 So I'm still Mel Hauser, Executive Director of All Brains Belong, and this is Brain Club. So I also want to tell everyone, most of you know this who are here on Zoom with us now, but for those watching asynchronously, and those of you who are here who are not yet aware of this, we have a very cool event happening that is part statehouse lawn, part hybrid statehouse lawn in Zoom. So it's a community health and education fair where not only do we have our customized COVID vaccination clinic for babies, kids and adults, but we have some awesome community partners tabling about various resources. We have health education presentations about COVID safety and family youth mental health, long COVID, all kinds of topics that and I think we're going to be really, really good conversations. And that those educational parts are you can you can sign up if you wanted to come via zoom. Just go to allbrainsbelong.org forward slash protect dash kids. And if you're around a Montpelier we'd love to see you on the statehouse lawn. As always, you can participate, however, works for you. If you if your captions are not popping up and you would like them. Click on the life the live transcript, or if that's not popping up in your version of zoom the more dot dot dot. Show subtitles and then if they are popping up automatically and you want to turn them off. Do the same pathway to click hide subtitles. All right, so I'm going to tell a little bit of story. Many of you have heard the story before but I think just kind of frames our conversation about unlearning some of our expert expectations and things that we've been told just before we became parents but like while we're doing it right. So, there I am on the left six weeks before I gave birth to Luna. And actually, I mean like I think just a week before you got birth to Luna, and then there's Luna, who made it really clear to me that I didn't know what I was doing and that anything I had been told about how this just was to go, even as a doctor takes care of babies. No, that's not how that went like at all. And the thing is, it's because of what I had been told, and what I was telling myself that contributed so much to the stresses that I experienced as a new parent. I say that because really now, now I know that there's no right way to be a baby, there's no right way to be a parent there's no right way to be a human right and so yet there are these defaults and so all month we've been talking about the defaults of healthcare the defaults of education the defaults of employment like there are defaults of parenting they're totally are. And so that's what I'm hoping we can unpack a little bit tonight. So, um, I decided since we had the luxury of a slide show. Since so so so I've been talking about brain rules I never like went back and did the original what are we even talking about like so four weeks in what do you even, what do you mean when you make up these terms because they are in fact made up terms. Brain rules, the things we grew up with our assumptions the expectations the things people tell us the things they that we tell ourselves, as opposed to world rules like laws of physics, like, universally generalizable human kind statements like don't hit people in the head if they don't like it. But there, and there are world rules of parenting sure there are, but there are a lot of brain rules. And that impacts our expectations of our self and our expectations of other people expectations of our kids expectations of our partners expectations of our co workers like expectations of just like general society. And, um, sometimes that impact is not very good, or very helpful. And when, and some other examples, like, we have to sit down together as a family at the dinner table. That's actually in fact a brain rule because in fact you can be a family without being at the dinner table. In fact you could actually eat dinner not even at a table. Whoa. My house has to be clean when people come over. Like, lots of people say that stuff or think that stuff. But it is a brain rule someone made it up as opposed to a true world rule. I have value as a human being. I need to provide my brain and body with nourishment. The dopamine on brain needs dopamine. These are like true world rules. So we make brain rules for regulation. We make brain rules. That's upstairs brain making downstairs brain feel safe. I always love this, this construct from Dr. Dan Siegel and Dr. Tina Payne Bryson upstairs brain and downstairs brain. So your cortex, your limbic system. And we spend a lot of time at brain club talking about what a dysregulated limbic system can look like. But brain rules are a way of trying to regulate for upstairs brain, trying to make the world make sense, trying to assert or establish autonomy or control make that real predictable, less chaotic. So I might say to Luna, you're eating red juicy melty cherries. You have to eat that in the kitchen and not on the white rug. Yeah, that's upstairs brain trying to reduce chaos that does not make it a world rule. And of course, avoiding trauma or traumatic memories. So I have, I have been on this journey. I know a lot of people have been on this journey since we've been doing it together about like checking your brain rules. Is this a brain rule or a world rule? And just because it's a brain rule doesn't mean you have to do, you know, it doesn't mean it's wrong. It just doesn't have to be rational. Brain rules are supposed to help you and if they help you keep them, otherwise, instead of making a new brain rule. And so I'm going to introduce, before I introduce our panel, I'm going to play a little video clip from actually how do I do this? I have to click share sound. There we go. A little clip from Brain Club from February, where Hannah