04/29/2023
Absolutely love this from 💕
▪︎▪︎▪︎
One of the most pervasive understandings of discipline is the idea that authoritarian or power and control focused techniques "work" because children stop crying and comply in some way to a parent's wishes or will.
This ideology gets passed down in families with generational trauma woven into their attachment patterns. It becomes accepted and typical for parents to punish, blame, shame, and react with scorn when their children are in struggle mode.
Unfortunately, when we use control approaches to our children and focus on behavior modification and not relational co-regulation, we instill dissociation as the primary mechanism of coping. Instead of learning to tolerate emotions and find words to share and verbalize feelings and needs, these kids have to check out, numb out, and disconnect from their body states.
Guess what else mirrors that coping process? Substance abuse. Yup. Eating disorders? Yup. P**n addiction? Yup. Isolating from close relationships? Yup.
The goal is not to teach our children to ignore what they feel, it is to teach them that they have support and that you care about what they are going thru.
Can that be a challenge as a parent? Oh yea. Especially when they are toddlers, or teenagers, or at bedtime when you are exhausted, or in the midst of a hard personal season, or if you grew up with trauma and no one ever offered you co-regulation.
But will it be worth the challenge? yes.
And do you have to do it perfectly all the time? NOPE. NOPE. NOPE.
But do apologize when you lose your cool, and do your best to learn from your mistake and improve from that moment onwards as best you can.
Love on.
If you want more support, come join the Attachment Nerd Herd at attachmentnerd.com, I've got loads of guides and goodies for you there. You belong in my village if you are working on this and have days and seasons when you feel really lost at how to do it on the hard days.
