0:03 people who had a rough childhood often
0:05 go through life feeling and knowing
0:07 really that they're different than most people
0:08 people
0:10 and it's well known that early exposure
0:13 to violence and addiction abuse neglect
0:15 they can have a lifelong effect on
0:17 mental health and behavior
0:19 it's common sense right but until
0:22 recently researchers understood these
0:25 effects to be mostly psychological or
0:28 learned from dysfunctional parents and
0:30 while this is partly true we now know
0:33 the primary injury is neurological early
0:36 trauma dysregulates the brain and
0:38 nervous system potentially triggering a
0:41 whole range of problems from obesity to
0:44 ADHD to heart disease to sex addiction
0:46 but for people with childhood PTSD just
0:50 being disregulated is a problem that
0:51 makes ordinary things in life
0:54 ridiculously hard things like going on a date
0:55 date
0:57 spending time alone expressing an
1:00 opinion or you know just buying a jacket
1:02 can set it off
1:05 so if you could see an MRI image of the
1:08 brain in this dysregulated state what
1:11 you'd see in the front left cortex it
1:13 would go darker and dimmer and less
1:17 active under stress hampering the
1:19 ability to reason and pay attention and
1:22 you'd see the right front cortex just
1:25 flaring you know which is a flood of
1:27 emotions and activity there
1:29 suppressed reasoning over-reactive
1:32 emotions this is familiar right this is
1:35 what it feels like it's not all in your
1:37 mind it turns out it's in your brain
1:40 so there's this change of activity brain
1:43 waves are irregular breathing and heart
1:46 rate become ragged and out of sync and
1:48 there might be numbness in your hands or
1:50 your mouth or your face and it can be
1:53 hard to find words or to complete a task
1:54 you're in the middle of or even to just
1:57 pay attention so personally I get clumsy
2:00 and I trip on the curb and drop things
2:02 when I'm dysregulated my handwriting
2:05 changes does yours for a lot of us we
2:07 say things that we don't mean and we do
2:09 things that we don't want to do
2:13 or we may grow silent and withdrawn or
2:15 we may feel desperate and act
2:17 impulsively or fly into a rage and lash out
2:18 out
2:21 so after an outburst like this a trauma reaction
2:22 reaction
2:25 we might feel no emotion and we could
2:27 behave coldly to the people we've just
2:30 hurt my friend once told me that when I
2:32 get upset sometimes I have a blank
2:35 expression on my face and my voice goes
2:37 flat so it's impossible for other people
2:39 to tell from the outside what I'm feeling
2:40 feeling
2:42 but it looks like I don't care
2:45 and I remember a teacher telling me once
2:47 that my son in his preschool had been
2:50 really naughty that day and when she
2:51 told me that I felt mortified and I kind
2:53 of freaked out about it and she said I'm
2:56 telling you this and you obviously don't care
2:57 care
2:59 and I finally have some insight about
3:02 why she would say that why people have
3:05 ever thought so about me I do care
3:07 and you might have this too it's a very
3:10 hard thing where people can't read you
3:13 but here's the thing these reactions are
3:15 not happening because I'm bad or you're
3:17 bad or anybody's necessarily being bad
3:19 or selfish or weak
3:21 I mean you know sometimes we are right
3:24 but these reactions are happening or
3:27 they're made worse because the brain is dysregulated
3:28 dysregulated
3:31 nobody knew this before not doctors not
3:34 therapists not Preschool teachers nobody knew
3:34 knew
3:36 but now we know
3:38 so one way that I've described the
3:40 feeling of dysregulation to people who
3:42 have never really experienced it is that
3:45 it's like wearing a pair of headphones
3:47 with like really loud music just
3:50 blasting in your ears and you're you're
3:52 wearing somebody else's glasses that
3:54 make everything blurry and you're
3:56 wearing a giant pair of shoes a foot
3:58 long for your feet and a mop is on your
3:59 head and all the dirty strings are
4:02 slapping you in the face and no one can
4:03 see this and they think you're normal
4:05 and and you're trying to pretend that
4:07 you are normal and that you feel fine
4:09 and that you are in the conversation but
4:11 actually you're frustrated you're
4:13 getting pulled out you're disconnected
4:16 you're uncomfortable but you have to try
4:19 to guess what a connected person would
4:21 say in that situation it's very anxiety
4:24 provoking right you have to think about
4:26 how to hold your face so it looks
4:28 appropriate to whatever the other person
4:30 is saying only you can't really hear
4:32 what they're saying because the noise in
4:34 your head is so loud and you have a mop
4:36 on your head
4:38 so dysregulation gets activated when
4:40 we're confronted with stressors and
4:43 crises and remember it can suppress your
4:46 ability to reason while it amps up your
4:48 emotions so you see how this explains so
4:51 much of why those of us with childhood
4:53 PTSD appear to keep making the same bad
4:56 choices over and over even when we say
4:59 we're never going to do it again and we
5:00 mean we're never going to do it again
5:02 but then you look down and there you are
5:04 doing it again
5:06 so I'm here to tell you you can break
