Happy Birthday RKBBB- and a gift for you! {EP 238}

Robyn: Two years, about one week after Raising Kids With Big, Baffling Behaviors, was published. So it was published on a Thursday, and I think on either Tuesday or Wednesday night of the next week, I received this DM from somebody on Instagram that I did not know I had never had interaction with before. My memory is that she was also a therapist and also had just recently published a book. And because she had recently published a book, she had been keeping her eye on the USA Today best selling list, and the list was published late that evening, probably nine or maybe even 10pm Eastern Time, which is actually past my bedtime. So it's kind of remarkable. I even got this message before I went to bed, but I got this DM from this person that I didn't know, and she said, Congratulations on making the USA Today bestseller list. And y'all, I thought it was spam, like I was convinced at first that it was kind of a joke or some sort of click bait, or, I don't know, so I remember feeling even a little sheepish to investigate it, like, Oh, certainly this is Not true, but yeah, I better go check it out, right? So I did some Googling, and I found the USA Today weekly bestseller list. And sure enough, there was Raising Kids With Big, Baffling Behaviors, number 61 which really, yeah, I never occurred to me in any way that the book would make a bestseller list. It wasn't on my mind. I wasn't checking I didn't know when the lists were published. So that was probably one of the most fun moments of the whole, you know, part of the book being published, just because it was so surprising. It was so surprising. I mean, it's just such a true moment of surprise and delight, and how that can really land in the nervous system and Raising Kids With Big, Baffling Behaviors, has continued to sell really, really well. It's been actually remarkably consistent. We we are about to, or we just passed 50,000 copies sold. What? What 50,000 copies? 

Robyn: You know, I didn't know what to expect. I honestly wouldn't have even been able to say, like, what was a good-quote, unquote, good amount of books to sell in a year. I went in with zero expectations. I just wanted to see if there was something that I could do to help people. Of course, the miles. Zones are fun. The statistics are fun. I really like to get the data, and my publisher knows this, and he'll send me an email every now and again and say, I know how much you like to know about the numbers. So here's the numbers today. So all of that, yes, all of that's really fun, but y'all, nothing about this book would matter in any way, shape or form if it wasn't for you, if it wasn't for it being helpful to you, if it wasn't helping you understand and make sense of your kids baffling behaviors a little bit better, which then you know, hopefully, is helping you stay more regulated yourself, more in your owl brain, yourself so one your own nervous system can just feel better because, of course, you deserve that so much, but then you can use your owl brain to help you decide, huh, what am I going to do next with this baffling behavior? None of the statistics would matter at all if you weren't telling me that the book is impacting you in that way, the feedback that I've gotten about how the book has supported you, about how you have feel, felt seen the number of times somebody writes in and says almost word for word, something like it felt Like you were writing a book about me and my kid, or something like, I couldn't imagine how you knew so much about me that you could basically write about me when you were writing about Nat and y'all. I love to hear that so much, because that was what I wanted. I have such a clear memory before I ever even began conceptualizing the book, of being on my treadmill walking, and thinking to myself, if I'm going to write a book, I don't want it to be just another parenting book. 

Robyn: There are a lot of great parenting books out there, and I know y'all well enough to know that you don't have time to read one that's not going to really be helpful. And I am a parent, and I've also read plenty of parenting books myself, and I know how hard it is to take something you've read in a book and make it meaningful in your actual, real, everyday life, and that's for a whole lot of reasons, not because it's not good information. I mean, sometimes it's not good information, but there are so many more reasons why it's hard to, like, read something and learn something and then actually apply it. So I didn't want to contribute to that. I didn't want to contribute to something that would take your time but not make an impact in your life, and so I really like pulled out my neurobiology, understanding what I know about the brain and what I know about learning and what I know about memory, and what I know about how Learning becomes an action, and then also what I know about the stress response system and how the more stressed we are, the less we can access information that's stored in our owl brain. And so there's all types of different science that I leaned into when thinking about, how can I write this book in a way that actually impacts the reader enough that they can use what they read in the book? And that's when I came up with Nat and that's when I came up with the idea of starting every chapter with a peek into a session between me and a fictional parent coaching client, Nat. And I wanted to give the reader a peek into my own thoughts, into my own feelings. I wanted to write those sections of the book in a way that you, the reader, could feel as though I was talking directly to you. And I knew that through that we actually could build some relational resonance. 

