today and have the relationship that I have with my mom if my mom was acting like that.

I don't think I could. But what I'm dealing with, this specific thing, is a wonderful woman with beliefs I don't hold. Who still wants to be in a relationship with me. And, I would say there's a few elements to, quote unquote, how I do it, and probably how she does it. Which is One, I built my own life and my own chosen family of absolutely unconditional support. Like I have chosen friends and family that like love me exactly as I am, root for me, check on me, worry about me. Like I basically built the dream family that I couldn't get from my one in Tennessee because don't know. I came to California and I found it. And so what happened there in my twenties and thirties was I built this strength in myself, knowing that I'm basically healing the little boy in my mind. If I trip and fall, someone will catch me. We all want that. And I think people feel very claustrophobic when they don't have that, and the only person that can catch them is a danger zone, which is their cruel mother. She'll still catch you, but on her terms.

And so, like, I think that creates, an existential claustrophobia, which makes people freak out and And feel very unsettled. And so I built this like inner peace in myself where if I lost my mother and if I couldn't handle her, I would be okay. If I never spoke to her again, I would be okay. And from that point of strength, I was able to approach her again and choose relationship with her because I do want her in my life.

And I do want to fall into her arms if I get hurt. But it's not my only option. And so, that gave me, the fortitude to stand in my own space and feel okay being in 80 percent relationship with her. We talk, we catch up, we check on each other, I go home for Christmas, we go on trips together, we laugh, we go to lunch, like, I get to have my mom, to a degree, and to a majority degree, and just because I don't get a hundred percent Doesn't mean the other 80 70 percent are not absolutely nourishing and worth That sounds so clinical, but like, that is how I see it. I'm like, I don't need 100%. 

Julia Winston: I feel like actually the clinical part is, is actually quite helpful because what we're saying is like, You can't get a hundred percent. It's not fair to expect a hundred percent from anyone. Just like it's not accurate to get a hundred percent hatred of this or of this other perspective. So you're finding like the way that you're finding a happy medium or a middle way is to just expect what's realistic from your Yes. 

Jedidiah Jenkins: I want exactly what she can give me and I'll give her what I can give her. And I like it. Like, I love, I think an underappreciated art that we're all doing all the time is pretending is playing just like la, la, la. Good to see you. Love you. Oh my gosh. Like. And we think that's being phony, but I'm just like, not everything has to be litigated all the time.

Kindness, civility, laughter, playfulness. Those are basically paying into the bank of affection that makes you survive conflict. And I'm just like, do that. You do not have to litigate everything all the time. Send a loving note. Do these bids of affection because that just like makes a relationship. I just don't want to fight my whole life. I just want to love people and be kind. And I want to love my mom and I want my mom to love me. And I'm telling you, it really works for me.

Julia Winston: Yeah, I mean what you're saying is running counter to a cultural narrative that we've all been feeding into well all but many people have been feeding into over the past I would say probably a decade or two which is about authenticity. I'm, I'm all about authenticity. I also do think I've come to learn that there are a It's not that there are limits to that, but like, if you want to have an effective relationship with someone that maybe there are these, um, thresholds that you don't step over where it's like, okay, I'm not going to actually, to your point about litigation, I don't actually need to assert my full perspective here and expect you to come meet it in order to keep my authenticity, what if the quality of the relationship actually asks me to step back a little bit from that authenticity so that I can connect and that we're all compromising a little bit on our authenticity to connect in a meaningful

Jedidiah Jenkins: well, I think that that's how beautifully put. I think you're exactly right. It's like we've put authenticity on this altar, which I think it should be. I'm obsessed. I feel like a very authentic person, but I think authenticity should be tempered by humility and respect. It's like, I don't actually know everything all the time. I don't know why you said that. I don't know why you think that. And me flying off the handle, just because you rubbed me the wrong way, I might just be hungry. I might have a headache. Like, there's all these things where just being kind and nice and funny, like, I just see it as lubricating the harder conversations.