Bloom talked about the myths of attachment and attunement. And here we go. Then I'll introduce our panelist. Hi baby. Oh, so sweet. So this was the like the story the books are going to tell you when you're looking at attunement and attachment that it happens. It's blissful. You get there. It's going to be this place and read these books and learn these things and then have a child in your arms. And this happens. And yes, we will have all of these days will have those moments of picture of a mother and baby snuggling chest to chest with white shirts on screen smiles and snuggling baby picture of a mother and a child on their back. Giggling in the ear and smiling the photo of two individuals walking hand in hand appear to be an elderly couple. And then a photo of appears to be a mother and a daughter teenage years rocking out and mom having a hard time understanding what's going on with this world. So, even within an hour, we have all of these emotions and we have all of these sensory systems and we have all of these regulations. And we know that it's going to happen over and over that cycle. And then in a lifetime attunement and attachment is a lifelong lifelong process. And with that, I will introduce our panel. We were joined by three panelists today we're going to talk about their process of thinking about this on learning process and what that's been like and then I'm hoping that most of our conversations they will be interactive, where we can do this together so maybe if you can wave when I'm introducing you maybe if you feel like it. So we're joined by Linda Riddle, who is a mom of two and occupational therapist and an atypical human. I love your introduction Linda I think it's like amazing, except when you deliver it like the way you deliver it is like just more it's better than it's better when you say it. Natalie manhouse who is a pediatric occupational therapist also who I also identifies as neurodivergent and is a mother of two boys age three and five and Laura Lewis mom of three, who is a nurse researcher focusing on quality of life and social relationships for autistic adults. So, um, I don't, do you have an order that you'd like to, to speak in. Okay, Linda you want to go first. Okay. I, I believed the propaganda. If I was capable enough and confident enough and dedicated enough and strong enough and persistent enough and stubborn enough. You know, I could, they everything would align and life would be beautiful with the little people at the dinner table and, you know, smock dresses and braid their hair like Laura Ingalls okay. I bought it. I bought the whole thing. And the people that God sent me wanted nothing to do with that illusion. I had to realize a great deal that I had assumed. And that projected was not at all based in the reality of my people to to the point that sometimes I think the point of them was to teach me that I don't know anything, but I am very happy with the people I got their wonderful people. And I'm glad that they're in my life. The things that they have taught me have been incredible. And there have been, there were parenting moments where I knew I was right. That I just, I was in touch with my kid and I knew what was going to work and I knew what was true. And it didn't matter that nobody else believed me because it was still true and it was right. And I, when I advocated for my children in those moments. I was being a good parent. When I was advocating for what I thought was true and right instead of what they thought was true and right are the times that it always came back to bite me. I guess. If I could give myself one piece of advice. I would go back and I would say the only thing that you actually have any control over at all is what you value. Make sure you value the good points. Thank you. There's so much done there, like so much. Natalie. Yeah, so I agree with everything, you know, Linda said, of course, and I think that one of the things is when you are going on this journey and you realize that you have a child who is possibly neurodivergent and it's not following the same path that you had, then told that you had to let go. Then you get to a place where you're like, okay, well, what, what do I do. And sometimes in the stories and Linda you didn't do this but sometimes in stories when you hear parents they're like well I had to let go of expectations and so it seems like okay well just like let go of their expectations. But it's it's like these little Mike it's like, like, try to think of onion, sorry, like what's that vegetable with the purple. Okay, so an onion so you have all these layers so you do like one layer or at first it's like okay, like kind of going back to Mel's example like we don't have to sit at the table like that's okay like we can get up and move around and then it's like all right well what's the next thing that's not working for me in my child and then it's like all right well then I'll address that so it never is like okay I'm just going to not do something. So when you start to kind of unfold what's going to work for you because it has worked for you as a parent and then also for your child. There's like people in my life so my husband is more traditional, like a more behaviorist point of view from parenting, based on how he was raised right like, I come with my own stuff like my brain rules my conditioning is such like the same thing as a lot of us. And then at some point I have to kind of confront him and be like this is what I read this is what I'm seeing and this is why. And that's not to say that he agreed with me or that even heard it. And same with my parents, so I had to have multiple multiple conversations of little pieces that I felt like we're working and not working. I actually can't discipline my child because he