What Really Happens When Missionaries Return From the Field with Shonna Ingram

Shonna Ingram is a missionary care specialist with over 17 years of experience supporting cross-cultural workers through transitions and trauma recovery. She serves as a Trauma Care and Career Transition Specialist with Pioneer Bible Translators and is the founder of Re-entry Experts, an organization offering coaching, resources, and community cohorts for global workers navigating re-entry. Shonna is also the creator of the Renewed Hope Approach, a faith-based, trauma-informed framework designed to guide individuals through healing and restoration. Her books include Beyond Broken: A Church’s Guide to Trauma and Growth and Navigating Life in Transition: A Global Worker's Guide to Discovering the Root of Stress, Loss and Anxiety.

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Chapters

• 0:46 Meet Shonna Ingram
• 1:58 Challenges of Returning Home
• 3:29 Unexpected Realities and Adjustments
• 5:14 Emotional and Relational Struggles
• 7:13 Myths About Reentry
• 10:01 Phases of Reentry: Return, Restore, Rebuild
• 22:48 Dealing with Trauma and Loss
• 27:18 Acknowledging and Processing Trauma
• 28:24 Healthy Ways to Process Grief
• 29:43 The Role of Lament in Healing
• 31:39 Community Support in Grieving
• 35:17 Finding Purpose After Grief
• 37:22 Embracing New Opportunities
• 40:16 Practical Advice for Missionaries
• 46:26 Resources for Missionaries
• 51:46 Conclusion and Final Thoughts

Transcript

Stephanie Gutierrez: 

Welcome to this episode of the Modern Day Missionaries podcast. We're talking about… it feels like now feels everyone's talking about re-entry, and it's a good topic because it happens. So we talked today with the founder director of Re-Entry, which is an organization that helps missionaries during this process. We talked today about the things that we would have known when we re-entered, a lot of the behind-the-scenes things, and what happens when a missionary transitions. We want to be as practical as we can because God is not done with you yet. He has a plan for you. We have some myth-busters, what that process really looks like, and how you can do it well and let God transition you into what's next for you in life.

So with that, let's jump into today's episode with Shonna Ingram.

Stephanie Gutierrez: Hey Shonna, thanks so much for joining us on the podcast today.

Shonna Ingram: It's great to be here. Thanks.

Stephanie Gutierrez: It is great to have you. And Shonna, we're talking about re-entry today. We know it's something that's hard, but I think for a lot of missionaries, it can feel way more than just hard. It can feel like an identity crisis, like the ground beneath them has shifted, and it kind of has. They've moved to a new place.

I'd love to just start off by asking you what one of the most unexpected or even shocking moments that you experienced when you returned home. Something that made you think, Nobody prepared me for this.

Shonna Ingram: Well, I don't know if there was one particular thing. I think it was a lot of different things on top of each other, but we were talking about this the other night. We have a group that gets together once a month, and it was like, well, what was it? And I thought, you know, we went over a little bit older. We weren't right out of college. We had moved, we had a house, and we had the kids already. And so I thought, Hey, we're just gonna move back. And we were only gone for five years. So I was like, Hey, we're just gonna move back in and things were gonna be, you know, but it's like, oh, well, you don't have any credit history for five years. You have to re-enroll your kids. Well, you don't have the paperwork. And so we had to go find paperwork. And it was just like all of this. Plus, on top of that, it's like, we live in Texas. So I was like. There were like five different energy companies, and it was just a lot. They were all on top of each other at one time. Like, oh, no, what's going on here? 

Stephanie Gutierrez: Yeah. The compound nature of it. You're right. It just, and I think your exposure to visiting back, you know, home to your passport country in the past has been for different purposes. You've been going to have a furlough or to raise funds, or to maybe take a break. And so you didn't have to deal with any of those realities of life.

And it's funny. I love that you brought up only five years because it does. It feels like it's maybe not that long. I've even talked to people who've been gone for two years or a year, and they're jarred when they get back. And I think too, when it's a shorter period, you think, There's no way things can have changed that much that not realizing how much you have changed not to mention the place you lived in before if you're going back even to the same place you might be in a new state or a new city. There is so much to learn and I like that you're pointing out some of those less obvious things because there are some obvious things that I think we think of, like, I need to prepare for, I don't know, getting a house and furnishing stuff, or renting a place. There's you know getting a car, there's stuff like mOh my gosh, I don't have a credit history.

