The Village We All Need | Deb Richards
Care, Community, and Showing Up for Young Parents
What does it really look like to support young moms who are carrying more than most people ever see?
In this episode of Neighbourly, Shannon sits down with Deb Richards from Youth for Christ’s Young Parents Program. Together, they explore what it means to walk alongside young parents through trauma, early motherhood, and the daily realities of raising children without a strong support system.
This is a conversation about more than meeting needs. It’s about building trust, creating community, and learning how to show up in ways that actually make a difference.
Why This Conversation Matters
Many young parents are navigating:
trauma from unstable childhoods or foster care
isolation and lack of support
the pressure of raising children while still growing up themselves
What they need most isn’t just practical help.
They need people.
People who stay.
People who listen.
People who remind them they’re not alone.
That’s what this episode is about.
What You’ll Learn in This Episode
Why relational care matters more than quick fixes
How to support young moms with dignity and respect
What trauma does to trust, and why it takes time to rebuild
How small acts like a text, a meal, or a conversation can change everything
Why community (“a village”) is essential for families to thrive
How tools like CarePortal help connect real needs with real people
The Power of Showing Up
One of the biggest takeaways from this conversation is simple:
Care isn’t complicated. But it is consistent.
It looks like:
checking in when it’s inconvenient
staying when things don’t improve quickly
celebrating small wins that most people would miss
Deb shares how even something as small as a mom replying to a message or showing up to a group is worth celebrating. These moments are signs that trust is growing.
Why “Village” Isn’t Just a Nice Idea
We often say, “It takes a village.”
But a real village requires participation.
It means:
offering help
receiving help
staying connected even when life gets hard
One of the most powerful parts of this episode is seeing how young moms, even while facing their own challenges, still show up for each other with generosity, encouragement, and care.
Community isn’t built by people who have everything together.
It’s built by people who are willing.
Dignity Changes Everything
Support matters most when it preserves dignity.
That can look like:
asking what someone actually needs instead of assuming
giving choices instead of just handing things over
letting a mom wrap her own child’s Christmas gifts
These small details communicate something deeper:
You matter. Your voice matters. Your role matters.
And that changes how care is received.
The Reality of Trauma and Trust
Many young parents Deb works with are carrying:
loss of family connection
experiences in foster care
deep questions around trust and safety
Because of this, trust doesn’t happen quickly.
It grows through:
consistency
presence
not walking away
This episode reminds us that even small steps toward trust are significant and worth noticing.
You Don’t Need to Be an Expert
One of the biggest barriers to caring for others is feeling unqualified.
But this conversation makes it clear:
You don’t need training to care.
You need willingness.
Care looks like:
sending a text
bringing a meal
asking a question
showing up again
That’s it.
A Simple Step to Take This Week
Think of one person in your life who might be carrying more than you can see.
Then ask:
“How can I show up for them this week?”
Not perfectly.
Just consistently.
About This Episode
This episode features Deb Richards, who leads the Young Parents Program at Youth for Christ in Winnipeg. Through years of walking alongside young moms, she has seen firsthand how community, consistency, and compassion can change lives.
Guest Links
https://yfc.ca/winnipeg/program/young-parents/
Produced By:
Episode transcript Read the full transcript
Introduction
Deb Richards: Their dreams are more, having enough food, having a safe house, having a yard for the kids to play in, just safety and stability. Some of them have dreams about things they'd like to do. Most of the time, it's how to make the system work better. And I think some of them will be system changers one day, once they can think further than the present moment.
Johan Heinrichs: Some care is easy to notice. A meal dropped off, a gift given, a moment that feels complete. But most care doesn't look like that. I'm Johan, producer of Neighbourly. In this conversation, Shannon sits down with Deb Richards, someone who has spent years walking alongside young mums, many of whom are caring more than we ever see. There are no quick wins here, no instant transformations. Just the steady work of showing up, building trust, and staying when things are hard. And over time, something begins to grow.
Johan Heinrichs: Not just support, but community. A kind of care that doesn't fix everything, but makes sure that no one is carrying it alone. Let's join Shannon at the table.
Shannon Steeves: Good morning, Deb. I am so glad that you are here today on the podcast. You are just such an incredible leader in our community, really. You work at Youth for Christ and are overseeing the Young Parents program. I can't wait to hear some of your background and your stories of how you've gotten into this. But first, we always start off with the same question for everybody. Growing up, who was a neighbour that you'll never forget?
