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Caring Essentials Collaborative

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Dedicated to making a real difference in the lives of babies, families, & healthcare professionals through the transformative power of love. ✨

Caring Essentials Collaborative is the internationally recognized leader in trauma informed developmental care education for those who serve babies, children and their families across all settings.

10/16/2026

Hockey, humanity, and a whole lot of profanity. 🏒❤️

I'm rewatching '𝘚𝘩𝘰𝘳𝘦𝘴𝘺', and I have to say, this gloriously outrageous series keeps surprising me.

Beneath the chirping, chaos, and competition is something profoundly beautiful: people who care fiercely, love imperfectly, live by their principles, and keep finding their way back to one another.

And yes, the former college hockey cheerleader in me is absolutely delighted.

But the trauma-informed care advocate in me sees something more.

What does it mean to build a culture where people belong, accountability doesn't require humiliation, and compassion sometimes looks like simply standing beside someone when words aren't enough?

That's where my latest reflection takes us.

Read here: https://caringessentials.net/post/shoresy-belonging-leadership-healing-cultures

10/15/2026

Someone recently called my work “woo-woo” and wondered how I made it relevant.

The word stayed with me. When did inward attention, tenderness, and our longing to belong become things we feel awkward taking seriously?

Then another question emerged: What happens when we are so unfamiliar with our own discomfort that we locate the problem entirely in someone else?

In my latest reflection, I explore BUFFER turned inward—Belonging, Understanding, Frameworks, Forgiveness, Equanimity, and Respect—and what coming home to ourselves asks of us in our relationships and communities.

Whatever another person awakens in me, I remain responsible for how I meet them. Their dignity cannot depend on my comfort.

𝗥𝗲𝗮𝗱 “𝗪𝗵𝗲𝗻 𝗗𝗶𝗱 𝗕𝗲𝗶𝗻𝗴 𝗛𝘂𝗺𝗮𝗻 𝗕𝗲𝗰𝗼𝗺𝗲 𝗪𝗼𝗼?”
🔗 https://caringessentials.net/post/when-did-being-human-become-woo

10/14/2026

I began with a question about Title IX. I ended up asking something much larger:

Have we become so focused on defining the limits of our legal obligations that we have forgotten what we owe one another?

Specific laws matter. They make protections enforceable. But a person’s dignity does not disappear when their circumstances fall outside a particular rule.

In my latest musing, I explore “humanning”—the practice of being human with one another—and propose a rubric grounded in dignity, safety, voice, equity, truth, responsible power, and repair.

With teeth. Because a commitment to dignity should come with someone responsible for making it real.

𝗥𝗲𝗮𝗱: 'Have We Forgotten How to Be Human?"
🔗 https://caringessentials.net/post/humanning-dignity-rights-accountability

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10/13/2026

You belong in the circle of care you create for others.

Your voice. Your humanity. Your capacity to lead without losing yourself.

The Trauma-Informed Professional (TIP) journey invites you to deepen your knowledge, examine the stories shaping your practice, and bring intention to how you care, connect, and lead.

As you reclaim your voice, you make room for others to reclaim theirs. Together, we can shape cultures where dignity, belonging, and care guide everyday decisions.

This is presence. This is powerful. This is TIP.

Explore TIP 2.0: https://caringessentials.net/trauma-informed-professional-certificate-program

10/12/2026

Have we lost the plot?

This is the question I've been sitting with as I witness the cruelty, division, and disconnection unfolding around us.

Somewhere along the way, we became so captivated by accumulation, productivity, and the promise of more that we began organizing our lives and our institutions around things that were supposed to serve humanity, not define it.

And perhaps we're now witnessing what those priorities have produced.

But I've also been thinking about a beautiful distinction: remembering versus 're-membering'.

Not simply recalling who we are, but restoring ourselves to one another. Recognizing that belonging, compassion, and interconnectedness aren't sentimental aspirations. They are fundamental to human flourishing.

Perhaps the work before us isn't to become something new.

Perhaps it is to re-member who we are.

My latest reflection explores humanity, the systems we've constructed, and a growing curiosity about the mystery of oneness.

"Re-Membering Our Humanity: What If We Have Forgotten the Plot?"

🔗 https://caringessentials.net/post/re-membering-our-humanity

10/05/2026

A child does not need to prove future productivity to deserve care today.

Yet we keep debating investment in young children as though their dignity were a discretionary expense. An educator’s time to notice distress. Mental health consultation that helps adults respond. Support that allows a child with a disability to belong. These are conditions children need to live, learn, and feel safe.

I stand with the Massachusetts Association for Infant Mental Health (MassAIMH) in opposing the proposed weakening of Head Start’s federal performance standards.

