Watch Intro Video

Something peculiar happens when we become parents. We hold this new baby in our arms and suddenly we tap into our own experience of being parented. The ghosts and angels from our childhood come into our adult life. We might want to fix the things that we didn’t like, or repeat the things we did. But it can feel so difficult to untangle the past from the present.

This four-session course is designed to help you understand how your own experience of being parented impacts on your current parenting.

You will explore the messages you received as a child, think about why the parent-child relationship is so important, and learn how to parent in the way you want to, making conscious choices driven by your current values and not your past experiences.

You can do this course alone or with your partner/co-parent. You do not need to have had children to do this course, some people find it useful to reflect on what influences their ideas about parenting when planning a family.

By no means is this an exhaustive course on all of the different factors which influence our parenting (there are hundreds of thousands of books written on the topic!) Instead it is a course with bite sized chunks of some of the key ideas which come up in my clinical practice with parents. I hope you will find this is enough to get you thinking, start conversations, make some positive changes and maybe even resolve some old issues.

Course Outline

  • 1. Why Does It Matter?

    This session explores how our previous relationships can influence our current behaviour and our expectations of other people. We will think about how to approach the course and any feelings which arise from completing it. You will outline your goals and the kind of relationships you would like to have. By the end of session one, you should feel clearer about your parenting goals and more confident about what matters in parenting.

  • 2. Who Am I?

    Who we are is largely defined by the relationships we have experienced in our early years. This session we will think about what those relationships were like for you, what messages they left you with and how this might be influencing your own attitude towards parenting. We will explore attachment theory and how you view yourself …and start to discover whether this still fits for you today.

  • 3. Why Am I?

    Following on from last session, we will continue to identify how previous patterns in your relationships left you feeling about yourself, others and your place in the world. We will explore whether those ideas of ‘self’ still fit today, and how we unconsciously keep these patterns alive through our actions and interactions. This session we will start to think about what we need in order to create new patterns.

  • 4. Rewriting My Story

    This week we will focus on how to heal. Taking all of the knowledge you have gathered over the past three sessions, we will think about how to move on from previous relationship patterns (if appropriate to do so) and step into being the parent you would like to be.

If, once completing the course, you would like to have an opportunity to discuss it in more depth, you are welcome to book a call with me to think it through together.

Buy the course

What does it involve?

  • Four sessions of content, available in full online for you to work through in your own time. There is no time limit to access the material

    Short introductory videos in each session

    Explanatory information and case studies describing psychological theories and how to apply them to your own life

    14 worksheets (editable PDFs) to support the application of information to your unique situation

    Prompts for your own further exploration or discussion with your partner/co-parent

Can I Fit It In?

  • How should I approach it?

    I suggest that you do not complete more than one session a week to allow time to process the information.

  • How long does it take?

    Each session will take a minimum of 1 hour to complete, but the pilot group found that they wanted to take longer to complete each session. Some completed it within 6 weeks, most allowed themselves more time.

  • Is it self-paced?

    The course is presented in bite size topics so you can dip in and out of it around family life.

  • How long do the worksheets take?

    Worksheets will require more focused attention so best to put aside an evening a week to think about these.

  • I have a question before I buy?

    Let me know if you have any questions at all before purchase. If you need an additional discount don’t hesitate to ask.

What others have to say...

"This was an invaluable course. It helped shed important light on some crucial differences with my upbringing and my husbands, and importantly the preconceptions we had with each other’s. It has also made an actual difference to my relationship with my dad, I have more understanding for what he went through, trying to do his best, and we are closer than we have been in some time. This was not something I went into the course expecting but am very pleased with."

"Emma’s course is engaging and interesting. Her expertise shines through and I loved learning about my parenting style. Lots of bite size reflective tasks make it easy to complete and fit in around everyday mum life."