Timothy L. Sanford, MA, LPC

When your child gives their life to Jesus, a transformation begins. A spiritual gifts test helps them discover the gifts God then gives them.

Help your children grasp and understand the depth and importance of Easter. Use our mini-lessons to teach them certain aspects about Easter.

A dad’s primary, underlying job isn’t control.

Your kids will grow to be more healthy and resilient as you start parenting with a clear understanding of what your real job is.

Fathers have an important role in their daughter’s lives. Here are some key insights to help dads be great.

Throughout church history, people who know Jesus as their Lord and Savior have practiced spiritual disciplines. Spiritual disciplines are habits that help a Christian grow spiritually. These activities deepen a person’s relationship with God so they ca …

Welcome, you! We wish we could chat with you over coffee about what brought you here … Maybe the journey of adoption has been on your mind since you were a child. Maybe you just started thinking about it and want to learn more. Maybe you’re already a f …

I’ve heard that children placed for adoption can have attachment issues, even Reactive Attachment Disorder (RAD). I know what that is, but what questions do we need to ask the case worker to find out whether the child we’re considering adopting has an …

What is RAD? Find answers about what a Reactive Attachment Disorder (RAD) diagnosis means.

In our previous article on four styles of relational interaction, we looked at basic principles of control and responsibility, and how people interact in any given situation: hold, toss, grab, or fold. HOLD and FOLD are healthy choices; TOSS and GRAB a …

For most of us, the question pops up every day: How can I mind my own business and still be responsible to the people I have relationships with? The answer won’t always be straightforward because every person and every situation is different. But we ca …

Share on facebook Facebook Share on twitter Twitter Traditional parenting techniques don’t always work for a child who has experienced trauma — and most adopted children have experienced trauma. An adopted child and their parents often need more suppor …

We’ve all known manipulative people, whether they are friends, family, or our spouse. They’re the people who know how to push our buttons. They might scare, coerce, obligate, criticize, guilt trip, bribe, blame, undermine, intimidate, abuse. Or they fl …

Resilience isn’t merely surviving. And it’s not about denying the depth of pain and its ongoing impact. Instead, it’s about learning from and growing through adversity — about becoming comfortable with being uncomfortable.

With all the changes going on around you, you can help to support strong mental health during the coronavirus for yourself and those in your care.

While the journey toward healing may seem daunting, there are actions an adult with attachment disorder can take.

Parenting reactive children or youth can be difficult but a technique known as Therapeutic Parenting can be helpful.

Some children struggle to process sensory information that they see, hear, taste, feel or touch. They may also have difficulty with balance.

Any number of unforeseen circumstances may create a situation in which parent-child attachment is a challenge. In this article, parents can learn principles and strategies for encouraging attachment in a struggling child.

Adoption may create a situation in which parent-child attachment is a challenge. In this article, parents can learn some principles and strategies for encouraging attachment in an adopted child.

Are your children truly grateful for what they have? Here are ways parents can create a lasting attitude of gratitude in children.

Counselor and author Tim Sanford offers encouragement and advice to parents of preschoolers who feel a great deal of pressure and stress about ensuring their child’s future success. Focus on the Family broadcast producer Eva Daniel joins the conversation and shares her own insights as a parent in the midst of the preschool years.

Working through the pain and rediscovering joy

These two examples show how an influencing parent should respond to a teen.

How control and responsibility affect the relationship between you and your teen.

Here are 5 things that make it hard for parents to give up trying to control their teens.

Here are some factors that can make it tough to validate, nurture and keep your fingers off the “control” button.

How control and responsibility affect the relationship between you and your teen.

A mom’s primary job isn’t cooking dinner, changing diapers or helping a preschooler glue colored macaroni on a coffee can as a Father’s Day gift.

Your teen is separating from you; make this transition easier by understanding what’s yours to control and what isn’t.

Every person needs both validation and nurture to fully develop into a healthy adult.

Get into the mind-set that everything you do as a parent ultimately is part of validating or nurturing your children.

If every parent’s job is to make sure his or her children turn out “right,” it would mean God messed up.

Understanding the differences between control, responsibility and liability — and how those nudge parents to try controlling teens.