When we are fully present with our child we are helping turn off their survival mode.
A child knows when our mind is somewhere else. They know mom or dad is not really here. There is a sense of being abandoned, which turns on their survival mode. Adults feel it with other adults when someone’s mind and attention is elsewhere. When we parents are not being fully present to a situation with our children, we are sending a message that signals “danger” to our child’s system, which responds, appropriately, by turning on their survival-mode’s reactions. When we are not fully present, we, for all intents and purposes, are asking them to fight with us or flee from us. When we do do the work of being clean and fully present with them, their emotions can be no more and no less than they need to be.
