What is co-regulation?

There’s a subject that comes up a lot in child development and parenting circles, called coregulation.

It’s essential for young children, but what is it exactly? And why is it so important?

Coregulation means that I, the adult, leverage my (mature) nervous system in service of your, the child’s, developing (immature) nervous system to get you (child) back to calm, cool and collected. Here’s what that looks like:

Infant cries and parent calmly picks them up. Child stops crying or crying lessens.

Toddler is upset because their ice cream fell and parent calmly sits with them until they’re ready to move on.

Elementary schooler doesn’t want to leave the playground and throws a fit about it, and parent calmly makes sure they’re safe while also steering them where they need to go.

Teenager rants and raves and calls names; and parent calmly reiterates the rule and the consequence.

Did you spot the operative word in all of those examples??

Yep: CALMLY

It turns out that helping kids get regulated (through the process of coregulation) is a strategy by which we lend them our calm (because they don’t have any). Our calm seeps into and onto them. That’s coregulation in a nutshell.

The reason it’s so important is because coregulation is the thing that allows children to (eventually) develop their own SELF-regulation skills. And that’s important because kids grow up to be adults one day.

If you’ve been following along here for a minute, you know that Orchid Kids become dysregulated very quickly. It doesn’t take much to send them into meltdown-mode. We’ll talk more about why this is in later posts, but for now just know that most Orchid Kids are dealing with a self- regulation system that is not working so well. 

Orchid Kids need a lot of help with regulation skills (staying calm); they need a lot of co-regulation.

Here’s the kicker, though.

You cannot fake the calm. This is not a situation where you say, “It’s ok honey” and inside you’re thinking:  “goshdarnit kid I am so stinking mad at you right now but I am gritting my teeth to smile and try and make it through this situation because I know that’s what ‘good’ parents do but actually I want to run away and maybe even smack you upside the head right now cuz you’re being such a butthead”.

Your words might be all right, but your energy will be all wrong. And guess what matters most? (Especially for Orchid Kids?). 

Ding ding! 

What matters most is what you’re NOT saying (but ARE broadcasting loud and clear energetically).

So, what’s an Orchid Raiser to do when their child’s need for coregulation is so high? How do parents handle it?

1. Sometimes not very well, and THAT IS OK! There’s some interesting research out there that says that “good enough” parents only get it right about 30% of the time. It’s ok to bat 300!!

2. By taking care of your own needs first. This can feel so stressful to parents who already feel overtaxed and like they don’t have time to take care of themselves. And yet, filling your cup first is the only way to make sure that everyone’s not dehydrated at the end of a long day/week. 

3. By managing your thoughts about it. We can choose to think things like, this is so hard, or they’ll never be able to learn how to manage themselves, or I hate having to work on staying calm so much.

But we can also choose to think things like, I am teaching my kid how to manage in the world, or she won’t always need me to do this, or I can totally handle my child’s needs.

As you say those sample sentences to yourself, which ones create a closed, tense feeling and which ones create a slightly more open, looser feeling in your body? Do you notice a difference?

Sometimes parents need a little support to find their calm so that they can create opportunities for coregulation with their child. When they do, their kids get calm and self-regulated over time.

If you’ve been struggling with the demands of coregulation and want some help with that, I hope you’ll join our (free) Raising Orchid Kids facebook group. You’ll meet a group of like-minded folks, share wins, and get tips, strategies and answers to questions. It’s fun in there! Come join us by clicking here!