Robyn: I knew that through that you might be able, by the end of the book, to believe me when I was talking about compassion and self compassion, and those are the things that change the brain, the resonance self compassion, authentic, felt, embodied self compassion. And I wondered, if I wrote the book in this way, could I create that experience enough and you as the reader, that you would actually have a shift in your nervous system. And now I'm sure. That's not happened for everybody who's written the book. And in fact, I get the occasional complaint about how the book was written, but overall, I have received such intense gratitude for how the book was written, how you were able to really feel as though I was talking to you, and whether then you kind of could tell or not, or could feel it or not. I know that that's what sparks the changes in the brain, the changes in the neural networks that then allow you to eventually make use of the material that you read. Now, of course, we're never parenting perfectly, and you're never going to respond to your child in a way that a book tells you to, and if you're a therapist, you're never going to be a therapist with a client in a way that I was in the book. You know, sometimes folks say to me that it's hard for them because they feel like they could never be like me as a therapist, or sometimes they'll tell me that their clients are unhappy because their therapist them isn't enough like me and and how I soothe them, is to say, well, of course, of course, of course. 

Robyn: First of all, you're not me and I'm not you, and you're spectacular, and I'm spectacular in my own way. But second of all, I had the luxury of writing this book in my office alone, with lots of space to consider the exact perfect words and I had an editor. I mean, what if we could parent or what if we could be a therapist or a parent coach, with lots of time and space where we could think very carefully about every single word we wanted to use, and we had an editor. Yes, we'd all do great things, of course, of course, what I wanted from Raising Kids With Big, Baffling Behaviors is that it would strengthen your own stress response system, widen your own window of tolerance the teeniest, tiniest bit. So you may be able to hang onto your owl brain one second longer than you could the day before you read it, and then maybe the next day you couldn't. But then maybe the day after that, you could hang onto your regulation one second longer, right? We talk about just aiming for 1% better. We're not aiming for perfection. We're never gonna lose our humanity. Sometimes we're gonna get dysregulated. Sometimes we're gonna act in ways we regret, and that's just about being human. We just keep trying. All right, y'all, so birthdays are actually about gifts, right? And so I thought about, how can I give you a gift over a podcast? I really can't, but I thought maybe I could help you walk away from this episode, not just with a whole bunch of rah, rah, rah, yay. About raising kids with big bathing behaviors, that's not really a gift to you, but with a little bit of practical insight, something that can really help you in the moment of a hard parenting experience. I wanted you to walk away from this episode with a few moments like that, so I'm going to talk about three baffling behaviors that I hear about a lot. Of course, what we want, what I wanted to do with Raising Kids With Big, Baffling Behaviors is actually to show that all behaviors make sense, right? If we really look at the neuroscience, we can disembaffilate, I remember when I was writing the book, my husband would use that word disembaffiliate. We can disembafilate these behaviors and actually see that all behavior makes sense, but I know that no matter how much we do that we are always going to be faced with experiences and behaviors that make us go, uh, what? That doesn't make any sense. That is so baffling. I have no idea what to even make of it. These are three behaviors that I've been hearing about with some regularity just recently. 

Robyn: So we're going to talk about regression and acting like a quote-unquote toddler. I'm going to talk about inconsistency in our kids. Sometimes they have a skill and sometimes they don't, and then I'm going to talk about that in ourselves, the inconsistency in our own behavior, and how we still are really struggling with baffling behaviors us the grown ups. So let's start with regressive behavior, or, quote, unquote, acting like a toddler behavior. Now I actually recorded a podcast episode about this not terribly long ago, so I'll make sure a link to that episode gets in the show notes, and if you feel like this applies to you, you can go back to that episode. And listen to an even longer episode, all about regression or acting like a toddler, but it has come up so recently for me, so many times recently for me, that I know that despite that episode, it is still feeling very, very, very baffling.