I've talked to several people, and they could not believe how much that caught them off guard, or, you know, I mean, even simple things. I remember I haven't had some friends who moved back, and they went, we're in our forties, and we're having to buy silverware all over again. Like, I don't want to do this again. I remember for our health insurance, we have a child with special needs, and I forgot the first time I got her that special health insurance; it took over a year to obtain it. And it took almost a year again to reobtain it when we got back. I mean, it is wild. Can you think of any other ones that just catch people off guard, maybe caught you, or you see them catching other people off guard that you don't think to prepare for?

Shonna Ingram: I think another area is relationships. Like, everybody's had life while you've been gone and like, and you don't like, know how to fit in. I think that's been a really hard one that I've walked people through. It's like they're coming back, and you know, it's special needs children or their parents are aging, and it's not just re-entry. There's just lots of different levels of grief and processing, and like, Oh, I didn't know that it was going to be this hard. 

Stephanie Gutierrez: You just can't even conceptualize that it could be that difficult. Also, if you are listening and you're getting ready to move back, we are not here to scare you today. Shonna and I love you. We're here to encourage you. And maybe bring up a couple of things that you haven't thought of, not to overwhelm you, just so that they don't take the wind out of your sails.

And Shonna, I love that you brought up things that are beyond task lists or to-do lists, because we started talking about a few of the things that you have to do, but you don't put relationships on a to-do list. Like that's not something that you think, this is what I have to do when I get back, find out how to fit in, that's on no one's list. And yet, you go. And you write up grief, too. That's when you can sort of put on a to-do list, like find a counselor or do a debrief. So there are things you can do about it, but not a whole lot you can do to prepare for what that will feel like. I'd loved it. 

I wanted to ask you what some of the biggest myths are that you think missionaries have about re-entry, or maybe even their supporters supporting churches?

Shonna Ingram: You're just moving back home. They think it is, Oh, we're just moving back home. People assume reentry is just like any other move. We're just relocating physically. We're just the emotional space. Identity of shifts a little bit. You're just going to pick up where you left off, might be another myth. Both you and your home culture have changed. I know America has changed and is keeping changing. You know, like how do we, how do I have a conversation? 

And I know that over at Global Trellis. They did some research on this, and they put it in, I think, Christianity Today. And it was like, you know, coming back to understanding like social norms. So, when am I supposed to say, or what am I not supposed to say? And if I say, what do I believe? What do I believe anymore? And what if my family doesn't believe the same way? Because it has been really hard. I think that's been one of our areas, and maybe another myth would be that everything is fine because you're just surrounded by familiar things and familiar people, but in my space, where I work, I have a lot of missionary cultural workers who say that they feel unseen and misunderstood.

Stephanie Gutierrez: Yeah. It is hard to understand. I mean, I can put myself in the shoes of people who are in a relationship with missionaries, but I haven't walked through it. It is hard to understand. We can barely understand our own experiences sometimes. Like, what the heck did I just go through? What was that?

So they don't have the tools, always the equipment, to know how to do it. And some people just aren't very good listeners, if we can be honest, and they don't know how to ask questions, and they get overwhelmed by our big feelings. And it's tough. I love too, that you brought up Global Trellis and Amy Young in that survey. We did an episode with Amy Young last year where we dug into the results of that and what missionaries are feeling and experiencing, and how shocking it can be for them and for their supporters. So, for people who want to learn more about that, they can go back and revisit that episode, and here's some of the stuff Amy had to share, but yeah, there's so much that's unknown.

And what I appreciate about what you're doing, Shonna, is you're bringing a lot of that to light. You're demystifying this experience, and you broke down the reentry process into three phases. Could you explain what those are and how they work?

Shonna Ingram: Yeah. It was hard. We do have timelines for them. However, we know that everybody's experience is different. So I always preface with that, that just because you've been back a certain amount of time, that you are in this space. So the first one, I think, there is quite a bit of literature on it. We call it a return. So it would be great if we talked about returning in the pre-field. It's like, you know what, you might come back, and that's okay. Like, so if we can start there, that would be a great place to start.

Stephanie Gutierrez: So, talk about returning before they even leave for the first time. 

Shonna Ingram: So that would be a good recommendation, or at least knowing going into your last term that you're going to be returning in a perfect world. That would be great. We know that doesn't always happen.

Stephanie Gutierrez: Like COVID, and we were like, what?

