Episode 4: Three Ways to Practice Social Justice through Parenting & Promote Your Child's Development
At the Same Time
[INTRODUCTION]
[00:00:02] NV: Sawasdee ka and welcome to the Come Back to Care podcast. I am your host, Nat Nadha Vikitsreth, a decolonized and licensed clinical psychotherapist, somatic and social justice practitioner, and founder of Come Back to Care. Adopt connector, norm agitator, and lover of liberation.
If you're on a journey to transform your daily parenting into a social justice practice that nurtures your child's development and promotes intergenerational family healing, I am so glad that you're here. On this podcast, we explore how social justice, child development science, parenting, and family systems intersect with one another. If you've been looking for ways to align your parenting with a social justice values, you're in the right place. Together, we find our way back to our true home. We come back home to our body and the goodness within. We come back to our lineage and come back to care together. So come curious, and come as you are. Let's move at the speed of care. And let's do this.
[00:01:26] NV: Welcome to the fourth episode of the Come Back to Care podcast. What if you could strengthen your social justice muscles through your everyday parenting practices? What if a diaper change builds a foundation of your baby's brain development, while offering you an opportunity to practice power with instead of power over? What if supporting your toddler during a meltdown lays a foundation for how they will navigate stress throughout their life and also gives you a chance to practice solidarity instead of savorism? What if the ways you reconnect with your child after you make mistakes models what resilience and compassion look like for you and your child and give you a chance to practice accountability instead of cancellation? I believe with my whole heart, that you can parent your child the same way you advocate for equity and social justice so that you don't have to pick and choose between the two.
In this episode, we're going to explore what it's like when your parenting decisions are driven by equity and liberation no matter what sleep, feeding and soothing techniques you swear by, so that you can practice parenting in ways that support social change in the community, and promote your child's development too. You build the awareness, action and agility that you need to both end, parenting and social justice practice, or to feed two birds with one worm. This way, you get your social justice exercises or reps end no matter where you are.
In social justice advocacy, we tend to go for the big ticket items, like abolishing the prison industrial complex. But we blow our pain and trauma through our partner or our children when we disagree with them at home. As Mia Mingus, who's a wonderful transformative justice practitioner puts it, “We want to end child sexual abuse. But we can't even be accountable to do the dishes in the sink from three days ago.”
So the tiny practices in the home that we can do through our daily parenting can really help us be more skillful, and be skillful advocates outside our home too. We're going to talk about how you can build the foundation of your child's brain and overall development by using your daily parenting practices to build these three R's; reciprocity, regulation, and reconnection. When you practice these three R's, you're practicing social justice concepts of power with, solidarity and accountability. If anyone can do this hard or heart work, it's you. You know that people tend to shy away from working through their baggage of unresolved issues. But most parents and caregivers want to dive in because they love their children. And I believe in your power as a parent.
Still with me? Let's start with our first R, reciprocity. When you think of reciprocity in an interaction, you might feel this rhythm of back and forth in that interaction, but feels queued in or attuned. Perhaps your best friend listens to what you have to say without judgment. And you might feel the sense of connection with them that you can relax into. And it feels like, “Wow, they really get me.” You feel seen and heard because your friend met you exactly where you were at, in your daily parenting, this reciprocal back and forth rhythm in your interaction with your child, or what the center on developing child at Harvard University calls the serving return. It may look like this.
You're changing your baby's diaper, and they're cooing at you. You coo back. They smile and lift their arms. You rev up the excitement too, and you rev that up in your voice before handing them a rattle. And then they shake the rattle. And then you say, “Shake, shake, shake.” In this brief example, did you notice the back and forth rhythm or reciprocity in it? And yes, chances are, you're most basic and mundane interactions that you have with your little one day-in and day-out are so rich with reciprocity. So, reciprocity, back and forth rhythm, or serve and return, is an act of meeting your child where they're at so that they feel seen and heard. And it does two things for development.
