Why I started infant sleep support.

People like me, we call ourselves cycle breakers.

We are those who come from backgrounds of trauma, abuse, neglect or from homes with many dysfunctional patterns.

I am here to pave the way for new cycles - cycles of nurture, self-regulation and healthy emotional expression and communication.

I want to empower others to do the same.

Prior to the pandemic I planned to take training as an Infant Massage Instructor. As a soon-to-be-mom, I thought the knowledge would help me bond with my own baby and that I could share that knowledge with other moms.

But the universe had different plans, as it usually does.

The world locked down the same week I was scheduled to attend the course. This lockdown also forced me to close my massage therapy business two months earlier than anticipated.

While my body welcomed the early maternity leave, the lack of income caused a great deal of worry as I had lost my independent financial security.

My future was altered yet again when our little wild child joined our family. The pandemic

restrictions left us without a village of support during a challenging transitional time of our

lives.

Our son didn’t fit the “normal” sleep patterns our socio-cultural narrative perpetuates. He

woke up as soon as I put him down and he cried if he was separated from us. I felt overwhelmed by my new role and left wondering what the heck I was doing wrong.

So I did what I always do in times of stress and uncertainty - I began researching. I went down the rabbit hole that is the internet and devoured all the information I could on infant sleep. Turns out, the little dude’s sleep was normal. Exhausting for me, but normal.

(As a side note, I later learned in therapy that researching is a coping mechanism for me, but that's a blog post for another day.)

I realized the issue was not with his sleep but with the current mainstream narrative of sleep and motherhood. Or to put it more bluntly, our modern society is not set up to support parents in their child-rearing journey.

Once I began to learn about biologically normal infant sleep, early childhood development and the role of attachment, my life changed a third time. It’s like a light bulb turned on and lit up all the reasons I struggled with my own mental health.

I was raised, like many in my generation and the generations before me, by parents with little to no emotional awareness. They lacked the information we have today of the importance of early childhood experiences on future mental health outcomes. My own mother struggled silently and alone with an undiagnosed mental health disorder for years that greatly affected her ability to parent - especially as a single mom of three.

So I am here to break the generational cycle and create a new cycle of nurture. And I want to

empower other people to do the same.