5:09 this cycle you really are capable of
5:12 making good choices and good changes but
5:13 it would really help if you could learn
5:16 to re-regulate so how do you know when
5:18 dysregulation is happening let's start
5:20 with the regulated State and what that
5:23 feels like when you're calm brain
5:26 activity is even and it's driving body
5:29 responses and emotions in an even and
5:31 predictable way
5:33 but when strong emotions trigger
5:35 dysregulation your thinking changes you
5:37 can go into reactivity you might
5:40 withdraw get silent get confused say
5:42 things freak out or do something
5:44 impulsive and it's hard to perceive
5:46 accurately what's going on in those
5:48 moments like you know what just happened
5:50 what's the actual problem is it me is it
5:52 the other person what am I supposed to say
5:53 say
5:55 so in our disregulated state we might
5:57 totally misread whether a person is safe
5:59 or dangerous and we can't tell whether
6:01 our words and actions are appropriate to
6:03 the situation and sometimes we say
6:04 things and do things that we later
6:07 regret so the trick to noticing
6:10 dysregulation is to recognize the signs
6:12 and they might be a little different in
6:14 different people but here are some Clues
6:18 one is you feel spaced out or at a loss
6:19 for words and you can't remember where
6:20 you are
6:22 or you feel scattered and you're trying
6:24 to do a lot of things at once but you're
6:25 not really finishing anything have you
6:27 had that
6:29 or you're tripping over things dropping
6:31 things losing things can't find your
6:34 phone your keys your jacket your purse
6:36 your voice and facial expressions are flat
6:37 flat
6:41 or you're in a rage or you feel a huge
6:44 urgency to express what's bothering you
6:46 or you can't feel parts of your body
6:48 your hands your mouth your face your
6:51 nose your feet or dysregulation often
6:53 begins with an emotional flood you get
6:55 very upset or scared or something that's
6:58 sad or something happens but sometimes
7:00 the trigger is nothing you noticed you
7:02 can wake up dysregulated in fact so
7:04 that's what it's like to be dysregulated
7:06 and I've put a quiz in the description
7:08 section it's on the free tools page
7:10 there's a quiz to find out if you're
7:11 dysregulated if you're showing the
7:13 common symptoms it's a self-assessment
7:16 now the most important question is what
7:19 can you do so first you notice that
7:20 you're dysregulated and if you can do
7:23 this one thing you can control your
7:26 negative impulses and give yourself the
7:29 time and space to re-regulate before you
7:31 begin saying anything or doing anything
7:33 that could be destructive so if you're
7:36 flooding with emotion going numb say to
7:40 yourself I'm getting dysregulated
7:43 all right number two be safe this is not
7:45 a good time to drive a car seriously
7:47 pull over and take your time don't go
7:49 running into a crosswalk or try to use a
7:51 table saw when you're dysregulated give
7:53 all your focus to getting yourself into
7:55 a physically safe place where you can pause
7:56 pause
7:59 if you are threatened with violence some
8:02 of this won't apply so just return all
8:03 your focus in that case to getting
8:05 yourself into a physically safe space
8:07 whatever it takes
8:09 all right number four if what triggered
8:11 you was an argument instead of
8:14 escalating the fight you can use gentle
8:16 words to stop the interaction at least
8:19 temporarily like I want to continue this
8:21 conversation I want to hear what you're
8:23 saying but I need to take a breather to
8:24 calm down
8:26 or you can say if you don't want to tell
8:27 the other person that you're triggered
8:29 and just tell them you need a bathroom
8:32 break or if you're on the phone you can
8:33 just say you have a call on the other line
8:34 line
8:36 now when you need to step back from a
8:38 situation you don't have to get into a
8:40 big discussion about it because remember
8:41 talking about it can actually make
8:43 dysregulation worse
8:45 so just find a way to put the
8:47 conversation on pause number six is then
8:50 to buy some time separate from the other
8:52 person if you can go to a room by
8:55 yourself even if it's the bathroom no
8:57 one has to know what you're doing if it
8:59 feels urgent take an even longer time
9:02 before you try to resolve anything
9:04 number seven is and this is a quick
9:05 technique stamp your feet on the floor
9:07 you'd be amazed how helpful it is to
9:09 bring yourself back into present time
9:11 into your body and as you stamp each
9:14 foot say quietly to yourself right left
9:17 right left and this helps your brain
9:20 begin to re-regulate you can also take
9:23 10 deep breaths focusing particularly on
9:29 like that
9:32 another measure you can take that no one
9:34 knows you're doing is you compress your
9:36 tongue to the back of your teeth like
9:39 like that number 10 is you can sit down
9:41 and feel the weight of your butt in the
9:43 chair and this is one more way to get
9:45 back inside your body now remember
9:47 inside your body out of your body it's a
9:49 figure of speech of course you're in
9:51 your body but you're not in full command
9:52 of your faculties when you're
9:54 dysregulated or dissociated
9:56 all right number 11.
