18 years ago, I sat outside a mothers’ group, with my baby daughter, and cried and cried.
I was longing to meet other mothers who were as passionate about Aware Parenting as I was.
I still remember that exact moment, because it was when my longing to be a part of a like-minded community became a mission.
3 years later, I became the second Aware Parenting Instructor in Australia.
18 years later, and there are now 18 Aware Parenting Instructors in Australia.
For some while, I’ve been called to have a series of conversations with other Aware Parenting Instructors, and parents passionate about Aware Parenting, around the world.
And now it’s here; The Aware Parenting Conversations!
I am so passionate about sharing about Aware Parenting and Aletha Solter’s work.
I’d like to share about my own journey with Aware Parenting.
My passion for Aware Parenting partly came about because it resonated with all that I had learnt in the previous 11 years, training and working both as a psychotherapist and as a developmental psychology researcher with a Ph.D. from Cambridge University.
It had everything I’d learnt about secure attachment, the impact of pregnancy, birth and early parenting, about trauma and feelings and repression. But it has this extra piece; that we can support our babies to stay connected with their feelings, and heal from daily stresses and bigger traumas, right from birth.
What did I do after that day where I cried outside the group and had that vision and mission to meet other mothers who also resonated with it?
I went and bought lots of copies of The Aware Baby, and took them to the local library, the local bookshop and local mothers’ groups.
I started running a group for mothers of babies. I put adverts up, I visited mother and baby yoga groups and singing groups and invited people to join.
Back then, there was an Aware Baby workbook, and each week we met up and went through the workbook together.
Having moved to Australia from the U.K., all the new friends I made also got into, or had already been practicing, Aware Parenting.
I became an Aware Parenting Instructor when my daughter was 3, and I started offering Aware Parenting talks to mother and baby groups, and started offering consultations.
I started up a Yahoo group, before the days of Facebook, and met people from all over Australia, and also from around the world; people who are still friends now.
Later, I started running in-person circles, and started travelling to other places in Australia to run Aware Parenting workshops.
Then, in 2014, I started creating online courses, including several on Aware Parenting.
And then, in 2015, I created the Aware Parenting Instructor Mentoring Course, with the blessing of Aletha Solter.
I had been wanting to create one of these for years, because I’d met lots of people who wanted support in their journey of becoming, or being, an Aware Parenting Instructor. The course is starting its 6th live round very soon!
One of the requirements to become an Aware Parenting Instructor is to attend a 6 hour live workshop with either Aletha Solter herself, or a Level Two Aware Parenting Instructor. You can find a list of all of the requirements HERE. I am a Level Two Aware Parenting Instructor.
I am so incredibly grateful to Aware Parenting and Aletha Solter. Not only have I seen the profound impact it has made on my children and myself; I’ve also met thousands of parents across the world who practice this approach.
I’ve spend thousands of hours talking to parents, in person, in groups, on video calls or FB lives or FB groups.
I experience being part of a worldwide community of parents who are practicing Aware Parenting, and feel such a sense of belonging and inclusion and meaning and purpose.
I remember, 18 years ago, reading this review of Tears and Tantrums (another of Aletha’s books), by Jeannine Parvati Baker, whose work on conscious conception and natural birth I had followed, and felt so inspired:
“Aletha J Solter guides parents through the mysteries of crying – what the messages mean and how to respond. Tears and Tantrums is the book I wish my own mother had read, for then I wouldn’t have needed therapy later as a young adult. What I discovered about crying through years of hard work, Solter shares in an immediately accessible form. My own six children have been responded to as Solter advises, and as a grandmother now, I can vouch for the results! My highest recommendation for Tears and Tantrums. This book needs to be in every library, and is the ideal baby shower gift. The information therein will free families of emotional trauma in order to journey through life’s challenges together in trust.”
Jeannine Parvati Baker (Midwife and author of Prenatal Yoga and Natural Birth, Conscious Conception, and Hygieia: a Woman’s Herbal)
I also deeply recommend all of Aletha Solter’s books: The Aware Baby, Cooperative and Connected, Tears and Tantrums, Raising Drug-Free Kids and Attachment Play.
So now, the first in the series of Aware Parenting Conversations is coming out.
The first series has 12 conversations, including one with Aletha Solter herself, and with other Aware Parenting Instructors and passionate parents.
The first series includes the following people talking about the following topics:
Aletha Solter, Ph.D.,
Founder of The Aware Parenting Institute
“The evolution of parenting.”
Kate Baltrotsky,
Aware Parenting Instructor
“Aware Parenting Research.”
Steph Fleeton,
Aware Parenting Instructor
“Aware Parenting with a child with a medical condition.”
Natalie Daniels,
Aware Parenting Instructor
“Trauma, stress, children’s diagnoses and Aware Parenting.”
Laura Shaz
“Applying Aware Parenting to becoming a mother of two.”
Helena Mooney,
Aware Parenting Instructor
“Attachment play.”
Brett Darnesh,
Aware Parenting Instructor
“The ecology of Aware Parenting – Self, children, family and sustainability.”
Titti Pauler Reenstierna
“Aware Parenting when you feel the least aware (coming back to the body).”
Katie Garibay,
Aware Parenting Instructor:
“Being raised with Aware Parenting and then using it as a parent.”
Liza Pinson,
Aware Parenting Instructor
“Aware Parenting – from doing to being; authenticity, self-compassion and lots more!”
Clare-Louise Brumley, Ph.D.
“Aware Parenting and Psychoneuroimmunology.”
Abbey Stanbrook,
Aware Parenting Instructor
“Why Aware Parenting made so much sense after years of Critical Care Nursing; and attachment play for adults.”
You can listen to it HERE on Soundcloud, or on my podcast on iTunes under Marion Rose, Transformation Through Mothering.