Psychodynamic Coach: Lavinia Brown

Lavinia Brown (MA Oxon) is a one-to-one coach, company gender-equality and inclusion consultant, author and speaker.

As a multi-passionate, life-long learner, she has enjoyed a portfolio career since graduating from Oxford University, that includes over 20 years as an employee of and service provider to the fine wine, corporate events, boutique hotels, merchant banking, auctioneering, luxury goods, marketing and energy drinks sectors.

Part French, Spanish, Austro-Hungarian, Scottish and English, Lavinia has lived and worked in Hong Kong, Paris, Bali, Goa, Geneva, Spain, London and Cambridge. She qualified as a life coach in 2016 whilst on a year-long, SE-Asian, travel adventure with her partner and three children, and now lives with her family on the Costa Brava in Spain.

Here she answers the Mama Sex Six:

What is the first thing that comes to mind when you hear the phrase "mama sex"?

Something a bit ‘dirty’ – like a special niche of pornography. Something curated for men’s viewing pleasure. Perhaps mothers with laundry or cleaning props in suggestive poses. Which makes me sad and ashamed that this is part of my cultural legacy.

And then there’s a personal memory of me and my partner starting to get intimate a couple of months after my first was born and my full boobs suddenly starting to squirt milk all over him.

What inspired you to work/create/advocate on the topic of "mama sex"?

I’m not sure I’m an advocate of mama sex exactly – to be totally honest, it’s an area of my life that could do with some work and my 13-year relationship with the father of my kids has been one of the biggest learning curves for both of us in terms of what intimacy and connection truly mean. Motherhood was certainly a big blip in this process but it wasn’t as big as the childhood wounds we came into the relationship with which deeply affected both of us.

What I am an unflinching, unapologetic warrior advocate for however, is mama authenticity – in the home, in the workplace, in the social arena and in the bedroom! And I believe that it is our duty as the custodians of the next generation to ensure that we are as free as we can be from the unconscious, inherited patterns that were passed down to us by our parents.

This demands a committed, courageous and rigorous exploration of our pasts which is often catalyzed by the initiation into ourselves that motherhood brings. Not only does this awaken us into our parenting potential but also into the potential we have to mother the parts of ourselves that have been buried or hidden up until this point.

Motherhood was a huge turning point for me: I started to see my unconscious patterns at play – not only in how I was parenting my first child but also in the ways in which my parents related to their granddaughter. I have been navigating this deeply painful but deeply liberating journey ever since.

In your work/practice/art, what are the biggest hurdles mothers are facing in terms of their sexuality?

The biggest hurdle I come across is their capacity for intimate connection and communication. Most of my clients have experienced childhoods in which they learnt not to trust. They were neither seen nor heard for who they really were – their needs were not met by their parents (for whatever reason) and so they had to become supremely self-sufficient (emotionally and practically).

This lead them to put up psychological armour, which has usually served them very well – they are high-achievers, praised by this patriarchal society for their capacity to do well under pressure and work independently – but it is impossible to be vulnerable at the same time. Again, this is something that is highlighted through becoming a mother.

We can’t live on an emotional desert island as well as be the open, empathetic mothers to our kids that we want to be. So, we work on re-parenting that terrified, inner child and supporting her - with love from the inside - to feel safe enough to trust others once more.

This blossoming vulnerability is what allows mothers to re-acquaint themselves with their needs, acknowledge that theirs too deserve to be met, communicate these with their partners from their heart (the bedrock for intimacy) and to be able to give and receive love once more (emotionally and physically).

What do you think society at large should know about motherhood and sexuality? And what is society getting wrong right now in regards to it?

That sexuality is part of our being. And that too many of us (me included) have been shamed out of truly owning it during our formative years so that it now feels like an ill-fitting cloak.

Motherhood just confirms that sexuality is unbecoming – it is one more nail in the coffin. And we need to fight against the archetypes that crush us (Virgin, Mother Mary, Whore) in order to relearn how to live as one in our bodies and with the earth.

The viscerality of birth is an initiation into the power and aliveness of being a woman. Breastfeeding continues this trajectory. But actually this journey started well before – at menstruation. And not enough women know yet that this amazing cycle can teach us all that we need to know about our authentic, feminine power.

Society does not support women enough emotionally, financially or practically. Shamefully, we are not valued for the work that we do in an office (the gender gap shows just how much catching up there is still to do here) and we are expected to live up to an impossible archetype in the home.

There are still very few rolemodels of feminine leadership and so we find ourselves disowning our sensuality (which in my opinion, underpins our sexuality) and then become so unused to embodying it that the stretch between who we are anywhere other than in the bedroom and who we want to be when we get between the sheets is too big to breach. We are out of practice.

We live in self-made ivory towers with one member of the opposite sex and therefore place far too many expectations on this one person to fulfill all of our needs. This can hugely impact the bandwidth left available for intimacy.

When we start to outsource (especially our emotional) needs to others – I recommend that my clients find themselves a ‘wife’ in addition to their romantic partners (someone who can either intuitively hold space or willingly learn to hold space for their feelings in exactly the way that they need at any one moment) – this frees up our capacity to be there for our romantic partners. They can then drop some of the roles we have projected onto them and we can start to see them as sexually attractive once more. 

What piece of sex advice would you give mothers? Was there something you wish someone had told you?

You are allowed to say no. To understand my drive behind sex – connection/release/performance/approval. To understand the feelings of unsafety that intimacy can bring up in me and to start a gentle enquiry into where they came from instead of pushing them down. To do the work in my past around the shame I inherited from my parents around sex. That there is never any rush to do anything that doesn’t feel right. That sex is a form of intimate communication and to honour it as such. That I would never again enjoy as much sex as I did in my 20s so to make the most of it ; )

Let's amplify our voice: Who are some mamas you love following on social media?

@triciafoxmusic is a great mama artist who has just come out with a new album – she’s all about linking music to healing

@newbornstateofmind

@itsnotacrisispodcast – she is HILARIOUS

@realkindparent

@keesha____

@healingparents – very soothing and supportive as well as deeply insightful

@kaseyjones_art

Services Lavinia Offers:

Lavinia is an online psychodynamic coach that supports mothers to stop feeling anxious, guilty and angry by helping them to understand and heal their past. She offers a 3-month, one-to-one programme (which includes 24/7 online access to her) as well as 3 different self-led, e-courses.

·       Instagram: www.instagram.com/laviniabrowncoaching/

·       Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCtFSVu5DC5O2-f25L0U8rAw

·       Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/laviniabrowncoaching

·       LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/lavinia-brown/