Meet the parents who get life coaches for their four year-olds

Busy mums and dads are turning to professionals to guide their children through their difficult early years

Back in May, Bernadette Dancy decided it was time to find a life and confidence coach. The self-confessed planner took a strategic approach: comparing their experience, qualifications and philosophies before deciding on the best fit. Not for herself, or for her sports psychologist husband Paul, 39 - but for their four-year-old son.

"Callum is an emotionally intelligent boy," explains the personal trainer, 37, from Surrey, "not afraid of showing his emotions, good and bad. But he's also a pleaser and a high achiever, which meant tantrums and emotional outbursts when he couldn't do something to the high standards he set himself. He'd started using negative affirmations about things not being good enough."