Robyn: So if we understand how the brain develops, neuro sequentially the brain develops. And I learned this from Dr Bruce Perry, the brain develops from the bottom up and the inside out, so lowest parts of the brain develop first and the highest parts of the brain develop last. Now, without going into all of the details here that happens over developmental period. Right brain stems. Really working on development in utero. Continues to develop, of course, after birth, but is really working hard, hard, hard on development in utero and then in those first, earliest months of life, the limbic portions of the brain, the next highest up portions of the brain. And we're not going to get too rigid about what's what in the brain. Some of us have different definitions of what's part of the limbic regions and what's not. Hey, we're really, I'm using these names for the regions just to give us a little bit of a map, I guess, of the brain. So after, after you're born, those limbic regions are really working on wiring up, really working on wiring up. And then after that, the cortical, highest parts of the brain are developing. And this happens neuro sequentially in over years. And then the brain is continuing to make neural connections, increase in integration. It goes through periods of course of pruning. All of this is happening. And we, we kind of consider the brain, quote-unquote, fully developed in the mid to late 20s. Though, of course, the brain can change throughout the lifespan. When the nervous system is feeling safe and connected, the brain then has the ability to, let's say, be its best self, calm Brains, brains that are feeling safe and connected have really active and diffuse connections. 

Robyn: That's the language that I'm pulling right from some work I just did with my dear friend and colleague, Marti Smith, as we get more stressed, as the brain gets protective and stressed, the brain starts to prioritize regions in the brain that are more focused on safety and survival, and that happens to be the lower portions of the brain. So as we get more stress, as fear and activation increases in the nervous system, we start to function out of lower and lower parts of the brain. And since the brain develops neuro sequentially, as if we're going to function out of lower and lower parts of the brain, we are, in a way, getting younger and younger. So regressive behavior isn't backsliding. It isn't a behavior problem. I mean, I'm not saying it's not a problem, but it isn't only a behavior problem. It's a sign of stress. It's a sign of a brain and protection mode that is getting more and more activated and therefore functioning out of lower and lower regions in the brain. This is all based on Dr Bruce Perry's work his neuro sequential model and specifically, state dependent functioning. So as stress increases, that owl brain goes offline, and the Watchdog or the Possum steps in. And the more activated the Watchdog gets, or the more activated the Possum gets, the lower and lower and younger and younger we start to function in the brain. 

Robyn: That means we see behaviors, behavioral strategies, responses to stress that we would maybe see in younger children. And we start to see toddler like behavior. We start to see toddler like capacity for stress, right? So a lower stress response, we start to see toddler like responses to stress, tantruming, maybe throwing things, not using language or words, right? Because language is in a higher part of the brain, we start to hear regressive behavior, right? I might start to hear a child who's kind of repeating the same word over and over and over. Or again, somewhat like you would see in a younger child or in a toddler. There's so many examples of regressive behavior but But oftentimes, when a parent is telling me about a significant behavioral concern in their child, one of the things I'm thinking in my mind is, is this a behavior? This behavior that they're describing, something that we would see typically in like a three year old or a two year old and a one year old, and if a one year old is doing this, we wouldn't love it, but it wouldn't feel anything like what it feels like that our 10 year old is doing this behavior. And that helps me keep conceptualizing like what's happening for this child, what's happening in their brain, what's happening in their stress response. So the more stress we get, the younger and younger and younger we get. Regressive behavior makes sense from the lens of the stress response system. I mean, even think about yourself. When was the last time you or another grown up, you know, threw a toddler like fit? Right? A toddler like tantrum? Maybe not that long ago, maybe not that long ago.

Robyn: Now, remember, all protective behaviors are not just about protection. They're about attempting to find safety. So baby like behaviors, regressive like behaviors, even though they actually are usually off putting right, like whining, acting like a baby, those are behaviors we typically are kind of annoyed by, kind of cringe at, right. So even though those behaviors tend to make us less likely to want to offer nurturing connection and co-regulation, the intention of those behaviors, and those baby like child like behaviors, is to get safety and connection. So don't shame yourself for being annoyed by them, because that's normal too. You're having a very normal reaction. And if you can hold onto your owl brain, you might be able to see the need underneath that stress response and respond in a way that can increase safety, increase connection, and provide the co-regulation. If you could say in your owl brain, you might be able to think about, oh, what sensory strategies could help my kid right now? What's the best way to co regulate my kid in this moment? Basically, the question becomes, what does my child's nervous system need right now in order to feel safe? Now? Again, I did do an entire episode all about regressive behavior earlier this year. I'll make sure that episode number gets in the show notes. And if you're in the club, remember that we did a master class all about regressive behavior. And we have those really cool handouts that decoded state dependent functioning, Dr Perry's theory of state dependent functioning, and we overlaid that with owls Watchdogs and Possums. So if you're in the club that's over in the resource library. 

