How to teach self compassion to new parents - 3 practices that bring love

If you have followed me for a while you will know how much I enjoy using hypnotherapy techniques to support parents recovery from all kinds of different perinatal trauma, anxiety and depression.

But what I love sharing, even more, is how to bring love and self compassion through stressful, anxious times or periods of low mood.

Most parents will know what this stress feels like in the first year of parenting.

It's pretty common for self doubt, worry and and the inner critic to land pretty hard BUT for parents who have been experiencing trauma symptoms for a while, then these harsh, inner conversations  can quickly and insidiously turn into an inner world dominated by self loathing, depression and overwhelm.

Throw in a difficult birth experience, lack of sleep, isolation from friends, and feeling cut off from their normal resources for coping, these early days can easily drag parents down into some dark places.

All the while trying to cope with the demands of feeding, nurturing and bonding with a baby.

Lowering stress levels by teaching deep relaxation is always the first thing that TBR Perinatal Hypnotherapists share with parents.

Once parents have a tools for self regulating then we can go deeper by introducing the concepts of mindfulness and in particular the value of practicing self compassion.

Here are my 3 favourite self compassion practices that I share with parents experiencing low mood or anxiety.

1. Heart based loving connection back to the self. This is a very simple, yet effective way of parents experiencing the feelings love, appreciation and compassion for their self. It involves asking parents to focus on their heart and generate this feeling love, and then to use their breath to allow these feelings to expand and grow. I love teaching this simple but effective way of self compassion. Once this simple technique has been mastered it can be extended for the person to receive forgiveness, acceptance and gratitude from the heart too.

2. Creating loving, compassionate affirmations that are tailored and personalised to their own inner self talk. This is where using a solution focused approach is helpful to discover what changes would occur without the negative self talk. A great question is 'when the negative self talk is gone, what is the first thing you would notice?' Their answers always produce the most wonderful compassionate affirmations.

3. Repeating these affirmations during relaxation, record and send it to them to listen to regularly, or simply them to write them out several times on paper each day or repeating them whenever they notice the negative, harsh, punitive self talk.

What I love about working with clients this way is how they instinctively know that love, self compassion and a feeling of wholeness is their natural state.

Parents also intuitively know that this self compassion will be felt by their infants too.

Parents also seem to instinctively know that showing themselves self love and compassion in the face of difficulty, stress and worry is also how they can best support their own babies and children when they struggle.

This aspect of mindfulness really is like teaching love and it is a natural state that once reminded of parents can keep returning to and sharing with their families.

There are a few more places left on the next live TBR 3 Step Rewind course happening on the 9th and 10th of December 2025. It includes the online version of the course too.

We would love to welcome you to this quiet, but powerful revolution in perinatal mental health.

Get in touch for more details.