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Jen Satterly

@jen.satterly

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Old house. New adventures.
Life with @tomsatterly ❤️
1749 New England farm
Grown kids, dog, figuring out the rest.

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I used to think a good marriage meant being good at marriage.

Almost twelve years into ours, I’m starting to think it might mean something else entirely.

Tom and I have gotten a lot of things wrong.

We’ve misunderstood each other. Hurt each other. Been selfish. Been stubborn. We’ve had conversations that brought us closer and others that changed us in ways we’re still understanding.

We’ve had seasons where we couldn’t get enough of each other and seasons where “till death do us part” felt like an unnecessarily specific timeline.

I used to think a really good marriage somehow avoided all of that.

Now I think it’s something much less impressive. Like two people who keep being willing to come back after they’ve gotten it wrong.

Not pretending it didn’t happen.
Not keeping score.
Not one person doing all the returning.

Just eventually looking across whatever distance got created and saying, in one way or another…

Come back over here.
And then doing it again.
And again.

Almost twelve years in, I don’t think being good at marriage means getting it right all the time.

I think it means being willing to look at yourself. To tell the truth. To change. To forgive. To keep learning the person beside you as they change too.

And when you lose each other somewhere along the way, to be willing to do the work of finding your way back.

Tom and I have done that more than once.

And every time we do, we know each other a little better. We love each other a little differently. And somehow, what we’ve built becomes a little more ours. 🤎 by @jen.satterly

Today is Jen’s 51st birthday, and I wanted to write about the woman who holds my heart.
Babe, you didn’t get an easy start. As a little girl you lived through things no child should ever face. It could have easily made you hard. Instead it made you tender and caring. You learned to love hurting people because you knew what hurting felt like, and that’s how you were able to love me. When I came home broken, you stood in the fire with me and never let go of my hand.
You are an amazing mother and the most beautiful soul I know. You bared your heart and shared the secret parts of your life with the world, just so someone suffering in silence would know they’re not alone and that healing is real. Selfless soul.
You’ve been attacked by people you once called friends, and still you choose grace, always attempting to remain mature and godly, following Jesus the best you know how.
Every morning I get to watch you wake up renewed. You head off to Bible study excited and come back with that joyful voice and that smile that still stops me in my tracks. The world tries all day to take your joy, and every morning God gives me a new Jen. A stronger Jen. A better Jen. And I fall in love with you all over again.
You are my best friend, my safe place, and the greatest gift of my life.
To everyone reading this, if Jen has touched your life, tell her below. Let her know how loved she is.
Happy birthday, my beautiful, amazing wife. I will love you forever. by @jen.satterly

Blended families aren’t broken. They’re built.

Tom and I have a blended family. And like most things worth building, it has taken patience, grace, and a willingness to grow together. Love doesn’t erase the complexities. It gives us a reason to work through them.

📌 As ASF Coach Deb reminds us, parenting in a blended family isn’t about replacing roles. It’s about expanding them.

Children thrive when the adults in their lives offer consistency, emotional safety, and respect for one another’s place in the family.

Four reminders from our coaches:

1. Lead with steadiness, not perfection.
Kids watch how we handle complexity more than they expect us to solve it.

2. Affection looks different in every home.
What matters is that children feel seen, valued, and emotionally safe.

3. Co-parenting is a long game.
Small, predictable behaviors build trust over time.

4. Your partnership sets the tone.
When adults communicate clearly and honor boundaries, kids feel anchored.

Blended families are living proof that love can be restructured, expanded, and strengthened.

It’s not easy. But it’s deeply worth it.

Thank you, Coach Deb, for reminding us that building a family isn’t about getting every role perfect. It’s about showing up for one another.

At All Secure Foundation, we understand that family life can be complicated, especially when navigating the unique challenges of the special operations community.

If your family could use support, connect with an ASF coach. We’re here for you.

#AllSecureFoundation #BlendedFamilies #MilitaryFamilies #CoParenting #specialforces by @jen.satterly

It’s remarkable how much living we can do without ever leaving our minds.

The conversations we’ve had. The arguments we’ve rehearsed. The heartbreaks we’ve endured and the beautiful moments we’ve imagined in perfect detail.

Entire chapters of our lives written, rewritten, and occasionally grieved.

And yet none of it ever happened.

Out on our drive, Tom described a scene in extraordinary detail. Every character had a role. Every reaction, even the ending, was decided.

I told him he was a beautiful screenwriter, however, none of the actors even knew they’d been cast.

