Potty Break – Dealing with the Holiday?s – Episode 11 –
4 simple tips to thrive despite your child?s limitations.
Every child will become dysregulated when pushed beyond their limits. As parents we will can thrive during these times if we:
- Learn Your child?s limitations: (Study and log their reactions)
- Accept your child?s limitations as they exist today.
- Appropriately Expand your Child?s Limitations.
- Don?t blame yourself or your child when you decide to act with respect for your child?s limitations
Links and products from this video:
A great book about a kid with serious limitations who found growth and healing written by one of the world?s foremost authorities on Childhood Trauma. ? The Boy Who Was Raised as a Dog: And Other Stories from a Child Psychiatrist’s Notebook–What Traumatized Children Can Teach Us About Loss, Love, and Healing
More about self regulation problems with kids at The Child Trauma Academy:?
About Potty Break:
Potty Break is a series of daily training and encouragement videos for foster and adoptive parents…designed to be watched during those precious few minutes that you can find some alone time….your potty break. (Parents of kids with other special needs are free to listen in 🙂 – most techniques we suggest are effective for kids that have other types of trauma and neurological developmental issues.
Segment Overview
The first segment of Potty Break consists of 13 episodes dedicated to helping family with adopted and foster children with special needs thrive during the holidays. Jennie and Lynn laid out 5 reasons that kids struggle more during the holidays that at any other time of the year.
- Sensory Processing Issues: All the extra sights, sounds and smells overstimulate children with Sensory Issues. Sensory issues are common among children with in utero exposure and other early traumas (Episodes 3, 4 & 5).
- Anxiety: All kids get anxious around the holidays. As anxiety goes up, functioning goes down. Many of the children that were adopted from hard places already had very little capacity for anxiety so the holiday put them over the edge (Episodes 6 & 7).
- Self Regulation Issues: For a variety of genetic, mental health, and trauma related reasons, some children lack the capacity to regulate their own emotional state. Parents of these kids will need to help them stay regulated and set realistic expectations (Episodes 8, 9, 10 & 11).
- Trauma triggers: Often the worst times of our kids lives happened during the holidays. Sensations and situations can trigger a traumatic response which can cause a physiological response, bring up an old memory that they may try to suppress or both. Parents can help their kids discover what is going on to reduce the child?s regression. (Episode 12)
- Grief and Loss: Special moments are a reminder of what our kids lost or wish they had. Processing this loss periodically is a necessary part of acceptance. (Episode 13)
[starbox id=”lynnallan,Jennie Owens”]