I think it was Esther Perel or one of these genius people said, If you're ever in an argument with your boyfriend, girlfriend, spouse, or you're having a hard conversation, hold their hand and pet their hand. Like touch them affectionately. When you think about getting in an argument with someone You're sitting on the couch with your arms folded tight and you're like closing yourself off physically but if you remain physically open it actually keeps the part of your brain open that can learn new information as opposed to just Shutting down and calling your lawyer, which is your memory of the things that you already believe and it's like Keeping that in all sorts of relationships is just a better way to live life. And that doesn't mean you're inauthentic.

Julia Winston: I want to bring in Jedidiah’s mom, Barbara, for a minute here. Last year, Jedidiah interviewed her on his podcast Know The Self. They talked about their relationship and their family, and I want to play a clip so you can get a sense of their dynamic.

Jedidiah Jenkins: you read my first book to shake the sleeping self and my second one, some of it, I'm sure. And then this one is you're a major character in my life because you're, I mean, everyone's, most people's mothers are one of the biggest character of their life. 

But you know, the way I write about you and the way I write about the church and the certain things of my life, I, my experience with that is pain.  And so in some ways, like you are a pain point for me, but, but then again, you're not, you're like my favorite person, but it's like certain beliefs and certain structures of your, of, of your beliefs and the structures of things we did growing up were hard for me. 

Do you feel like I do seek to understand you? Do you feel like I treat you fairly? Do you f What does it feel like to be written about? 

Mom: Well, first of all, you're a wonderful son,  I'm very proud of you,  um, you, you have such an inquisitive mind,  and  as your mother, I've always felt that God had a plan and a purpose for your life. I think that, that you, um,  you're, you're on a journey, Jed.  And at different parts of a journey, you think differently,  and you feel differently.

And I'm going to compare this to my mother. When I was young,  I had so much anger and so many  things about her I didn't like. There were things about her I loved, but she was a very difficult, demanding, and in many ways a cruel mother.  But yet, because I think in my heart of hearts,  I truly wanted a relationship.

I wanted, I wanted to love her. I wanted things to be the way I wanted them.  So I think my journey, what my journey taught me about my mother was that if you are blessed to live long enough.  Which I was with my mother.  I was 60 years old before  I lost her  and  I was able  to make a lot of peace in my heart toward her.

I was able to forgive the things of the past because I think when you get older  you begin to understand  that it isn't that people are mean It's just that they are, they're hurting, or they're confused, or they don't know what to do. So, so you, I think you learn to offer a lot of grace and give people a lot of space and a lot of room for God to work in their lives.

So that's how I feel about you. I don't have to manipulate you. I don't have to tell you what to do or how to live. Now I may disagree. with some of the things that you do, but that's between me and God, and I will,  just like Abraham put Isaac on the altar,  I put my children on the altar, and I pray for you every day. Because at the end of your life, you don't have to answer to me.  You have to answer to the living God. And so,  I'm able to hold you with an open hand and say, Jed.  I love you,  forgive me where I have failed you,  and  whatever our differences,  God is in the business of redeeming. 

Julia Winston: How have you seen yourself seek to understand her? Because on one hand you have this part of you that's like, I do not, like, I think your Christianity is harmful to me. then on the other hand, you, the only way for you to have a strong relationship is to both be understood and to understand. So how have you seen yourself compromise or, uh, expand in order to bring that understanding to her?

Jedidiah Jenkins: I think my mom has a harder job than I did because I used to be Evangelical Christian. And so I remember that feeling of laying down my life To the scripture and to God's plan. So I have a sense memory of her worldview. She has never had my worldview and layer in the context of the work of the life that she has lived, which is jesus, you know, she gave her life to Jesus in high school and, or younger, and has just been this good Christian girl who like wants to be a, serve the Lord. And her husband cheats on her. She's left alone raising three kids. And the only thing she can do is pray to Jesus. So Jesus becomes her husband.

Add to the mix her little effeminate son is playing with Barbies and my little ponies and she is seeing on the news that there's this new thing in the eighties called gay cancer called AIDS and it's killing gay men and the pastors are saying, see, the, the cost of sin is death. Yeah. And how scary so like to to reprogram all of that is like above my pay grade and it's actually I'm not interested in doing that because that is the thing that is her entire operating system and she's 77 years old like girl sing hallelujah all the way home like am not about to change you. 