will literally freak out and hate you for the next week. And so it looks the way that I have to parent looks totally different than how I was parented then how everybody in my circle of people who see him almost every day parented. So that's sort of can be the daunting task but I think what was really helpful is look at okay like what's the thing that's not working. Then I'll address that what's the thing that's not working and then when they see it, when they start to see it, then it's able, you're able to kind of explain it better and in the meantime it's a lot of like, I'm doing this. I think this is right. And you have to just trust me I know it didn't look like how you raised me. I know it doesn't look like it's typical but this is sort of what is working and so we're going to go with it I ended up just a little backstory to we ended up pulling my son out of this preschool program in November of last year and homeschooled him. And again we come from a very like school oriented parents, grandparents like, like literally it was like everybody's mind was just like blown. And now that they see it like I was able to get more buy into my husband when he's like oh yeah our child's not melting down for like two or three hours a day, like every single day like oh yeah like he seems to be happier. Once you get that evidence, then it's a little bit easier not only to see okay there's like the next thing that's not working for us there's the next thing but it's also easier to naturally advocate, because you have the evidence there but in the beginning it's like you're like well, alright I'll let go of expectations but it is just like okay what's not working and then I think that was really helpful for me it's sort of a long winded way of saying that. And the evidence is that you like something like the brain rule wasn't working anymore. So like it made it easier to kind of recognize it as a brain rule and and and that framework can be applied to so many things. I think even more interesting and that's another layer to this is that I'm a pediatric occupational therapist and then I did this deep dive into neurology maybe like eight years ago and then I learned everything there was to learn about neurology from an occupational therapist standpoint and then applied those principles to supporting children who were dysregulated or had trouble regulating. So it was a very successful minus like kind of a handful of kids. Then my child comes along, and literally nothing I know or do works. That's not even including the fact that I look at my child or my children like nothing comes into my head like nothing clinical there's no ideas he just like a person that I don't understand. Not only did I have my parenting brain rules and just like me brain rules and then it was like okay well I thought I was this amazing occupational therapist. And I can't do anything with my child and so it was like I had to break all of those to which is really interesting. I had that very similar experience and many, many clinicians do because I should know how to fix this when there's not something to fix. I should know what to do like no human should know what to do in all instances so like the I should know what to do is a brain rule. And it's not a helpful brain rule for like a lot of people in a lot of different situations. Thank you for sharing Laura. I have so many thoughts on this and Linda and Natalie that was like, like nodding along profusely when you're talking. I have like a random list of things that came to mind when I was thinking about my own brain rules and learning. Linda you said you know we knowing it's right and true even if others didn't and they didn't listen or feel that. I think one of the things I've struggled with is not parenting for other people besides myself and my children and my family, like so often I found early on. And if I was with my parents, I would discipline my kids very differently I would treat them differently I'd respond to them differently than when we were alone in our house and it led to more chaos that led to my kids feeling like I was an unpredictable parent because depending on the audience, I would change what I was what I was doing and it took a lot of, I think just time and confidence to stop caring what other people think of my parenting and just doing what works for myself and for my family. So that was one thing and along with that there that idea that there's like one right way to do it. And then the children's line that he says to me all the time is there's more than one way to load a dishwasher. And basically the idea being like we're getting the job done and that's our way and it works and like, and that goes. He uses that line with me a lot when we parents differently that like, you know, we're both, we both love our kids we both have their best interests in mind we stay on the same page we communicate about everything but in the moment we do it a little differently and that that's okay we can be on the same page. Excuse me, and we can be on the same page and still respond to the situation a little bit differently. I also find that whole idea of there's more than one right way to do it. I can be judgy of other parents and I can worry about other parents judging me and what I found I was just reading a grenade brown book and reflecting on that idea that when I'm judgy that means it's an area where I'm a little vulnerable and I'm feeling a little insecure about my own parenting. And so kind of taking that stop and reflecting and stop worrying about what other people are doing and really focus on like why am I feeling insecure about that decision in my own life. And one of the things I found really interesting in the book I was reading, she says, it, the question isn't so much are you