Deb Richards: My best friend's parents. They were my favourite. They just welcomed everyone in, and the house was always light. There was a lot of laughter. They loved to be silly. They loved to tease. Everyone was just brought in with one big, giant hug.
Shannon Steeves: That is beautiful. It's crazy how much we remember how people make us feel, whether it's somebody that you had a relationship with in that family or even just strangers. We never forget that. And it's so neat how that stayed with you. How old were you, I guess, when you first met them?
Deb Richards: Eight, maybe. Yeah.
Why This Work Matters
Shannon Steeves: I'd love to hear a little bit about how you found your way into the work you're doing now. Where did that start from, and why are you here?
Deb Richards: It started back in high school. One of my good friends found herself pregnant, and I lived in a small community, and it was a very churchy community. I was scared for her that she'd have a lot of judgment. Instinctively, I just thought, she needs support, not judgment. That always stayed with me, and I always had that soft spot for teen mums, for people who found themselves suddenly on the outside, for people who needed a lot of support.
Deb Richards: It was always playing in the back of my heart, I'd love to serve young teen mums and help them get established, help them stabilize. I first heard about the Crisis Pregnancy Centre way back in the day and started volunteering with them. I learned a lot through them.
Deb Richards: Through them, I learned what love looks like in a whole new way, where you just walk into that space and it's love. So when Youth for Christ started a teen mums program way back 30 years ago, I helped get it started in our church and worked with that for a while. I kind of bounced in and out of it as I was raising our kids, then found that it wasn't really working for us. I needed to get a job to help pay the bills and raise the kids.
Deb Richards: Then I was feeling really bored and unsettled in the job that I was at, and I was just like, God, you've grown me so much, to the point where I felt like I had such a good relationship with Him, and I wanted to serve Him. I wanted to do more than what I was doing. God brought this young mum as an intern to the place that I was working at, and one morning He says, well, what about her? Are you ready to go back and love the young mums again? I was like, oh, let me think about that.
Deb Richards: Because it's not just a walk in the park. It requires a lot of effort and showing up for people in hard spots.
Staying faithful in slow work
Shannon Steeves: That's kind of what I was going to ask next. I imagine you experience so much, and it's probably really powerful to walk with these young parents. But what keeps you showing up when the days do get hard or when maybe you see setbacks?
Deb Richards: Something that we do here a lot, that my boss encouraged me to do right from day one, was to keep something he called a journal of celebrations, or what I sometimes like to call evidence of God at work. It's really a practice of noticing the little things. Because when you're working with people that have experienced a lot of trauma, that are often in crisis, it's not fast work. In order to keep showing up every day and just walking alongside of them, you have to notice where God is showing up.
Deb Richards: It might be that they responded to a message that you sent them. It might be that they actually showed up for group.
Johan Heinrichs: Wow.
Deb Richards: It might be that they shared something really hard with you, or they let you pray with them for the first time. There are so many things written in our journal of celebrations over the year, and often it really is just those little things. Holding a baby for the first time, being with a mum when she's giving birth, all those things are amazing. They're kind of those watershed moments where God really shows up. But noticing in the hard where God shows up, where they're willing to trust a little bit more, where they've shared something hard and you haven't walked away, so they trust you a little bit more, that keeps you coming back and waiting to see what God will do.
Shannon Steeves: I love that you gave some of those specific examples of what it looks like, because I think it's easy for people to be drawn to ways to serve that have an immediate result and instant gratification. That's not inherently bad. But that longer-term, walking with somebody, that deep relationship, just being consistent, that takes a lot of patience and persistence. Can you tell me about some of the young parents that you get to walk alongside and what that's like?
Stories of Community and Growth
Deb Richards: There was a couple of mums way back in the day. They were both 15, maybe.
Shannon Steeves: Wow.
Deb Richards: They were due about a month apart. They came from very different backgrounds, but they really bonded over their pregnancy, and it was really fun to watch. They were both so excited to have babies. It ended up that they were both born the same day, nine minutes apart. So we affectionately called them our twins.
Shannon Steeves: Yeah.
Deb Richards: It was really fun to watch these little girls grow up and also watch their mums grow up, and just walk with them through the good, the bad, and the ugly, just to watch them keep showing up for their kids, be able to keep showing up for them, and encourage them. That was a real joyful time. There was lots of heart in there too, but it just makes my heart smile when I think about them. That was quite a while ago, near the beginning of when I started at YFC.