Shonna Ingram: Exactly. There is that space. So, if we could sort of think of nine months before we head back, there are some things we need to do. We can do a lot of things, such as how we end our term? Well, how do we, you know, know what comes up the raft, right, is one of the big things. It's like, how do we say goodbye to people? How do we emotionally prepare?

So we have a checklist for 90 days out, 60 days out, 30 days out, even a week out, you can check off. It's like, okay, I did this and I did that. So, you know, it's sort of that practical space, but also the emotional space to it. And you make sure you have your housing and you make sure you have transportation and you make sure you have Internet and health insurance, and all of those, practical things. And on average, that probably takes three to six months if you know you're coming back. I don't know, you might be living with a parent for a year, or, you know, a church might have a place for you to live. So again, not putting certain timelines on there, but getting to like, okay, you know, Maslow's hierarchy of needs. We've got everything taken, you know we can, function.

However, if you're also in a place of uncertainty, there might be some legal things that you need to deal with if you're in the middle of a divorce, or medical things that you need to put on your plate. So that return is going to take a little bit longer. And then we get to enter into the next phase that we call restore, which again, is six months to two, two years. Post return. We like to call this the space in between two worlds. And sometimes that can be messy because, you know, the adrenaline is wearing off and now you're sort of dealing with sort of identity or relationships.

Stephanie Gutierrez: And everyone's asking you so many questions. What are you going to do next? What now? What now?

Shonna Ingram: Yeah. And you're like, wait, hold on, you know, like two weeks in, and everybody kept telling my husband, like, Okay, well, you're going to go get a real job. Now. Part of our story is we lost our biggest supporting church and our biggest supporting single supporter, like three months back, even though we had told them, you know, we're staying with the mission and so like, oh, I don't even know what to do or, you know, it was like the hardest time in our marriage. It was like he was looking at how to get the phone bill down lower, and I'm like, we just need to get a job. And I was like, wow, we are looking at this differently.

Stephanie Gutierrez: The enemy just uses that type of stuff, too, to beat you down. Like, look at you, you don't have a purpose anymore. You don't have a calling. What are you doing? I mean, if you think you as as grounded as you think you are in your faith, the enemy will use those low emotional times to just really go after you. So thanks for being vulnerable and even just talking about some of what you guys experienced. It's tough. Tough's a nice word.

Shonna Ingram: I mean, there is a process to it. We do give spaces to grieve, I think it is a big place, a big place of forgiveness, of, you know, I think one of the biggest things we have to do is forgive ourselves of looking at lies or expectations. That either we put on ourselves or churches or families, or yeah, and so we sort of dive deep in that season of looking at that space and that again, but we can get stuck in that we can get stuck in that and I know people that have been dealing with that. I'm not an overseas missionary anymore. So I'm done. God's done with me. I can't, you know, there's nothing. There's nothing left for me. That's like, no, there's much more.

Stephanie Gutierrez: There is, and Shonna and I are talking to you from the other side of the Restore phase. You got this. There is hope on the other side. And we're also, I know, we have a lot of listeners who have faith and believe that God is good and has good things for them. And yet, let's say if you're going to run a marathon, if you run a marathon, we are not being negative people. If we say like, you will probably hurt after the marathon, your muscles will be sore. You will probably be dehydrated. There will be some things that will happen to your body after you run a marathon. That is not being negative. That is not expecting the worst. That is just being straight up logical. Like, Hey, when you do hard things, it's hard. It's stuff on you physically, emotionally, spiritually, like we're just being really practical here today, but there is hope on the other side. And so I think that it's really important to acknowledge the difficulty, not from a place of being negative, but from a place of preparation. 

I mean, the Bible talks about counting the cost. We count the cost when we go on the field, but part of counting the cost, as you mentioned, Shonna, even in that. Before we leave, he says, I, Lord, help me to count the cost, knowing this is going to be hard going. And this is going to be hard coming back. And I think, and you know, talking to you and many others, that re-entry culture shock can oftentimes be way more difficult than initially moving, because you don't have all the rah rah of everyone behind you.

Everyone's just like, Oh, you're back now. Oh, we don't need to support you anymore. I don't want to say everyone, but with many people, it can be. So the restore phase is hard. Yes, that's what we're saying. And you will make it through, and God has good stuff for you on the other side. And that leads us right to phase three, which is…

Shonna Ingram: Rebuild. We get to rebuild. Part of my training is as a career development specialist on top of my trauma training. So this is where it's like, Oh, we get to maybe integrate that part of us that happened overseas. And how do we integrate that into our next season? So I think. Integration is a great word for that, but through that we get to look at, well, what values do I have that might be different we had before? What motivations, what's motivating us now? 

