Tag: Parenting

Hands to Hearts Launches in Haiti

There are now 12 HHI Trainers ready to go forth and share new knowledge, skills and love with their communities in rural Haiti. These women, and men – teachers, health workers, and orphanage caregivers – spent the last 6 days sharing, studying, practicing and creating some new materials especially for the parents and babies of their communities.

HHI Trainers created this song (in Creole) to reinforce the lessons they learned.  It translates to:

“I am talking to you so you can learn how to talk.
I am showing you different things, so you can learn to think.
I am letting you move, so you can move by yourself.
I am treating you kindness, affection and with care.
Further away, you will see me the same and then you will learn to believe in yourself.
Trust me my baby, I am helping you to become strong in your body, in your brain and in your love. To become strong in your body, your brain and in your love.”

The trainers, and our colleagues from Alliance for Children Foundation and the Matenwa School, all made for a week which was not only incredibly productive and successful – but fun! See all the pics here:

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Now these trainers are ready to get to work in their communities of Kennescoff and La Gonave. Conservative estimates are that they will train approximately 1,100 – 1,500 moms, dads, orphanage staff and other caregivers – every year! Thus ensuring that thousands of babies experience: greater affection and nurturing; more talking, reading, and singing; more opportunities to learn and explore.

We are deeply thankful to the Alliance for Children Foundation for making this all possible!

 

Hands to Hearts Wows at TEDxMtHood!

It was tears, cheers and laughter from the full house at TEDxMtHood!  I’m excited to report, that I truly gave the talk of my lifetime! It took months of preparation, 40+ drafts, and more practice than I ever imagined, but it all came together and was totally worth it!

My talk, Love: a low-tech solution,” tells the story of why I created HHI, some of the trials and tribulations, and our journey from India’s orphanages to communities around the world. I ended with a challenge to all of us be more loving in our everyday lives. Love is a core human nutrient; something babies need to survive and the rest of us need to thrive. In the first 3 years, 85% of brain development occurs, and love is a critical component to building healthy brains and whole people. In our everyday actions, we can just act, or we can act with love. I’ve made a whole career about love, but I’m no expert at putting it into practice. I often act as what I say or do doesn’t matter, but nothing is further from the truth.

Love is one of the most powerful, yet underutilized tools we have to better children’s lives and our world. To learn more, I invite you to watch the video here.

Laura Peterson @ TEDxMtHood

And, when you are all full of warm and fuzzy love – please share this generously with your family, friends and co-workers.

(Photos from the day)

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Spread the word! Share your stories on Twitter and FaceBook of how being #LOVED has changed your life.

♥  ♥  ♥  ♥  ♥  ♥  ♥  ♥  ♥  ♥  ♥  ♥  ♥  ♥  ♥  ♥  ♥  ♥  ♥  ♥  ♥  

My deepest gratitude to all of those who contributed to this talk with their time and talents. Each of you has changed my life with your LOVE, thank you!

BIG thanks to: My partner and most generous supporter, Cris Apatachioae. My talk-whisperer, Cynthia Lopez. The vision, faith and relentless generosity of Jim Greenbaum. All of my colleagues at Thrive Networks, with a special thanks to Jessica Burg. My parents, Don & Roberta Peterson. My smart and talented friends and allies: Sara B. Cooper, Kristin Ohlson, Paige Jones, Julie Livingston, Kara North, Deb Burke, Miriam Garcia, Liliana Barzola Read, Theresa Pridemore, Jensine Larsen, Casey Vaverka, Ted Moeller, Katarina Krouse, Tina Hart, Michelle Jones, Mark Powers, Elicia Brandon, and Darcy Jones. Loren Podwill and his team at Bullivant Houser Bailey PC. The entire TEDxMtHood team, who’s hard work, ceaseless generosity, tech-wizardry, and organizational skills were mind-bogglingly-awesome! And the stunning stage art, created by Sabina Haque.

A Grandma Says “Thank You HHI”

In a tribal village, far down a dirt road in the rural district of Angul, Odisha, India, an HHI training was offered to all the mothers and grandmothers to join us to learn about early childhood development.  The response was fabulous, with more than 22 moms piling in, almost all had young infants, and a few had newborns snuggled close to their chests.