Robyn: Now this also kind of relates to the next baffling behavior that I hear about a lot, which is inconsistency. Sometimes they have the skill and sometimes they don't. Sometimes they can manage a certain stressor. Sometimes they can't. I've worked with kids where it's it's even like sometimes they can do this math skill. Sometimes they can use what they know about subtraction to do their math homework, and other times it's like they've never even been taught about subtraction. It's like they've never even had the skill ever. These skills come and go, whether it be an academic skill like that, or, you know, relational or emotional skill, sharing things like that, stress, you know, ability to regulate and navigate stress. So sometimes they melt down, and sometimes they don't. Why? Right? If they've done it before, why can't they do it now? Well, the reason is the exact same reason. It all has to do with in this moment. What is the capacity of my stress response system to navigate this specific stress? And that changes rapidly. It changes rapidly. It changes based on neuroception. It changes based on physiological things and other stressors, even just being hungry or tired, right? We all know that that changes our capacity to deal with stressors, and it changes based on the kind of brain state they're in. And if they're in a regulated, safe, connected brain state, and they're able to fully use their owl brain, they're gonna have some skills. And if they are far down the Watchdog or the Possum pathway, maybe not like tantruming. Yeah, but just kind of stuck in a real protective space. It's gonna feel like they've lost skills, and that makes sense, because they're literally operating out of lower and lower parts of their brain. I know that this inconsistency can feel manipulative. It can feel like laziness. I get it, and it's about the nervous system. It's about the stress response. Now, of course, y'all, just like last week's replay episode, talked about understanding this behavior, not excusing it. Of course, I'm not saying, well, oh, well, just is what it is, not saying that at all. 

Robyn: But if we understand where the behavior is coming from, we might be able to respond in a way that's actually helpful. Now, of course, we'll never be able to do that all the time. It's just not even kind of reasonable to think that that could be true, and it doesn't need to be true. Our kids don't need us to respond to them with perfect attunement every time for their nervous system to grow and heal. But if we can do it a little bit more often, really understand the nervous system when what's happening with those behaviors, right? Stay in our owl brain, and then think about, is there a way I can increase cues of safety? Is there a way I can increase regulation? Is there a way I can increase connection, and that would lead to increased safety so that the owl brain could come back? And maybe that's not possible, so maybe actually, the next step is lowering the expectation. Maybe the next step is realizing, well, this is what is happening right now. This is what everyone's capable of in this moment and then adapting to that. That doesn't mean that that's the way it's going to be forever and ever, but I know I certainly have as a grown up with a relatively healthy, strong stress response system, there are definitely times where I just have to be honest with myself, like I don't have it in me today I can do this thing. And yeah, you know, other days I can, but today I just can't I'll try again tomorrow. We can offer that same opportunity to try again later to for our kids. 

Robyn: Okay, so the other behavior that parents are often coming to me about, that they still face they feel so baffled by, is their own baffling behavior. There is so often this question of, why, why? Why? Why? Why do I keep doing this? I don't want to do this. I know that I shouldn't do this. I understand my child's behavior. I understand what kind of response they need, and I'm not doing it. Why do I keep doing the things that I don't want to do. And I know that when you're in a state and you're asking those cell yourself, those questions, you are in a stressed state, okay, they go together. If you're lamenting, why can't I do this? Why can't I do this? I should be able to I know how to do different, right? What I know is that in that moment, you are in a stressed brain state. So of course, in that stress state, it's hard for you to remember, Oh, I can't do these things for the exact same reason my kid can't do them. So our goal, and my work with parents is the exact same work as my work with kids. Can we slowly, slowly, slowly, over time, strengthen that stress response system so that you can hold onto your owl brain just a teeniest, tiniest bit more, so that maybe one day when you ask yourself, Why do I keep parenting this way? There will be another voice you can hear that says because you're stressed, you're doing the very best that you can. Everything you believe about your child is true about you too. So let's take a breath. Let's be with ourselves with some self compassion, and then let's try again.

