ASD · ADHD · FASD · Trauma
Hope You Can Hold Onto, Even on the Hardest Days
A practical, faith-rooted guide for raising neurodiverse teens, written by two dads who've lived every page of it.
You're doing everything right. So why does it still feel this hard?
The meltdown in the grocery store. The IEP meeting that feels like a diplomatic summit. The nights you lie awake wondering if you're failing the one job that matters most.
You've read the articles. You've tried the strategies that work for "typical" kids. And still, you feel like you're parenting alone, even when you're not.
Maybe your faith feels stretched thin in seasons like this. Maybe you just need someone who's actually been there, not a textbook, not a stranger's theory, but two dads who've sat where you're sitting.
A kitchen-table conversation from two dads who get it
Carl and Joel are two dads from two different families and two different states who each discovered the root cause of their son's behavioral symptoms in 2016. They began their journeys independently, seeking to understand how to parent differently while raising children impacted by autism, ADHD, fetal alcohol spectrum disorders, and trauma challenges. At that time, they were exactly where they are now: searching, overwhelmed, and unsure if they were doing the right things.
What they built is the first parent guide to bring all four profiles together under one roof, translating cutting-edge neuroscience into real, "kitchen-table wisdom" that's been tested in real homes, including their own. It's guidance that meets grace, because no parent should have to walk this road alone.
Real strategies. Real stories. A real way forward.
80+ home-based strategies
Practical interventions you can start using today, grounded in over 900 citations of evidence-based research.
Stories you'll recognize
Four relatable characters, Zak, Q, Shay, and Kennedy, bring each challenge to life so you see your own family in these pages.
Your child's brain, explained plainly
Ten brain domains, translated out of clinical jargon and into language any parent can use and apply.
One book, four profiles
The first parent guide to treat ASD, ADHD, FASD, and trauma as connected, because your teen's story rarely fits in just one box.
Read it your way
Every Core Conversation chapter stands on its own; work through it like a novel, or jump straight to today's challenge.
Dignity over "fixing"
Strategies built to help you understand and support your child, not change who they are.
Not another parenting book. A paradigm shift.
Embracing Hope is the first parent guide to explicitly recognize FASD as part of the neurodiversity spectrum alongside ASD, ADHD, and trauma, written from lived experience, not just research.
Embracing Hope is also part of something bigger: The Embraced Movement, including the novel Embracing Zak, a feature film in development, the FASD documentary Embraced: Truth About Fetal Alcohol Spectrum Disorders, and a growing community of parents walking this road together.
Endorsements
"Carl and Joel have created the first comprehensive parent guide that recognizes ASD, ADHD, FASD, and trauma-impacted children together under one umbrella of neurodiversity... an unprecedented shift in how we understand, communicate with, and support neurodiverse children."
"Embracing Hope is an outstanding resource for anyone impacted by Fetal Alcohol Spectrum Disorders. This book is chock-full of practical, real-world strategies that caregivers and professionals can start using right away. What makes it especially powerful is that it's written from the heart by two incredible fathers who truly understand the day-to-day realities of FASD. Their compassion, honesty, and respect for families shine through on every page. This book offers both hope and tools, and should be required reading for caregivers, educators, social workers, and anyone supporting individuals with FASD."
Your journey starts here!
Whether you're a parent, grandparent, foster or adoptive parent, teacher, or therapist, if you're walking alongside a neurodiverse teen, you've found your tribe.