It’s a bold title – ”Naked Parenting, 7 Keys to Raising Kids With Confidence” – but EG author Leah DeCesare’s message in her new book is not sensational. Rather, she preaches the gospel of “stripped down, honest, direct parenting.”

“Before we can parent effectively, we need to look at ourselves,” DeCesare said in a recent interview.

Take body image, for instance.

“If we’re constantly talking negatively about ourselves, it’s really hard to send the message to our kids that they should be confident about their bodies,” she said.

What matters is to start when children are young, she said, offering “age appropriate lessons all the way through childhood about respecting your body, caring for your body, that carry to decisions they make in their teens.”

The book’s subtitle speaks to that.

DeCesare said its double meaning was intentional: follow these principles and you will have children who have confidence, but also, follow these principles and you yourself will have confidence.

“I can’t cover every single thing that’s going to happen to your kids,” she said. “You can take these keys to guide you.”

DeCesare studied advertising and marketing in college but after her first child was born, she was part of a new moms group and just loved it. So much so, she got certified as a childbirth educator.

For the past 13 years, she’s been working with new moms.

Two years ago, DeCesare starting blogging – her blog’s called Mother’s Circle. The book comes as a natural outgrowth of the blog. She’d hear from past clients, those she helped when their children were born, and they were looking for help with some aspect of child rearing.

Naked Parenting, then, offers tools for the journey of parenthood, a journey DeCesare is on too. She has three children now, ages 15, 13, and 10. She found that most mom blogs focus on the early years, so her book is intended to address issues that carry all the way through.

“I do feel like that gives me a unique place to be able to address problems down the road,” she said.

What’s DeCesare’s biggest challenge as a parent?

“It’s one of the biggest challenges for everybody – we need to follow through and be consistent and find the RIGHT consequence. It’s really hard.”

DeCesare’s book is available on Amazon here. She said she was happy to visit book groups who read her book.