I recognized the talent immediately.
I’m quite the accomplished screenwriter myself.

Our stories differ, but often come from the same place.

The need to know what’s coming.
To be prepared. To feel safe.

Tom’s training taught him to anticipate threats. My childhood taught me to read a room, to notice a shift in someone’s voice, to sense trouble before it arrived.

Different classrooms. A remarkably similar lesson.

Don’t get caught off guard.

But the instincts that once protected us don’t always know when their work is done.

They follow us home.

Into our relationships, even our happiest expectations.

I can imagine the perfect holiday before any wreath is hung. I used to think that was romanticizing life. Imagining the perfect outcome was another way of protecting myself from another disappointment.

If I anticipate the worst, maybe I can prevent it. If I imagine the best, maybe I can make that happen, too.

However, that same imagination made it unfair to the other actors. Words never spoken that hurt. Promises never made that disappointed. Casting loved ones in roles they never agreed to.

Tom and I still catch ourselves directing imaginary productions. Understanding why doesn’t make the habit disappear.

But we’re learning to recognize it.
To let people speak their own lines.
To let a moment be beautiful without following our plan.

Healing isn’t knowing how every scene ends.
It’s feeling safe enough to let the story unfold.

We’ve lived so many lives inside our minds.

It would be a shame to miss the one happening right in front of us. 🤍 by @jen.satterly

Jesus didn’t make Paul’s road easier. He made Paul’s purpose clearer.

Saul’s life was arguably easier before Jesus. He had status. Education. Religious authority. A tribe. Certainty.

Then he met Christ.

And what followed? Prison. Beatings. Rejection. Shipwreck. Hunger. Betrayal. Eventually, martyrdom.

Not an easier path.

I think part of me believed following Christ would make my life easier. And in many ways, it has. I have a compass now. I know who I’m following.

But having a compass doesn’t mean the terrain gets easier. Jesus never said it would. He said the road was narrow.

Before Christ, Saul knew the rules. He knew where he stood. He knew who the enemy was. He was so certain of his own righteousness that he persecuted the followers of Jesus.

Then one of the most extraordinary plot twists in Scripture happened.

Jesus met one of His enemies on that road. And He didn’t destroy him.

He redeemed him.

The persecutor became the persecuted. And the man who once watched Christians suffer would eventually write:

“Bless those who persecute you; bless and do not curse them.”

Grace was no longer theoretical to him. He had been the enemy Christ loved.

Following Christ in a dark world doesn’t mean fighting darkness with darkness. It means refusing to let darkness determine who we become.

The world says destroy the person who hurts you. Christ says love your enemy.

The world says humiliate the person who humiliates you. Christ says forgive.

The world says power is winning. Christ kneels and washes feet.

Sometimes obedience costs you the room you used to belong in. Sometimes following Christ changes your friendships, ambitions, reputation, even your definition of success.
Sometimes forgiveness requires more courage than revenge.

And sometimes you can be exactly where God called you to be and still find yourself in a prison cell.

Prison wasn’t proof God abandoned Paul. The hardship wasn’t proof he took the wrong road.

The road was hard because it was the road.

Jesus never promised Paul paradise on Earth. He gave him something else: Purpose. Truth. Grace.

And the promise that whatever happened on the road, Paul would never walk it alone. by @jen.satterly

I don’t know exactly when I lost touch with her.

There wasn’t a falling out. No argument. No goodbye. No single moment when we decided to go our separate ways.

I think life just happened.

And somewhere in the middle of loving people, losing things, carrying responsibilities, and trying to be enough, I stopped checking in on her.

Until today.

There was something familiar about her. The way she smiled. The way she tilted her head. Little things I remembered from years ago.

She seemed different now. A little older. Quieter. Like life had asked more of her than she’d expected.

I remembered her being full of life.
Always dreaming about something.
She laughed easily.
She believed in things.
In people.
In possibilities.

As I sat with her, I noticed the little ways she’d changed. The lines around her eyes. The softness in her face. The things time had left behind.

Beneath all of it, there was something so familiar. I could still see her.

And I wondered how long she’d been waiting for someone to notice.

How many times she’d quietly disappeared into the background while everyone else went about their lives.

How long it had been since someone had simply sat with her and paid attention.

She had this way of looking forward to life. Like something good was always just around the corner.

I’d forgotten how much I loved that about her. I hadn’t realized how much I’d missed her.

She was still beautiful to me. Still funny. Still hopeful, somewhere beneath the hurt.

She hadn’t disappeared.
I’d just stopped looking for her.