And that God still loves us. Though we're not cross-cultural workers. And I don't know how many times that just sits with people that our identity has been in that we're over, we've done, you know, this thing overseas, but it's like, no, he can use us more. And we're great examples of that taking that space. So I mean, I have people that are like, you know, I'm going to go work with refugees because I still need that cross-cultural place, or they will go on trips, you know, maybe short-term trips. Also, some people are like, I'm just done, like, that wasn't for me. 

And you know, I've got my husband who teaches in a school that's, you know. It's diverse ethnically, and you know, so there are still places, especially in, if you live in the U S now, there is a very big culture. I was talking to a friend. I live in the Dallas area. So she's Fourni, which I don't know how many people there are. It's like we have 136 different languages in a town of, you know, 500,000 people, you know, it's just, I mean, the world again is changing, and it's almost coming here to the states. You can always have a big cross-cultural experience if that's something that you still feel like God is calling you to.

Stephanie Gutierrez: It's true. And I love that you mentioned earlier about the ways are that we're different? What are the ways we've changed? Because if you think about us coming back, there are things that we will have gained. We'll have become much richer people because of the experience we've lived through. We might come back with a new language, with new cross-cultural, you know, experiences and lenses and worldviews and understanding. I mean, there's so much that you can learn even in a short period overseas. And on the other side too, we might come back with some trauma and having lived through some pretty brutal things, whether they're physical things we lived, lived through or emotional experiences or spiritual things.

I mean, there's, it's a lot. So we come back with a lot. And so with rebuild and what you're talking about, we're leaning into what are some of the beautiful ways in which I've grown and changed. How can I kind of let that get synthesized and integrated into a new way of being, whether it's with my current ministry or whether it's something new?

My husband actually still has a nonprofit where we work with Spanish-speaking pastors and missionaries. So that's a huge part of what we do. And he really felt called to go back to school to become a marriage and family therapist. So he's now working in the school system as a marriage and family therapist, working with families and children in a Spanish immersion school. How amazing is that? Like, I would have never thought he'd go that way. And it's so right. So we're getting to do this blend of things, a little bit like what you talked about. So there are new paths and new doors that God wants to open on one side. 

And then let's talk for a second about that other side, about maybe some of the tough things that we bring back. You've mentioned that your approach is very trauma-informed, and trauma is a word that we are using more now. It wasn't comfortable for Christians for a long time, but we're being honest about what we experienced. So what does that look like for missionaries entering back in and looking at that concept of trauma, and maybe how that impacted them during their time there?

Shonna Ingram: I think every situation is so different. And if you look at the definition of trauma, it's just something that goes beyond your ability to handle. And we come from, like, I call a post-traumatic growth where, like, it's okay that something hard has happened to us, and that we can grow from it. And so I think, like I said, there is a process of learning and seeing what losses. We had overseas, and again, depending on how we come into reentry, it affects how we're going to, like, what happened to us on the field. So we need to look at, oh, yeah, indefinitely working with possibly a therapist or a trauma informed coach or somebody we brief that says, Yeah, that was hard and that sucked. And we're here with you in it, and so that's one of the things that we're trying to do is create safety, a safe space, because there isn't a safe space, necessarily, around this area. 

So we do, we do that in community, through our program. I didn't know that I had trauma because I was thinking that trauma was one big, bad thing that happened to us. And now we have lots of words of, you know, neuroplasticity, and so we can change. We can talk about the importance of processing loss during reentry, which I think is so good because I think so too. With Christians, sometimes we can fall into one of two camps. And one is the camp of, and I shouldn't say Christians, would just say that people in general can fall into the camp of a victim mentality. Like, the second I identify that I've had trauma or I've had difficulty in my past, I can go into trauma mode and go on one ditch and say, well, it's this person's fault. And this is what happened to me. And that doesn't have a growth mindset. I mean, referencing Carol Dweck, as you brought up the mindset/victim mentality, there’s a post-traumatic growth. It's like, Oh, poor me. This is awful. Look at what happened to me. And let's be real. There are times we have been victimized. There are. We could have been victims. So we're not saying that you are a victim and have experienced something bad. You might be a victim, but there's a difference between being a victim and a victim mentality.