parenting the right way, as it is, are you the adult that you want your child to grow up to be. And I thought that was a great quote, but it's really funny I'm sitting here and I'm reading it again and thinking that that sort of implies that my kids should grow up to be like me and that really doesn't reflect who they need to be either and I think that's its own brain rule of like they should be me and they, I can model to them and they will be that and I think a huge thing for me is learning to love and admire their strengths for who they are, even if those aren't the strengths I expected or dreamt of in my head when I thought about being a parent. Like you mentioned like that, you know that braid and that like my kids hair is everywhere my daughter chipped her tooth when she was really little and every picture for her entire childhood she's got this like half a front tooth missing and it to me epitomizes like, I had this dream of like girls with curls and like, no, it's none of that and it's perfect the way it is but like it's not that vision, and that being okay and like Mel was saying that idea of I should know how to fix this, like stop fixing and just love them and that makes it a lot better. Along with that, one major brain rule for me is that people pleasing was a great quality that I wanted my children to have I love people pleasing I'm the people please that my child people please is to a dangerous degree and for me now it's how do I teach a child self advocacy and selfishness almost that like you don't have to give away everything you have to be kind that's not the same thing and it's it's been a funny flip of the script for me that we're always so focused on sharing and kindness and my daughter will come home and say you know somebody wanted this so I gave them all of the time and I'm like well then you couldn't play and she's like but it made them happy. Well, like, that's, I feel like I'm struggling sometimes still with how to like, you know, celebrate that she's sharing but also teacher that skill of like you don't have to give everything you don't have to empty the whole cup, like, you know, keep some in there that's an important skill. And then I think the last kind of point is that it's really okay to be overwhelmed and tired and to not love every moment of parenting and that that doesn't mean I don't love my kids and it doesn't mean I'm not a good parent. But it's okay to make mistakes and I think a major one for me there is that it's okay to share with my children when I made a mistake. I was raised with that mentality that when you make a mistake, like, doesn't parent is always right that's it. And we're raising our kids much more like, hey I yelled at you earlier and I shouldn't have and here's what I was feeling and that's the way I responded and that's not a good way to respond. I mean, there are other things I could have done different differently and we're finding that that works a lot better in our house for actually modeling like humanness instead of that idea that we're always right and you always listen. I mean they should, there's that balance between safety and wanting them to listen when they need to but also like that we're not just these like beings that know everything. So those that was my long winded list of things I thought of. Thank you there's I mean that there's there's so much there right and so just like in for all three of you I really appreciate you modeling for all of us right that this, it is a world rule that this is really hard. Right and like, when people make it look like it's not hard. Like, that's one not helpful to maybe based on some brain rules and just on learning the whole thing of saying what, what, what do I do, how do I exist in this relationship in any relationship but to establish safety and co regulation, because that's the world rule. And, and what I thought I would do just so that we have multiple different ways of engagement. I made us a jam board. And I was thinking, let me see if this works. Oh good. Okay. So as we have our conversation today. In addition to just unmuting and shouting it out or typing in the chat box, if you wanted to. You could click the link in the chat, it will bring you to this screen, and then over on the left underneath the arrow is a sticky note, and you can say, I'm child needs to sleep alone, or whatever it is that the brain rule is, you can make sticky notes and I bet that we hi Nina thanks for coming no I totally I was, I was, I was expecting that football practice to take over your live so thank you for being here. So, so anyway, I would love to know how this, this topic is impacting any of you. And again, feel free, feel free to participate however, however works for you. It's kind of mentoring moment I'd like to share with my youngest. And it falls under that, you know, you have to look right in public sort of thing, and your, your child and your family has to conform to it. So when she was a very, very little person. She was working on using both her hands because while she has great fine motor skills she didn't have good bilateral skills. And my dad was visiting. And as a break for me, he took Emma around in the cart and I hear this God awful horrible noise in Walmart and I'm like, Oh my God, I, you know, what is that somebody needs to control their kid. Wherever I go in Walmart there's this like honking. And I'm with my other kid and you know it's about time to meet up in the honking is all over the store this honking. It's idiots. And there's my dad and my youngest. He's just gotten her this old fashioned duck call that he found somewhere in the sporting department, where you have to do this with it to make the duck call noise. And for the last half hour she's been going around Walmart, making the