First, it nurtures your child's social and emotional development, specifically, self-trust and self-worth. When your child feels seen by you, most of the time, they learn that they matter and that their feelings are valid. They know that, “I'm real. My needs are real. My experiences and existence are valid. It's okay for me to take up space in the world exactly as who I am. I don't have to break myself into pieces and hide parts of myself to be accepted, to blend in, and to belong.” This trust in themselves and in you are such important building blocks for attachment.
The second thing that reciprocity does for development is build connections between brain cells so that parts of the brain that take care of problem solving can work with the parts that handle language, motor skills, and so on. We know that newborns come to us with around 86 billion brain cells. What's lacking are connections or the architecture among those brain cells. And this simple back and forth interaction that makes your little one feel seen, essentially builds the brains architecture.
The great news is you're already doing it during diaper change, potty time, play time, snack time, getting dressed time, most of the time. And again, because life is real, and perfection isn't. Brain development starts with a nurturing relationship, or as the late Dr. [inaudible 00:07:58] put it, “The action is in the interaction.”
Now let's connect the dots between child development science and social justice practice. In order for you to create this reciprocity in daily parenting for your child to feel seen, you decenter your power a bit and move it to the side. This way, you can see more clearly what your child needs from you in that moment so that you can meet them where they're at, instead of where you need them to be. When you decenter your power, you practice powering width, instead of powering over.
Power over is an approach to power that ask who and what I can exploit, manipulate, dominate, control or compete with so we can get ahead or on top off. This approach to power is deeply woven into the norms of society built on historical oppression and white supremacy. Add individualism and capitalism to the mix. And we see this power over in institutions like prison, policing, immigration and more. But that's that. We're all swimming in this pond where the water is white supremacy. So I want to remove shame out of the equation for a second.
When, not if, we collude with the power over a paradigm, especially in our parenting. In our parenting, power over can look like a dominating and forcing our little ones to be, do, act and feel whatever we want them to do, or what the tracking apps say. Instead of meeting them where they're at first, we want them to meet us where we are so that we can “teach them lessons”. Or worse, give them something to cry about. It doesn't mean we don't teach them and let them do whatever they want. We do teach them, but it's a matter of timing, right? We connect with them first. And when they're in that space to learn, we teach them. More on this when we get to the second R, regulation.
That's why I want to highlight that when you choose to decenter your power and invite reciprocity, you’re resisting the dominant norm of power over. By practicing power with instead, you're practicing social justice in the home. To sum it up, when you practice reciprocity in your parenting and help your child feel seen, you build a foundation for attachment and brain development. And you decenter your power to practice power with instead of power over.
Shall we move on to the second R, regulation? When you feel regulated, you're in that zone where you feel alert, calm, and curious, compassionate, and courageous. You have the juice to meet your life's demand with relative ease. That means you're not spending every second in survival mode or in fight, flight, freeze, people please, or shut down mode. You just be.
As you can feel or imagine, this space is so welcoming for us to learn and connect heart to heart with others. I know. It sounds pretty great, right? And this zone has many names. Dan Siegel calls it the window of tolerance. And I'll just nickname it bandwidth. Because when you're regulated, you have the juice and the bandwidth to be the imperfectly compassionate and intentional parent you know you can be. The best-ish version of your parenting self.
For your child, it's the same thing. When they're regulated from feeling safe, cared for, and seen by you, they're in their bandwidth to, ready and open to learn and develop. They have to choose and the bandwidth to be their best-ish self too. Regulation is a big deal for our little ones learning in development. If you're a coffee drinker, like me, you know how rough it is when someone wants to engage with you before that caffeine kicks in. Rough for you and the other person. I mean, they should know better, right?
Or how hard it is to be thoughtful and present when you're hangry? Our kids need that kind of bodily regulation and emotional regulation too where their bodily needs are met, and they feel safe and secure enough to pay attention, take in information, process it and learn.
Regulation is the first thing I addressed in my therapy session with young children and their families. Yet, a lot of child development resources out there divide development into different domains. Pick like slices of pie. One slice for cognitive development. One slice for language development. One for motor. And one for social development. But if you really take regulation into consideration, development will look more like a layered cake. The base layer is regulation. And then the other layers stacked on top are the domains of development, cognition, language, motor, and so on.
