When Both Sides Go Silent: A Mother's Day Letter to Anyone Holding the Quiet

Hey you. Come sit with me.

This is not the blog I set out to write today. I was originally going to briefly touch on the silence in relationships and tie it back to the May Digital Detox. Clean. Tidy. A nice kitchen table reflection for Mother's Day morning.

But before I went any further, I need to acknowledge that today is not the same for all of us.

Some of you woke up to flowers and breakfast in bed and a phone full of love. I am so glad. Hold that close.

And some of you woke up with a lump in your throat. Because the person you wanted to call did not call. Or you did not call them. Or the person who used to be your safest place has not felt safe for a long time. Or she is gone. Or she is still here, and the silence between you is somehow heavier than her absence would be.

If that is you today, I see you.

And then, before I could write another word, God moved. Right here. In this blog. As I was typing.

I felt the PAUSE. The tug to listen. The same framework I have been teaching all month showed up in my own body in real time. Pause physically. Acknowledge what is rising. So I stopped typing. And I sat with it.

And what He showed me was this. I do not just sit in one chair today. I sit in both. The daughter who pulled away. The mom waiting for the call. I have lived both sides of this silence. And maybe you have too.

So today, I am following Him instead of my outline. We are going where He is leading.

A Different Kind of Silence

All month, on the Lavish Life Living blog, we have been talking about the silence I found at the Masters when they took my phone at the gate. The May Digital Detox. The dopamine reset. The nervous system finally exhaling.

That kind of silence is a gift.

But there is another kind of silence. The kind that lives between two people who used to know each other best. The kind that grows when one person stops calling and the other stops trying. The kind where both sides go quiet, and somewhere in the quiet, the relationship goes too.

That silence is not a gift. That silence is a wound.

The First Mother's Day

I remember the first Mother's Day when the silence started. I was on a plane with my younger daughter, headed to New York. My podcast had just won an award for season two. I was about to be on a billboard in Times Square. Something that once felt like a distant dream.

It was a moment I should have been celebrating. But if I am honest, I would have traded all of it for one thing. A phone call. From her.

My phone rang. Unknown number. I nudged my younger daughter. It is her. My heart lifted so fast I could feel it in my chest. I had not been forgotten. I answered with a smile already forming.

But it was not her. It was one of her friends. A sweet girl who had lost her own mother the year before. She just wanted to tell me Happy Mother's Day.

And I remember sitting there, caught between two emotions I did not know how to hold at the same time. Grateful, that I could be there for her. And quietly heartbroken, that it was not my daughter on the other end of that call.

And if I am being real with you, in that moment, I could not see God in any of it.

What I See Now

I did not understand it then. I do now.

There can be hope in the sadness. Love can grow even in silence. And sometimes the moment you feel forgotten is the moment you become the answer to someone else's prayer.

That young woman on the other end of the phone needed her own kind of mother that day. And God put me on that plane. With my heart already aching. Already opened. Ready to receive her call without performing okayness.

That is the part of the story I could not see in the moment.

Since then, my life has changed in ways I never expected. I have come back to my faith. Not casually. Deeply. The kind of coming back where you stop pretending you are fine and start actually surrendering what you cannot fix.

The door is still open. I pray for her every single day. Not just for reconciliation. For her life. For peace. For protection. For joy.

And even though I still cannot see the full story, I believe this with everything in me. God is good. All the time.

The Silence No One Talks About

I did not choose this silence. It found me. And it is the kind of silence people do not know how to talk about because it is messy.

There is no clean ending. No clear explanation. No step-by-step program to fix it. No two stories look the same. And sometimes, there is not even a moment you can point to and say, that is when it broke.

Sometimes it looks like this. A message that goes unanswered. A holiday that passes without a call. A birthday that comes and goes quietly. A Mother's Day where you do not know if reaching out would heal something, or reopen everything.

And over time, both sides go quiet. And the silence becomes the relationship.

What This Season Is Teaching Me

This May Digital Detox has shown me something I did not expect. When I put the phone down, when I gave my nervous system space, the first thing that surfaced was not peace. It was this. The silence I have been carrying. Not digital silence. Relational silence.

The unsent text. The unmade call. The quiet question that still shows up in my mind. What if I just tried.

And the truth is, I am not always brave enough. I am still walking that out. Still praying through it. Still asking God what obedience looks like here.

But I am not pretending anymore. I am letting myself feel what this costs. And that is part of healing too.

The Silence the Bible Names

Whichever chair you are sitting in today, I want to name something that the enemy uses against us more than we admit. The silence is its own kind of wound. It is not just the absence of conversation. It is the ground where shame grows. Where doubt gets loud. Where the voice that says you are forgotten, you are not loved, you are not enough finally has the room to be heard.

The Bible talks about this directly. And once you start looking, it is everywhere. Silence as wound. Silence as enemy. Silence as the place the enemy tries to convince you that you are alone, forgotten, or unloved. Scripture does not ignore it. Scripture names it.

So today, let us not rush past it either.

David asked God how long, when the silence felt unbearable. How long wilt thou forget me, O Lord. Forever?

Job sat in his ash heap for seven days before anyone spoke. Seven days of silence with the people who loved him most.

Even Jesus, on the cross, knew what it felt like to ask why hast thou forsaken me.

The silence is not new. And it is not yours alone to carry.

