From Surviving to Connection:How breathwork and embodiment has helped support my parenting.

Sharing a bit of my personal journey with breathwork and parenting

My win this week

This morning, my daughter and I spent time at Beachbox saunas (try them out if you’re in Brighton, they’re fab) followed by a leisurely coffee and cake together. It sounds like a nice but pretty normal thing to be doing right, Mum and Daughter time … but what made it special was the quality of our connection.

We chatted on a level that we have only recently been experiencing with each other. No bickering. No cross words. No walking on eggshells or bracing for conflict. We listened to each other without interruption and responded when space was naturally made for it.

The ease and presence we shared filled me up completely. While these moments have been happening more frequently recently, they still feel novel, small miracles that I don’t want to take for granted.

The backstory

I've raised my daughter as a single parent pretty much from the beginning. If I'm perfectly honest, it hasn't been an easy journey, though there have been many joyous moments and amazing times along the way.

I have struggled with the realities of solo parenting. Often exhausted, wrung out, operating on a short fuse.

In the early years especially, I often felt harried and overwhelmed, like I was just about managing to keep the cogs turning , doing my best to ‘get it right', to provide enough of what my daughter wanted and needed, above all to keep her safe, whilst also attempting to keep my body, mind and soul intact.

Most of the time, I felt like I was falling short.

I found myself comparing myself to other parents who seemed to know what they were doing, who looked happy and confident. I never felt I measured up. I judged myself harshly for not being the parent I thought I'd be or wanted to be and i felt judged. I certainly didn't feel like I was righting the wrongs of my own childhood. I was unable to reach out and ask for help because I didn’t know how to, what to say, what to ask for, what i needed. I didn’t understand these difficult feelings i was experiencing and i felt ashamed of them.

Luckily I had some very good friends who i could speak to honestly about the struggles of being a single parent with no judgement but i still felt like a trainwreck inside

Repeating the patterns of the past

What I didn't understand then was how much my own mostly loving but choatic and at times traumatic, childhood, had left me with a lot of unresolved inner conflict and confusion which was affecting the way i was showing up in the world, and was impacting on my ability to be the mother I wanted to be.

I was caught in cycles of perfectionism, unable to look after myself properly, ie get enough rest, take time out for myself, ask for help. I suffered from social anxiety, avoidant behaviours. Numbing strategies had become my go to coping mechanisms. I was operating from a place of chronic stress and anxiety

My daughter, sensitive and intuitive as children are, was picking up on all of this. Our interactions often felt tense, like we were both walking on eggshells. I knew something needed to change, but I didn't know how to break these patterns that felt so deeply ingrained.

I wanted so badly to have a mother/daughter relationship where I could be present and receptive, where she could share and trust her ‘stuff’ with me but i realised, just like my grandmother with my mother, and my mother with me, i was unable to create the conditions for this.

Whilst life wasn’t completely awful and i was (now that i can look back with more perspective) doing a ‘good enough’ job, it most definitely didn't feel like we were living in an episode of the Waltons.

Cutting yourself some slack

When i write this i realise that so much about what we think being a good parent is, is what we are fed, by unrealistic tv famiiies, societal norms, advertising companies and businesses, looking to profit from our desire to be the best parent possible. It plays on our insecurities and the realities are so often not this lovely dreamy existence. Not enough support, rest, understanding, community and most importantly, little understanding of how our own histories, physiologies, nervous systems determine how we show up and try to live up to our own internalised ‘ideals’ of parenthood.

Discovering Conscious Connected Breathwork

I had already been working with healing modalities, talking therapy, movement, functional breathwork/pranayamas, which was wonderful for helping me find a calmer more spacious way to be but after my Mum died it felt like the time had come to find something that was going to reach in a little deeper. In some way i knew that a large part of my grief was due to not having the relationship with her that i would have liked whilst she was alive. I kept coming across Conscious Connected Breathwork and its connection to trauma release. I knew I was carrying a lot of unresolved ‘stuff’ from my early life and I felt this was what I might be looking for.

I found the training I was looking for (EvolveBreathBody) and I dove into it whole heartedly. Very quickly things began to shift. I started understanding and connecting to parts of myself that i had never gotten close to with talking therapy.

NB: Without absolute trust in the safety of the container one is being held in, there's simply no chance for the nervous system to feel and heal.