Another, like, tool that I would use if you have this ability is, is take the time to get to know your parents as they were in their 20s and 30s. Like, understand that your parent is a child that got older. That is a young person, however old you are right now. Let's say you don't have children. Your parents probably had children at the age you're at right now. Doesn't that sound scary? Do you feel ready to have children? If you have three children right now, do you feel ready right now? Like they just did it in the eighties or the seventies or whatever. It's like, they are young people who got older and they're still that young person in their mind. And so get to know that person and it will defang so much of their power.

Julia Winston: Okay, to that end, about getting to know your mother when she was in her 20s, I want to talk about Mother Nature. tell us about Mother Nature, what is this book that you wrote, what led you to decide to write it?

 Jedidiah Jenkins: Yeah, so my first three books I realized are really a mother trilogy. They're like all me unpacking my relationship with my mother. And the third book is the culmination where I just take it dead on. And I really just had this thought that I Want to know my mom as she was like I want to go on a trip with her and her alone. And originally the trip was and I still haven't given up hope we were gonna go on a Glenn Beck Republican cruise from Italy to Israel and She invited me all excited and I was like, you know mom, you know, that's my actual hell But then I was like wait, this could be the funniest book Of all time.

Like, me, I still want to do it, so stay tuned. But I, I just realized, oh my god, I want to go on a trip with my mom, and I want to know her. And so, the interesting and unusual thing about my mom is in the 70s, her and my dad walked across America. They wrote for National Geographic, and they lived on the road for five years walking across this country and writing about it, so it was this big, hippie adventure. Like, they're on the cover of National Geographic. August 1979, if you want to look it up. And that was all before I was born. And it's this huge adventure, which made them pretty famous. And I was like, wow. But then my parents got divorced early in the eighties.

And so like that great adventure and that fame also had like kind of a sting to it as I was growing up, because it was camelot lost and so there was so much I didn't know and I just had this idea I was like mom should we do a road trip and retrace your walk across America? And then you tell me stories about what it was like like because Lord knows I haven't read those books I can't bear to but let's go on a road trip, and she was thrilled of course. I mean most mothers would be thrilled if their adult son said let me take you on a road trip. And so we retraced her steps and to my delight and surprise My mom had a fat journal.

She wrote every single day of her walk. I've never seen this journal. I didn't even know it existed She has notes from every day every town every step. And so I'm and she did the walk from age like 29 to 32 or whatever because she did three years of the walk My dad walked from New York to New Orleans met my mom fell in love with her convinced her to then walk from New Orleans. So we did the road trip from New Orleans to Oregon.

And so just like got to really know my mom in a, in a new way, but also, and this is why I highly recommend being a writer and is that I am a coward and I'm scared of confrontation. And I have, I realized that I have lived my life wondering if, when I get married to a gay man, would my mom come to the wedding? And I realized, I am 40 years old, and I don't know the answer to that, and I'm terrified of the answer. And so, this is why I suggest writing books about your life, is that like, I would never have asked my mom if I didn't have a book. And I was like, this book is gonna force me to have a hard conversation, which I'm too chicken shit to have.

But if I feel like a journalist, of my own life. It gives me confidence and a little distance. And so the book is me like challenging myself, getting to know my mom and going on this adventure with her. And it is unbelievably expansive and cathartic for my own mind and life and still very challenging. I don't know, it's my, it's my love letter and my fist fight with my mom.

Julia Winston: Wow. What did you learn about your mom and about your relationship with your mom?

Jedidiah Jenkins: I learned some of the things that I said just moments ago about just like, where her head was at when she was with my dad, when she was young, when she was divorcing him. Like, those are just things I didn't know. And really humanizing this like, alien force known as the mother into this young girl from the Ozarks. Who's trying to have a good life and she had a lot of dreams. She had dreams of being with my dad forever and having a cabin in Colorado and, you know, all these dreams collapsed. And that's a really interesting thing to talk to a woman in her 70s about all the dreams deferred and destroyed. And how you have to find new dreams and, you know, to young people you have all these dreams and you don't know which ones are going to really hurt you.