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The moms were excited and surprised to have a training that would offer education and support for their role as caregivers/mothers, this was a new experience for them.  HHI is unique in offering parent education and even more so because of where and how we do this, that is in extremely remote areas with few resources.  And, while this village has been raising babies for generations, none of their babies came with instruction manuals (just like the rest of the world’s babies!) and they just do the best they know how.

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They listened intently, soaking up the new information and merging it into their own knowing and practices.  It is always a joy when I get to witness an HHI training, I learn as much from the participants as they do from our trainers and the conversations that they spark with each other.

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A special surprise that I got at this training though was from this grandmother. She was a village elder, born and raised within her tribe, in this small village.  She’s seen a lot in her years and she was a wealth of knowledge.  To my delight she had come to attend HHI’s training and she moved to sit next to me in the back of the room.  I was slightly daunted, thinking, “what could HHI possibly teach her?”.  But, she was very interested in the new information and all of the activities and she leaned over and said to me (via a translator), “Thank you. Thank you for coming to our village. This education is all new to our mothers and they need this, this will make them more intelligent and our children will benefit forever.”

Wow… I was humbled and honored to know the value she saw in HHI.  Thank you grandma!

 

 

 

 

gDiapers’ LOVED Collection Benefits HHI

gDiapers just released their latest collection (and we think cutest!) and a generous portion of the proceeds support our on-going work with moms and babies in India.  The new LOVED collection was inspired our shared missions of supporting babies and their families in one of the most basic human needs – Love.

With a bold stamp of Loved, the new Love Me gPants and tees artfully declare the critical desire of our hearts. From the moment we are born we all want, and need, to be loved. But for families battling hunger, poverty and disease, it can be a struggle to provide that need, which hinders babies’ ability to thrive. A portion of each sale of the specially-designed Love Me gPants and tee will benefit Hands to Hearts International, identified by the Fetzer Institute as an “an exemplar of love”.

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Love Me gPants are a limited edition, so get yours soon! Available at gDiapers.com.

Thank you g!  We LOVE you too!!!

gLoved pant.tee

Nurturing Caregiving – Preventing Disease, Addiction, Violence and More

Nurturing relationships between children and their parent(s) or caregivers can be likened to an inoculation against the negative, lifelong problems that can develop from a childhood filled with adverse experiences.  When families are grappling with disease, violence, mental health issues, poverty, and other serious adverse experiences, children are exposed to toxic levels of stress that can have lifelong negative implications for that child and their greater community. This recent Opinion piece in the New York Times does a great job explaining this.  And it describes what HHI has been doing for almost eight years, for more than 140,000 vulnerable children around the world.

HHI has a very similar approach and results, though our program is more simplistic.  I believe that the “aha moment” that they refer to for a mother they describe, that is love awakening, and once that wakes up, nothing stays the same.

 

Protecting Children From Toxic Stress

By DAVID BORNSTEIN
 
Imagine if scientists discovered a toxic substance that increased the risks of cancer, diabetes and heart, lung and liver disease for millions of people. Something that also increased one’s risks for smoking, drug abuse, suicide, teen pregnancy, sexually transmitted disease, domestic violence and depression — and simultaneously reduced the chances of succeeding in school, performing well on a job and maintaining stable relationships? It would be comparable to hazards like lead paint, tobacco smoke and mercury. We would do everything in our power to contain it and keep it far away from children. Right?

Children can be shielded from the most damaging effects of stress if their parents are taught how to respond appropriately.

Well, there is such a thing, but it’s not a substance. It’s been called “toxic stress.”
….
However, children can be shielded from the most damaging effects of stress if their parents are taught how to respond appropriately. “One thing that is highly protective is the quality of the relationship between the parent and the child,” explains Darcy Lowell, an associate clinical professor at Yale University School of Medicine and the founder of Child First, a program based in Shelton, Conn., that has marshaled strong evidence demonstrating the ability to intervene early, at relatively low cost, to reduce the harm caused by childhood stress in extremely high-need families. “Early relationships, where adults are responsive and attentive, are able to buffer the damaging effects on the brain and body,” she says.
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By developing the ability to read a child’s cues, and by being emotionally available on a daily basis, parents can provide buffers that reduce the harmful physiological effects of high stress. “I feel like I enjoy my daughter more now,” Ana Patricia said. “And she enjoys me as a mother.”
 
Read the whole article here .