Transform parent brain fog into focused clarity through the research-backed REVEAL coaching model. Discover how this systematic approach helps high-achieving parents understand, adapt to, and leverage their evolving cognitive capabilities.
When Parent Brain Fog Strikes
Imagine standing in the grocery store aisle, your mind blank on what you came to buy, or organizing a playdate while wondering if you hit ‘send’ on that work email earlier—moments when your brain feels scattered despite your usual routine. These aren’t just signs of fatigue—research shows they’re evidence of your brain’s natural adaptation to parenthood (McCormack et al., 2023).
Quick Topic Links
As an engineer and executive turned parent focus coach, I created the REVEAL model when these changes challenged my own capacity for organization. REVEAL integrates evidence-based coaching approaches, combining cognitive behavioral coaching, solution-focused techniques, and positive psychology (not therapy or medical treatment), we work together to understand and adapt to these changes. The REVEAL model offers practical tools for parents experiencing typical adjustment challenges—while recognizing that some parents may benefit from additional healthcare or mental health support for clinical concerns.
My Brain Went to Mush: The Journey to REVEAL
After having my first child, despite years of optimizing complex processes and leading strategic projects, I struggled with basic mental organization. This unexpected shift led me to learn how pregnancy and parenting affect the brain. While productivity coaching strategies helped, I noticed these weren’t tailored for parents in this unique transition.
Drawing from my core values—authenticity, power of choice, learning, individuality, and independence—and blending my problem-solving expertise with coaching experience, I created REVEAL to share with other parents. This model—Relate, Educate, Validate, Empower, Adapt, and Love—reimagines ‘mom brain’ as a ‘parent brain reboot,’ treating it like a natural system upgrade: temporary slowdowns while new features come online, ultimately optimizing performance. REVEAL combines systematic problem-solving with compassionate coaching, honoring each parent’s unique journey through evidence-based strategies.
The Science Behind the ‘Parent Brain Reboot’
Ever notice how you can remember every baby-proofing hazard but blank on where you parked, or instinctively catch a falling toddler while losing track of your coffee cup? These aren’t just sleep-deprivation moments—they’re signs of your brain’s sophisticated upgrade process.
As detailed in my companion article reviewing parent brain research, these adaptations rewire emotion and memory centers (Pawluski, 2024; Pritschet et al., 2024), and the REVEAL model helps transform this frustration into growth.
The REVEAL Model: A Step-by-Step Path to Clarity
While traditional parent coaching focuses on child development and parenting skills, REVEAL helps you understand and work with your changing parent brain. Whether leading projects, managing your household, or building your career, this approach helps maintain your focus and confidence while embracing your evolving capabilities.
The REVEAL model offers a roadmap with research-backed methods for navigating the cognitive transitions of parenthood. Each component builds on the previous, creating a clear path from overwhelm to empowerment:
Relate: You’re Not Alone in Parent Brain Fog
Everything starts with connecting. When parents discover they’re not alone in experiencing these brain changes, something shifts. Research shows that social connection is crucial for adapting to significant life transitions (Conaboy, 2022; Blanchard et al., 2023), with strong social support significantly reducing parental stress and burnout.
Educate: Your Brain’s Amazing Adaptation Story
Understanding transforms frustration into curiosity. The science is clear: cognitive shifts during parenthood aren’t just normal—they’re necessary. This understanding helps release self-criticism and opens the door to growth (DiMarco, 2021).
Validate: These Changes Make Perfect Sense
With knowledge comes self-compassion. Parents can acknowledge that these changes in focus, memory, or mood aren’t failures but signs of adaptation. This validation helps release self-criticism and opens the door to growth (DiMarco, 2021; Sagui-Henson et al., 2022), with research showing how self-compassion supports adaptation to new roles.
Empower: Simple Steps to Work with Your New Parent Brain
Equipped with understanding and self-compassion, parents can act. This stage focuses on practical strategies for maintaining effectiveness at home and work. Research on coaching shows that reframing perspectives can lead to improved outcomes, particularly during significant life transitions (Grant & O’Connor, 2019; Sagui-Henson et al., 2022).
Adapt: Turn Your New Skills into Strengths
As parents develop new strategies, resilience grows. Solution-focused coaching helps develop strategies that work with your natural tendencies and evolving capabilities (Grant & Cavanagh, 2018; Kim, 2016).
Love: Embrace Your Evolving Capabilities
The journey culminates in self-acceptance. While parenthood often demands putting others first, maintaining self-care becomes more manageable when we understand and work with our evolving capabilities (DiMarco, 2021; Teti et al., 1996), as research shows self-efficacy directly impacts parenting outcomes.
Evidence-Based Coaching Tools for Enhanced Focus
Research demonstrates that evidence-based coaching effectively supports significant life transitions (Altman, 2022; Sagui-Henson et al., 2022). REVEAL integrates four proven approaches:
Cognitive Behavioral Coaching (CBC):
Reshape Your Thoughts, Reclaim Your Focus
Based on established CBC frameworks (Palmer & Williams, 2013), parents learn to reshape challenging thought patterns into supportive ones.
For example, “I can’t focus like I used to” becomes “My brain is developing new capabilities”—a perspective shift that enhances problem-solving abilities.
Solution-Focused (SF) Coaching:
Practical Solutions for Real Results
Rather than dwelling on cognitive challenges, REVEAL guides parents toward practical solutions.
