What’s Regulation Got to Do With It {EP 6}

Robyn: Today what I want to talk about is the concept of regulation. And specifically, like what does that even mean? Well, it's does regulation have to do with anything? Like why am I even talking about it all the time because I am talking about it all the time. Like I'm talking about it all the time, professionally, you are going to read the word regulation in my blogs, and my videos, on my website. And I'm positive I use it a ton in my personal life too. Like I'm positive, my husband, and my son, and my best friend, and my parents, everybody would say yes, yes, yes, we hear the word ‘regulation’ a lot. So let's pause and define like what regulation even means. And then let's talk about why do I think it's so important when thinking about kids, and behaviors, and, our ultimate goal, which is healing the brain, and the body, and the nervous system of kids who have experienced complex trauma. 

Robyn: So the right word regulation really is simply about balance and being in balance. And it's a word that applies to a lot of different things. Like way past parenting and way beyond behaviors, right? So think about the word regulation in context of like the heating and cooling systems and our houses, right? That the thermostat is this device that acquires the data that's needed for our healing or cooling system to remain in regulation. So the thermostat is taking the information in, lets us know like what's the temperature in the room. And then that information helps the heating and cooling system know if it needs, like, more accelerator. It needs more heat or more air conditioning. Or if it needs more brake, it needs to back off of the heat or it needs to back off of the air conditioner. So the thermostat kind of helps acquire this data and then gives the data over to the heating and cooling system so that the heating and cooling system can stay in balance. It can remain regulated based on what works for us, right? Like based on what our preferences are. And I can say recently, we've had to do a little work on the heating system in one particular part of our house. Because the system that helped the heat stay in regulation got a little bit wonky. And it would do one or the other. Sometimes it would be freezing, you know, drop downs, like I'd wake up in the morning and I have dropped down to 52 degrees. But then sometimes the heat wouldn't shut off, and all of a sudden, it would be like pushing 80 degrees, right? So the regulation of the heating system got a little bit out of balance. 

Robyn: When I talk about regulation, I'm talking about regulation with regards to ultimately behaviors, but what I'm talking about is the regulation of the energy and arousal that is underneath those behaviors, that's causing the behaviors. And this energy and arousal is the energy and arousal of our autonomic nervous system. There’s part- this part of our nervous system, that is supplying the energy that our body needs to be alive, right? The energy and arousal that we need for our hearts to beat, and for our, you know, lungs to breathe. This is the same energy arousal of our autonomic nervous system that's responsible for these kind of automatic parts of staying alive. That energy and arousal is also driving and underneath behaviors. And it's this energy and arousal that then also gets combined with felt safety. Are we feeling safe or not feeling safe? And I'm going to talk a little bit more about felt safety maybe later this week. Today, I want to stay really focused on regulation.

Robyn: So this autonomic nervous system has an accelerator and has a break, just like I said, like our heating and cooling systems, you know? Like either go, go, go, more, more, more or less, less, less, right? The break. Too much of either of those, right, is what can- you know what we end up calling dysregulation, right? Like too much heat, heat in and of itself, is it bad, right? I want the heat in my basement right now, because it's winter, and 23 degrees, and snowing outside. But if it's too much, then it starts to be extremely uncomfortable. Or if it's too little, that's when it starts to get extremely uncomfortable. So it's the challenges, and regulation, and energy and arousal of our autonomic nervous system, combined with a lack of felt safety. And again, I'll talk about felt safety in an upcoming episode, although you can find an article about felt safety on my blog, if you don't want to wait any longer. 

Robyn: So it's this disruption in regulation, a dysregulation, combined then with a lack of felt safety that is what is leading to the behaviors that we are seeking for help with, right? Oppositional behaviors, defiant behaviors, aggressive behaviors, lying, stealing, sexually acting out, drug use, tantruming, manipulation and control. Every single one of these behaviors is about dysregulation in the nervous system combined with a lack of felt safety. So from that regard, regulation actually has literally everything to do with behaviors, everything. 

