The Polyvagal Theory and the Power of Relational Safety

[@A1Happy777]

What you are talking about... I see it in the responsive behaviour of my dad who has Alzheimer's. He was a child of a war torn country. Now these defensive mechanisms and responses can exploid from him as they do in children. I noticed it was like a regression back into a younger child's development phase due to the changes the beta-amyloid plaque is imposing on the brain. And as in children, his expressions are ventral vagual expression of some fear and attempt of survial that has come back from his past that has been triggered. What happened to you? is such a deep question. What you are doing will influence many if not all ways we look and understand responses in over a spectrum of mental conditions. Thank you. I see in my dad, his defensive often rages are just as a child trying to survive and often redirection isn't working. Thanks for your very interesting insights. It is helping to better accept the changes in my beloved dad.

[@flymamainfovideo]

Thank you so much! This is really amazing new understanding of behavior

[@MagdusiaPoProstu]

Excellent work, specially now in post-cov disconnected world! Much love and healing process into full health for dr. Mona. I signed up for updates on her website and I’m looking forward to hear/ read more of her new blogs, talks in near future.

[@PropheticCoachTheresa]

Wow. Thank you so much for advocating for children and their families-the obvious missing piece of treatment of behavioral issues is love.

[@tonytrujillo57]

I wish everyone working with children would see this! I am enjoying reading your book.

[@monadelahookeph.d.1289]

Tony, thank you! I'm thrilled you found this video and that you are enjoying the book!

[@imagerythroughplay]

So beautifully explained. I am sharing with all my clients and colleagues. Thank you for your wonderful contribution to the field.

[@monadelahookeph.d.1289]

Thank you Tammi, I'm so glad it helped and thanks for sharing with colleagues!

[@Neilgs]

When you work with "surface behaviors" you are not only re-traumatizing the child, you are not allowing (but rather in fact short-circuiting or precluding) the higher functional emotional-developmental capacities of empathic thinking and perspective-taking from ever-developing. Essentially, they are hi-jacked (adapatively wired) by a constancy of autonomic fight/flight responses and associated hyperarousal or more serious parasympathetic dorsal vagal shut-down. We literally,then,, biopsychosocially, cannot slow-down to engage. This is so poorly understood as to be virtually non-existent. It becomes out of reach of our physiological and autonomic capacities. I guide families however in (emotionally-bodily) understanding this as they engage their infant/toddlers or older (diagnosed or misdiagnosed) by breathing, slowing down and utilizing what largely has been culturally discarded or muzzled, literally our senses-and-bodies. Moreover, this is precisely why we have such functional deficits in typical and non-typical populations distinctions notwithstanding with respect to engaging in the simplest nuanced and reflective conversations; as our nervous systems have become geared to unfortunately adaptively short-circuit higher functional capacities of empathic reflection-and engagement as we are taught to repress deeper and meaningful access (e.g., by insecure avoidant and ambilvalent attachment practices, or quite separately misunderstanding the heterogeneous affect-sensory prcoessing challenges associated with ASD) and in lieu of this perpetuate the pandemic pedagogical myth of "managing surface behaviors."

[@monadelahookeph.d.1289]

So eloquently stated!

[@caroljeannephillips8794]

I'm not a clinician, just a grandparent of a 2E child wanting to be a better grandparent. Can you please recommend a book/video on this topic for laypeople?

[@monadelahookeph.d.1289]

Hi Caroljeanne, I think my book Beyond Behaviors covers this in more lay language, but in March, I have a new parenting book coming out, Brain-Body Parenting that will spell it all out for parents and grandparents! Thanks for asking! Also I have quite a few blog posts on my website written for everyone.