duck call noise as loud as she can because she's never been a weak child. She's like honk honk honk honk honk honk all over the store. And I'm like, I look at him. What are you doing? You know how many people are hating us. And he's like, she's using both her hands. And I'm like, well, okay. She's using both her hands she's been using both her hands for half an hour she's using them purposely it's coordinated. We're going to buy the duck call I'm shutting up now. Emma was fine. Annoying people in Walmart because apparently that's what we needed to do to get her to use her two hands together. There's no right way to grow your skills. I'm just, I'm commenting on one of the stickies in the Jamboard about shoes required to be in stores. So, Luna. Luna asserts her autonomy in many ways throughout the hour. But one of which the theme of I do not wear shoes is is is a common one. And so we were going to go get a treat like Luna shoes, they're required for the going in the bakery. I was like, no, brain rule. It may in fact be a brain rule, but it's not my brain rule. It's the bakeries brain rule, and I don't get to control other people's brain rules that brain rule makes their world makes sense and makes it safe and orderly in their place of business. They can have their brain rules, and you can choose whether or not you get a chocolate chip cookie, we don't have to go in there but like if you want to go in there. You got her shoes. She's like, fun. So I think that it's healthy for kids to know that everyone makes brain rules, including them. And that it doesn't mean they're bad. We've talked a lot about brain rules that are bad. But like there are some brain rules that are good. Or helpful in that situation and when they're no longer helpful you give them up. There's some good ones here. I'm wondering, what other, what other experiences have you had with unlearning how how other people tell you you have to do it that like you knowing your soul is not how you have to do it. I'm going to read some of these out. There's such good ones here. I'm trying to like move things around so we can see them and see each other. Yeah, oh yes, kids have to say hi, or engage with other adults or children when when when meeting them have to say please and thank you have to eat what everyone else is eating at a meal there are so many brain rules around food and eating in such problems. Um, yes. Laura. Yeah, I'm just thinking of your question about dealing with people and their brain, unlearning the brain rules and I, my thought on it is just, I found it really painful to unlearn the brain rules honestly, like it's liberating in the long run, but it's painful in the process. I had to let go of a lot of like, what people think of me and I'm somebody who cares very much about what people think of me. And that's been a really difficult process for me. And even recognizing like the difference between a brain rule and a world will like dicing that out and trying to separate like things I've grown up, you know, believing in and and hearing about and the way I was raised. And they have really deep rooted ideas and they can feel so deeply rooted sometimes that they feel like world rules even when they're not and that's been a real learning experience for me at it ongoing I feel like that'll be a lifelong process of sorting those out. And that's the thing about a brain rule or real brain rule is the one that feels like a world. It's so because especially ones that you were taught or yourself made up as a young person, because they get, you know, over rehearsed and those neural pathways strengthened for decades. And a lot of times, when we are stressed and dysregulated ourselves we go right back to them. And like for me, I have a brain rule that it is optimal to be calm, and that to be a good parent, like a comforting good parent. And that is that I am calm. And so when I am not calm, and I judge myself and like think about Bernie Brown and the shame factor, because I violated a brain rule of my own. Those are the ones that hurt the most. Sarah's gotten the chat, because you not only have to go against mainstream culture, but many of us have had to face outright criticism. It's not as hard as a people pleaser. Yes, and a lot of us experience rejection sensitive dysphoria, where that criticism is like a limbic assault, it feels literally unsafe to be criticized, and it's not like being dramatic it's like, you don't get to pick what sets off your limbic system and criticism for a lot of people does just that. It's like people pleasing for myself to the extreme and that I honestly just want people to like my kids. And it can be extremely hard to accept that doing the best slash right thing for my kids sometimes means that people won't like them and that's okay. I think one thing that was really helpful for me is knowing that, you know, when you look at any given situation. If I started asking myself like why and there's a in my kids are always asking, like, especially the one that started diverging more why I'm and I swear to God like 90% of the time like I don't know why, you know, and it's and it's going back to that maybe with our parents. They would say well because I told you so well that doesn't apply to my child like it that does not work. So I've had to rethink every single thing that I do. And if I don't have a good solution or like a true solution something that makes like literal sense, then I'm like well I guess we can do it because it's just one of those things that I was implicitly following without perhaps thinking about it and I think that's how a lot of us were taught before we became parents just like follow what you're told like do this like and not question it right but you've got if you have a child who's constantly