Robyn: So it's definitely true that some behaviors really need to just stop. Like there needs to be an intervention that helps the behavior stop as fast as possible. We can think about kind of the classic example of the child who's running out into the middle of the street. We're not super worried about the child's regulation at that moment, or their curiosity, the accelerator in their autonomic nervous system that is propelling them forward and, you know, having their legs move them forward into an unsafe situation, right? That- when our kids’ running into the road, we're not thinking about that. We're thinking about how do I respond right now to get this behavior to stop because there's a major safety issue on the line. And that's true about other examples too, right? So sometimes, we really do kind of put the concepts of regulation on the backburner and we intervene as parents because we need the behavior to stop as fast as possible, almost always because there's some sort of safety issue involved. Safety for a child, or safety for someone else. 

Robyn: But there are also a lot of behaviors that aren't causing like an immediate safety threat. And if we, as the adult, have the opportunity to pause and consider the regulation, the energy, and arousal that's underneath and driving that behavior. We're not only going to, first of all, possibly be even more successful at stopping the behavior in the moment because we're going to be targeting what the real problem is. So we might be actually even more successful at stopping the behavior in the moment. But we're also going to be responding in a way that offers the support to the nervous system, to the autonomic nervous system, to the regulatory system that is going to help our kids move towards the inner health, the inner wellness integration, that is what's going to contribute to long term changes as well. Okay? So focusing on regulation and seeing how we can support regulation is going to do more than just change the behavior in the moment. It's going to create the inner change that's needed for long term change in the future. Now, I'm not promising that focusing on regulation is going to even stop the behavior in the moment. It's a lot more complex than that. You know, what's happening with the behavior and why this behavior is happening. But I do know that if we focus on like, what the real problem is what's really driving the behavior, we still have the potential to kind of impact, and change, or stop the behavior in the moment and behavior that does need to change. As well as creating the opportunity for the healing and the health in the- in the regulation in the nervous system that's going to impact long term change. 

Robyn: So how is regulation developed? Well, regulation is developed inside attachment. In fact, Dr. Allan Schore has, you know, I don't know how long ago probably 20 years ago, at this point, published a paper called Attachment Theory is a Regulation Theory or something very similar to that, I might be mixing those words up a little bit. Attachment theory is essentially a regulation theory, meaning regulation and our regulatory circuits, the part of our bodies that we're working to develop when we use words like self regulation. There are mechanisms there- are things inside our nervous system that are, you know, contributing to this eventual goal of self regulation. Well, those mechanisms, the way we develop eventually, long, long time down the road self regulation is through the attachment cycle. It is through the regulated caregiver or the regulated adult, co-regulating that dysregulated infant. And this experience happens a lot, like a bajillion times, right, in the first year of life, and way beyond, right? Like I'm parenting a 14 year old, and I'm still regularly offering co-regulation to him, I regularly offer co-regulation to my husband, and vice versa, right? But in the earliest years of life, inside that attachment dance of the regulated caregiver offering co-regulation to the infant, that those regulatory circuits begin to build, and begin to be nurtured, and begin to develop into what ultimately is what we call self regulation. It takes a long time like it takes years, and years, and years, and years, and years. But it is through the co-regulation of the adult that we develop the ability to have internalized regulation. So if a child has missed co-regulation experiences in their early moments of life, for a wide variety of reasons. If a child has missed the opportunity to develop regulation through being co-regulated by the adult, we can still contribute and support the same development of those same mechanisms by continuing to offer co-regulation. By continuing to bring our regulation to our child's dysregulation. We are developing the neural circuitry of internalized self regulation.

