Steady
Parenting with Borderline Personality Disorder
For: EUPD / Borderline Personality Disorder
“You are not a danger to your children. You are a parent in pain who was never taught how to carry it, and that can change.”
For press, bloggers, podcasters & reviewers
Press & partnerships
Everything you need to write about, review, interview, or link to The Steady Series, gathered in one place. Nothing here is gated and nothing needs my permission first. Take what is useful, and if you need something that isn't here, ask me at the bottom of the page.
At a glance
- Who
- Esme Hartley, author of The Steady Series. A pen name.
- Writes about
- Parenting while living with EUPD/BPD, Complex PTSD, or ADHD. Also PMDD, and the partners who support someone carrying one of these.
- Perspective
- Lived experience, not clinical. A parent who went looking for these books and could not find them.
- Based
- United Kingdom. Writes for UK and US readers, and covers NHS pathways in detail.
- Books
- Five, on Amazon in Kindle and paperback, UK and US.
- Contact
- esme@esmehartley.com
- Link to
- esmehartley.com
Bios, paste-ready
Three lengths. Use whichever fits, edited however you like.
One line
Esme Hartley writes The Steady Series, honest, lived-experience guides for parents raising children while living with EUPD, Complex PTSD, or ADHD.
Short, about 40 words
Esme Hartley is the author of The Steady Series, written under a pen name to protect her children's privacy. A parent, not a clinician, she writes the warm, practical books on parenting with EUPD, Complex PTSD, and ADHD that she once needed and couldn't find.
Medium, about 90 words
Esme Hartley writes The Steady Series: lived-experience guides for the parents who love hardest and struggle most. Each book takes one of the things a parent might carry, EUPD (Borderline Personality Disorder), Complex PTSD, or ADHD, and meets it without flinching and without shame, then hands over a real, practical toolkit. She writes under a pen name to protect her children, and from the conviction that you don't have to be fixed, calm, or perfect to raise a secure, happy child, you have to keep coming back.
Links block, for a byline or show notes
Website: https://esmehartley.com
Free pocket guide: https://esmehartley.com/free
The books: https://esmehartley.com/#books
Contact: esme@esmehartley.com
About the pen name, and why there is no photograph
Esme Hartley is a pen name. The books draw on real experience of parenting with a mental illness, and the children in that story did not choose to be written about. The name protects them.
That means there is no headshot and no author photograph, and there won't be one. If your format needs an image, the book covers and series graphics below work well, and plenty of shows have run an interview with cover art in place of a face. Voice-only interviews are fine. So are written questions.
If it is useful to your piece, the decision itself is worth writing about, and I am happy to talk about it on the record.
The books
Cover images below are free to use in any piece about the books. Right-click to save, or ask me for higher resolution.
Grounded
Parenting with Complex PTSD
For: Complex PTSD (C-PTSD)
“You are not the people who hurt you. And your past does not get the final word.”
Present
Parenting with ADHD
For: ADHD
“You are not lazy. You never were. You have a brain built for a different world, doing the hardest, most relentless job there is.”
Steadfast
Loving and Supporting a Partner with EUPD, Complex PTSD, or ADHD
For: For partners
“For the person who stays. Loving someone who carries something heavy is one of the most generous, and hardest, things a person can do. And almost no one sees how much it costs you.”
The Waiting Room
Surviving the Wait for an NHS ADHD or Autism Assessment
For: UK · ADHD & autism assessment
“You have been left in a queue that can run for years, often after a lifetime of being told you were fine. You are allowed to find that hard. This book shows you the moves that make the wait shorter where they can, and more survivable where they cannot.”
If you are linking for your readers rather than to a shop, the book pages on this site are the more useful destination. They carry the full description, what is inside, and the correct edition for whichever country the reader is in.
What I can offer you
A review copy
Any book in the series, in whichever format suits you. Tell me where you review and I'll send it over. No conditions attached, and no expectation of a positive review.
An original article for your site
Written fresh for your readers, not a reprint of something already on my site. Twelve angles are listed below, or tell me what your audience actually needs and I'll write to that.
A podcast or interview
Voice only, or written questions if that suits your format better. The pen name means no photographs and no face, which most shows find easier than they expect.
