Brave Together Podcast: Support and Community for Caregiving Parents
This is Brave Together Podcast. On Brave Together Podcast, co-hosts Jessica Patay, Susanna Peace Lovell and Dr. Zoe Shaw, will share interviews, celebrate stories, explore challenges, and rally hope for the motherhood journey. Through this inspirational and resourceful podcast, may all caregiving parents know that they are not alone. We Are Brave Together is a global nonprofit that creates community for mothers raising children with disabilities, neurodivergence, or complex medical and mental health conditions. The heart of We Are Brave Together is to preserve and protect the mental health of caregiving moms everywhere.
Brave Together Podcast: Support and Community for Caregiving Parents
EXPERT: Parenting Fiercely Authentic Kids Starts with Changing Ourselves w/ Kirk Martin
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Hello Brave Friends! Welcome to today’s expert episode, #248, featuring Kirk Martin, a parenting educator known for his honest, practical insights on raising strong-willed children and leading with calm.
These expert episodes are conversations with professionals whose work directly supports caregiving parents. In this episode, hosts Susanna Peace Lovell and Jessica Patay talk with Kirk about the evolving landscape of parenting—and why the most powerful shift we can make is moving from controlling our children to regulating ourselves.
Together, they explore how parental anxiety often fuels controlling behaviors, why strong-willed children require a different approach than compliant ones, and how calm leadership creates safety and connection. Kirk emphasizes the importance of normalizing children’s emotions rather than correcting them, validating their experiences, and modeling emotional intelligence in everyday moments. The conversation also highlights the crucial role fathers play in breaking generational patterns and fostering secure, healthy relationships with their children.
This episode is filled with practical strategies and honest reflection, reminding us that parenting is not about perfection or performance—it’s about growth. Success as a parent is not defined by a child’s behavior, but by our willingness to lead with steadiness, self-awareness, and compassion.
Find more information about Kirk Martin and Celebrate Calming here.
Follow Kirk on Instagram here.
Find more information about Life Coach, Susanna Peace Lovell here.
Find Susanna’s book, Your True Self is Enough here.
Find our first book from We Are Brave Together here.
Find FULL episodes and clips of our podcast on Youtube here.
Brave Together is the podcast for We are Brave Together, a not-for-profit organization based in the USA. The heart of We Are Brave Together is to strengthen, encourage, inspire and validate all moms of children with disabilities and other needs in their unique journeys.
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Feel free to contact Jessica Patay via email: jpatay@wearebravetogether.org
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