Robyn: The thing is, is that it's just really challenging to do that, right? Like it's a lot easier, theoretically, to co-regulate a dysregulated infant, right? But also, sometimes it's not, right? Because sometimes infants are harder to soothe, or sometimes because of what's happening for us, it's harder for us to stay regulated in order to soothe and co-regulate the infant. And we get overwhelmed, and we get dysregulated, and then we- we can't, right? Like we can't co-regulate that infant. So it's easier to co-regulate an infant. But it's not easy, right? 

Robyn: So as children get older, right, and they're five, or they're eight, or they're 15. And dysregulation isn't just expressed by crying, right, dysregulation is expressed in behaviors that are pretty difficult to navigate. Lying, and stealing, drug use, screaming at you, swearing at you. This is still an expression of dysregulation, but man, is it harder for us as the adult to stay regulated during these behaviors so that we can offer up the co-regulation that is what's really needed to create the change inside the nervous system that will allow for kind of long term health and ultimately change. Right? 

Robyn: So understanding regulation, and what regulation has to do with everything, but we're especially talking about behaviors right now, means that we can feel confident that kids who are displaying negative behaviors that are- that's about dysregulation don't need punishment, right? They don't need punishment to get those behaviors to stop. They need boundaries, and they need co-regulation, right? So an example of this is a child with some delayed internalized regulation, might struggle, let's say at recess time, more than their same age peers. So this child might struggle to have socially appropriate behaviors. They might struggle with turn taking. They might struggle with knowing how to engage with their peers on playground equipment, or connect with their peers and the kind of like games that are happening on the playground. And then this struggle often looks like behaviors that we feel that we need to you know, have a punishment for or have a consequence for. Because they're being mean to their friends, or they're even hitting, or kicking, or throwing sand, right, or having huge tantrums because they just can't figure out how to navigate these experiences. And so we want to respond with punishments or consequences. But what's really happening is that the child in a situation like recess has almost certainly lost a lot of the adult co-regulation that they need in order to engage with their peers and socially appropriate ways, right? Because at recess, a child is almost certainly has less connection to a regulated adult than they do for example, in the classroom, right? First of all, the children are have more energy moving through their systems, because they're out on the playground, and they're- they've got more energy going. But also teachers and professional, parents, adults, even though they're present, they're not providing the level of connection and co-regulation that children are receiving in other circumstances, right? So this isn't about a kid who doesn't know how to behave, or who only, you know, knows how to engage with their peers in controlling ways, or who is waiting for the adult to not be present so that they can act bad, right? It's not about any of those things. It's simply about having lost some of the adult kind of co-regulation that they need. Now, it may be frustrating to us that the 10 year old on the playground needs the level of adult co-regulation that a toddler needs, right? Like we don't throw you know, like 50 toddlers to a playground while adults stand on the periphery and assume that they're going to figure out how to be with one another right? Like a toddlers need a lot more adult connection, a lot more adult co-regulation, a lot more support as they navigate these experiences. So it might be true that you have an older child that is simply just developmentally delayed in having internalized the co-regulation. So when they then are not able to access the co-regulation of the regulated adult, they aren't able to be successful in these situations that are actually quite complex when it comes to social skills. 

Robyn: Another example that is- comes to mind for me right away is I get- I have a teenager, so I am dealing with different kinds of dysregulated behavior. Like for example, maybe mouthiness or disrespect, right? And if I'm regulated, I can be with my child when this mouthiness or this disrespect is coming to the surface. And if I'm regulated enough, I can set a boundary and say something like, “oh, hey, buddy, like, we don't talk to each other that way in this family”. But then I can also try to figure out what the real problem is right? Like I can think in the back of my mind, what's really going on? What's causing this dysregulation? And how can I offer the co-regulation that's needed, so that my kid can come into regulation, and then his goodness, right? His wonderfulness, his normal teenagerness emerges? Because that's what his brain is designed to do. Right? Our brains are designed for us when we're regulated, when we’re connected, and when we're feeling safe to emerge as our best selves. So parents hang with co-regulation, beyond what is maybe expected or typical for how old our child is, or how chronologically old our child is, is very active parenting, right? And, honestly, it's very frustrating that as our kids get older, we don't get to decrease how active we are in our parenting. We're supposed to be able to decrease how active we are in offering up co-regulation, how active we are in- you know, the kinds of parenting that our kids need in order to be successful. That's the trajectory of development that my 14 year old needs a lot less co-regulation than he did when he was four years old. Except for those of us who are parenting kids who didn't get the co-regulation that they needed, or they have other brain based differences that are causing them to need more co-regulation than their same age peers do, right? 

