CATCH’s March 12th Lunch and Learn featured Stephanie Zwilling, MSW, LCSW, Founder & Owner of Providence Farm, a sober living facility for young men in Northbrook. Stephanie addressed the importance of learning to regulate our own systems to foster better communication and connection with our children.
Learning to Regulate Your Nervous System
Our nervous system is responsible for regulating our entire body. By learning how to self-regulate we can respond to situations in a more calm, measured manner, which in turn, allows us to engage with our kids more effectively.
We are all neuro-biologically wired for connection from a very young age — we use our eyes, ears, voices, etc., to look for positive affirmations and a sense of safety from others. When kids don’t see these affirmations or feel insecure, they often respond with defensive postures and behavior (shut down, become hypersensitive, get angry, etc.).
Using Your Superpower
Parents’ “superpower” is the ability to help co-regulate our kids by modeling regulation of our own nervous systems. When we are attuned to our children’s cues and see them upset or angry, we can help to “down-regulate” them by using Playful, Accepting, Curious, Empathetic (PACE) responses. Our kids often remember how we make them feel more than what we say, so using affirmations such as a calm voice, gentle touch, eye contact, etc., fosters connection and trust. When we detach from our kids (or if our kids reject our connection attempts), we often see an increase in their stress hormones or emotional shut-downs.
How we interact daily with our kids impacts how they will approach us in moments of crisis. When we don’t regulate our own responses and get activated (raise our voices, start arguing, etc.), our kids respond by also getting activated, raising the temperature on the situation. Role modeling self-regulation is a powerful way to show our kids how to recover and regroup. Show them that it’s okay to say, “I had a bad day and am crabby – I need a few minutes for myself and then I’ll come back so we can talk.”
In times of conflict, it’s okay for kids to understand that we are angry, but yelling and screaming often diminishes our power and our children’s respect for us. It is better to step back, think about how you want to respond and return to the conversation with a thoughtful response and consequence (if appropriate). Modeling vulnerability, regulation, and healthy communication is critical to building successful relationships.
Ways to self-regulate
- Set aside your phone.
- Focus on your child, not the stimuli around you.
- Modulate your breathing. (Breath is a key way we can regulate our nervous system.)
About the Speaker
To learn more about Stephanie, visit Stephanie – Providence Farm Community | Northbrook, IL (pfcommunity.org)
Links
- Watch the recording of this presentation on the CATCH YouTube channel.
- Watch the P.A.C.E. Yourself clip of the recording from this presentation on the CATCH YouTube channel
- Read the transcript of the presentation.