For example, instead of focusing on frequently misplaced items, we develop systems that work with their evolving brain and routines (Grant & Cavanagh, 2018).
Executive Function (EF) Support:
Daily Tools to Get Things Done
REVEAL incorporates evidence-based strategies for managing cognitive load (Kluwe-Schiavon et al., 2013; Orchard et al., 2023), from time-blocking to brain-dumping techniques.
Positive Psychological Coaching:
Build on What’s Already Working
By identifying and leveraging personal strengths, parents build psychological flexibility and resilience. This approach helps them navigate daily challenges and long-term transitions (Van Zyl et al., 2020).
Conclusion: Moving Forward Together
The parent brain reboot represents one of life’s most remarkable transformations. Through REVEAL, parents gain practical tools to navigate this transition, turning cognitive adaptations into powerful assets for both home and career.
Through collaboration with mental health professionals and integrating the latest research, REVEAL aims to remain at the forefront of evidence-based parent focus coaching.
Together, we’re redefining how parents understand and work with their evolving capabilities, creating a future where every parent can embrace their brain’s remarkable journey of adaptation and growth.
Evidence-Based Parent Brain Fog Information
Click here for the references for this article, or visit our detailed parent brain coaching research list.
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- Altman, M. (2022, July 12). New research finds coaching to be on par with therapy. Psychology Today. https://www.psychologytoday.com/us/blog/evidence-based-care/202207/new-research-finds-coaching-be-par-therapy
- Blanchard, M. A., Hoebeke, Y., & Heeren, A. (2023). Parental burnout features and the family context: A temporal network approach in mothers. Journal of Family Psychology, 37(3), 398. https://doi.org/10.1037/fam0001091
- Conaboy, C. (2022). Mother brain: How neuroscience is rewriting the story of parenthood. Henry Holt and Company.
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- DiMarco, I. D. (2021). Mom brain: Proven strategies to fight the anxiety, guilt, and overwhelming emotions of motherhood-and relax into your new self. The Guilford Press.
- Grant, A. M., & Cavanagh, M. J. (2018). The solution-focused approach to coaching. The Complete Handbook of Coaching, 35-51.
- Grant, A., & O’Connor, S. (2019). A brief primer for those new to coaching research and evidence-based practice. The Coaching Psychologist, 15(1).
- Kim, P. (2016). Human maternal brain plasticity: Adaptation to parenting. New Directions for Child and Adolescent Development, 2016(153), 47-58. https://doi.org/10.1002/cad.20168
- Kluwe-Schiavon, B., Sanvicente-Vieira, B., Viola, T. W., Souza, L. S. A. E., Rigoli, M. M., Fonseca, R. P., & Grassi-Oliveira, R. (2013). Rehabilitation of executive functions: Implications and strategies. Avances en Psicología Latinoamericana, 31(1), 110-120. https://doi.org/10.12804/apl31.1.2013.08
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- McCormack, C., Callaghan, B. L., & Pawluski, J. L. (2023). It’s Time to Rebrand “Mommy Brain”. JAMA Neurology, 80(4), 335-336. https://doi.org/10.1001/jamaneurol.2023.0019
- Mitchell, A. E., Whittingham, K., Steindl, S., & Kirby, J. (2018). Feasibility and acceptability of a brief online self-compassion intervention for mothers of infants. Archives of women’s mental health, 21, 553-561.
- Orchard, E. R., Rutherford, H. J. V., Holmes, A. J., & Jamadar, S. D. (2023). Matrescence: Lifetime impact of motherhood on cognition and the brain. Trends in Cognitive Sciences, 27(10), 974. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.tics.2023.06.002
- Palmer, S., & Williams, H. (2013). Cognitive behavioral approaches. The Wiley-Blackwell Handbook of the Psychology of Coaching and Mentoring, 319-338.
- Pawluski, J. (2024). The parental brain, perinatal mental illness, and treatment: A review of key structural and functional changes. Seminars in Perinatology, 48(6), 151951. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.semperi.2023.151951
- Pritschet, L., Taylor, C. M., Cossio, D., Faskowitz, J., Santander, T., Handwerker, D. A., & Jacobs, E. G. (2024). Neuroanatomical changes observed over the course of a human pregnancy. Nature Neuroscience, 1-8. https://doi.org/10.1038/s41593-023-01601-3
Q-Z
- Sagui-Henson, S. J., Welcome Chamberlain, C. E., Smith, B. J., Li, E. J., Castro Sweet, C., & Altman, M. (2022). Understanding components of therapeutic alliance and well-being from use of a global digital mental health benefit during the COVID-19 pandemic. Journal of Technology in Behavioral Science, 7(4), 439-450. https://doi.org/10.1007/s41347-022-00263-5
- Teti, D. M., O’Connell, M. A., & Reiner, C. D. (1996). Parenting sensitivity, parental depression and child health: The mediational role of parental self‐efficacy. Early Development and Parenting: An International Journal of Research and Practice, 5(4), 237-250. https://doi.org/10.1002/edp.136
- Van Zyl, L. E., Roll, L. C., Stander, M. W., & Richter, S. (2020). Positive psychological coaching definitions and models: A systematic literature review. Frontiers in Psychology, 11, 793. https://doi.org/10.3389/fpsyg.2020.00793