A quote for something you're writing
On parenting with a mental illness, the rupture and repair idea, NHS waits and Right to Choose, or the stigma around personality disorder diagnoses. I answer journalist queries quickly.
A resource-page listing
If you keep a page of recommended reading or support for parents, I'd be glad to be on it. The free tools below are usually the more useful thing to list.
Talking points
The six things I can speak to properly, for an interview, a panel, or a quote.
Rupture and repair
Secure parents are genuinely in tune with their children only about a third of the time. It is the repair afterwards that builds security, not the getting it right. This is the single most freeing idea for a struggling parent, and almost nobody has heard it.
You can heal and parent at the same time
There is no waiting room. Parents are routinely told, or tell themselves, that they have to be well before they can be good at this. They don't.
The stigma costs lives
Untreatable. Manipulative. Dangerous parent. None of it is true, and the fear of being seen that way is what stops people asking for help.
Breaking the cycle
Intergenerational trauma ends with the parent who learns to regulate and repair. That is a practical skill, not a personality.
The partner's hidden load
Supporting someone who carries something heavy is invisible, generous, exhausting work, and almost no one names the cost. Steadfast does.
Why a pen name
Protecting children's privacy when you write publicly about your own mental health. An ethical choice rather than a marketing one, and a question worth asking any writer who does this.
Articles I can write for you
Each one is written fresh for your site, not reprinted from my own. Pick an angle, or tell me what your readers need and I'll write to that instead.
- You Don't Have to Be a Perfect Parent: The Science of Rupture and Repairgentle and general parenting
- What I Wish People Understood About Parenting with Borderline Personality Disordermental health, BPD advocacy
- Loving Someone with BPD Without Losing Yourselfrelationships, couples
- Emotional Flashbacks: The Trauma Symptom No One Warned Me Abouttrauma, CPTSD
- The Invisible Mental Load of ADHD MotherhoodADHD, parenting
- How to Break the Cycle of Generational Trauma Without Being Perfectparenting, psychology
- Five DBT Skills That Got Me Through the Hardest Parenting Momentswellness, self-help
- Newly Diagnosed with BPD as a Parent? Start Herenewly-diagnosed support
- Rejection Sensitive Dysphoria: When “No, Mummy” Feels Like a Knifeneurodivergent parenting
- Why I Write About Motherhood and Mental Illness Under a Pen Namewriting, memoir
- The Difference Between a Hard Relationship and an Unsafe Onerelationships, abuse-aware
- Wounded People Can Be Wonderful Parentsinspirational, parenting
Free things your readers can use today
These are usually more useful to a reader than a book recommendation, and they are the easiest thing on the site to link to. They run entirely in the browser. No account, no sign-up, and nothing is sent to a server or stored by me.
PMDD symptom tracker
Two cycles of daily scoring, which is the one thing a GP needs to see before diagnosing PMDD. Prints to a single sheet.
DBT diary card
Emotions, urges, and the skills used against them, with a rupture and repair row for parents. The first thing a DBT therapist reads.
Quiet BPD self-check
All nine criteria, shown as they are usually described and as they look turned inward. Deliberately gives no score, only notes for an appointment.
The free pocket guide
A short PDF for parents in the hard moment. Fine to offer your readers directly as a freebie.
How I work, and what I won't do
- I am a parent writing from experience, not a clinician. I don't give medical advice and I won't be presented as an expert clinician.
- No photographs, no face, and no identifying detail about my children, ever. Please don't ask for it, and please don't speculate about it in a piece.
- Every clinical or legal claim I make is sourced to a named primary document, usually by recommendation number. Ask me for the source and you'll get it.
- I won't write anything that frames a mental illness as a parenting failure, or a person as a danger to their children.
- I don't pay for links or placements, and I won't accept payment for a positive review.
- Amazon links on this site are affiliate links. See how I work for the full disclosure.
Ask me for something
For a review copy, an article, an interview, a quote, or anything the page hasn't covered. It comes straight to me and I read every one myself. You can also just email esme@esmehartley.com if that's easier.
If you came to this page because you are struggling rather than writing, please go to Resources & support. Samaritans are free on 116 123, any time, for any reason.