Mother-infant sleep is surprisingly complex, yet professionals are often given simplified guidance that fails to consider infant biology, maternal mental health, and stress physiology. When infants do not sleep, crying increases, maternal stress rises, and risk for depression grows.

This session explores how infant characteristics, maternal mental health, and feeding practices interact to shape sleep outcomes. Dr. Kendall-Tackett examines how certain sleep recommendations unintentionally increase maternal fatigue, undermine breastfeeding, and contribute to emotional distress, while also offering practical considerations for supporting families experiencing extreme exhaustion.

Session Format: Presentation plus live Q&A

Sleep coaches often encounter parents who understand what to do but struggle to follow through due to exhaustion, stress, and dysregulation. This session reframes follow-through not as a motivation problem, but as an occupational performance challenge shaped by nervous system load, executive function, attachment needs, and real-life demands.

Participants will gain practical, strengths-based tools to support families in ways that match their capacity, reduce overwhelm, and create sustainable change.

Session Format: Presentation plus live Q&A

Supporting the Anxious, Over-Informed Parent: Staying Grounded & Effective with Clients Who Feel Overwhelmed by the Pressure to “Get It Right”. Today’s parents often arrive deeply informed yet highly anxious after consuming endless advice, conflicting research, and strong opinions about what is “best.” In this session, Nelia DeAmaral helps sleep professionals better understand the psychology of the over-informed, perfection-driven parent who feels immense pressure to make the “right” decision at every turn.

Participants will gain strength-based coaching tools to effectively support parents stuck in anxiety loops, second-guessing, and fear of getting it wrong. Nelia will also share therapist-informed strategies to help professionals stay grounded and regulated when client anxiety becomes activating or emotionally charged. This session equips sleep coaches with practical skills to support overwhelmed families with clarity, confidence, and calm leadership without stepping outside scope.

Learning Objectives

• Getting to know and really understand the anxious over-informed parent
• Gain strength-based coaching tools to effectively work with the parent stuck in the anxious "get it right" loop
• Learn key skills from a seasoned therapist on how to stay grounded and effective when we get activated while supporting these clients

About Nelia DeAmaral:

Nelia DeAmaral is a Registered Psychotherapist and an approved Brainspotting Consultant in private practice in the Greater Toronto Area. In addition to her clinical work, she provides consultation, training, and supervision to therapists and other helping professionals. As a former birth & perinatal professional for over 13 years, she has extensive expertise supporting clients during pregnancy and parenting.

Nelia works from an integrative, attachment-oriented lens, incorporating somatic practices, Brainspotting, and practical tools to support clients and professionals in becoming more balanced, grounded, and effective. She also specializes in working with neurodivergent clients.

She has developed innovative programs for clients and professionals that integrate metaphor, writing, and community-building as pathways for growth and healing. These include Emerging Mothers, offered throughout Ontario, and From Pointer to Pen, which weaves reflective writing and Brainspotting to help professionals and clients cultivate clarity, embodied presence, and greater effectiveness. Nelia also serves as the Fiction and Creative Nonfiction Editor for Bone to Brain, an international journal of healing.

In this session, Kaili Ets introduces the Rooted in Regulation Map, an integrative framework designed to help professionals understand how nervous system capacity influences sleep, feeding, movement, emotional regulation, and early development. Rather than focusing solely on surface behaviors, this model invites us to consider how system load, sensory processing, body tension, oral-motor coordination, and relational context shape a child’s ability to rest, feed, move, and connect with ease.

Using the metaphor of a tree, branches (visible concerns), trunk (integrated body systems), and roots (safety, embodiment, rhythm), Kaili offers a compassionate, capacity-based lens that supports clearer clinical reasoning. Participants will gain practical insight into how reducing effort and supporting foundational regulatory conditions can create more sustainable change, while remaining within scope of practice.

Learning Objectives

By the end of this session, participants will be able to:

• Explain the core components of the Rooted in Regulation Map, including the relationship between branches, trunk systems, and roots.
• Analyze how nervous system load and regulatory capacity influence common presenting concerns such as sleep disruption, feeding challenges, movement differences, emotional reactivity, and early play/language development.
• Differentiate between behavior-based interpretations and capacity-based interpretations when assessing infant and toddler challenges.
• Identify contributing trunk-level factors (e.g., body structure, oral-motor/digestive coordination, sensory processing, relational/environmental context) that may increase system load.
• Apply a regulation-informed lens to case scenarios to select supportive conditions that reduce effort and enhance regulatory capacity within scope of practice.

 About Kaili Ets

Kaili Ets is a Certified Baby-Led Sleep & Wellbeing Specialist™, entrepreneur, digital educator, and mother of two. Her professional work is rooted in a deep commitment to supporting infants, young children, and their families with thoughtful, developmentally informed care.

 With training in infant development and sensory processing, Kaili provides a holistic, attachment-informed, and evidence-based approach to sleep and wellbeing without relying on traditional sleep training methods. She works closely with families to improve sleep while also considering the broader context of regulation, nervous system function, feeding, movement, and overall wellness.

 Kaili is passionate about natural wellness and low-toxin living, and she integrates these principles into her work in a balanced and practical way. Her mission is to help parents feel confident, informed, and supported as they navigate early childhood, reducing overwhelm and empowering families to build healthy foundations for lifelong wellbeing.

This workshop explores how coaches can work ethically and confidently with families across cultures and borders, balancing respect for diverse practices with professional responsibility. Real-world examples from caregiving and sleep support will be used to highlight common challenges and practical ways to stay grounded in complex global work.

This live experiential session supports the nervous system of the helping professional. Through simple practices, participants strengthen attention, presence, and regulation, key foundations for effective listening, communication, and support.

Session Format: Live engagement session