Announcing NURTURING PEACE, the latest online issue of The Attached Family. Read one post or all. Share what inspires you with your friends and family.

Features in this issue center on nurturing peace within, in the home and for the world:
+ Conscious living
+ How to talk to our children about world tragedies
+ The dynamic of disappearing dads
+ ACEs -- what are they, and why you should care

Featuring AP activist LISA REAGAN, humanitarian TAMARA BRENNAN, author MERYN CALLANDER, journalist JANE STEVENS

Is world peace possible? When we talk about the potential for Attachment Parenting to change the world, we are referring to a ripple effect: Our children growing up to be compassionate and empathic, becoming parents who foster secure attachments with their children, whose children then grow up to repeat the cycle of peaceful living in and out of the home.

API Leader and mother of 3, Rita Brhel explains on API's blog how Attachment Parenting presents a very real path to peace -- within, in the home and for the world.

"We found that greater levels of cumulative stress during childhood and adolescence predicted lower reward-related ventral striatum activity in adulthood," said study lead author Jamie Hanson, a postdoctoral researcher at Duke's Center for Child and Family Policy and the Duke Department of Psychology and Neuroscience.

3. Shaming photos

"Child shaming online seems to be all the rage, but this practice can have devastating effects on kids in the short and long term. Not only does shaming violate trust between parents and children, it may cause post-traumatic stress disorder, depression and anxiety later in life."

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API Board Member, Darcia Narvaez, issues a challenge with respect to society's fascination with "grit" as we dig into our AP Month 2015 discussion on "Parental Presence: Birthing Families, Strengthening Society."

"In the century since he wrote, I believe it has only gotten worse. We are inundated with images and discourse that assumes that toughness-without-tenderness is part of being masculine. Women are trying to validate themselves with this same notion as they are told to abandon putting family first and put their primary focus on work and getting ahead.

A parent's choice to balance working outside the home with prioritizing the child's attachment needs -- which very much includes presence -- is not so much a choice in lifestyle as it is CRITICAL to a child's healthy development. And API thanks all of the partners and sponsors of AP Month for supporting parental presence.

"October is Attachment Parenting Month, and Johnson said her organization is highlighting the importance of parental presence in the life of a young child. Increasing access to paid leave is part of their effort to enable parents to shape the life of their child and nurture the bond that will benefit them both as the child ages.

Beginning this year, federal employees were given the right to take six weeks of paid leave when they became parents. California, New Jersey and Rhode Island have paid family-leave programs.

It's hard not to over-schedule our children. They are so many classes, teams and other activities offered at younger and younger ages. As parents, we believe that our children will benefit by becoming involved in a wide range of endeavors, mastering as many of them as possible. Perhaps, we say, our children can find their talents early and have the opportunity to develop their skills sets -- and self-confidence -- sooner tha we did ourselves.

On occasion, we see a post circulating the Web about the cash-value of stay-at-home parents if they were paid the going rate for their hours "on the clock" and for the multiple, often-simultaneous roles they play, from "facilities manager" and "counselor" to "janitor" and "teacher." According to one such post at Salary.com, the average stay-at-home parent is worth an annual salary of nearly $113,000.

NASHVILLE, Tenn.

"Plan International (Uganda, Finland, Australia) together with Christian Weller Creative film studio have produced video recordings of Early Childhood Care and Development practices in Uganda (Tororo, Kampala and Luwero districts). The recordings were made for illustrating good early childhood care and development practices e.g. ECCD center set-ups, parenting group sessions, making nutritious meals etc. 

"Kids who are adopted have richer, more involved parents. They also have more behavior and attention problems. Why?"

"One clue might be attachment theory, which holds that a strong bond with at least one nurturing adult—usually the mother—is essential to a child thriving."

Today is the day! Kim John Payne is speaking on "Simplicity Parenting" tonight at 9:00 pm EST/6:00 pm PST during a special API Live teleseminar as part of the 2015 Attachment Parenting Month: "Parental Presence: Birthing Families, Strenthening Society" -- helping families worldwide put in practice what we know is critical for investing in early secure attachment.

"Thus, extrapolating from trajectory data to absolute levels of IQ and concluding that breastfeeding has no impact on IQ is just plain wrong (let alone ignoring the wealth of articles in literature that support the conclusion that breastfeeding does increase IQ : see the most recent review: Effects of Breastfeeding on Obesity and Intelligence: Causal Insights

"Black Breastfeeding Week was created because for over 40 years there has been a gaping racial disparity in breastfeeding rates. The most recent CDC data show that 75% of white women have ever breastfed versus 58.9% of black women. The fact that racial disparity in initiation and even bigger one for duration has lingered for so long is reason enough to take 7 days to focus on the issue, but here are a few more..."

"Breastfeeding has immense health benefits for babies and their mothers," says CDC Director Dr. Tom Frieden. "More hospitals are better supporting new moms to breastfeed - every newborn should have the best possible start in life."

"According to the latest CDC report, the percentage of hospitals in the US that use the Ten Steps to Successful Breastfeeding - a standard for hospitals to support breastfeeding - increased from 29% in 2007 to 54% in 2013."

"There were no lactation rooms or dedicated spaces for breastfeeding mothers when Tara Ruby was on active duty in the Air Force from 1997 to 2001. After her first son was born, Ruby remembers ducking into empty offices and bathrooms -- anywhere she could find privacy for 20 to 30 minutes at a time to pump. That's why she was thrilled to learn about a new nursing room in the headquarters of Fort Bliss, the Army post in El Paso, Texas.

"The recent adoption of the global 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development with its target of ending all violence against children requires renewed attention to prohibiton and elimination of corporal punishment in all states.

"In this playbook you'll find tips, facts, and teachable moments to help you talk about healthy relationships with the kids in your life.

Maybe you don't think it's necessary to talk about it. We often hear, "well, I'm not violent, so I never thought to have a conversation with my kids about what a healthy relationship looks like." What's important to remember is that young people are getting messages on what to think and how to act all the time—from you, their peers, the media, other adults in their life, and more."