Embodied Mothering : Healthy Anger and Agression

Mamas, this is your invitation to come back to your full energy and aliveness.

Here's what I know through my experience as a mum and somatic trauma therapist - when we block our anger we exhaust ourselves. Trying to be calm all the time is a recipe for burn-out and apathy.

At the same time, we absolutely want to protect our kids from scary anger we might have experienced when we were little.

I want to give you another option - a way to embody your natural anger in a way that supports your wellbeing and a healthy relationship with your kids.

In this experiential workshop I will :

• Share the three principles of embodying healthy anger

• Break down layers of guilt, fear and shame you might have from times your anger spilled out in unhealthy ways

• Lead you into ways to move this vital energy source that leave you feeling uplifted and empowered. This will involve moving and making sounds!
  

I am so looking forward to sharing these liberating understandings and practices with mums in our community so we can support each other in mothering with more energy, joy and love.

I understand that it can be vulnerable to enter a space with others where we are bringing our emotions and hearts into the mix. I encourage you to be brave! And if you have any questions about attending then I welcome you reaching out to me at chloe.waretini@gmail.com any time ❤️

MY STORY

Before becoming a mother I knew myself to be a kind and gentle person and I rarely expressed anger. Mostly I viewed anger and agression as something scary that needed to be under control so as not to hurt others. I’d say I had a pretty strong aversion to it.

Then along comes my son, who I am so deeply committed to loving for who he truly is He was born full of fight. So strong willed and intense. And from around 2 years old this manifested as frequent rage.

Now at 4 years old, his favourite way to play is to fight and wrestle. Without a good dose of it each day he is really dysregulated - demanding, uncooperative, can’t relax and settle for sleep, can only palate high carb food and wants to dissociate through watching videos.

This was so hard for me! I felt exhausted, dominated and like I just wanted to get away from him. Then one day as I was taking a moment to breathe myself back into being available to him, I had a big realisation. I was really really angry!! Angry about having zero physical space, at being ‘forced’ to play fighting games I hated, at being his favourite punching bag. And keeping this emotion contained was making me so tired.

Anger and agression are vital forces of energy within us. If we repress them, we have less energy available. And keeping that lid on the pressure cooker takes even more energy.

Does this make sense of why mums are so tired and kids have so much energy??? Would I have more energy if I let myself inhabit my agression too?

I wanted to do this in a way that wouldn’t be too frightening for Arthur so I did some research. I learned about the difference between cold anger (anger with disconnection) and warm anger (anger with connection). I started to experiment with games that we could play when I felt myself getting tense and wanting to disconnect.

As a trauma therapist, I carry the extra weight of awareness of what happens when boys who don’t have healthy channels for agression grow into men. If it can’t come out directly it will come out sideways. And as a solo mum I knew that if I didn’t embrace my own agression then I would inevitably supress his. So I was determined to get to the bottom of this!

Arthur and I have now found some seriously fun ways to connect in anger that we both enjoy. I took him as my mentor in expressing anger and now I can bring the full force of my mama rage to our play and enjoy the connection and energy boost it gives me. I don’t feel dominated anymore, I feel liberated. And definitely a bit wilder.