So we're talking about the extreme of being in and staying in a victim mentality. Then on the other side, this would be more Christian when you see a lot, especially with tough missionaries. There's the extreme of like, I'm fine. Other people've been through tougher things. It's no worries. God's got me. I've got the victory. And there is almost no acknowledgement of it. Like, yeah, that happened, but whatever. I'm fine. Because we lean into this hyper positivity, where we ignore or push down because we think that if we don't say it, it disappears. Instead, it's just shoving and packing down. And at some point, if you pack something too full, it's like that jack-in-the-box. It's going to come flying out. And yet there is this space in between, in between the victim mentality and nothing happened to me. I am great. Hallelujah. And that's that space in between the names. We're not blaming, we're naming, like, okay, so yeah, I was a victim of something that happened to me. This happened. This was wrong. This was terrible. And you know what? I even need to cry about it and grieve and go through all of this, but it's not going to send me over here to this extreme place. And it's not going to send me here to this extreme place. I'm going to sit here. I'm going to process it through, and I'm going to let God bring healing to me.

But yeah, I remember when I went through trauma therapy, when we came back, long story to that one, but I remember them saying, you cannot heal what you cannot feel. And I didn't want to feel that. I remember saying out loud to my husband, like, Why do people have to feel so many feelings? It's so much easier not to feel as if I had somehow escaped that, or my personality had permitted me to, to not go there. You gotta go there. So, hey, all you positive people. It's okay. You can go there. You can name your stuff and don't feel scared of going to a victim mentality place. If you're hyper-positive, you're not going to go there anyway. Nothing's going to get you there. Let God do the work for you and get you to the place where you can process through that healing. Be sad. And Sean, I want to invite you to speak into that. Talk a little bit about. The importance of processing grief and what are healthy ways to do that.

Shonna Ingram: Yeah, there are different ways to process grief in, you know, there there's lots of resources out there. Well, I think the first thing we need to notice is that grief has been so, I think it's coming to light now that people realize that grief isn't just about the death of a person. So, first we need to realize, oh, I am grieving that. That I'm not just grieving the death of a person, but I'm grieving a dream. I'm grieving relationships. I'm grieving security. Yeah, I'm grieving possessions, you know. For our TCK kids, you know, the pets that we had to leave behind. You know, I think for, again, like you said, naming it of like, oh, okay, we are friends, yeah, we have a place that, you know, we sort of sit with it, and what does it look like?

And then there are just things that we can control. In that, and sometimes there are things that we can't control, and then sometimes we just need to put it on a shelf, and it's like, you know what, I can't deal with this right now. And we're going to put it on the shelf, but we're going to bring it back out at another time. And then one of my favorite Christian practices is laments.

And sitting with the Lord and him, I'm very angry about this, and I'm angry with you. We call it the wrestling tent, which is okay. I also, how we hold this grief and this gratitude at the same time? And what does that look like? Each day might look different. And so I think like in, like what you were saying, you know, that the mentality of a victim or positivity, but it's like, it's somewhere in the middle, and it's somewhere in this present, in this present. And that's where the Lord heals us as well.

It's like He heals us in the present. And so if we can sit there with the Lord, and okay, that it's a little uncomfortable right now, but he wants us, and he walks with us. We use Psalm 23, you knowin this restored space is that restoring is a continuous restoring from Psalm 23, 4, you know, he restores our soul, and he's continuously restoring us. And so if we can come from the mindset of that, or at least have people around you. You know, okay, we got this. And again, that's a little bit partly why we do this in in, in groups is like, Oh, I'm dealing with that too. I was the only one.

Stephanie Gutierrez: It's true. And we see others grieve. I think it can permit us to feel like we can as well. You know, it's Jesus who grieved. I mean, we, we always say we want to be more like Jesus, but nobody ever says like, I want to be more like Jesus. So I cried. Jesus grieved. He wept. Yeah. Wept is not crying. Wept like that's weeping.

Jesus wept. And yet that's not a way in which we ever talk about it. We want to be more like him, but it's throughout scripture. Like you said, I mean, my, my favorite lament psalm is Psalm 42. If somebody's like, I just. Need to invite a little bit of that sad space in so I can feel my feelings, man. Go to Psalm 42 and you will feel all the feels, shot. I don't know if you have a favorite, but you have a resource that you created around this using the Psalms, correct?

