One day I was talking to a friend that I see on a regular basis, every three weeks to be exact and she would often tell me stories about her little boy. After listening to her for several months one day I asked her if she knew about a personality trait called highly sensitive children and she said no. I proceeded to tell her about Doctor Elaine Aaron and her work on high sensitivity and her definition of high sensitivity and my friend said I don’t think this is describing my son. At that moment I was 99% sure her son is a highly sensitive child, but I didn’t want to push my point because it was important to me that she discover for herself when she would be ready.
About Parastoo Emami
My journey to empowering parents of highly sensitive children
Where it began
Discovering my high sensitivity
In 2019 I learned about Highly Sensitive Person (HSP) when I took a workshop by Doctor Elaine Aaron. This was a pivotal moment in my life because for the first time in my life I had a name for all the ways that I was different from the majority of people that I had come across in my lifetime. I finally understood that indeed I was unique, and this knowledge was the first step in my journey to accepting this personality trait and start loving myself exactly the way I am. Armed with this knowledge, I set out on a mission to learn more, not just for myself, but for others who might be on a similar journey.
If I met someone who I thought might be highly sensitive I asked them if they knew about a personality trait called high sensitivity? If they said no, I would explain to them what it is and would encourage them to learn more about it. I would tell them my story and how it changed my life for the better and hoped that this would inspire them to do the same. If they said yes, I would ask them to tell me about it and 9 out of 10 times their understanding was not accurate. I was really wanting to help as many people as possible, so I talked about Highly Sensitive People wherever I found it to be appropriate because in my mind even if that person was not highly sensitive maybe they had a relative, or a friend, or a colleague who was highly sensitive.
Connecting with others
Sharing my experience
Several months went by and she told me that indeed her son is a highly sensitive child. From that point forward every time we saw each other we would talk about her son, and I would share my knowledge with her and explain why her son is doing that particular thing that she was telling me about and I would give her some food for thought and some suggestions on what she could do to help her son and of course herself. One day she told me that knowing that her child is highly sensitive and getting coached on how to parent her son has helped her so much and she encouraged me to consider doing this for a living and that in her opinion this is my calling. My initial reaction was wow. I’m so happy that I was able to help, and I was able to have such a positive impact on her family’s life and it warmed my heart to know that her son is thriving now.
Embracing my calling
Becoming a mentor and coach
I thought hard about what my friend had said to me, and I decided to start coaching highly sensitive people and parents of highly sensitive children. After working with several people and seeing the profound impact I had on their lives I realized that my friend was right. This is my calling. I wanted to be a guide, a support system, and a source of inspiration for parents navigating the beautiful yet intricate landscape of raising a highly sensitive child.
I had suffered so much throughout my own childhood by parents who loved me in their own way and had good intentions but unfortunately didn’t have the knowledge or tools for raising highly sensitive children. So, I prayed to God and asked him for guidance. I asked God to give me a very clear sign that I should pursue this path. I told God that I want the sign to be so clear that there is no way I could miss it.
Expanding awareness
Building a community through podcasting
Several weeks went by and I get contacted by Ahmad via LinkedIn to talk to me about Podcasting. Now I never ever thought about having my own podcast because I’m an introvert and I’m a person of very few words. When I speak, I get to the point, and I don’t add fluff so how could I possibly come up with a 30-minute episode on a weekly basis, but my intuition said give this a chance, so I accepted Ahmad’s invitation to talk.
When Ahmad and I met I immediately knew that I had to work with him. I know my body very well and my entire body was giving me a resounding YES. Even though I knew I would work with Ahmad I still took the time to sleep on it and get back to him the next day and the rest is history. Now I’m coaching parents of highly sensitive children, I’m podcasting on this topic, and I’m building a community for parents of highly sensitive children all in the hopes that I bring awareness and acceptance to high sensitivity, and I give parents the knowledge and the tools they need to parent their highly sensitive child in a way that sets them up to thrive in life.
In the hopes that thousands of children all around the world would have a better childhood and a better adulthood then the one I experienced up until a few years ago.
I’m grateful to God for giving me the strength and courage to work through all the hardships, heal from them, and be able to turn my life around. I’m much happier, more resilient, and most importantly I love and honor myself exactly the way I am, and I see my sensitivity as my superpower.
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