The Mindful Reconnect

Do you ever feel like you don't have any time and energy to prioritise focusing on your mental wellbeing?

I'm sure within your everyday life you have a list as long as your arm with tasks and responsibilities.

This will be even more so if you are a parent of a child with ASN/SEN. You'll have the added appointments and meetings for your child to support their needs.

And depending on your child's needs there might also be meltdowns, shutdowns, nervous system dysregulations and more.

I emphasise with you that you will have very little time to focus on yourself and your needs while using your energy to advocate, support and care for your child.

Are you a parent of a child with Additional Support Needs who wants to reconnect to your mental wellbeing?

If you are, you'll soon find out a new way that I am able to support you later in this post.

And if you aren't, I would be grateful if you could share this blog with anyone you know who is.

As well as being a mindfulness and yoga teacher, I also have a Postgraduate Diploma in Community Education.

I have worked with many people, from different backgrounds, which includes 7 years of experience supporting children with ASN and their parent carers.

This includes supporting parents of children with additional needs to attend appointments and meetings.

I have saw first hand the level of stress and the amount of overwhelm that parent carers experience in their daily life.

Prior to this, I worked with children and young children of different ages in different settings, a large number of them were diagnosed and undiagnosed with ADHD and Autism.

In my personal life, I have a close relative with additional support needs. I have experienced having caring responsibilities and increasing my understanding and awareness of support needs.

I know what it's like to see a child be too anxious to attend school and then be classified as a ‘non-attender/school refuser’. Which is another thing to stress and worry about since more communication with their school is needed all the while you are doing the best you can to meet your child's needs.

Navigating accessing additional support for your child in school, through CAMHS (or waiting years on the waiting list), and other services they require can cause you to feel like you are exhausted and reaching burnout.

Which probably means you don’t have the time or energy to take care of your wellbeing.

Your full focus will be on your child and juggling your other responsibilities.

Your mental health as a parent carer is as important to prioritise as supporting your child's mental health and wellbeing.

Of course your child should be at the top of your priority list. However, you should also keep in mind you should be at the top of the list too.

After all, you can't give all your energy if you're running on empty to give.

When you take time to look after your mental wellbeing as a parent of a child with additional support needs/special educational needs you:

Increase Your Energy

Becoming aware of how you use your energy can help you avoid burnout. Which means you'll have more energy for yourself and to care for your child.

Develop Self-Compassion

You might have a loud inner critic telling you that you should do more or other unhelpful thoughts. Learning how to notice these thoughts and meet them with self-compassion will support your mental wellbeing.

Have a Deeper Connection

You will practice bringing awareness to and connecting with your feelings and emotions.

You will create much needed time to notice how you feel and the impact of relaxing practices.

Reduce Stress

Whether you're stressed about an upcoming appointment or something else relating to your child, when you focus on your mental health you create more mental space to plan and increase your mental energy to advocate for your child.

While focusing on your mental wellbeing is necessary, finding the time to do so can feel impossible.

Taking all of this into consideration, I wanted to create a course to bring you a haven to take care of yourself and reconnect to your mental and emotional wellbeing.

I’m happy to share my new course The Mindful Reconnect for ASN Parents with you.

I have combined my experience of supporting families in community/school settings with mindfulness practices to create a unique online course especially for you.

Over 8 weeks you will have the chance to become equipped with techniques to help you reconnect to your mental wellbeing. You will further explore ways to be more present in your everyday life and treat yourself in a kinder way.

There are currentlyfounding member spots available, where you get 50% off the full launch price in exchange for feedback.

The course price will increase for the full launch in late August.

You'll Receive…

Lifetime access to the course from the 8th July 2024.

I will gradually make the modules available over an 8-week time frame, with the first two modules available from the 8th July.

Share Your Views

I will ask you a few questions to get your feedback on the course format half way through the course and near the end.

I will also ask if you would be happy to share the impact that the course has had on you. I would be looking to share this as testimonials on my website/social media. These can be with the first initial of your name or full first name, whichever you feel comfortable with.

This will help more people find out about the course by hearing from other ASN parents experiences.

Access to any new content/bonuses added in future.

If I add any new content before the full launch or afterwards you will receive full access to it, without an extra cost.

Community

There will be a private group chat via the app ‘Telegram’ which you are more than welcome to join.

This will give you the opportunity to continue your mindfulness journey with others from the course.

I will share weekly reflective prompts to help you continue having mindful moments in your day.

You can use the group to share how you use the practices from the course in your everyday life and ask any questions.

There isn't a pressure to join the group or engage in the chat, it is optional. You can simply use it as a way to take a few mindful moments with the reflective prompts.

Ready to join?

You can sign up to The Mindful Reconnect for ASN Parents here.

I look forward to supporting you to reconnect to your wellbeing and take some time for you.