When the base layer gets wonky, the whole development is not on a solid ground. A clear example of when your child is not regulated, or in their bandwidth, is when they have a meltdown. Meaning they're too overwhelmed to cope. If you're little one is crying nonstop, isn’t napping well, or has lots of meltdowns, and you're up at 2:36am Googling things like, “How to stop tantrums? Or how to manage the terrible twos. Or how to choose between spanking and timeout? Or is bribing my toddler okay? What you're essentially trying to address is how do I help my child become regulated? Or how do I help my child get back into their bandwidth?
Chances are, once you've gathered all of those hot tips on the interweb to manage your child's tantrums, you might find it super challenging to implement them correctly. Or even to remember the steps. You might laser focus on implementing this strategy right and unintentionally miss the tiny person in front of you who's asking for your help. And I'm not saying that you lack the skills, expertise or persistence to implement the strategy and help your little one cope. It's actually quite the opposite. When your child is in their bandwidth and they're asking you for help through crying or a full metal lockdown, you're likely to be out of your bandwidth too. It's hard to be calm and chill when you hear your baby's screaming and you don't know what to do right away to help your baby. Plus, the unpredictability of parenting in general adds to your stress.
And I'm talking about the kind of stress where you're reading Pete the Cat with your toddler while planning laundry, and making a grocery list in your head, that kind of stress. And on top of that, there's this invisible threat called the COVID-19 virus. And depending on your intersecting identities, cumulative stress from systemic oppression and daily micro-aggressions certainly add to your stress or survival response. So you're probably already on high alert, and primed to tackle any danger that comes your way, virus or racism, like a mama bear, a papa bear, or a gender neutral parental bear.
And have you seen a parental bear who's nice, kind, sweet and polite? Probably not when you're on high alert for danger. You're just not nice, kind, sweet and polite. And clinically speaking, when your nervous system and body are mobilized and energized to prepare you for danger, you're likely to move out of your bandwidth. Remember that space where you're kind, calm, curious and compassionate? Yep. Once you're in fight, flight, freeze, people please mode, your way out of your bandwidth. And when you're in your fight, flight, freeze, people please mode to tackle threats, the smart part of your brain, the neocortex, goes offline. And that's the part that helps you think, plan, use your judgment and do overall adulting. It goes offline, because you don't have time to discuss Shakespeare when you're in survival mode.
Another thing that goes offline, when you're outside your bandwidth of calm, curiosity and compassion is your social engagement systems. You’re neurologically not in a position to show up as your best-ish self, where you're intentional, present, calm and compassionate. So the question of what do I need to do to help my child becomes regulated or get back into their bandwidth? It makes no sense.
Given how our brain and nervous system operate, it makes so much more sense to change that question a little bit to, “What do I do to get back in my bandwidth first so I am centered and anchored enough to help my child get back into theirs?” Because when you're not in your bandwidth, you don't have the neurological juice, if you will, to show up as your best-ish parenting self, let alone helping your child navigate their big feelings.
The reason I'm talking about the nervous system is that many of us are so quick and so skilled at shaming ourselves when we can't show up as a calm, cool and collected parent/baby whisperer. I hope that this understanding of your nervous system can help move us away from the good bad parent binary. Are you still with me? So how do we get back into our bandwidth first? I'm so glad you asked.
If you're getting ready to side eye me because you suspect I might tell you to do yoga or meditate, I won't do that to you. What I do is share an example from a data used to work with through the in-out and through program. As dad stats sometimes gets anxious. And when he does, it's hard for him to be present with his wife and daughter. His go-to coping behavior is eating. And he worked really hard on deepening his awareness of his body and notice that there was a restless feeling on his arms and hands when he feels anxious. To stay regulated and to get back into his bandwidth, he honored that restless energy in his arms and hands and channeled it into an activity like doing laundry. He said he had to get busy and productive with his hands. And when he did that, his anxiety was metabolized.
I bet you have various ways to resource and get back into your bandwidth too. Maybe you have a warm beverage you're holding in your hands right now that feels really grounding to you. Or you're looking at your favorite plant, or snuggling up with your pet and you feel centered and secure. Or you're doing the dishes, doodling or playing with your pen to stay engaged with me right now. And you know what feels grounding to you.