Deb Richards: Some of the mums, we've walked with them, one mum since the beginning of COVID. I met her when she was 18 years old and had just had her first baby. We built that trust, and she became the mum that invited all her mum friends to come and get support and really build up the community.
Deb Richards: She's the mum that was always looking for things, and it was always for other people. Oh, I know this mum who needs this. Can we go get that for her? Yes. Can we go help this mum over here? This mum needs help. So she's building up that village and seeing beyond herself in so many ways, which was really cool to witness.
When mums support each other
Deb Richards: One of our favourite things right now is watching how our mums come into community and support each other. We have a chat going, and one mum says, oh, I need prayer. Then all the mums are like, I'll pray for you, I'll pray for you. They're sending Bible verses, they're encouraging each other. Sometimes we don't even enter that conversation because it's just so beautiful to see them care for each other. They've built that village for each other, so they're not alone.
Deb Richards: That is what everyone needs. They need a village. They need people to be in their corner.
Shannon Steeves: That's been on my mind recently. My sister-in-law is about to have a baby, and daycare was closed for spring break about a week ago. I was on the phone with her and asking about where my brother was, what he was up to. She said, oh, he's driving our two-year-old four hours to my parents so they could watch him during the time daycare was closed. She said, it takes a village.
Shannon Steeves: We hear that phrase, and something I've been thinking about too is, you have to be a villager in order to have that village, and be willing to invest in others and receive it. It's not one or the other.
Deb Richards: No, it really isn't.
Shannon Steeves: I love that you even said sometimes you guys don't even engage in that chat when women are supporting one another, because that's the goal, I would imagine, right? That you are supporting women who then get to support each other. That's incredible.
Deb Richards: Exactly. Yeah. And it always makes me sad when they isolate and don't let anyone in, because that's when things go wrong. That's when you fall into a deep state of depression. That's when life gets really, really hard. If you don't have anyone to share your burdens with, I don't know how you do it. So we're always encouraging them to reach out, to respond back. That's why it's so important when you get those messages back, because it's easy to just say, no, I don't want to talk to anyone.
Deb Richards: But when you do reach out, your life automatically gets that little bit brighter, right? And you don't feel so alone anymore.
The Hidden Realities Young Mums Carry
Shannon Steeves: What are some of the realities that these young mums are carrying that people might not see?
Deb Richards: They're carrying their childhood, their teenage years that didn't quite get lived out how they thought. They're carrying a lot of baggage. A lot of them have been through the foster care system themselves, and so there's always that background fear of their kids entering the foster care system. They know very well their experiences. While some foster experiences can be very good, there can also be a lot of bad. Just that separation from your biological family is a trauma, even if it means that you're safer. You never stop missing your parents or your grandma.
Deb Richards: There are a lot of articles going around about that gap of not having a mother yourself and then becoming a mother. That is a very real thing. You never stop missing your mum. A lot of these mums, and the dads, didn't have stable parents growing up, or they were removed for whatever reason. So they're learning how to parent without that mum to guide them, without that mum maybe to call when the nights are long. That's very real for them.
Deb Richards: Their losses in their lives are very significant, and the trauma is real. Jesus provides healing. But when you've never had anyone that you can really trust, how do you learn to trust Jesus? It's a slow process when you think of how long it takes us. For me, I grew up in a Christian home learning about Jesus all my life, and still sometimes it can be hard to trust. So when you've never had that, it's that much harder to trust. That's why we really celebrate when they do choose to trust us.
Deb Richards: There's a lot of hidden baggage, and they're still trying to get up every day and take care of their kids and just get through each day. There isn't a lot of room for extra emotional energy. There isn't what we would think of as normal. Their normal looks completely different. So the question is always, what do you want? Where do you see yourself? Can you even dream right now? If you have one dream, what is it? It's always about their kids. I want my kids to be healthy and happy and safe. I want to give my kids everything I didn't have. It's all about their kids every time.
Learning how to dream again
Shannon Steeves: While you're talking about that, something I wonder is how much of what you're doing through this program is helping people learn how to dream.
Deb Richards: Good question.
Shannon Steeves: It just came to mind because I think about so many people who are experiencing trauma or poverty, that it can kind of be like, I'm just trying to get through the day or get through the week and provide the next thing. There isn't even the thought to consider, or the time to think about the future, to think about what are my dreams for myself. I guess, how do you see that show up? Maybe that's a better question.
Deb Richards: That's something that is really hard, and we sometimes do try to talk about it with them. It sometimes goes farther than other times.