Julia Winston: It sounds like you gained a lot of empathy for your mom on that trip.

Jedidiah Jenkins: Yeah, I did. I mean, I ga That's the thing, is when you really see where someone's coming from, it's hard to turn them into a cartoon.

Julia Winston: Brene Brown has this great quote, it's hard to hate up close. And I love that because like, right. I feel like maybe. in some ways, if you have the desire and the curiosity and enough, um, enough of an open door between you, if you do have tension with a parent or someone in your family, it almost just seems like that leaning in, getting closer and wanting to get to know them is actually kind of how you find that middle ground, like you were saying reach out, put your hand on their hand, like get a little bit closer, which takes courage and bravery to, I mean, you had the courage and bravery to, to like step towards you know, this worldview that actually really disregards your existence.

Jedidiah Jenkins: I also like, I'm deeply impacted by and affected by the like human instinct to find your parent very annoying and entrapping and like spending time with them. Like I've always been fascinated by this instinct where the moment I'm far away from my family, I'm singing their praises. I'm loving them. And then I'm like, Oh my God, I can't wait for Christmas. And then I'm in the house for approximately 13 minutes. And someone's talking and I want to rip my ears and go hide. And I'm like on walks just to like not be in the house. So one way I think if you do feel like a little pull on your heart to like go on a trip with a parent or whatever is like you can actually set yourself up for success. Like go on, go on a trip where you're doing things and seeing things together where you're not necessarily looking at each other, but you're shoulder to shoulder doing something together.

So there's something to talk about and the parent isn't just staring at you and like asking you all these annoying questions. Or Another serious life hack, this is a major one, let your parent bring a friend. So this is a role reversal if you remember when you would go on family trips as a teenager and your parents let you bring a friend. Like this what I do I'm if my mom brings a friend and the three of us go on a trip I'm basically their chauffeur.

This has had a profound impact on spending time with my mom because My mom is getting to hang out with her son And go on an adventure, which she loves. But I'm also seeing my mom from a new perspective. She's in the backseat, giggling about an inside joke with her friend. She doesn't talk like that to her kids. Like, there's a side of her that I have never been exposed to, because my mom is not my friend. Even though I want to, you know, like, she's as close as she can be, but she's still my mom. Where like, the way friends behave is, is, it's actually really profound to see your parent. And then the trigger of your mom asking you questions, About how are your friends? How's your living situation? How's whatever? How's your career? Whatever. When a parent asks you those questions, sometimes you have that flight rage of just like shut up and you go fine, fine. But, but what's so interesting is if your mom's friend asks you, yeah, talk all day. You'll tell them everything mom is sitting there in shock that you have all these words. You're like, oh my god. It's just, these are like, psychological workarounds to having a great time with a parent.

Julia Winston: Whoa. That is such an unlock. I love

Jedidiah Jenkins: Yeah. 

Julia Winston: Earlier I asked what you learned about your mom and your relationship on this trip. Now I’m curious to know what you learned about yourself. What changed within you?

Jedidiah Jenkins: I mean, one thing was I basically asked her the hardest question I've ever asked her and have like a full actual debate argument with her that's not over email, but like live. And I finally like every last thing I could ever say or believe I said. So that she has no, she has no hope of a different outcome based on my, of what she's decided she thinks I might believe. And that like final stand was really liberating because now like I realized I lived in a little fear of her knowing the full me. And I kind of had this Realization it was like she shows me the full her all the time and she knows I don't like it She sends me like, you know, Jesus Bitcoin scams or whatever and like whatever the heck she's talking about and I'm like And she knows I do not like it.

And so I'm like, well, why can't I show her things? Like I'm an adult, like I can do exactly what she does. Cause I don't need to tiptoe around her ever again. And if she chooses to be in a relationship with me, well, I choose to be in a relationship with her. It was sort of like my ultimate final stand that I am an adult and that I am in an adult relationship with my mother. That was like the profound shift.