For the first time in years, I really saw her.

As I caught my reflection in the window I whispered, “Don’t be a stranger”.
We have so much catching up to do. by @jen.satterly

I almost quit something I loved because I thought struggling made me a fraud.

This weekend at Camp Virago, I told a room full of women something I haven’t known how to say for a long time:

I built this. And sometimes I’m not even sure I belong here.

Then I looked around and said, “I bet some of you feel that way too.”

Heads started nodding. A lot of them.

We don’t have to be sisters or immediate best friends. Sometimes that feels forced and puts too much pressure on a room.

Instead, I asked one thing: Just be a good neighbor.

See me. Make room for me. Sit beside me if I’m alone. Be kind even if I’m not your person.

Maybe I needed that lesson too.

Somewhere along the way, I poured so much of myself into this work that I couldn’t tell where All Secure ended and I began.

And eventually, I ran out of words.

For years, Tom and I spent hundreds of hours in front of Special Operators and their spouses telling our story.

All of it.

The dirty laundry. The darkest parts. The things most couples would never dream of saying out loud.

We told it because it helped people.

Until I realized I didn’t want to keep talking about the darkest chapters of our lives anymore.

Not because I was ashamed of them.
Because we were ready to stop living in them.

The story that helped other people heal had started keeping us tethered to a version of ourselves we were trying to leave behind.

And without that story, I didn’t know what to say next.

So I stopped writing.
But I kept showing up.
Sometimes beautifully. Sometimes barely.

For a long time, I thought that made me inauthentic.

I’m beginning to understand it made me human.

The people doing the helping sometimes need help too.

The woman who created a place for everyone else to belong can wonder if she belongs there herself.

I’m still figuring out where I belong.
Still showing up.
Still writing.

And trying really hard to be a good neighbor along the way. 🤍 by @jen.satterly

Coming home and leaving a place are two very different things.

33 years ago today, Tom was a 26 year old Delta Force operator in Mogadishu.

He was surrounded by men who had trained together, served together, and trusted one another with their lives.

On October 3rd and 4th, 1993, they fought for one another, carried one another, and went toward their brothers when others might have turned away.

Some went beyond what most of us could ever fathom, laying down their lives for another.

There is terrible darkness in war.
And there is also courage, sacrifice, loyalty, and love.

For a long time, part of Tom remained in Mogadishu. Even 33 years later, the smell of bleach, oppressive heat, a sound, a face, or a memory can take him right back. October 3rd. 4th. 6th.

There were years when the weight of what happened nearly consumed the life he came home to live.

Slowly, he faced it, the battle, the loss, the choices that followed, and the warrior he had been and will always be.

He rebuilt his life. Is still rebuilding.

He no longer lives in Mogadishu, but he will always carry parts of it with him. Especially the hearts of his brothers.

Some of his brothers never came home. Some came home and were lost in the years that followed. Others are still here, carrying memories and names that have never left them.

Today, remember all of them: those who answered the call, fought beside one another, gave their lives, and came home to continue fighting battles few could see.

Remember their families. The incredible weight they have carried, too.

They are no longer the young men who walked into Mogadishu. They are husbands, fathers, grandfathers…

But some part of them will always remain together on those streets.

“Whom shall I send? And who will go for us?”
And I said, “Here am I. Send me.”
Isaiah 6:8

October 3. October 4. October 6 1993.

Never forgotten. by @jen.satterly

Sometimes we pray desperately to be delivered from something, then grieve when deliverance requires us to leave it behind.

For years Lots wife’s story bothered me.
She was so close. She was nearly safe.

God was leading them out of destruction and gave them one instruction:

Don’t look back.

And she did.

Was someone she loved still there? Were people screaming behind her? Was she afraid? Did she suddenly remember everything she was leaving behind?

We don’t know her motives.
But I don’t think the warning is simply about turning your head.

I can definitely relate what happens when your feet are moving forward but your heart is still reaching backward.

I’ve prayed for doors to close and then stood outside them wondering if I should knock again.

I’ve prayed for new chapters and mourned the ending of old ones.

I’ve asked God to lead me somewhere new, then kept turning around to see what I was leaving behind.

I understand Lot’s wife differently now. Leaving isn’t always the hardest part.

Sometimes it’s resisting the urge to turn around.

There are things we love that aren’t meant to come with us. Identities that once fit.
Places where we once belonged. Relationships that mattered. Versions of ourselves that got us this far.

We don’t have to make any of it bad in order to leave it behind.