Robyn: So one more thing I want to mention about why understanding regulation is so important. And it's because it helps us see our kids for who they really are. A child who's dysregulated. A child who's a really great kid, but who happens to be dysregulated. Now, maybe they're dysregulated a lot or what feels like almost always, right? But that still doesn't change the fact that they're a really great kid who is dysregulated. And even if I can't stop, like a behavior, or come up with a tool, or technique that's going to change their behavior- holding tight on to my belief, that it's regulation. That is what's underneath this behavior, impacts how I see my child, and how we see our kids matters. Because how we see people contributes to who they are and who they become. So when we change how we see people, that's a way that we're offering up oppor- opportunity for people to change, right? So because of mirror neurons and the resonance circuitry and all this other like really cool stuff that's happening in the brain, and the mind, and the body, and the nervous system. Changing how we see people, changes people. 

Robyn: So when we understand regulation, we get to see our kids as kids who are struggling with regulation, right? They're not bad kids. They're kids who are struggling with regulation, and then eventually, our kids are going to start to believe that about themselves. They’re are good kids who are struggling, right? And when our kids can shift their beliefs about who they are, their behaviors shift. Believing that we are a good person who is struggling, changes are behaviors, right? So now I know that being able to stay really grounded, and really anchored, and seeing our kids through the lens of regulation requires what it requires a lot of our own regulation. A lot of regulation. Especially as our kids get older, and as their dysregulated behaviors get maybe more triggering, or more dangerous, or we get closer to them launching out into the real world, right? And that increases our dysregulation because we started to feel like oh, my gosh, I'm running out of time, right? So parenting in this way, obviously requires a ton of our own regulation. I absolutely know that. And that's why one of the primary things that I talk about with parents of kids with really challenging behaviors, and dysregulated behaviors, and parents of kids with complex trauma is not only do we need to develop the tools. Not only do we need to develop the interventions, because I know, part of you right now is even thinking okay, all of this sounds great, but I don't understand what it looks like, just tell me what to do. I know that, I know that’s what so often our brain goes to. But truly like the most important tool continues to be, how do we as parents stay regulated enough so that we can see our kids through this lens, we can know that what they need is regulation, connection, or felt safety. So that we can then respond with- with that, right? Like if just knowing the tools isn't enough, because we're too dysregulated to use them, right? 

Robyn: So what's regulation got to do with it? Well, it's got a lot to do with what's happening for our kids. But it has a lot to do with what's happening for us, too. And why you'll continue to hear me talk about how to support parents regulation, and that's why I have so many resources on that. So I'm gonna continue this conversation. I'm going to keep coming back and I'm going to keep offering you more and more ideas. And in the meantime, you can head over to my blog, and you can head over to my free resources page. So RobynGobbel.com/blog, and then RobynGobbel.com/FreeResources has a lot of good stuff on it, including a deeper dive into the understanding of regulation. But it also has a couple of resources very specific towards how to help parents maintain more regulation, and especially in the midst of a lot of chaos that we can't always control. 

Robyn: Alrighty, and there you have it a closer look at what I mean when I use the word regulation and why it matters. For an even deeper dive, you can watch my free 45 minute masterclass on regulation, connection, and felt safety over at RobynGobbel.com/FreeResources. Understanding the neurobiology of being human is the first pillar in bringing true relational healing to kids and families. If you loved this podcast, please share. I'll see you next time.