Shannon Steeves: Sure.
Deb Richards: Depending on where the mums are at.
Shannon Steeves: Yeah.
Deb Richards: Again, they're not dreaming about going to the moon or travelling all over the world. Maybe in odd moments they do, but their dreams are more having enough food, having a safe house, having a yard for the kids to play in, just safety and stability. Some of them have dreams about things they'd like to do. Most of the time, it's how to make the system work better. And I think some of them will be system changers one day, once they are stabilized, once they can think further than the present moment.
Shannon Steeves: Yeah.
CarePortal and Practical Support
Shannon Steeves: In this podcast, we've over various episodes talked a little bit about CarePortal. In the last episode, I shared some of my experiences helping to oversee this network of requests coming in and helping train churches. For those who don't know, the Young Parents program, you and your staff sometimes are the ones that submit needs into CarePortal so that nearby churches can help come alongside those mums and dads that you're serving. Can you think of a time where a request went out and something about the response stood out to you, or just a story from any of those connections?
Deb Richards: We've received quite a lot of support from CarePortal. Whether it's a stroller or a crib or some groceries, the mums are always really appreciative. This Christmas, we got to try a new experiment with you guys, having people buy gifts for our kids. I was a little hesitant at first, honestly, but the response we got from our mums just really blew me away.
Deb Richards: One of the mums, when I messaged her to ask if this was something that would be helpful, she just said, thank you, Jesus. This had been such a heavy burden on her heart, wanting to give her kids Christmas.
Shannon Steeves: Yeah.
Deb Richards: So knowing that someone else was going to go out and buy her kids Christmas presents to make sure they weren't forgotten on Christmas Day was such an answer to prayer for her. When I asked her what she thought her kids would like, she said, it doesn't even matter. It's just that someone thought of us. It's really humbling when you hear something like that, because we get caught up in our own concerns, and everyone does, but just that mother's heart to want to do good for her kids and not sure how she's going to do it. And then Jesus steps in with Christmas gifts. That's a beautiful thing.
Dignity, agency, and being seen
Shannon Steeves: Wow.
Deb Richards: Another mum from that Christmas gifts drive was thrilled that the person from the church through CarePortal would message her and ask what her son would like, and gave her choices. They said, I was looking at these things, which one do you think your son would love? Giving that mum a voice to choose was a wonderful experience for her. It wasn't someone just being like, here, here's something for you because you need it. It was treating them like valued people.
Shannon Steeves: Yeah.
Deb Richards: Everyone wants to be seen, known, and loved, right? Every time you do something like that, you're adding value to their person.
Shannon Steeves: So often, for me, it's easy to take for granted the amount of agency and choice I have when it comes to just how I live. I can choose, do I want to go work at a coffee shop today, or do I want to work from home? Do I want to make a coffee or go buy a coffee? These simple choices. Or even when it comes to Christmas, thinking about what do I want to get my mum for Christmas this year, not am I going to be able to give my mum something. I think it's so important that we create ways for people who often have a lot of choices made for them to have that choice and that sense of dignity.
Shannon Steeves: Just being a human, that you can decide what do you want to give your kid this year, and someone's going to help support you with getting that item, but you get to choose what that is, and you get to wrap it and give it to them on Christmas morning. That's community.
Deb Richards: Yeah. Even just wrapping the gift yourself was something that I requested for each of the gifts. Send wrapping paper, send tape, let the mum do the mum thing. Every mum wants to wrap that gift to put it under the tree for their kiddo.
Shannon Steeves: Yeah.
Deb Richards: It's sometimes in those little details, right? Even in the gifts we give them or in the ways we show up for them, sometimes it's just those little details. During COVID, when we couldn't go have group, we'd just go to them. We'd call it our coffee ministry. We'd show up at the door with coffee and Timbits and stand on their doorstep and chat for 15 minutes just to make sure they saw another human face.
Shannon Steeves: I love that we're talking again about how people feel, because that makes so much difference. When you feel supported, when you feel cared for, you can ideally be more confident and feel like, okay, I might not have all the answers for how to be a mum today, but I know I have people in my corner and that I can do it.
What Actually Helps in Early Parenting
Shannon Steeves: One question I have is, what have you learned that actually makes a difference in those early parenting seasons? As a mum yourself, I don't have that experience. So from all that you've gotten to walk with people through, what have you learned?
Deb Richards: Wow. A lot, and I feel like also not a lot sometimes.
Shannon Steeves: Yeah.