9:58 sometimes what you need is to eat
10:00 something and when you're stressed
10:02 you'll probably crave carbs and sugar
10:05 but it's protein foods that will help
10:07 you get grounded again so mix that into
10:09 whatever you're eating add it
10:12 number 12 if you need some comfort you
10:13 can wash your hands and feel the water
10:16 and soap on your hands warm water is
10:18 beautifully calming
10:21 number 13 if you have a trusty friend
10:24 with you you can get a good squeezing
10:26 hug and it can really help re-regulate
10:28 your brain if no one's around try
10:30 pressing your back into a corner and
10:32 then Wrap Your Arms Around yourself so
10:34 you can feel pressure all around your
10:36 torso we're wired to calm down when
10:40 we're hugged and that's it you now have
10:42 a whole bunch of things that you can do
10:44 when you notice you're dysregulated and
10:46 I've written them down in a downloadable
10:47 PDF that you can access in the links
10:50 below I go deeper into the science of
10:52 dysregulation in my course healing
10:54 childhood PTSD also dysregulation boot
10:57 camp two different courses so I'll put
10:58 those links down below too
11:02 some people ask me is medication helpful
11:04 for treating dysregulation and some
11:06 researchers say yes and some say no but
11:08 given that we now know that the
11:10 underlying problem with a lot of
11:12 childhood PTSD symptoms
11:14 it's not a chemical imbalance per se
11:16 that's corrected by the introduction
11:18 introduction of chemicals there's
11:20 evidence that some medications can
11:23 actually do more harm than good
11:25 and one of the reasons may be that they
11:27 interfere with your natural ability to
11:28 re-regulate after a period of
11:30 dysregulation so think about that
11:32 everybody gets dysregulated sometimes
11:34 and everybody eventually re-regulates
11:37 with cptsd we tend to get disregulated
11:39 more often for longer periods of time
11:42 and it's harder to come back from so the
11:44 goal is to learn to re-regulate as soon
11:46 as you notice it and then to stay
11:47 regulated more of the time
11:49 so that's the first part of the solution
11:53 the second part then with your nice
11:55 fresh regulated mind is to work on the
11:58 behaviors and circumstances that flowed
12:00 out of you living your life disregulated
12:02 so much of the time
12:04 the childhood trauma happened and we
12:06 definitely were affected by it but this
12:08 is the stuff that holds us back now it's
12:10 the dysregulation and the behaviors so
12:12 that's the essence of what I teach in my
12:14 courses and coaching programs learn to
12:16 re-regulate your brain and emotions and
12:18 I teach people how to do that and two
12:20 acknowledge what happened to you and
12:22 then put it over on the side so you can
12:24 stop dwelling on it or identifying with
12:27 it and then move your focus to Healing
12:29 the life problems that are holding you
12:32 back today the habits the behaviors and
12:34 the reactions that you have focus on
12:37 right now what you're doing to make a
12:39 happy life right now to become your real
12:41 self right now
12:43 because it's time and the past can't
12:45 touch you now it's time to be your real
12:47 self even if it's funky because it's
12:50 beautiful you're a miracle you are made
12:52 to be something much more than someone
12:54 who struggles and if you can Master
12:57 re-regulation you can then have all this
12:58 space in your life and all this
13:01 possibility you can meet people and try
13:03 things and quit things and make a
13:05 positive difference in the world that's
13:07 where happiness comes from these all
13:09 become choices when you learn to
13:11 re-regulate you can go back to school
13:13 you can try your hand at a relationship
13:16 you can tell your story without flying
13:18 out of your body and collapsing into a
13:19 crying mess
13:21 you can choose what you want to spend
13:24 time thinking about it's really nice and
13:26 I made a video about what it's like when
13:28 you heal and I've got that for you right
13:31 here and I will see you very soon [Music]
