Book description
As a psychotherapist, parent educator and parent coach, Alyson Schäfer
has worked with a great many mothers who, in the quest to be a
"good mother" have ended up on the door step of despair.
Alyson is a forty-something, suburbanite, working-mother of two and can
speak to these issues both personally and professionally.
This book explains the psycho-social phenomena of how each person
creates their own unique "good mother myth" and then
examines why these myths are not only faulty, but could in fact lead
to poor parenting, marital disaster and individual crisis. Her years
of educating parents around these concepts afford Alyson the skill to
take complex ideas and explain them to a lay audience in a compelling
and easy to understand way.
Capitalizing on the need to present parents with information in an
easy to digest format, the book is presented as a series of personal
stories, each highlighting a common parenting myth. This format will
appeal to tired parents who have little time and energy for
"academia". Instead, readers learn by taking a voyeuristic
peek into the private family lives of the book's characters. Readers
can identify with the fictitious parents and coaching clients in the
stories and see first hand how the characters ' life experiences
shaped their unique "good mother myths" and how these myths
create conflict in their lives.
The author offers up ideas for how the character can reject her
current thinking and adopt a more useful outlook to improve her
situation. The story arc allows readers to identify and then project
how their parenting may be unknowingly going off the rails.
The goal of this book is to provide parents with some basic education
and a means of self-discovery. Readers uncover their own good mother
myths and are given an eye-opening glimpse into potential issues to
challenge their thinking. A great sense of empowerment is restored as
mothers become better able to resist the pulls of their personal and
cultural myths, and instead begin parenting with greater intention and
in ways that are more suitable to proper child guidance.
Alyson Schäfer, BSc, MA Counseling OACCPP AAMFT
Alyson Schafer is a psychotherapist and recognized as one of Canada's
foremost parenting experts. She is the host of The Parenting
Show, a call-in advice show on Roger's Television, and the regular
guest parenting expert on CBC television's The Gill Deacon
Show. Alyson is also a Chapters' Indigo Trusted Advisor and a
popular corporate speaker for Lifespeak. Alyson is the selected
speaker for Rainbow Canada's 2007 speaker series. You can find
Alyson's advice in articles in Today's Parent, Canadian Family,
Chatelaine, Canadian Living and Readers Digest and through her
website: www. alyson. ca.
Alyson brings the age-old topic of parenting to a twenty-first
century audience of educated, enlightened and motivated parents. Her
style is fast and witty, and her information is grounded in theory and
research. Alyson educates, inspires and entertains - whether speaking
to an audience of parents, presenting workshops, or one-on- one in
private parent coaching sessions.
As a mother of two and a former nursery school teacher, Alyson brings
real life experience and passion to her work.
