Conscious Parenting:  How to Help Your Child and You Break the Stress Cycle
Channel: CJ Liu
Date: 2021-06-28

During the interview Dr. Shanker defines how he encountered 447 definitions of self regulation . He simply defines it as  "How do we manage stress?"  He explains that there are maladaptive and growth promoting ways of dealing with stress.  CJ shares her own personal story that happened right before the interview and Dr. Shanker shares his observations of how CJ coped with stress. 

As a parent, caregiver, teacher, or boss, Dr. Shanker explains the 3 parts of our brain (triune brain). There is the reptilian brain which is related to our primitive flight or fight.  Mammals have a limbic grain that is always looking for danger and scanning the field. The limbic brain is below our conscious awareness and are ways that we react to stress. When stress is at this level, a person really cannot rationally explain why they react in a maladaptive way.  During the interview, he provides an example of a teenage girl who erupts emotionally when her mom did not buy her a pink sweatshirt.  In this example, he shares how he coached her mom to use his 5 steps of self-regulation. 

Step 1: Reframe - When the daughter lost her temper, it is determining whether she was misbehaving or under stress. Dr. Shanker offers a few pointers on how you determine if someone is stressed. 

Voice - It doesn't follow the typical cadence. During stress your child talks either too fast or too slowly or at a higher pitch. 
Facial- The child's face may look pale or may advert your glance
Body - The child is in a fetal position. 
Step 2: Determine stressor - Is it physical, emotional, prosocial, social, or cognitive. In the interview, Dr. Shanker explains that the mother knew that her child was tired from a lack of sleep and working very hard at school. 

Step 3: Reduce stress - Determine what is needed for the child to feel safe, secure, protected, and connected. As her mother was instructed that reasoning or talking to her daughter or lecturing her when she was in "red brain" mode (limbic) would not be received, she didn't say anything. Instead, she just asked her daughter to squeeze her finger if she was ok with her mother turning off the lights and offered a gentle touch. 

Step 4: Get to calm - There are many strategies for getting to calm.Dr. Shanker shares his favorite strategy with his own children was to go outside and have his children's to engage their senses when outdoors (e.g.- what do you smell, see, feel).  

Step 5: Default Mode- Once you can turn off the switch from the "red" brain to the blue "thinking" brain the child is more resourced. The energy tap to the "red" brain is shut off and no longer a gas guzzler taking all the energy.  Instead, the ventral prefrontal cortex can engage and you can feel more focussed.  

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