RIDING IN TANDEM – THE ART OF CO-REGULATION – Jane Mitchell AUK trainer

I chose to call this article “riding in tandem” because so often it seems to be the case that your emotions ride in tandem with your relationships, whichever dyad you are thinking about, and I believe this interdependence to be a feature of attachment and therefore crucial in our relationships with our adopted children.

There is an interesting thing about stress and co-regulation – how many times has your child been in a rage or upset or generally overwhelmed state and been able to effectively push your buttons so that you engage in that upward spiral until you too are out of control – or does that only happen to me? Or have you noticed a situation where your child follows you into a hyper state – for example – my daughter was following me around as I got the house ready and did catering for a large family gathering. She became more and more hyper and disruptive as the morning went on, and I had in the end to take her out to walk and let off steam, but afterwards on reflection I realised that she had taken her lead from me – I was whizzing around, so she started whizzing with me, but had nothing productive to do with all that energy so it fired off in a series of incidents which certainly did not help the agitated atmosphere in the house! My husband and I made contingency plans that in future similar situations, he will take her out so that she does not follow me up into a hyper state. Similarly, when my daughter was very stressed before this Christmas, becoming disruptive at school, losing friends (literally the child in the playground everyone was running away from as another child informed me) I became extremely stressed too, phoning round trying to get support, speaking to school, and getting very upset. Again on reflection at the end of term I realised I had got quite manic, and that this was because I had engaged with my daughter’s stress levels. And then of course there are all the times they press your buttons seemingly just because they can…. now I believe there are two golden nuggets hidden in all of this – firstly, these situations occur because you are bonded, there is a connection between you. I say this, because I can look at any number of children displaying aggression or tantruming etc in the supermarket or at school, and I smile sympathetically, but it does not engage my stress response because I am not bonded with them, and all of that behaviour is not directed at me. In effect, I believe you need to be affected by your children’s behaviour – that emotional empathy is due to the attachment between you. Secondly, if you can co-regulate to a hyper state, then you can co-regulate to a calmer one. In fact, this kind of connected behaviour is what happens during the attachment process when you become attuned to each other – ideally, your baby’s distress distresses you, and the process of relieving that stress calms you which calms the baby. Our children’s needs are not always baby needs, so we have to seek attunement in other ways. Therefore it is useful to match your child’s excitement, empathise with their fear, anger or sorrow – if they feel you are attuned to their emotions you will be able to use that connection to regulate them back to a calm state. Remembering as well that unmanaged feelings can be overwhelming is helpful – if you are planning a day out, make sure there are calming down opportunities.

Of course there are times when this all spirals out of control leaving us feeling overwhelmed, ineffective and despondent; when our reactions are not ideal, and our fear catapaults us into uncontrolled and angry states. For me, touching that state is sometimes the trigger I need to mentally step outside of the situation and calm myself. Before Christmas my daughter’s state of stress and the strain of managing at school whilst feeling overwhelmed was such that she frequently came out of school and got home being disruptive to the childminded children that were round. These were unpleasant evenings when she was manhandled into the kitchen to be with me (time in) and simply screamed for half an hour or more, whilst I tried to cook tea and field her attempts to escape/grab knives/upset cooking pots and so on. As my own fear and palpitations subsided, and my calming response became more real, so her own level of arousal reduced, until invariably she asked for hug and dissolved into tears. In the end, I just catered for the fact that she needed a good scream after school, which made life much easier as it became part of a process. (hard on the ears, though!) After Christmas as usual all this adverse behaviour disappeared – until we got two foot of snow…. but that’s another story!

Another thing to remember when you have hit that all time low is that a huge part of the attunement process is the cycle of rupture and repair. Normally this is where a child is chasitised, suffers the anxiety of a rupture in his relationship with his attachment figure, which is then repaired by the attuned parent. This is a simple process that happens again and again – think of a two year old being told “NO!” and bursting into tears, after a little while there is a hug or cuddle, explanation, reassurance. These incidents are important and help build a child’s resilience – mistakes happen, but can be recovered from. If a child has not had this experience, then the pain and anxiety of a rupture can be overwhelming and send them into panic states expressed by anger and aggression. We can remember this and use even the most damaging of situations to ensure there is repair of the relationship (as well as appropriate consequences). We all lose our rag sometimes ( hopefully I am not alone!) but if we use these situations as opportunities to reflect, develop strategies and most importantly repair and rebuild the ruptured attachment, this can still add up to a positive outcome.