Sometimes the prayer has already been answered.

The door has opened.

Our feet are pointed forward.

With the reminder, something new doesn’t have to be visible yet for you to stop looking back. by @jen.satterly

There was a point when I was banging a gun against my head.

I was ashamed. Embarrassed. And underneath all of it was the same story on repeat - I’m not good enough.

Jen kept pushing me because she loves me. But sometimes what I heard was, I’m not healing fast enough. I’m failing her.

We had to figure that out together. And eventually I realized something…

We’ve been trained to do a lot of hard shit. But most of us were never trained for what happens when the battle comes from inside.

So get trained.

That’s why we started All Secure Foundation. We teach Special Operations warriors and couples how to process the pain, understand what’s happening, and build a life worth fighting for.

PTS doesn’t belong to the military or law enforcement. Trauma is human. So whoever you are, if you’re hurting, stop treating it like something you should already know how to handle.

You don’t grow through comfort. You grow by going through the hard shit and learning what to do with it.

No matter who you are get your training.

Today. Right fucking now. by @jen.satterly

Tom and I have always been a little bit of a bad idea together. Like taking a convertible out for a ride in a tornado :)

Push the boundary. Have another drink. Take the trip. Do something ridiculous and figure out the details later.

If something was fun, we could usually find a way to make it more fun. We like adventure, intensity, and occasionally making decisions responsible adults might want to workshop first.

I don’t want to heal that out of us. But lately we’ve been looking at something deeper.

When you’ve lived with trauma, sometimes wanting more isn’t really about having more. Sometimes it’s about changing how you feel.

Bored? Find excitement.
Uncomfortable? Find distraction.
Hurting? Numb it.
Restless? Go somewhere.
Feeling empty? Fill it.

And whatever makes you feel better…if this feels good, more will feel better.

Another drink. Another adventure. Another accomplishment. Another rush. Anything that keeps you from sitting still long enough to feel what’s underneath.

When your nervous system has spent years living in intensity, peace doesn’t necessarily feel peaceful. Sometimes peace feels boring. Quiet feels uncomfortable. So without realizing it, you start manufacturing intensity.

Tom and I realized we haven’t just participated in each other’s healing. We’ve participated in each other’s escape.

We’re learning there’s a difference between being adventurous and being unable to tolerate stillness. Between enjoying something and needing it to change your state. Between freedom and having absolutely no brakes.

We’re learning to run in the wildness without letting the wildness run us. To sit with discomfort instead of immediately escaping it. To enjoy something without automatically needing more.

To be able to say, I’m good. That’s enough.

We’re nowhere near mastering this. We’re just finally recognizing the pattern.

Maybe the question is, “What am I trying so hard not to feel?”

That’s a question Tom and I are sitting with right now. Not as experts.

Just two people trying to keep the adventure while occasionally pumping the brakes. by @jen.satterly

I went looking for quiet and apparently quiet had some notes for me.

I thought quiet meant rest. Long walks. A few books. Drinking coffee slowly. Instead, this year stripped me down to the studs.

It was lonely.

Some friendships I thought would always be there weren’t. Some relationships changed when I changed. And some distance showed me things I hadn’t been willing or able to see before.

There were losses I didn’t expect.

And when enough of the familiar falls away, people, places, roles, work, routines, even the version of yourself you’ve been dragging around for years, you eventually end up sitting across from the one person you can’t escape.

You.

There was nowhere left to perform. No crisis to solve for someone else so I could conveniently avoid my own.

I had to look at the ways I’d been numbing. The ways I’d been running. The things I’d buried under work, purpose and being needed.

And I had to ask some uncomfortable questions:

Who am I when I’m not useful to everyone?
Where do I belong?
What parts of my life are truly mine and what have I been carrying because I thought I was supposed to?

There were moments this year when it felt a little like being sent into the desert. Not the pretty kind. The zero stars for the accommodations type.

But somewhere in all that quiet, things started getting clearer.

Not figured out. Clearer.

I’m learning that losing people doesn’t always mean someone was wrong or bad. Sometimes people walk with us for a chapter. Sometimes we grow differently. Sometimes space reveals what closeness couldn’t.

And sometimes losing what you thought you needed creates enough room to discover what was underneath it all along.

I wouldn’t call this the easiest year of my life. But it may end up being one of the most important.

I went away thinking I needed a break from my life. Turns out I needed enough quiet to finally meet myself inside of it.

Still figuring out who she is.

For now, that feels like a good place to start. by @jen.satterly