So regulation is the foundation of development, because it's the space where our children are open and curious, the best place to be for learning. And regulation starts with you, not the other way around. What I'm proposing here is for you to get regulated first to help your child be regulated. Or I'm inviting you to get into your bandwidth first, so that you have the juice you need to guide your child back into their bandwidth.
So let's connect the dots and tie in the social justice concepts of solidarity and savorism. When you anchor yourself in your bandwidth first, you're honoring your own safety, energy, boundaries and dignity. This way, you can meet your child where they're at in solidarity and help guide them back into their bandwidth.
In solidarity, you're saying, “I see my humanity, and I see your humanity. I don't need to sacrifice mine to uphold yours.” In the messiness and the strength of our relationship, we can do this together. And savorism, on the other hand, is sacrificing your own safety, energy, boundaries and dignity for your child. Because capitalism, patriarchy, colonialism and white supremacy told you that that's what good parents should do.
So the idea of putting your mask on first isn't just a nice idea, but a necessary one. Because first, you reset your nervous system, and get back into your bandwidth, so you can show up fully for your child. Second, you're resisting patriarchy’s idea of mothers as martyrs, or parents as productivity protectors. By honoring your own needs as a parent too, you’re unsubscribing from this capitalistic idea that taught you to ignore your well-being because it was such an inconvenience for productivity.
When you're a parent, it doesn't make your needs less important. Instead of picking either, taking care of your needs, or taking care of your child's needs, the concept of mutuality and solidarity can be a reminder to not become a martyrs just to get a gold star from capitalism and patriarchy. So it's absolutely okay to talk to your child about the coping strategy that you use to get back into your bandwidth. And if it's appropriate to invite them to do it with you, that's great, too.
For example, you might say, “I've had a long day, and it feel very stressed. When I go for a walk, I feel much better. Would you like to take a walk together?” With solidarity in mind, self-care becomes self-respect. Now, let's say you're back into your bandwidth and your child has a meltdown. What do you do? Well, I'd love to share one thing you can experiment with if you'd like. Meeting your child where they're feeling and naming that feeling can be so validating and soothing for our little ones. Dan Siegel calls it “name it to tame it”. And I humbly add feel it to free it.
I remember one mom who I used to work with stopped pushing her Walmart card when her toddler was crying because he wanted a basketball. She got down to his level and said to her son, “That basketball looks like so much fun. I want it too. But we have to buy groceries today. I feel sad too that we can’t get it today. Maybe next time.” And I wish I could say – Then the toddler magically stopped crying and melted into his mom's warm embrace. Ha, as you might have already predicted, my little buddy cried even louder. But mom stayed connected with him. And they had their heart to heart connection.
So name it to tame it and feel it to free it isn't about giving in. Mom wasn't swooping in like a savior and get the basketball for her son. She just didn't give up on the connection and let her discomfort take over her parenting decision in that moment. In this example, mom was slightly annoyed, understandably, as she was in a hurry. I mean, there's dinner prep and make after this grocery shopping run. But she was still in her bandwidth instead of in her fight flight, freeze, people please mode. So she was able to gently and firmly guide her little guy back into his bandwidth in that moment of connection.
To recap, our second R is regulation Because when your child is are regulated, they learn best. To help your child get regulated, you can put your mask on first so that you can meet yourself where you're at first. Then show up in solidarity for your child to meet them where they're at.
Onward to our final R, reconnection. You might have already noticed that I say parenting this and parenting that thing most of the time. It's simply because, in parenting, we can get it right all the time. Remember the example we talked about in reciprocity about a diaper change? Sometimes you're changing your baby's diaper in the back of your car, and there's just no time to have that serve and return, or regulation. Sometimes you can't quite figure out if our little one’s off, because they’re teething, hungry, or just over it.