questioning and not able to listen to these directions that do not perhaps make sense. Then it requires you to think about them really like analytically and then come up with something. And those who question the status quo are those who change the world, and we can't have it both ways straight and so if everyone followed the brain rules of that's the way it is and just do the thing like nothing would ever get better. But in the moment it's like so hard to think about that because it violates brain rule. And then you think about how I know my son of I and I have come a long ways 14 now and I certainly you certainly have certainly have a lot more brain rules to work on but one good thing I can say is that one thing I've been teaching him for quite a few years is we say you know we're thinking about what other people think we're leaders and I give an example of people that are great leaders in the world and what they do and how they stand out and even when it comes to things that used to be brain rules for me like you must wear matching socks or things like that. Like, he wants to get step outside of that like last year all year he wanted to wear these really wild crazy and matching socks. And he was like really popular in school because of that and I said even if it was it went the other direction, you still got to be strong and we still have to be leaders right because everything you do may not go that way. Like one other example is that I'm like he has these hyper fixations that like they just go on these phases he has to keep doing the same things he doesn't know why like all last year in school he was doing the Spider-Man three dance. And I'm like, I just said as long as you're not doing you know like during class if it breaks or other times and that's fine you know whatever you have to do it. And that's the thing where he got really popular people are requesting it. You know what I mean just being himself. But again I said if it doesn't go that way. Then, you know, you know, whatever you know it's just, you still got to be you still got to be strong you're still a leader right I don't care about what people think so something that's kind of taken some time but we've gotten to the point it's like, for at least a lot of things. We just don't care. Yeah, and I like to tell Luna that it's a world rule that you can't infringe upon someone else's access needs. So if you need to make noise or you need to do this dance or you need to throw whatever. That's fine that you can, you can do that it's your access need, but it is a world rule that you cannot infringe upon someone else's access needs so you can't like if I if my access need is to communicate to someone else like you can't you know like you can't hit someone else you can't violate their consent you can't like so so that's that's world rule stuff, while still affording autonomy and access. There's a lot just like themes of stuff that's in the Jamboard, a lot of things about conforming to social standards, including politeness. Natalie says in the chat. It's like when my son needs to crash into things he will often go to his brother and tackle him so it's a lot of redirecting and explaining that humans are not for hurting you can crash over here yeah you can you can crash but not into him because he did not give consent for that. And Laura says super wise to teach that that that listening would be good, even, even when it does not go well that it's still about being a leader. Sorry I read them out of order or chronologically connected. I'm wondering if when you all first started to think about like the process of questioning like the things that you believed about how parenting was supposed to go and when you like, like what are you talking about like what do you mean this is how it's supposed to go, like how did that process first begin. Because I think like me. There's lots of people who it's hard to even begin the journey of learning because you don't recognize that it has to begin because you don't recognize it's a problem until you at least on a little bit of unlearning, you continue to we as humans, when people violate our own brain rules. It's really hard to be open to that. Laura says my kids have forced me to self reflect. How did, how did that, how did they do that. I feel like they it's a was it Natalie saying your kids are questioning everything I have a daughter that questions everything and I feel like the more I'm questioned it's exactly the example that you said it's like having to give an answer or not I mean my parents wouldn't have engaged in that it just would have been because I said so and that would have been the end of it and I. I kind of had in my head that I wanted to give an answer I didn't want to just be a because I said so and that was like a little brain roll that I was like all right I'm going to I'm going to go out on my own and do it this way. But I was so low and behold that was like the start of this whole opening of the floodgates to say, letting them question really forced me to think about why I was doing what I was doing and that and I think it has taken a lot for me to when when it doesn't make sense to like let it go and even say to her like, well I don't know I don't know why we do it that way that's let me think it through and like talk out loud with her and I have a kid that helps connect the dots a lot and she'll even bring new lot. and she'll even bring new lot is it like this mom and I'm like well no but now that you say that that's a really like she makes me think in different ways that that make me learn about parenting I think. I think something else um that was helpful too is from the very beginning and I think this is true for a lot of parents it was very obvious that my child was different in like