02/12/2022
On the drive home my oldest was whining about everything, probably hungry and tired. My baby was crying and definitely tired... though I could understand all of this, it all got too much and it was a sensory overload for me.
🥵”Everybody stoooooop” I said in a loud voice, joining into their chaos.
It didn’t help 😂... it never usually does. Instead the yelling made everything worse.
I pulled into the driveway, opened the sliding door to the van, and though I was prepared to be angry, my oldest and I locked eyes for a moment and it brought me back to the present. 🥺
I spent a moment looking into her teary eyes. Then I looked over at my crying baby and locked eyes with her.
In the moments when we are all dysregulated it can be easy to disassociate from our kids and lose sight of who they are.
When we lose sight of the fact that our little humans are also having a hard time, that their emotions are real to them, it’s so much easier to join into their chaos.
There’s something about making eye contact that can remind us of our little humanness.
Remind yourself:
“This is a whole person who I love who is having a hard time. I hold their mind in my mind during this tough moment.”
Holding your child’s thoughts, feelings, mind within your own mind can be a deep way to regulate yourself in these moments that are so tough.
Though we may not agree with or understand our littles feelings we can still hold in mind that the emotions are real.
Eye contact and reminding ourself of this truth is a powerful way to co-regulate our emotions with our kids, diffuse whining, and start over.
After I opened the sliding door I stood there for a minute with my two crying girls. Before I opened my mouth again I looked my girls in the eyes and reminded myself “they are whole people with real feelings, we are safe, they can release their feelings, and so can I.”
By the time I did this and took a few breaths we all had reset.
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