Part 1: What Wildlife Journalism Taught Me About My Kids
A wildlife journalist turned parent shares 4 observation techniques from the field that transformed how she reads her children's behaviour, before the meltdown hits.

If you've watched your child lose control and cried afterwards, this is for you. A honest letter about what shifts when the conditions change, and what's waiting on the other side.
When the world feels overwhelming, one conversation in a playground shifted everything. A reflection on privilege, guilt, and the serious work of raising good humans in uncertain times.
Nature is good for kids, but how we show up matters more than where we go. Discover Nature-led Parenting and the small, everyday moments that calm children, restore attention, and bring families closer together.
Every transformation needs a track to run on. Mine is a 4km loop through the mountains of Asturias that I've walked in every season, every mood and every version of myself — with babies on my back, dogs dragging me round, and more recently with an ACT course in my ears and orchids on the verge. This is about how a familiar route becomes a growth practice, why the landscape matters less than you think, and the question that lives with me every time I walk it. Plus an excerpt from my book No Paradise with Wolves — where the Loop began.

I spent a decade as a wildlife journalist documenting how environments shape behaviour — from Peregrine Falcons in Chicago, to otter families in Singapore, the return of wildlife to the Chernobyl Exclusion Zone to the return of wildlife to our finca in Asturias. Then I had children.
And I realised I'd been studying parenting all along.
The same principle that restores ecosystems restores families. You don't force change, you restore the conditions.
That insight became The Wild Shift™.
Wildlife journalist — BBC Wildlife, National Geographic, Geographical
Author of No Paradise with Wolves (Earth Books, 2025)
Founder of The Wild Shift™ and the ROOTS Framework™ — a nature-led parenting methodology for parents of children aged 10 and under.
A weekly note for parents who want to understand their children more deeply — and change the conditions, not the behaviour.
Real stories.
Small shifts that actually work.
Backed by science.
Every week I share one idea, one story or one shift that helps family life feel steadier — rooted in nature, grounded in science, tested in real life.
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