This training offered that container and within it, my body, supported by my breath, revealed what I had been holding onto for all those years. The moreI learned to trust the space and the holding, the more my system was able to process.

I began to understand why certain patterns kept showing up. This work quickly took me right to the root of some of the most difficult times in my life. I was able to meet and let go of the anger, pain, and grief that had been residing there for decades

So, what actually shifted?

I started to understand what a dysregulated nervous system meant in my body and how it was showing up in my daily life. It was a revelation and a relief to know that i wasn’t broken, i was just easily triggered into old nervous system patterns that i was not able to move out of quickly. Through the work we were doing i was able to

• Release stored trauma and tension that was keeping me stuck in survival mode

• Develop an understanding of nervous system regulation and accompanying practises that help me respond rather than react

• Connect with my body's wisdom trusting it’s messages over the ruminations of my anxious mind

• Understand what self compassion actually feels like and put it in place of harsh self judgment

• Look honestly at unhelpful coping mechanisms and have more agency over them

  This is experiential work. It is not so easy (in my experience) to talk this kind of healing into being., For me, feeling fully into what is present, allowing it’s expression through my body and integrating it have been the key to so much personal transformation

Self Care

The functional breathwork patterns remain an important part of my daily practice, while Conscious Connected Breathwork and embodiment have become my trusty allies, practices I return to again and again

Sea swimming, walking in nature, good food, saunas, being in good company are some of the other things i love to do and i take any opportunity i can to spend good time with my daughter.

These days i feel more firmly planted in my own centre. I'm not so hung up on 'getting it right' and can trust myself to create space, listen to my own wisdom, and find the right support when I need it. I do have a fantastic mentor and support network of wonderful people who I can safely explore ideas, thoughts and experiences with.

I'm always deepening my understanding of nervous system healing, and at present my intuition is leading me toward exploring the Mother Wound, Inner child work, intergenerational trauma, attachment styles, and shadow work… that’ll keep me busy for a while!

Here and Now

So getting back to this morning’s breakfast date with my daughter…

..the beautiful thing about this work is that healing doesn't happen in isolation. As I have changed, my relationship with my daughter has naturally begun to transform.

I feel i am more present, less reactive. I can hold space better for her emotions without them triggering my own. I have learnt to listen without already formulating my response or defence.

I feel that she has begun to feel safer around me as I feel safer in myself, that she can trust me with her stuff more, which means she can be more authentic with me, more open and the tension that has characterised so many of our interactions has started to lessen.

This morning has been a lovely illustration of this and shows me that change is possible and it is happening.

Change is possible

I share this not just to talk about my own journey, but because I know how isolating it feels when you're struggling with your own lived experience and subsequently your relationships with the people you love the most. How demoralising it can be to think that behaviours and patterns are so entrenched it seems unlikely they will ever change. I know now this doesn’t have to be true. Change is possible.

Your nervous system can learn new ways of being. Your body can release what it's been holding. You can develop the capacity to stay present and connected even in challenging moments

The reality

I have not miraculously become a perfectly beautific parent. There are times where old patterns resurface and i lose my cool, im a shouter, but I can recognise whats going on more quicky now and I have tools to come back to connection with myself more easily. i’m working on it

Where it’s going

This work is beautiful and deeply rewarding. Changes can happen quickly but it’s not a quick fix. With consistent practice the body/mind system starts to trust that it’s safe to go a bit deeper and to heal a little more. I have got to know myself so much better doing this work and the result is that I trust and like myself more …. and the knock on effect is that the people that matter seem to like and trust me a little bit more too

This is the most important work I've ever done for myself, for my daughter, for our future together. In reality, it ripples out to all of my relationships.

Those moments of easy connection between us are becoming more familiar now rather than rare exceptions. That feels like a great gift for both of us and I don’t take it for granted.

This is a work in progress and I am grateful to have the tools

As a caveat i would say that CC Breathwork and Embodiment has been the most transformative method for me for meeting and transforming old stories, patterns and behaviours, and have been supported by many other modalities i have taken that led me to this place including yoga, pranayama, meditation, bodywork, talking therapy, being active as much as possible ie dance, swimming, cycling etc. This is my path and i acknowledge there are many other paths to take that are equally as fruitful for people looking for meaning and meaningful change in their lives.