Thursday, September 12, 2013

Emotional regulation

I think this concept of keeping your emotions in check is interesting. I'm not sold that it's actually an ideal thing but it is what has been known as "proper manners" for some years now, possibly as long as people have stayed put. Maybe it's just me but when I walk all day, I don't hold back with those around me at all.

Anywho, I read this interesting article about how private schools refer children who don't sit still to OTs to learn how to sit and how it's awful we demand our children conform so tightly to school rather than school meeting kids where they are and adapting our teaching to their development. The public school counterpart to this "there's something wrong if your kid can't do super sitting still structure" is sending boys and especially boys who aren't white to special ed to get a diagnosis. 

I get why it is helpful to learn emotional regulation. Absolutely it is helpful for kids to be able to keep a lid on their tempers. But it's hard to see the other extreme of emotional regulation at school in my kid. She is so successful at boxing in her emotions outside the house that she hides them almost completely. After a day of no emotions expressed, she is a lit stick of dynamite most nights just waiting to blow up without warning. 

I worry about the kid, honestly. If she can never tell the other kids when she's upset or hurt or mad about something, how can she manage in the world? Yes there are times to contain your emotions but being an emotionless Vulcan is too far. Expressing emotions in the moment is a big part of being human. To a point. I get so mad when people can't have a rational discussion without bringing their entire emotional baggage to the table. It is hard to work when emotions about the past totally inform every single sentence of the conversation. There I'd say it is fine to have emotions but you have to contain them when they impede the discussion at hand. Have a good bedside manner and use it when needed. 

I guess that developing an appropriate level of emotional regulation is going to come later. I really hope it does. The other big problem our kid has is being super shy. Shy doesn't matter at daycare obviously and she got over it or around it in preschool because the group was small enough. In a classroom of nearly 30 kids with hundreds on the playground, it is hard for her. She has no willingness to ask to play or to start a game herself. None. We keep explaining it to her and she keeps not getting it or is too scared to try and also afraid she will "get in trouble" if she admits she's scared. She has some bizarre personal definition of what constitutes "in trouble" that includes anything we talk about that she doesn't want to talk about or worries about. 

So for now I think we will attempt to manage and hope that in time she will find a niche or at least a place she is safe enough to stop being so completely defensive. I just wish we could be done with being read the "I hate you and I hate it here and can't we just live at our old house again?" pre-riot act biweekly (followed by some rioting and sobbing). So if you think you could just move with a 4 year old, know that it will be miserable and try not to do it. Ugh. I hate that it's likely we may move after I graduate, just in time for her to have settled in here. Sigh. 

6 comments:

  1. Oh, that sounds so hard on the kid. I also don't know how I feel about controlling emotions. Osita has always been very volatile, emotionally and we've worked hard to help her name her emotions and give her tools to work through them. Sometimes I wonder if that backfires, or we're doing it wrong. A lot of times when she is really upset she'll say, I'm not sad mommy, I'm happy. All while she's sobbing. I always tell her it's okay to be sad, but I also reminder her of what I do to feel better. I wonder if that makes her feel pushed to get over her sadness too fast. I'm going to watch this more closely...

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. We decided not to so much name her emotions as just use words when she's upset. Her best buddy was close to noverbal as a 2 year old when they met and she got in the habit of screaming instead of using words. We've mostly tried to name emotions in others with her (because I felt like my mom forever naming my emotions wrong was irritating, but she is terrible at identifying emotions in everyone so it wasn't just me). I think that for the kid at least she needs space to work through her emotions. We got a punching bag so she can get out her aggression on something safe, in private. My other wish is that she'd watch Mr. Rogers to learn about emotions that way but it's too slow moving for her interest level, alas.

      Delete
  2. This sounds so hard, for you and for the kid. The fact that you're in tune with her needs and are encouraging her can only help though.

    ReplyDelete
  3. No advice, but honestly, I am so glad I'm not the only dealing w/ outbursts and intensity. D's pre-k teacher told me he is very quiet in school, so I suspect he is holding everything inside like your daughter does, only to blow up at home later.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. I hope this is a phase they grow out of eventually. I have had this song in my head and I wasn't sure why on earth it was there, but then I looked at the lyrics, and went, "Wait. That's my kid in this song... hmm..." So we adults will try to model more emotions in the moment for her! http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oAdA_ilVLIM

      Delete
  4. Whoa.. do you know who this sounded like as I read through?! ME... as a child, that age and even a bit older. My teachers would have said what a quiet, calm student I was. My friends, their parents, all would have said the same. She's so quiet, she's so shy. My parents... would have said I was a NIGHTMARE. I held it all in until I couldn't anymore and where I couldn't anymore was at home. Oh and the worrying about being in trouble thing? Same thing I did. I remember lying in bed at night, calling to my mum to tell her about things going on at school that were worrying me but I couldn't tell my teachers because I didn't want to 'get in trouble' but they were absolutely not things I should have thought that about. Whoa, bringing back some memories. I wish someone had helped me at that age to figure out how I could express my emotions at the time they were happening and not hold it all in to blow up at home. I don't know the answer and what would have worked for me. Talks with my mum about it did help, but for the most part I think I did just grow out of it eventually... or never... oh gosh..

    I hope that for you, a lot of it is due to the move and that this will just be a phase. I hope that her school an help her to speak out and express herself when she needs to. It is tough. You are doing the best thing by recognizing this and doing what you can to help her.

    ReplyDelete