Deb Richards: Because every experience is new, right? So you have the years of built-up wisdom, but not assuming that you know what they need would be step number one. Based on my own experiences in life, from my neighbour, from my grandma, it's about being that welcoming presence. For every mum and child that walks through the door, you're excited to see them. You're going to check in with them, you're going to make sure that they're seen, make sure that someone knows them, make sure that they feel loved.
Deb Richards: In those early days of parenting, celebrating with them, this is a new life, this is their new child. It's someone that God has created and loves. So rejoicing with them, having the privilege to hold that new baby and to pray over that new child and to bless them, sometimes bringing a meal, sometimes just those texts to say how it's going.
Deb Richards: For a little while, we had a doula who could go and do all the supporting things after children were born. She could go and hold the baby so the mum could have a shower, she could wash the bottles, she could help with nursing, do laundry.
Deb Richards: This last week, we had a mum come by for a group. Her baby is a week and a half old. She had that exhausted new-mum look about her, and she's trying to hold it all together. I said, right now, your only job is holding the baby, feeding the baby, and keeping the baby clean. Laundry will wait. Everything else will wait. Just be good to yourself.
Deb Richards: Every new mum needs to remember to be good to herself, because life just changed. You're doing something that you haven't done before. Even if you've had three kids, this is a new child with new needs. Your body's gone through a lot. So it's doing what anyone would want done for them. When you stop to think what has supported you, then go and do that for someone else. That's what being a village is about. When you've received, give it back out to someone else.
Learning from the generosity of young mums
Deb Richards: If you want to learn generosity, these mums blow me away every time. They're in the midst of all their own stuff, and another mum comes in that's more needy than them. They just love her. They speak words of love over her. They hold her while they cry. They stop everything else they're doing to be there for them. Oh, you need this, I'll give you this. Oh, there's a homeless person over there, I'm going to give them this leftover food that program gave me to take home. Their hearts are generous to those who are also suffering.
Shannon Steeves: There's so much to learn from them. That kind of goes back to this idea of not assuming what people need. And taking that a step further, not having an expectation that there's always others that need the help and we're not. Actually, those that we're serving and loving and helping can serve and love as well.
Shannon Steeves: I think that's not always maybe something we say, but sometimes there's this internal thing, especially in church communities, like you said, very churchy worlds. I love what you said, that it might not seem like on the outside someone has a lot to give, but then they still give. I think that's really important that people understand. We can have a lot going on in our world and a lot of needs ourselves, but that doesn't have to stop us from finding ways to care.
Deb Richards: That's right.
Shannon Steeves: All those ways you listed, sending a text, making extra of your own dinner and bringing that to a new mum or bringing that to your neighbour, all of these small ways actually become how we live in community and how we be a village, just like you said.
Deb Richards: Yep, exactly.
Closing Reflections
Shannon Steeves: Deb, thank you so much for coming on today. I have just loved getting to hear your wisdom. I think about when I become a new mum, I'm going to have to call you and get all the tips.
Deb Richards: You bet.
Shannon Steeves: Thank you for being willing to share. We are so blessed by you and love that through this ministry and through relationships, people are finding community and finding hope.
Deb Richards: Yeah, definitely. The community that is being built up in Winnipeg to serve people, to serve families, CarePortal being a big part of that, and all these other ministries that we work together with, that's building up a village where none of us feel like we have to do it all. We can go, oh, I can call so-and-so for this and they'll help you with that.
Deb Richards: Just like we ask the mums to share their burdens with us so that we can help them carry their burdens, when we're all working together, the burden becomes lighter because you don't have to carry it all. So I'm really thankful for all the different organizations that are coming together in Winnipeg to create that village for each other and for the communities that we serve.
Shannon Steeves: That's right.
Outro
Johan Heinrichs: The stories we share here remind us that care does not have to be perfect to be powerful. It just has to be present. Neighbourly is an initiative of Care Impact, a Canadian charity equipping churches, agencies, and communities with technology and training to care better together. This episode was produced by CARE Creatives Co, a social enterprise of Care Impact. If you're building a podcast and want help with strategy, editing, or full production, visit CareCreativesCo.ca to connect with us. I'm Johan. Thanks for listening, and keep being the kind of neighbour someone will never forget, in a good way.
Deb Richards: Breaking all chains, when I see you in a stranger, I no longer stay.
Johan Heinrichs: Turning over tables, tearing down walls, building up the bridges between the souls of these, turning over tables, breaking.