In these moments, where you're not your best-ish parenting self, or can't quite figure out what to do, or what worked yesterday, these are moments of disconnection. Disconnections are an organic rhythm in parenting, isn't it? When there is a disconnection, you reconnect and keep it moving. I know you already know that perfection isn't real. Yet, many parents seem to have an exception to this perfection rule when it comes to parenting, as if there were a perfect parenting strategy that they should have known and executed flawlessly all the time.
What do you say you know your child best? It's because you've gone through so many trials and errors. So many disconnections and reconnections with your child. You know what works and what doesn't, at least for that day. This disconnect, reconnect rhythm is so important for your child's development. When there is an unintentional disconnection, it gives your child a brief, and this is on brief, moment to exercise their coping skills that they have been practicing with you. Say your five-month-old baby is having a blast playing peekaboo with you. Then your boss calls and you need to pick up the phone and disconnect from your baby for a minute. Your baby might be vocalizing more to get your attention back. And this vocalization might rev up to the point of crying. Then they might try to fuss with their blanket to occupy themselves briefly, or maybe suck on their thumb, or play with their foot. There is a base layer of trust there that you'll come back and reconnect, just like you're down for the past five months.
When I talk about disconnection and reconnection, I love sharing this study by [inaudible 00:27:58]. Their studies shows that 18 babies from age three to nine months experienced that dreamy blissful synchrony where their mother is perfectly responded to their needs in the first glance, and successfully tuned in to their feelings like professional baby whisperers. Only 30% of the time. Only 30%. The rest of the time, those babies experienced mismatches, missteps and disconnections from their caregivers. You know, those moments when you have no clue why the baby's crying and you go through your mental checklist? Hungry, wet, bored, crying just because. You know that list. And you're trying to figure out what to do. Because what soothing techniques you used yesterday has just become a one hit wonder, right?
So those trial and errors and disconnection made up of 70% of the baby's day to day experiences. And the baby turned out okay. As young as four months, many babies can distract themselves, shift attention away and soothe themselves, like playing with their feet or suck on their fist to remain engaged with you while you're trying to figure out ways to meet their needs as best as you can. Not knowing if the hunger cry is hunger cry or a bored cry right away, or not knowing how to discipline your toddler immediately when all they want to do is to open and close the drawers. It doesn't mean that you're failing as a parent. Your baby's growing ability to briefly regulate their emotions gives you a small margin of grace, and not having all the answers all the time and right away.
When you finally figure out what to do, you reconnect with your baby and repair the rupture. And this reconnection, where you keep showing up for your child even when you don't have all the answers, is so important to attachment and overall development. The five minutes, that might feel like five hours, that you're scrambling to rock, shush, pounds, walk, wrap your crying baby while heating a bottle, who child is safe with you. And in this safety, they're having a mini-rehearsal of problem solving, persistence, and emotional regulation. In this sense of security, your baby knows they're loved, supported, and most certainly not alone. They know that they can navigate through this hard moment with you, with grit, sometimes grazed, and most certainly resilience.
I want to share this study, I always get mixed feedback on this idea of getting it right 30% of the time, some parents feel so relieved. Others feel frustrated that the bar is only 30%. That it's so low. I personally feel relieved that we only have to aim for 30%, because the hard part is in the reconnection, or the repair after the rupture. The hard part is when you keep showing up again and again for you and your child, especially when you don't have all the right answers, or have some answers right away. And here's why. During a mismatch or disconnection, it can be stressful and overwhelming. And you might be out of your bandwidth and in your fight, flight, freeze, people please, or shut down melt. When that happens, our nervous system, in its own wisdom, takes a quick action to help us become less overwhelmed and prevent us from spiraling into that shutdown mode. And we all have our go-to coping behaviors in the face of conflict. Some of us shut down and disappear. Others reflexively agree with the other person to avoid further discomfort of the conflict. In other words, they people please. Some of us scream and stay in that fight mode to gain and maintain a sliver of control over the situation. And these coping behaviors are likely to be developed when we were little. And whether they are adaptive or outdated is another story.