Jedidiah Jenkins: What I'm just saying is like standing on your own two feet, regardless of the response where it doesn't actually matter how they respond. It's that you stood your own ground face to face with the parent who is like still backstage pulling strings. It is like the final umbilical cord cut of adulthood. And I think so many people live their whole life and their parents die and they never actually cut that cord.

Julia Winston: I, I, I feel like, um, I'm getting like teary eyed and also like a well of emotion right now because I recently had an experience like that with my own mother this past year. And it's led to so much liberation for me. And, um, Um, what I really want to hear from you is how do you stand up to your mother with love? Because I think that the fear a lot of people have, and I know the fear I had was if I really stand up and stand my ground and cut the umbilical cord, I'm worried I'm going to injure her or injure our relationship in some way that. is impossible to heal and the answer to that is probably to do this with love. And so, how do you think about that?

Jedidiah Jenkins: Well, I think that the, The underlying fear of almost every argument is rejection and abandonment. It's usually not even what you're talking about. It's like, will you leave me? Will you never talk to me again? Will I be alone? And I think that's also a fear of a parent about their child standing up and they actually use whether they know it or not, their parental power to maintain that sometimes. And to make sure that the umbilical is still there. I am your mother, you know? And so I think for me, in these really hard conversations with my mom, I was like, mom, I believe XYZ. I will not believe your X, Y, Z, and I'm not going anywhere. I love you. I will always love you. You can reject me. You can pray against me. All the things. I'll still come knocking at your door. You can, you can rage and I will still come to the door. I will never stop. Which is what mothers often do. And I say that because I feel very confident in loving my own life and loving myself. Her rejection no longer, of course it would hurt me, but I've just like built a community of acceptance so rich that like I'm not left alone in the wilderness. And so, like, I think the way that I've been able to stand up is letting her know. That I know at the core, she wants relationship with her son more than she wants, you know, philosophical and religious agreement 

Julia Winston: When I pose the question of how do you stand your ground and also do it with love? I didn't know how I would answer it. And then when you answered it, I I um I realized that I had a similar experience. My sort of come to Jesus moment with my mom was, um, in a therapy session, which because she agreed to come with me to therapy is how I know that she is just as devoted as I am to being in relationship. And when we were there, one of the sessions, she kind of asked me, If, if we were at risk of her getting estranged and it was only then that I understood how terrified she was of my boundaries amounting to a rift, like a genuine rift. And so something maternal came through me in that, in that therapy session where I said, mom, I am never going to leave you. I love you. There's nothing that could happen that would make me turn my back on you. Period. An entirely separate conversation is something I want to have within the understanding that I am not going anywhere and I love you.

Jedidiah Jenkins: Hmm.

Julia Winston: And then we were able to have this conversation and it's like, I didn't plan that. I just suddenly saw the child in her who needed to be reassured that I was going to be there.

Jedidiah Jenkins: That is, uh, I have chills. That is exactly the moment where you have the, the rush of the parental feeling for your parent. Of like, Oh my gosh, this little, this little baby bird is scared. And you like, you suddenly empathize with that. That is like such a moment. That's exactly the moment I fell. 

Well, and I, another like example of like practices and empathy is I think about like my mom's beliefs about queerness and same sex love. And I just think about like, I'm obsessed with history and I read about like the civil war and like how all these good Christians thought slavery was okay. And then my grandparents thinking that interracial marriage is not okay. And I'm just like, These evolutions and understanding come for every generation and I am not immune. And so no matter how wonderful I think I am, if I have kids someday, they're probably going to scream in my face that I am old fashioned and bigoted about something that I don't even know what it is yet.

Julia Winston: Yeah. I, I think that's, , So humbling and important to remember that, you know, to the point of this, like these generational divides, we will be the Crusty old people one day who like, don't get it. Yeah. I mean, we're already kind of, we're kind of getting there fast.

Jedidiah Jenkins: Thank God I'm tired of being relevant.