Over 200
NCT students attended their graduation at University of Bedfordshire on 21
November 2012. The day was hosted by the Vice-Chancellor of the university and
marked the graduation of all students that studied in the Health and Social
Science Faculty at the university. This included 226 NCT students, many of
these graduates will go on to be practitioners for NCT helping to deliver
high quality services to parents.
Of these
graduates was Megan Stephenson, who gained her diploma of HE Breastfeeding
Counselling.
We asked
Megan to write about recently qualifying as a breastfeeding counsellor. She
thought that these extracts from the last essay she wrote for her diploma would
be a good illustration of the impact of her training.
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Extracts from "What have you learned about yourself during your training?"
My
role as a breastfeeding counsellor is as a supportive outsider empowering
parents to make the best decisions they can for their families by giving the knowledge
they need to do that. At the same time, if parents have decided that the
solution to a problem is to feed their baby artificially then, whilst I can
attempt to find alternative solutions with them the decision is ultimately
theirs, and once they have made it, it is my role to support them. I suspect
that at the start of my training I would have found that role incompatible with
my feelings about formula milk. I have dealt with this dissonance by separating
my feelings about marketing tactics used by formula manufacturers with my
feelings about the milk itself.
The
process of understanding more about myself ... has actually changed me, knowing
about it has changed what it is. This is how feedback works - being given
constructive feedback means that not only are we aware of how we are perceived
but we can change and improve our practice. It is therefore vital that, in all
aspects of the role, I seek out feedback from clients.
When
I began the training, I imagined breastfeeding counselling taking a small,
voluntary, part of my time. During the time I have been training, the NCT has
changed its relationship with counsellors, bringing in tuition fees, and
creating relationships with other organisations, such as Baby Café, so that the
role is now perceived as comprising a larger paid component than was the case
previously. Since my personal circumstances have also changed during the time
of my training, I am looking forward to making the role as full-time as I can
manage to fit around my children's school hours. Being paid will be welcome in
this time of austerity.
This
course has impacted on many different aspects of my life - my relationships
with my family, my view of myself and my fit within a local community of
parents. If I met myself from five years ago I think I'd recognise myself, and
my counselling training would mean that I wouldn't try to argue with myself,
but I think we wouldn't agree on everything.
If
reading this has inspired you to train with the NCT to support parents in their
journey, take a look at NCT College http://www.nct.org.uk/nct-college
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