Sometimes we face disconnection and we automatically go into our coping behaviors to soothe the pain and discomfort of the disconnection. Then we stay there and we don't reconnect with our partner's, parents or children. We forget to repair the rupture and leave the other person hanging with the open wound caused by the disconnection. Instead of setting a parenting goal to be doing it right 100%, perhaps even fight you to get it right 30% of the time, and keep showing up consistently to reconnect.
To connect the dots between reconnection and social justice practice, accountability come to my mind. Accountability in our context simply means owning your oops. We hold ourselves accountable by showing up consistently and not perfectly. We hold ourselves accountable to find possibilities in the disconnection. Instead of staying in the self-soothing comfort of your coping behaviors, you can hold yourself accountable and in compassion to move through your discomfort and reconnect with your child.
Malidoma Some said it's so beautifully that conflict is the spirit of the relationship asking itself to deepen. So by reconnecting with your child after the disconnection, leave perfection at the door and deepen your connection with your child.
Let's talk about how, which is discernment. Before you go into your usual coping behavior, I invite you to check in with yourself by asking these two questions. Am I unsafe or uncomfortable? And does this coping behavior adaptive in this moment? My people pleasing coping behavior isn't so adaptive when I'm trying to advocate for equitable changes in my workplace. But people pleasing a customs and immigration officer who's interrogating my humanity and the validity of my being is all adaptive, because it's a matter of life and death to me. For you, when it's our discomfort, how do you hold yourself accountable to get back into your bandwidth? Move through the discomfort of disconnection so that you can reconnect with your child?
I'd like to share a clinical example with you to highlight this dad's disconnection and his hard work of reconnection with his baby. Because dad already gave me permission to share the story with you. Charles notices that they feel uneasy in their upper chest area that's sinking down into their stomach when their baby wants a hug. They often automatically hand the baby something like a book or a toy to dodge that physical intimacy.
As we worked together, Charles remember the same sinking sensation in the stomach when they were little, when they ask their parents for the same hug, which their bid for connection was often met with rejection. So to protect themselves, they learned over time to not be “needy or dependent”, and they have worked so hard on becoming self-reliant.
Charles often says things like, “I don't need anyone or anyone's validation. I am me.” And you can see that the disconnection happens where the baby wants physical comfort. But Charles feels really uncomfortable with that. And they reflexively hands their daughter a toy to play with instead, in a way, trying to teach her to not be needy, to avoid feeling the painful rejection that they experienced. This disconnection comes from Charles’ inner child wound or attachment injury.
Now, Charles understands that this coping behavior protected them back then, but might not be so adaptive for their daughter now, given that they want to give their daughter a different kind of childhood that they had, and to really love up on her. With this awareness, Charles moves into action to reconnect. They share that when they feel centered and grounded, a.k.a. regulated in their bandwidth, They catch themselves repeating the same pattern. So they say to themselves along the line of, and I’m paraphrasing, “Yes, I know I faced rejection in my childhood, and it hurt so much. Thanks for protecting me. But my child reaching out to me, asking for a hug, makes me so uncomfortable right now. But I'm going to sit with this discomfort and choose to reconnect and connect with her instead, to disrupt this cycle of intergenerational family pain.”
To sum it all up, the same parenting practices you use every day offers another avenue for you to practice social justice in your home too. And by building reciprocity, regulation, and reconnection, you're laying a foundation for your child's development as well. When you decenter their power and meet your child, whether at first, you practice power with instead of power over while building your child's brain architecture and allowing them to feel seen and heard. When you get into your bandwidth first, and then help your child journey back into theirs, you do so together in solidarity instead of savorism. And when you mess up, yet, you keep showing up to try again, even though you don't have all the answers, you practiced holding yourself accountable for that repair or reconnection, which forms a foundation for your child's grit, and resilience. If you're a visual learner, or simply want to have a visual reference of what we've just discussed, I've made a handy dandy guide for you to download and keep. You can find that in this week's show notes on our website.
All right, we covered a lot. As always, in solidarity and sass, until next time, please take care.
[OUTRO]
[00:39:22] NV: Thank you so much for spending your time with me today. You can find all the resources, links and complete show notes over at comebacktocare.com/podcast. If there's something you want to check out, you could find it at comebacktocare.com/podcast.
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