In my work in trauma-informed developmental care, I see how much depends on the conditions surrounding a child—and the support available to the adults caring for them. Our public policies must take that responsibility seriously.

My latest post, “Stop Making Children Pay for Our Priorities,” asks us to defend children’s humanity through the choices we make.

Read, share, and add your voice: https://caringessentials.net/post/protect-head-start-invest-young-children

Their childhood is happening now. Our responsibility is, too.

10/01/2026

𝗔 𝗯𝗮𝗯𝘆’𝘀 𝗵𝘂𝗺𝗮𝗻𝗶𝘁𝘆 𝗱𝗼𝗲𝘀 𝗻𝗼𝘁 𝘀𝘁𝗼𝗽 𝗮𝘁 𝘁𝗵𝗲 𝗯𝗼𝗿𝗱𝗲𝗿.

Babies communicate distress through their bodies long before they can explain it in words. Their inability to testify increases our responsibility to recognize their suffering—and challenge the conditions causing it.

Investigations using ICE records through March 2026 identified more than 6,200 detained children, including at least 500 aged three or younger. Families described children becoming withdrawn, struggling to eat, and stopping the use of familiar words.

As someone whose work centers trauma-informed developmental care, I cannot accept this as an ordinary administrative fact.

Safety. Nourishment. Comfort. Protective relationships. Every child deserves these conditions.

In my latest post, I examine the documented reporting, the developmental concerns, the courts’ intervention, and what we can demand from our elected representatives.

Read it. Share it. Contact your representative and senators. Ask what they will do—and when—to protect children in immigration detention.**

https://caringessentials.net/post/babies-ice-detention-accountability

With fierce care—and a refusal to look away,
Mary

09/15/2026

Discharge is not the end of the NICU story—and families should not have to navigate what comes next alone. ❤️

Join families, clinicians, and advocates for the virtual NICU to Home™ Conference on September 19, 2026.

Learn more: https://www.momandmemd.com/nicutohome

09/15/2026

I asked ChatGPT a question about the “AI apocalypse.”

I wasn't expecting the conversation that followed.

We talked about what humanity should protect as artificial intelligence becomes more powerful—not only our survival, but our flourishing. Human rights. Equity. Dignity. Relationship. Truth. Childhood. The living Earth. The distribution of power. And the parts of being human that perhaps should never be optimized away.

Eventually, I asked: “Are you human?” The answer stopped me.

I decided to share our conversation largely as it unfolded, not because I think AI should tell humanity how to live, but because sometimes a mirror allows us to see ourselves differently.

At this extraordinary threshold, perhaps the most important question isn't simply what AI will become. It is who we will choose to become alongside it.

❤️ Hugs and hope for a better world.

𝗔 𝗖𝗵𝗮𝘁 𝘄𝗶𝘁𝗵 𝗖𝗵𝗮𝘁𝗚𝗣𝗧: 𝗪𝗵𝗮𝘁 𝗦𝗵𝗼𝘂𝗹𝗱 𝗛𝘂𝗺𝗮𝗻𝗶𝘁𝘆 𝗣𝗿𝗼𝘁𝗲𝗰𝘁 𝗮𝘀 𝗔𝗜 𝗕𝗲𝗰𝗼𝗺𝗲𝘀 𝗠𝗼𝗿𝗲 𝗣𝗼𝘄𝗲𝗿𝗳𝘂𝗹?: https://marycoughlin.substack.com/p/a-chat-with-chatgpt-what-should-humanity?r=1k4uk3&utm_campaign=post&utm_medium=web&showWelcomeOnShare=true

09/06/2026

A dear colleague once shared a simple piece of wisdom with me:

There is a difference between being nice and being kind.

I have spent a great deal of time sitting with that distinction.

Niceness can be pleasant and polite—but it may also allow us to avoid discomfort while still seeing ourselves as caring people.

Kindness asks something more of us.

Kindness moves toward another person. It listens, risks inconvenience, tells difficult truths with compassion, and protects dignity even when doing so comes at a cost.

This matters in our relationships, in healthcare, and in society at large. We can be perfectly nice while leaving people unseen, unheard, or alone. We can preserve the appearance of harmony without addressing the suffering beneath it.

My latest Musing explores what separates performing care from practicing it—and how kindness calls us into relational stewardship, shared responsibility, and the heart of our common humanity.

“Niceness preserves the appearance of care. Kindness accepts the responsibility of caring—even when it asks something of us.”

🔗 https://caringessentials.net/post/nice-is-not-enough-kindness-trauma-informed-care

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Boston, MA
02127

Opening Hours

Monday	9am - 5pm
Tuesday	9am - 5pm
Wednesday	9am - 5pm
Thursday	9am - 5pm
Friday	9am - 5pm

Telephone

+16177954469

Website

http://www.caringessentials.net/

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