Parents are supposed to be at their best when their children are at their worst. The only problem is that parents are people, too, and are susceptible to knee-jerk reactions, anger, and fears that make perfect parenting nearly impossible. But it is possible to keep your long-term parenting goals in mind, give yourself credit for what you're doing right, and most importantly, enjoy the rewards and joy of raising a child.
The Joy of Parenting is a compassionate guide for parents who sometimes feel overwhelmed-that is, all parents. The acceptance and commitment therapy (ACT) skills in this book will help you develop the flexibility and mindfulness to help your child make critical transitions and gracefully move past the bumps along the way.
This guide offers practical skills-based exercises to help you:
Handle tantrums and defiance with grace
Refocus on big-picture values when you feel overwhelmed
Act compassionately toward yourself when you make mistakes
Adjust your parenting as your child works through typical developmental transitions
Using the science that underlies more extreme approaches to 'attachment parenting,' The Attachment Connection helps parents sort out the facts from the fiction about parent-child attachment and shows how paying attention to the cognitive needs of a growing child can help him or her grow up healthy, secure, and confident.
In Mindful Motherhood, a psychologist specializing in mood disorders who is also a mother herself presents a mindfulness training program developed at the California Pacific Medical Center Research Institute. Clinical studies showed that this program was effective in helping new mothers parent their children and manage changes in mood, stress levels, and behavior.
