Keep Your Cool

Connection Tool

The technical term for this is “parental self-regulation.” Practice the ability to stay above the storm as your child releases emotions, even when they seem like personal attacks.

HOW TO DO IT

Triggers are essentially anything that sends us into fight / flight / freeze mode. You can tell you’ve been triggered when you have a seemingly automatic, negative, often out-of-proportion response. Triggers can be rooted in our childhoods (eg. we were censured for taking up space, so it feels dangerous when our child is a ‘show off’), or they can simply be a cumulation of daily stressors that leave us depleted and overwhelmed (eg. you're exhausted, have a mountain of work to catch up on, and your child won’t go to sleep). In either case, your higher brain suddenly goes offline, and your reptile brain will do anything to stamp out the threat and regain a sense of control. And unfortunately, it does reptile-like things, like yell, rage, or be harsh to whomever it sees as the enemy… even your beloved kids.

While this happens to everybody, and it may feel empowering to let your feelings out, there are several reasons to try to "self-regulate" when you are triggered. Self-regulation is being self-aware and mindful in order to realize when you're being triggered, and choose a different response.

Note that self-regulation is different from trying to control or suppress your very strong emotions (which is not healthy psychologically). As psychologist Stuart Shanker put it: “Self-control is about inhibiting strong impulses; self-regulation [is about] reducing the frequency and intensity of strong impulses by managing stress-load and recovery. In fact, self-regulation makes self-control ... in many cases, unnecessary.”

Self-regulation is the desirable path because:

By modeling self-regulation you teach your kids to do the same. Greater self-regulation is linked with greater overall well-being at all ages, and helps young people be more successful in school and social relationships.
Self-regulation signals to you both that you are not in an emergency (whereas losing your temper reinforces your feelings of being in danger). And after self-regulating, you won't need to deal with any added feelings of guilt or disappointment for having over-reacted or been unkind.
Your tantrum doesn’t solve the problem – in fact, an intense reaction from you is likely to send your kids into fight / flight / freeze as well, and they aren’t able to absorb, learn, or make productive choices around the issue. Usually they just want to shut you out.

As soon as you notice the panic rising or the anger expressing, do your best to just pause.

Make sure everybody is safe, and then you don’t need to continue the conversation until you’re able to. A simple statement can let your child know what's going on:

“I need a moment – I’m having hard time with this.”

Depending on the situation and how you process emotions, you could try:

taking some deep breaths
eat or drink if you have low blood sugar or are dehydrated
removing yourself to another room for a few minutes
surfing the wave of the emotion
asking a spouse or other adult to step in

Give yourself the time and space to let the voice from your pre-frontal cortex – the seat of nuance, empathy, and higher thinking – come back online.

When you’re able to re-engage, make a connection with your child. Remember who they are: a small, possibly scared or confused person whom you love. At the core, they're not trying to hurt you, mess up your day, or turn out badly.

Even if they have behaved badly, you want to bring them back into the fold of cooperation and mutual respect through connection and helping them feel safe. (Berating, ostracization, or punishment all keep them in fight / flight / freeze mode, where they won’t learn or genuinely want to make amends.)

Eye contact, breathing together, gentle touch, embrace, and even just sitting near each other can all start to calm and connect you both.

It may sound obvious, but every time you’re triggered into automatic rage or panic, you've just been shown what elicits those feelings in you. If there’s a silver lining to being triggered by our kids, it’s that we can start to bring them out into the light. Wouldn't it be nice not to have those buttons be quite so automatic?

It can be illuminating to make a list of the things that trigger you, and then journal about them. You can also discuss with a friend, listening partner, or therapist. Look for patterns, and the underlying fears that come up for you in these situations.

As an example, somebody who feels hurt and disrespected when their child disobeys a direct command, might ask some new questions about the situation, such as:

“Was my request really necessary, or did it just upset me to be ignored?”

“How did I feel as a kid, knowing I’d be punished unless I obeyed? Is that what I want to for my kids?”

“Why is it so threatening if they don’t listen? Maybe I can have more confidence in my authority than that.”

Also consider whether you need to build more self-care into your routines. Regular exercize, getting enough sleep, healthy food and drink, regular journalling or getting listened to, all help keep your resources up to better deal with triggers and stressors.

This process of understanding your triggers will create a sliver of space between the trigger and your reaction, which can be enough for you to decide how you want to react.

The more you are able to catch yourself when triggered, and step back from the brink, the more empowered you become - to see that the situation may not be as scary as it feels, that you don't have to automatically lose your cool, and actually you can probably get a better result another way.

It becomes easier with practice, and life will gradually feel less out-of-control as well.

Just as we recommend listening to, empathizing with, and validating your child’s emotions, you need to experience feeling heard and understood. Talking with someone (or a few people) who can listen, empathize, and validate helps you process the feelings and feel less alone.

Potential listeners could be: a close friend; a group of parents on the playground or at kids' activities; a counselor, clergy person, or therapist; or another parent with whom you regularly exchange listening time.

Anxiety causes us to breathe shallowly or hold our breath. Consciously breathing deep into your belly or into your sides will lower your anxiety response. You can try counting slowly as you inhale and exhale, or putting your hands on your ribs or your belly to feel them expand, or other breathing methods you have found helpful.

Moving our bodies helps rid them of the anxiety response. Try whatever movement feels good, whether a few stretches at your desk, a 10-minute walk, or an intense run.

Try grounding yourself in your present place and time, to make you less focused on your worries and what-ifs. Objects and ritual activities can both work - try a few and see what works for you to bring your focus into the present moment. Some examples:

Keep a small stone in your pocket to run your fingers over when feeling anxious, noting how smooth/rough or cold/hot it is
Do a body scan, or tune in your feet or another body part for a few moments.
Look around and notice 3 things in your environment that you see, a hear, and smell. (This may also encourage gratitude as you notice something positive that you would have otherwise overlooked.)