Dysregulation vs. big emotions: child psychologist on why parents shouldn’t blame themselves

Parents often take the blame or blame themselves when facing dysregulation and big emotions from their kids. Child psychologist Tammy Schamuhn has some tips.

Parents in our community say they often face dysregulation and big emotions from their kids and they often blame themselves, but there are other factors at play. Child psychologist Tammy Schamuhn joined CTV Your Morning Edmonton’s Kent Morrison with some tips on how parents can help in those situations.

This transcript has been edited for length and clarity.

Kent Morrison: Are we actually seeing more big emotions from kids right now and should parents feel like they should take the blame on this?

Tammy Schamuhn: Yes, we are. We looked over the last 20 years and kids’ behaviours and emotions are getting bigger, but we’re not going to blame the parents here. Take a big breath. What we’re seeing is we’re raising kids in a really fast-paced world. There’s a lot of stress and we have to think about the components to it.

Screen time, eating a lot of processed foods, less time in green spaces, more of a focus on organized activities and less time on child-led play. Basically, we have these little nervous systems that are really overwhelmed. Think of it like they’re hijacked. What we see as “misbehaviour” and “defiance,” it’s often an overwhelmed nervous system. When kids feel overwhelmed internally, it’s often expressed externally as big behaviours and big emotions.

Kent: How do we define that? How do we know what’s what?

Tammy: With defiance, it’s often with older kids, not always, but we think of defiance as kids knowing what we’re asking but there’s a little bit of resistance. What we often see is they’re able to think and talk to you and have a constructive argument with you, but they’re simply testing limits and boundaries and they’re expressing disagreement with you. They can talk with you, it can be rational, maybe upset, but they can still have a conversation.

Overwhelm is a kiddo that wants to do the thing you’re asking, but they literally can’t because their body has hijacked them. They’re crying, they’re screaming, they’re melting down, they’re running away or they just can’t talk at all. There’s refusal, but very few words. So their thinking brain, the prefrontal cortex, is offline and they’re in their fight, flight, freeze, stress response system. Instead of thinking of it as a “can’t,” think of it as a “won’t.” Which one is it?

Kent: If they’re in that situation and you’re trying to get a message across or you’re trying to enforce rules but they can’t do it, what do you do?

Tammy: Instead of thinking about what to do in the moment, think about how I want to set kids up for success. We’ve got to think about what’s happened that’s led up to this moment. I want parents to start being proactive. I want them to think of first of all, what sets up a kid’s nervous system for health? What’s a healthy nervous system? Because that’s what the issue is, is a nervous system that’s hijacked.

Whole foods, less processed foods, movement - they need more time playing, less organized activities, they need time with their families to play and to eat together. This is going to keep kiddos nice and calm, but every kiddo has a unique nervous system. It’s not the same. I can’t give you a strategy unless you know which child you have. For today, we’re going to break it down really easily. You’re going to have sensory avoiders or sensory seekers.

What you’re going to do depends on your kiddo. Sensory seekers are kids who like climbing everything, chewing on everything, bumping into everything, talking lots on top of you, wanting to have discussions about things, those kiddos are under-stimulated. They need heavy work. They need lots of movement and deep pressure, those kiddos don’t have enough. In order for them to stay regulated, you have to get them moving, put them outside, get them to work.

Your sensory avoiders are kids who feel like the world’s too much, it’s too fast, too bright, too loud. Your avoiders are kiddos who melt down in public places when there’s a loud noise, they’re covering their ears. These are kiddos who are like, “My clothes are itchy,” and it’s the tags or they don’t like their socks on. They need less, they need quiet. They need less transitions. Those kids need noise cancelling headphones or they get to choose what clothes they’re wearing that feel comfy to them. They’re often picky eaters too, so they can be a little harder to feed, but it’s just because the world feels like too much. So those kids just need quiet time and slight changes to their environment.

Both of these kiddos, when we make these adjustments, feel safer in their bodies. The number one strategy I can give parents to reduce dysregulation, is your calm nervous system. That is the number one determinant of whether your child can behave and calm their body is how calm your body is and what your mental health state is.