Shonna Ingram: Yeah, we use Psalm 22. And Psalm 13 is a big one. I think 77. Is it Psalm 88 where it's like, it's like, there's no end to it. It's just like, because usually in, in, in laments, it's like at the end, they're like, Oh, well, got to tell him how good he is. It's like, well, not every Psalm does it. 

Stephanie Gutierrez: You're right. I think there is one, and it might be 88. I think you're right that don't be a Berean, look it up, but there is one song that just ends in a little bit of despair, and you're like, oh, did someone slip and allow this in the Bible? Is this okay? Hey, it's one Psalm out of 150 Psalms. It's okay.

Shonna Ingram: But you know, it's not forever.

Stephanie Gutierrez: It's not forever. But I think fear keeps people from going there. Like we talked about earlier, just a fear that if I go there, I'll never come back out. If you do it alone, you might, but you just brought up doing it in the community. Don't do it alone. Do it with somebody. And if you think I don't have somebody, that's what a debrief is for.

If you've never heard of a debrief, I had never, I was like, what the heck is a debrief? I had never heard of a debrief the whole time I was living abroad, found out afterwards, like a while, but it's a place where you go specifically to do this with people and with counselors who get it. And there are places all over the United States. If you're from the U.S., and if you're not from the US, there are places that do this around the world.

So I will post some links to this as well, where you can find out places to do these, but find a group. There's a place in Michigan called Alongside, where you can go for like three weeks and process through all this stuff. So get what you need. If there's a financial cost to it, let your supporters know, like, this is something our family needs.

And I believe if you're supposed to be there, God will provide a way to get that. I don't say that in like a fake faithy way. Like God will provide. Hey, you're missionaries. You know that God provides, you know what that faith journey looks like. So ask, and if you don't know how to communicate with your supporters, ask the debriefers, how can I communicate to my supporters that this is something I need to raise funds for? And of course, we'll be able to give you words. They believe in what they're doing. 

So yes, do that alone. And so speaking of, so we, they've gone through some of that grieving process, let's talk again, just for a minute, Sean, and we talked about that feeling of losing purpose when you come home. So for missionaries who are feeling that they're grieving, they don't know what on earth they're supposed to do next. How could it possibly be as meaningful as it was before? What's one thing they can do to just start moving forward in that direction? We're not giving you a solution to all of life right now, but what is one thing they can do to start moving in a good direction?

Shonna Ingram: Well, once after the grieving is like, where is God working? See where he's working around you. And that could be, you know, in a public school, or your church. It could be, I'm going to go sit at Panera and pray for people. You know, there's. Again, there are so many different ways, and I'm just so surprised by how, you know, we have all these people that come together, and it's like everybody's got something different the Lord is asking them. So, I would just say, like, just ask the Lord, like, is there, is there a group of people that, that you might have a heart for, like, my heart is for people in re-entry. I didn't know that. So I went to re-entry, no big thing. That would be just a great start, journaling/speaking. You know, we have, you know, what's our personality. 

I think looking at our season, maybe you went overseas and you were single and now you're married with 4 kids, you know, things are going to look different, and you might need to do things differently now. 

Stephanie Gutierrez: Yeah. But what good advice is to just start with observation, like notice, like you said, what's God doing in you, and what is God doing around you? And that's something I think anyone can do. And just to share a piece of our own story, cause that's exactly how the Lord did it with us. We started noticing, and I know for us, the Spanish-speaking pastors that we'd worked with before my husband had always been meeting with them to do, you know, consulting through, through our church.

We were part of, in Peru to help them think through small groups or systems or ways to strengthen the church or grow the church. I mean, all these strategic-type things. Well, he'd built great relationships with them while that was all going on, and just naturally became friends. Cause he's just super, he's just like that. He's an amazing friend. And so when they were calling during COVID, well, we moved back, I think, at the end of 2020. Yeah. Absolutely. In 2021, he got calls, and he just figured we were still working for the church back in Peru from here. And in all the calls, he was, they would say, we want to talk about small groups.

We want to talk about this. We want to talk about that. And as he was talking to them within the first, you know, 2 minutes. He realized it wasn't about small groups. It was about life and their relationships, and their church. And I mean, grown men just weeping. And then all of a sudden we started in that first year having pastors, Latin American pastors say, Hey, can we come up and stay with you for a couple of years or a couple of years? I'm sorry. A couple, couple of days or a week. And we're like, it's Minnesota. You want to, it's winter. Like, and they started one by one. And in less than a year, we had seven pastors call, ask, fly themselves up to come and stay with us, and just process life. And so speaking to observation, we started to go, okay, what's happening here?