Robyn: You are having stress responses just like your child is. And one of the other pieces of regression that I didn't talk about we talked about regression is that when we get more stressed, we tend to access memory networks that were very well, let's just say, exercised earlier in life, and now a lot of us are trying to make new habits, new ways of responding, new ways of seeing behavior, but these old ways are still stored in our brain, right? We still have all of that stored there, all of our past experiences. So as we get stressed and we start to kind of function out of lower and lower parts of our brain, we start to access those older memory networks where we responded with anger, where we responded with yelling, or where somebody responded to us that way, right where maybe we're going so far back in the memory banks that we're accessing memories from our own childhood now this we're not doing this consciously. These are not typically explicit memories, but the more stressed we get, the more likely it is that we're going to start behaving in this, those ways that we've been trying to change because we are accessing memory networks that were stored when we were younger. So y'all, I have an infographic about how to not flip your lid when your kid is flipping theirs, and it's available as a free resource to everybody. Every single person listening can snag that free resource. You can also get access to our free resource hub, where I store about 20 ish free resources. So I'll make sure the link to that gets in the show notes, and it has a very practical and a step by step way to work on not flipping your lid when your kid is flipping theirs. But really y'all, what I think is even more important than having this step by step process is by remembering to apply the science to yourself, apply it to yourself, find ways to have that compassion for yourself while still holding yourself to your own values, right? You can understand why you flipped your lid, or you can understand why you parented in a way that you regret, and also maintain a deep commitment to your own parenting values and keep working towards widening your window of tolerance so that you can handle stressful situations. 

Robyn: You can be in the midst of highly stressful situations and still have enough access to your owl brain that you can indeed practice your parent in the way that you want to, in a way that's in alignment with your values. All right, so I hope, as we explored those three baffling behaviors, that you found something that was helpful, a helpful tip that you can walk away with and can be useful immediately for you that felt like the best way I could attempt to give you a quote, unquote gift here on the podcast. Thank you for celebrating with me. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you for celebrating with me. You could join in the celebration, and I have a few ideas about how you could do that. You could tell somebody about Raising Kids With Big, Baffling Behaviors, or share about it in some way. You could gift it to somebody. And if you want to buy five or more books, you can go onto my website and get information about a pretty steep discount for bulk ordering, and bulk is only five or more. 

Robyn: So you could gift raising kids with big baffling behaviors, a really impactful way to offer a gift in return to raising kids with big baffling behaviors would be to give it a rating or review over on Amazon, it's normal, as books are out for a while that ratings and reviews start to slow down, and so there's not been as many ratings and reviews on the book this calendar year, and having ratings and reviews on Amazon is one of the best ways to get more eyeballs on the book, because the algorithms will recommend it. It is so easy to leave a rating, you can go a step further and leave a review. It can be really, really, really short. It is really impactful to getting more eyeballs on the book. And you do not have to have bought your book on Amazon, to leave a review on Amazon. So if you are inclined to want to celebrate with me, celebrate the birthday, the second birthday, of Raising Kids With Big, Baffling Behaviors. Those are just a few ideas. But y'all the reality is the very best thing that you can quote, unquote, give to Raising Kids With Big, Baffling Behaviors is what you're already doing. Right? You can use the book in a way that it's bringing more connection, more. Safety, more co-regulation, to you and to your family, that is more meaningful to me than absolutely anything else could possibly be. And if it feels like that's really slow going for you, right? Maybe you've been listening for a while. You read the book a while ago, and and you're feeling like this is not things aren't improving in my family as quickly as I would like, I understand, I get it. It takes a long time for nervous systems to heal, and some of you listening are parenting kids who have deeply, severely impacted nervous systems, and it is going to take them a very, very long time for there to have been enough healing in their nervous system that you're going to notice the change and notice the impact. But y'all, the brain and the nervous system is changing all the time. It can't not work. It can't not work. It's simply the science. 

Robyn: We might not see the impact of it working for a while, but it is working, and there's an aspect of this that's just a little bit of trust. So thank you. Thank you for listening. Thank you for being with me on this journey. Thank you to everyone who sends me emails or leaves comments or reviews, all of these ways that you what you're doing when you do those things is you're volleying the connection that I'm offering to you. You're volleying that back to me. And it matters to me. It really supports my nervous system and helps me continue to do this work. So thank you for that. Thank you for being somebody who wants to see kids and our most baffling kids for who they really are. And ultimately, this is having an impact on our world, and the world needs it now more than ever, so happy birthday, Raising Kids With Big, Baffling Behaviors. Thank you for celebrating with me, and I'll be back with you again next week on the podcast, see you later. Bye, bye.