Episode 21:
Alinta Blanchard on Embracing Imperfection, Navigating Infant Loss, and Her Awakening
Hi everyone, this week I chat to Alita Blanchard, who is a Parent Coach and Founder of Theawaremama.com.au We first connected through Instagram, where I relate to so much of her content and energy, and I’m excited to be bringing this conversation with her to you today.
Through her work, Alita holds space for mothers and helps them soften their high expectations of themselves and gently learn new skills to help them feel more safe, seen, soothed and secure, so that they can offer the same connection and co-regulation to their children.
During our discussion, Alita opens up about her experience of motherhood and the profound awakening it brought with it, describing it as “the ultimate breakdown” and the catalyst behind deep personal growth. She shares with me the insights that motherhood provided her with, surrounding her attachment style, emotional suppression, and the elements of herself and her life that weren’t aligned with her true authenticity. We also discuss Alita’s contrasting experiences of parenting her different children, as well as the heartbreaking grief she endured following the loss of her fourth child, which was yet another portal of change and introspection.
In this conversation we also discuss the importance of self-compassion in mothering, embracing imperfection, the inherent flaws in so many schools of thought with regards to parenting that perpetuate the myth of “the perfect mother” and how this can create shame, the role attachment theory can play in how we parent, and we define what “village” means to us when it comes to child-rearing, the different ways this can look and why it is so important when it comes to support.
This is a rich conversation and I hope you get as much value from Alita’s perspective and wisdom that I did.
Find out more about Alita in these places:
Alita has some upcoming workshops on holding space for big feelings, meltdowns, and aggression; aswell as a program “loving your ‘angry’ child” coming soon. To find out when they become available, please join her mailing list below.