This is a lot of times. This is highly specific. Lord, what are you doing? And that was what led us to formalize our nonprofit so we could raise funds to start doing these retreats for Spanish-speaking pastors. And then on the flip side, when we went through trauma therapy, I remember my husband went through it first. He's so good that he lets me share this stuff on the podcast. I love you, Danny, if you're listening. And I remember when I went through it a couple of months later, I remember being in that week-long therapy, and I looked at the therapist and went, This is something my husband could not even do. Like I've watched him doing an untrained version of this with all these pastors on our couches, and kind of came back and was like, I don't know. But again, observing. 

And so I give these examples, and I love that you, Shonna, because. For each of you missionaries, if you are coming back, just start noticing what is your heart being drawn to, what opportunities might be opening up, and we want to be realistic, it could take you a long time for some of you, God might open a door immediately for some of you, this could be years down the road. So, Shonna, let me ask you, what would you say to the missionaries where this seems to take just a really, really long time, and as they're observing, they are feeling more confusion than they are clarity.

Shonna Ingram: Yeah. Then there's yeah, I think getting a career coach or bringing the right people alongside that, or, you know, the rebuild workbook, I don't know. I don't even know what I can bring. I think that's a lot of it. It's like, I don't even know. Just giving structure to that of like, what is, like, what, what has changed, you know, what's the same? Like I get that one a lot. It's like, well, I still feel like I want to help people. Well, you can help people in lots of ways, you know, you can go in and you can get paid for that, too. So there are a lot of people who go into counseling or the medical field. So it depends on, you know, finances, of how that works. It's like, you know, I still, like, God has in my heart that I'm supposed to serve people. And I think you can do that anywhere in anything. And so maybe not. Or maybe it's just like, you know, I think I'm done with that, and I'm going to go work on computers, and I don't think there's a right or wrong. Like, well, let's just notice and be curious, and let's try a few things, and sometimes, well, let's just try it. I think. You know, this whole re-entry experts and how it came. It's like, well, we're just going to try it, and I'm just going to talk to people about it. 

So I went to PTM and said, Hey, I'm noticing this with people. Are you noticing this? When people come back and they're like, Oh yeah, I noticed that. And it's like, well, it's like this three, three seasons. And then, then you get, and then a book publisher comes and says, Hey, well, I don't, I don't, You write a book about it and we'll publish it, you know, and then it's just, and then like I said, what, 40 organizations came to a webinar last two weeks ago on how to serve, how do we serve missionaries in this season? And I'm like, God is like, like, I'm just trying to keep up with him.

Stephanie Gutierrez: PTM is a member care conference for people who work to serve missionaries. And Shonna's going to be speaking at that this fall, and I'm going to be there. So I'm excited. I'm going to get to hear you while you're there, but I'm glad you brought up Try Shonna because you get to try stuff out. After all, you and I right now are talking from a place where God has placed us in a space where we're thriving.

I mean, this, this, we are doing what I think he's equipped us and called us to do in this season, but hey, we both went through seasons where we were trying other things, throwing other spaghetti noodles up at walls, and things were not sticking. And there are times, too, you just need to get a job, any job.

And if you still have that heart to serve, go volunteer on the weekends or in the evenings. And so it's not sitting around waiting for this perfect job. Neither of us fell into these, you know, ideal, perfect things. So I want to be careful. As we say, we are in a good space now, and this is to give you hope and to inspire you, like there are exciting things ahead.

But don't sit around waiting for those as you're observing, because sometimes the doors open as you are walking through whatever door you see in front of you. Trying is what leads to those places. And, trying doesn't always work. Sometimes you might do something, and you do it for a couple of months, and it's like, Whoa, that was not it. Well, guess what? You just got some great information that was not it. Cross that off the list. That's still forward movement. Good job.

Shonna Ingram: Right. And that's what, and I think that's so hard for missionaries, and that's like, cause it's like, it was so clear that we were supposed to go over, and now it's not. And it's like, I almost feel like maybe he trusts us with, like, it doesn't necessarily, you know, you could be or you could, you know, work at Like, I mean, I don't know how many days I was like, I'm just going to go work at Target. 

Stephanie Gutierrez: Sometimes you need that, though. Sometimes you need a space of a job where you don't have to think for a little while and you can just. Kind of work through that grieving process and unplug mentally. And that's okay. Like, not only is it okay, that might be what God has for you in the season. I think so much of this, Shonna, has to do with not feeling shame over it.