a lot a lot of ways from what I expected parents need to be and so it was already very hard you know for me and so from that journey it's like okay well I need some help in this area so it's just like researching starting one thing and then as he got older it was more like you said like more self reflection so it was a lot of when you have a child who's questioning you it makes it very easy to self reflect but if you don't have that it's a lot of like what do I believe even like going to the core of like who am I and what do I like to do instead of just being told and so as basic as that sounds I think a lot of us grew up not being able to have that like we didn't have that kind of like autonomy and reflection and really knowing ourselves and being able to understand like who we are and what we want and how then how we want to parent and so you get into this parenting role and you're like well I guess I have to tell everybody what to do now because that's what happened to me and I think a lot of times when we have a neurodivergent child it doesn't start off like that you know so I think that it's again like kind of piece by piece as they come up it's like my child brings me stuff like now I don't even have to go looking it's like whatever the next thing is like he will confront me on it and then I know it's something that I have to kind of like relearn right yes oh that I that's so resonates with me um me to share is we didn't get questions we just got very puzzling behaviors and lashing out for me finding the pda label and reading about other parents experiences and what they found worked helped open my mind dramatically yeah and I think that um I was I was I was describing to someone earlier today about how um my child to me represents what like unfettered autonomy looks like and unfettered um self-advocacy like she communicates her access needs often in like really big ways and this is this is an admirable quality and it's hard it's all of that and so it is often um just to to Nita's point it is often lashing out and you know thing behaviors things we can observe that communicate someone's underlying physiologic speed and so how many times have I as a child or as an adult wondered about someone's underlying physiologic speed and that person is unable to communicate that so here we are we have a nervous system of a sweet little one who is communicating something really important toward our pursuit of the world rule of creating a safe co-regulation relationship and that's all like easy to say like from upstairs brain upstairs brain can say that all day in the moment downstairs brain has no clue downstairs brain just feels like your brain rules are being violated and it feels unsafe which energetically puts out and like energetic signals into the world that make a child potentially feel unsafe even if you say nothing feeling Natalie shares a few years ago I had never considered a PDA diagnosis for my child but as I learned unlearned more it was like the diagnosis finally made sense and much of it was about going through my own rules for example if I follow a brain rule that my child needs to listen to me I will have trouble adapting to their needs all outside of that brain rule and thus I won't be as open to adapting and relearning and our ads I think we were also pushed to question brain rules when we reached the point the parenting was just not going well for our family were okay with chaos but it felt wrong and for me for my partner for my daughter giving clear signals that we were not meeting her needs absolutely I had this you know I continued to have um that that experience of like well something has to change because needs are not being met that's like what Natalie said before um how have folks navigated balancing kind of the culture in your own homes versus um knowing that there are brain rules outside your home that your child has to interface with that's something that comes up a lot I try to be very honest and explain what the the societal expectation is when I understand it and where it came from when I'm able to figure it out and sometimes we just have to default to neurotypicals are weird they get to be them you get to be you we all coexist some some brains do it one way some brains do it another way either one of them is wrong as long as world rules are respected very like of not violating access needs not violating consent but um I want Luna to be able to predict um what's going to happen because she has a kind of brain for which it feels unsafe when things are unexpected like if I predict that you know this is the system I've created and then life outside my home there's like this outcome that is not expected that's gonna feel on that's gonna feel unsafe so some some some characters in the world may respond this way some characters respond this other way so all of that is expected I think a lot of it too is is being able to say um like my this is an example with eating right because my son's a very picky eater and so I'll say like my job as a parent is to make sure that you're getting healthy food I can't make you eat it but I have to put it in front of you and I will support you however you want if you want to taste it whatever it is if you want to just look at it that's fine but it's my job to make sure that you have healthy food available to you and so that um is much different than me saying you have to eat everything on your plate which literally will not happen and it will end up bad for everybody and so it's it's kind of figuring out kind of how to go around things and explain like what's my role and then just a lot of like check-ins like does this make sense to you like does it make sense that when you jump on him because sometimes I feel like it doesn't make sense like something