Even here, He held them. He held David through the questioning. He held Job through the ash heap. He held His own Son through the silence on the cross.

God meets us where we are. He does not wait for us to be put together. He does not need us to have the right words. He comes close to the brokenhearted, and He saves those who are crushed in spirit.

Maybe Your Story Is the Plan

I keep coming back to this.

Maybe there is a bigger plan at work. Maybe your story is the plan. Maybe what you are walking through is not the detour. Maybe it is the testimony.

Grieving while still living can feel pointless some days. Like you are trying to see a cup half full when all you can see is what is missing. I know that ground. I am still standing on it some days.

But here is what I keep finding to be true. God moves in the moments we feel weakest. Not after we get strong enough. Not after we figure it out. Right there. In the silence. In the ache. In the moment we cannot see Him. That is where He shows up.

If I had stayed sitting in the hurt, refusing to surrender, it would have destroyed me. My family. My life. Instead, I surrendered what I could not fix. And He has been moving in places I cannot see ever since.

You Can Hold Both

You can be grateful, and grieving. You can be strong, and hurting. You can celebrate others, and still feel the ache in your own story.

Both can exist. That is what makes this kind of silence so hard. And also, what makes you human.

If You Are Reaching for Your Phone Right Now

Some of you are going to finish reading this and your hand is going to drift toward your phone. You are going to find their name. You are going to wonder if this is the day. If a text is the right thing. If they would even respond. If you would survive the silence if they did not.

I am not going to tell you what to do. But I am going to tell you this. There is no perfect message. There are no right words. There is no version of Happy Mother's Day that will make all of it disappear. If you send something, send it because you want them to know you are here. Not because you are hoping for a specific response back.

And if you do not send anything today, that is okay too. The door does not close just because you did not knock.

Two Letters, One Silence

I want to give you two letters. One from the person who went silent. One from the person who is still waiting. Read both. Because most of us have lived on both sides of this, just in different seasons, with different people, in different versions of ourselves. And the truth is, the silence is rarely as one-sided as it feels when you are standing in the middle of it.

A Letter From the Person Who Went Silent

A Letter From the Person Who Has Been Waiting

Whichever Letter You Felt First

There is no right side. There is no winning side. There are just two people, both carrying something the other cannot fully see.

Maybe you read the first letter and recognized yourself. Maybe you read the second and felt something break open. Or maybe, you read both and realized you have lived both. Different people. Different seasons. Same silence.

Wherever you are today, I want to offer you this. The silence is not always the end of the story. Sometimes it is the middle. Sometimes it is the pause before something shifts. Sometimes it is the place where truth finally gets honest enough to heal. And sometimes, it is just where you are right now. And that is allowed too.

You do not have to fix it today. You do not have to send the message. You do not have to force closure. You just have to stay honest with yourself about what is true in your heart.

Name What You Are Feeling

Before we close, I want you to do one thing. Name what you are feeling right now. Just one word. The first word that surfaces.

Something happens in our bodies when we name an emotion instead of pushing past it. The ache stops being a fog and becomes a feeling we can hold. David did this in the Psalms over and over. Why art thou cast down, O my soul. He named it. Then he turned it toward God.

So here is your invitation. Find your word on the list. Read the scripture next to it. Let it sit in your chest for a minute. Whatever you are carrying today, you are not the first to carry it. He has met women in this exact emotion since the beginning.

A Prayer for the Silence

Sweet friend, if you will let me, I want to pray over you right where you are.

Father. I am sitting in this silence today. You know which silence. You know whose name we have been holding. You know which chair we are in.

Some of us have been on both sides of this. We have been the one who pulled away. We have been the one waiting for the call. We have sat in the hurt long enough to feel what it costs.

Lord, we do not want to be destroyed by what we are carrying. Help us to surrender what we cannot fix. Help us to lay down what we were never meant to hold alone.

Meet her where she is. Whether she is the daughter or the mother, the one who left or the one who stayed, the one who is reading this with a phone in her hand or with tears on her face. Meet her there.

Help her name what she is feeling. Help her bring it to You instead of carrying it alone. Help her see that the silence is not stronger than You are.

Where there is hope, let her feel it. Where there is healing, let it begin. Where there is restoration, let it come in Your time. Where there is only grief today, hold her in it. Do not let her walk through this alone.

You are good. All the time. Even here.

In Jesus' name. Amen.

If This Found You Today

If you are reading this on Mother's Day and carrying a heaviness no one around you seems to notice, I see you.

More women are carrying silent relationships than anyone talks about. We do not post about it. We do not bring it up at brunch. We do not always even have the words for it. So today, I am bringing it to the table. Right here. Where it belongs.

If one of these letters felt like yours, or one of these emotions named what you have been holding, tell me. You do not have to say it perfectly. You do not have to explain everything. Just say it.

I am here. I am reading. And you are not alone in this.

Walk With Me

The deeper we dive, the sweeter it gets. Walk slowly. Listen deeply. Live lavishly. I love you.

— Jenn

P.S. I am finishing the manuscript on Silent to Spoken: When Both Sides Go Silent this year, with a 2027 release. It is the book I am writing while I am still living the question. If posts like this meet you somewhere real, the email list is where I will share the journey of writing it in real time. The signup is right here on the blog. Come walk with me.