Marian Tompson and Isabelle Fox Awarded Lifetime Achievement Awards
"Earlier this month at the LLL Kentucky/Tennessee and Attachment Parenting Conference I was surprised with the presentation of a Lifetime Achievement Award given to me by Attachment Parenting International. As I thanked Barbara Nicholson and Lysa Parker on behalf of the Founders it occurred to me that all LLLeaders are really Founders of the unique contribution you each bring to all that LLL stands for and is able to accomplish. So I accepted the Award in your names too." ~ Marian Tompson, recipient of a Lifetime Achievement Award from Attachment Parenting International, November 2019.
2019 Lifetime Achievement Awards were presented by API cofounders Barbara Nicholson and Lysa Parker to Dr. Isabelle Fox and Marian Tompson.
Dr. Isabelle Fox has degrees from Radcliffe College and University of California Los Angeles, and is a retired clinical psychotherapist who specialized in child development for more than 30 years, an associate of Western Psychological Center, Encino, California, and was Senior Mental Health consultant for Operation Head Start in San Fernando Valley (1965-1975). She has a husband, 3 children, and 7 grandchildren. She was a stay-at-home parent for 10 years, wrote the book, "The Importance of Being There: The Benefits of a Stay-At-Home Parent," along with many others, such as The Prospective Spouse Checklist: Evaluating Your Potential Partner, Growing Up: Attachment Parenting from Kindergarten to College, Sex Is Not Enough: The Do's and Don'ts of Spouse Selection: How to Search - Who to Marry with husband Robert, and continues to support families in challenging situations. Read Dr. Fox's beautiful response.
Marian Tompson, one of the Founders of La Leche League International, was its President for 24 years. Wife of the late Clement Tompson, she is the mother of seven children, grandmother of 17 and great grandmother of fourteen.
Marian was the first editor of the LLL Newsletter, now Breastfeeding Today. She started the library of breastfeeding research that became the Center for Breastfeeding Information. She initiated breastfeeding seminars for physicians, which were held annually by LLLI from 1973 through 2008 and were eventually accredited for continuing education credits by all the major medical organizations.
In 2001 Marian founded AnotherLook, a not for profit organization dedicated to gathering information, raising critical questions and stimulating needed research about breastfeeding in the context of HIV/AIDS. With their mission achieved and the needed research done, AnotherLook closed its doors in 2011. HIV+ mothers who previously were told not to breastfeed are now encouraged to exclusively breastfeed for the first six months and to continue breastfeeding as additional foods are added.
Marian serves on the International Advisory Council for WABA (the World Alliance for Breastfeeding Action and the LLLI Board of Directors and continues to speak at Conferences around the world. Marian was the first Living Treasure named by Mothering Magazine and in 1999 received the Ethical Humanist Award from the New York Society for Ethical Culture.
Her memoir, Passionate Journey: My Unexpected Life, was published by Hale Publishing in 2011.