that I take for granted like when you jump on someone or wrestle someone like when back to the other example like that will hurt their body I feel like there's this disconnect where he will jump because it feels fine in his body but he doesn't relate it to their body so part of it is like I feel like almost pointing out those very obvious to me rules like those world rules that he doesn't implicitly understand like when you jump on someone that could hurt their body and it would feel like if someone jumped on you that would hurt your body so there's a lot of kind of like that where you don't think you maybe need to take a step back but it's super helpful when you just assume that they're not assuming anything or that they just don't know yeah and in that example it may not even be about the how it would feel in your body it might be about did you ask permission before you made contact with another person's body no you did not and I mean if permission was asked and permission was granted to jump like that's a different conversation but that first step probably got skipped too and that goes the other way around too like when I think about even myself where I like impulsively reach out to like fluff my child's hair or like offer her a hug like I definitely don't always remember to ask consent to fluff her hair and so like I'm trying to relearn like I'm trying to practice like adherence to that world rule because that is in fact a world rule that I want her to know about about asking consent before making contact with another human and entering their body bubble that's how we talk about it. Mel that also reminds me of something I've learned from this group is I've noticed how often I like gas like my kids without meaning to like a number of times they'll tell me like it's too loud in here and I don't perceive it to be loud and my gut response is no it's not like how horrible is that like I'm just dismissing what they're telling me and that's something that I didn't even recognize I did until I heard people here talking about that and then was like oh my gosh I totally do that to them that it's it's such a small thing for me that I didn't even realize I was doing it and I feel like one thing I've been trying to do in terms of reconciling the different environments where they have to be my son lately was telling me that school was too loud and so and I talked to the teachers about it and we said you know he's it's very loud for him at school would it be okay for him to wear a pair of headphones to have in the classroom if he finds it to be too loud he never even uses them but he felt a lot better about he didn't want to go to school anymore because he kept telling me it's too loud there and now we haven't had any issues since we got him the headphones and his teachers say he never even wears them but just having that tool has made a huge difference awesome because you know the agency of being able to do something you know you'll feel like the safety comes from just knowing that there's something you can be able to do um and I think that like that's not I wouldn't give yourself such a hard time I know that lots yes people at brain club often give that example of like this um the invalidation of sensory experiences um growing up in the world um those many of those situations um relate to people who um are not not as self-reflective as you to be able to say oh that's happening I'm doing that like so it like um I would venture to guess that that's not the only thing that that occurred in those relationships I really hope not I that's not how I perceive myself as a parent but it's it is funny I feel like sometimes it's those little things where we respond without thinking that then we look at and say like what message am I sending by this behavior or this reaction that can flip yeah yeah um and I think that um a lot of it is habitual right like if we um grew up in environments or have been around in environments where there's like the reflexive responses of like you're okay that is what comes out even if that's not the message that we intend to be sending yeah that's another one is uh is the is the you're okay yeah um but it's it's um yeah they fall and my gut is to say you're okay because but it's coming from a place of wanting to reassure as soon as you flip the lens of saying that is potentially invalidating like then you're not going to do it then you're going to like be able to like you know pause override but that's like high level executive functioning stuff to be able to do that once you have the paradigm shift and your lens is different then then it's totally different but it's laying down those new pathways of what you do instead I ask Luna what do you want me to because my instinct is to go hug that is not what my sweet little love wants so I say what would you like me to do when you trip and fall nothing so we have compromised that I will um I will come closer but I will not look and I will not talk and that's how we negotiate our access needs everything is negotiating access needs that's a world rule so with that um thank you so much to our panelists and thank you um so much to everyone oh oh I want to yeah um that's a really good I'm just noticing out of the corner of my eye lore adding that school teaches my kids to ask friends is there anything I can do like if someone looks hurt yeah that's that's I like that I like that well thank you thank you so much all of you again and we hope to see you Saturday at um at at at our community health and education fair and then next week's brain club we will be talking about the brain rules of relationship so it's going to be like a part two conversation from our July brain club I really love that brain club so I uh I I look forward to seeing you then bye