Video Transcript
If you were feeling resistance from your grandchild or a child, it’s helpful to remember, oh, okay, yeah. They’re also experiencing this loss. And it’s not gonna be like it was when you were raising your children. It’s not, it’s a totally different environment and a lot of different issues and things might come up.
But just coming from the environment of where they came from, they’re gonna be traumatized. They’re not gonna know how to express what they’re feeling. They may not even realize they’re feeling it. Their own nervous systems are gonna be, you know, either hypersensitive or maybe totally depressed, you know, shut down. And they’re gonna respond to the new living situation the way they know how.
And it’s not because they’re trying to be bad, it’s just their nervous systems are responding. They probably survived in the environment that they were in using these coping mechanisms.
So as you go through the day, you might find, oh, they don’t wanna go to school, they don’t wanna get ready to get dressed. Things might come up and they have feelings. And it may not even be about them not wanting to get dressed. It might be about that they’re really missing their mom or dad, but the only control they feel is to get really angry.
So if that happens, a tool you can use—and a book I recommend highly—is called The Whole-Brain Child by Dan Siegel and Dr. Tina Payne Bryson. It’s an excellent book. It even has little cartoons and simple steps about really just meeting the child where they are, and then being there for them in that way—being able to say, “I see that you’re feeling really upset about putting your shoes on right now.” And acknowledging what it is they’re feeling.
Sometimes that might be enough—just kind of sitting with them and saying, “I see that you’re feeling this way.” Sometimes you might have to do other things.
When my granddaughter first came with us and she was having those kinds of things happen, she wouldn’t even be able to really be around other kids because it was too stimulating for her. Something would trigger her and she’d get really upset. So sometimes I would just hold her—because she couldn’t talk about it. I would hold her until she calmed down and then just state, “Okay, I see you’re really upset and I understand. Everything’s okay right now.” Doing that over and over again helps not only the child, but it’s going to help you too.
Another thing that I did that was really comforting—probably more for me than her—is I would lay down with her at night and just hum as she went to sleep. She wanted me to be with her, and I would just sit there and hum for a while. We’d read a book and then hum a song, and it was really soothing.
So anything like that, that’s simple, that you can do every day to help them have a safe space to have those feelings, but also help them calm their own nervous system—your calm nervous system will help.
If you’re feeling nervous and you’re just trying to rush them out the door, which I know happens, they’re going to feel that too.
So having those moments, even in between the harder moments, where you guys can connect—that’s going to help build up that connection for them when they are dysregulated.