In the parent support programme delivered by AUK (Piece of Cake) we talk about anger or stressed states in terms of traffic lights – so that green is calm, relaxed – a regulated state where you may be alert but are able to stay in control of your own feelings and help your child with theirs. The next step is amber - a stressed state where you are leaving a fully regulated “green” state, and are entering a state where you are not relaxed but stressed. You may be feeling agitated or worried, or distracted. You may find you have reduced tolerance – a “short fuse”. Your ability to help your child regulate their feelings is reduced, as is your ability to recognise either your state or theirs. The final state is red – stress overload. This is a purely emotional state – a reactive state. You are experiencing emotional overload, whether this be anger, fear, sorrow or pain. It is interesting that in America this state is described as “Mad” – a very accurate description! Your fuse has disappeared and you are not in control of either your feelings or reactions. Your heart rate will be increased, and you may shout, cry, lash out or feel very destructive as you attempt to alleviate these feelings and discharge that emotion. This

can be a key to understanding our children’s behaviour – my daughter, for example, is rarely in green, she lives mainly in amber. This is shown by inability to concentrate, hypervigilance, low tolerance to stressors, impatience, restlessness, disturbed sleep patterns and scared and defensive behaviour. She easily moves into a “red” state where she is harder to reach or impossible to reach. But how can this help us? In order for us to co-regulate our children, we need to be in a calm place ourselves, so sometimes this can take planning or a process of reflection. For example if there is a situation which often causes stress in your daily life, reflect and see what you can change to help yourself remain calm so that you are able to be effective. A good example of this for me was getting ready for school. I was frequently driven to distraction by my daughter’s disruptive behaviour which prevented me from getting ready in the morning, meaning that we were frequently late for school. My solution was to get up half an hour earlier and shower and dress, so that when she got up, I could concentrate on getting her and her older sister ready, breakfasted, dressed etc. This worked because once I am ready, I do not mind whether my daughter is dressed or not – I will leave the house in time to get her sister to school. I did have to hide school clothes in the car once or twice and calmly take her out in her vest and pants, but generally speaking my mornings are far less stressed and it is well worth losing half an hours sleep over! Also I can be aware of her stressed times and have strategies in place – letting her have a good scream after school, making sure there are snacks available because she gets very stressed when hungry. If all else fails, a favourite of mine is to get her into a lavender bath and leave her to calm down – if I put enough lavender in, the smell gently wafts through the house, having a relaxing effect all round!.

As well as being aware of our childrens’ emotional states, we should be aware of our own. Is our base state “green”? or are we so stressed that we are living in “amber” and therefore less able to regulate our children because of our own emotional status? There are so many ways in which outside influences can stress us and keep us in an “amber” state – finances, marital disputes, our jobs, concerns about family, battles with schools – add your own to the list! Unfortunately, adopting does not stop the usual run of stressors, it just adds to that rich tapestry! Also of course there is our own child’s behaviour – but as I have said, our children are regulated by us, therefore when we are stressed, they will also be stressed – let us not forget that in a large number of cases this sensitivity to a parent or carer will be part of their survival technique. Therefore our stress will be likely to produce stress reactions in our children – and then we can see we have a spiral that is likely to escalate into a “red” state on both parts. So we need to find ways to help ourselves, which is why at AUK we emphasise self care - so what can we do to help ourselves?

Deal with your own feelings first. Identify triggers – both for yourself and your child; reflect after the event. Think about what episodes could have triggered the response. What is the child trying to tell you? What state is being demonstrated via their behaviour? What does the incident tell you about your own issues? In Dan Hughes book “Building the Bonds of Attachment” both the mother and foster child are in therapy, but the mother’s emotional state is given precedence. If she is having a tough time, the reasons why are explored and this is central to her ability to understand her own response

to her child and the impact this has on the whole situation. I believe this kind of holistic approach to be essential to managing the complex relationships in adoption.

Deal with the situation – try and stay calm, literally take a deep breath. You need to be calm to calm your child, but the good news is that if you get angry first and then calm down, it does still work, just takes longer! (at least that has been my experience). Remember that when in a highly emotional state you cannot reason, so do not try and talk when a child is in a highly stressed state – shouting, lashing out etc, concentrate on giving them space and calming them down by talking and reassuring in a relaxed voice. I sometimes speculate about what is going on with my daughter, or sometimes just shush and remind her to calm down, sit down, its OK. As they calm down, if they will allow you, initiate physical contact as this will help due to hormonal exchange via the skin. My daughter sometimes gets overwhelmed when out walking or at shops, and I always then insist on holding her hand until she feels calm again. I have also had occasion to use a holding technique to prevent her harming herself or others – this is controversial but if managed safely can be very effective, and has been very necessary from time to time. Once you have achieved calm, then you can try and unpick the situation and see what happened.

Finally, help your child help themselves – identify and clarify feelings with them. Empathise. Remind about appropriate and inappropriate response. Help them reflect, ask them how they feel. How were they feeling? Why? What can they do to help themselves? What could they do differently next time.

I just wanted to add a footnote to those who feel their children constantly reject them, although they seem to have good relationships with other adults such as teachers. I believe that often this is not the sign of a failed attachment, but the beginning of a secure one. If a child has experienced frequent moves or rejection, then their default is to expect rejection. If they feel attached, I believe they will feel vulnerable and scared and do anything in their power to stop that feeling to protect themselves. Seeing your child’s rejection as an expression of vulnerability might make it easier to empathise with them and take the tiny steps to allow them to accept you. I had years of rejection from my daughter (adopted age 3, now nearly 9) however 5 years on I feel we have turned a corner and she does now trust herself to love us, but I remember incidents where if we felt we had drawn close to her this would produce a torrent of rejecting behaviour and language as she tried to protect herself. She still demonstrates her vulnerability by her need for reassurance if she feels she is in trouble, but what a long way we have come.