That shame where you're just like, I've done something wrong, and this is God's punishment. And just the humiliation sometimes of trying to answer people's questions. Quit trying to answer them. Or if you're going to answer them like, just own it, like own what you're doing. I am stocking shelves at Target right now. And you know what, man, this is just what God has for me in this season. While I just rebuild and look at life and figure out what's, what's next for me. So I find so much joy in being a blessing to my coworkers. What a unique experience. How great, like you said, God has entrusted me and placed me here in this season. And I am going to be the best. Best shelf stocker that there is, because there is no shame in that. We think about going from missionary to a job like that, like there's shame. There's not, there is joy and opportunity and honor in any work that God places before you. So I hope that. It was for somebody just to take a step forward.

Go for it, Shonna. I want to make sure we don't forget to as we round this out to bring up all the resources that you have, because for everybody, whether they are getting ready to go on the field to any one of these three seasons, they would probably love some of those checklists that you talked about. I've got a couple of your workbooks. They're fantastic. Can you list out some of your resources and how people can get hold of you so they can start digging into all this?

Shonna Ingram: Yeah, of course, we've got for each of these three seasons, we have different resources. So, for the pre-returnee checklists. 90 days out, 60 days, 30 days/week of just, you know, practical things and emotional things that you can, can do during that time. Once you get to the States, we have an, call an arrival six months off, a lot of it is just actually working through the Psalms on the spiritual level, but also on the practical side. Of things, so we've got a planned return to 6 months, unplanned is 9 months. And then we have, and then we also have some little devotions that are 6 weeks. We do everything in 6 weeks. We feel like 6 weeks is, you can always, like, people will commit to 6 weeks, but they might not, whoops. Commit to something longer, and then for Restore, we have, you can buy the workbook and do it on your own. We don't recommend that, but I do have people who just buy it and work through it, or you have, you know, people in your organization, like a group that had to come home for some reason. They go through Restore together. We do have groups in the fall in spring, so we'll have, we always have fall groups and spring groups, and people like it because it's sort of a third space, where not necessarily, yeah, it's not necessarily, or because, you know, sometimes organizations cause trauma. 

Stephanie Gutierrez: That is true, unfortunately. Yep. We're honest here.

Shonna Ingram: And then we've got a digital course through Restore, and then we've got the rebuild. So, just help for the transition season. And yeah, we're also looking at maybe a membership of two years of drop.

Stephanie Gutierrez: That's good.

Shonna Ingram: We're, we're working on that. I'm still trying to figure out the best way. End of that, but also we don't, you know, we don't know where the Lord's gonna with that. And the book! 

Stephanie Gutierrez: I was just gonna say Fall 2025, something fun is happening.

Shonna Ingram: Yeah, we think, I think it's called The Re-Entry Journey. So we're gonna, we look at sort of a trauma, you know, trauma-informed space, you don't have to go through trauma, to read the book. This isn't just for, you This is for anybody that's come back, but we come from it from a trauma informed perspective that people might have it, and then we look at the three seasons, but then at the end of the book, we have, how does your organization and church work together to create a support network for your missionaries that have come back. And like, how do you guys meet together, you know, how do we meet? So, you know, I'm partly going through this book. I have other organizations. It's like this, you know, we're using this as a workbook to like, we'll have the same words, same vocabulary, unjust like, oh, this person is, is in reentry.

Are they in restoration? Oh, they might be. You're probably in all three, you know, depending on the day that you wake up. So it's not linear, but there is a structure to it.

Stephanie Gutierrez: There's, there's some stages. And so we'll post a link to all that, including a pre-order link for the new book and all of these great resources. So for anybody listening, whether you are a missionary or you serve missionaries, you've got some tangible steps that you could take to go through this process stronger.

So again, there is hope. I don't even say on the other side, there's hope in it. As you said earlier, Shonna, we hold grief and we hold gratitude in the same space. And so. On the same days that you might be crying your heart out, you can also be praising God and celebrating Him for bringing you to where He needed you to be and for the good things He's done in your life.

So this is a time to grieve, and it's a time to celebrate. It's a, it's a time of winter of things dying, and it's a time of spring of new beginnings. And we believe that God is going to get you from where you are to where He needs you to be. So, Shonna, thank you so much for joining us today. We loved having you.

Shonna Ingram: Thank you.