The Art of Co-Regulation

There are moments when what we are feeling seems larger than our capacity to bear it. For some, anger that builds to the point of losing control may sound familiar. On other occasions, a sense of worthlessness may rise to the surface until sobs spill out uncontrollably. Many of us can identify with the firehose of overwhelm that floods our ability to think, speak, or feel embodied. This is emotional dysregulation.

It can arise more frequently in some as a consequence of traumatic experiences, relational patterns, or the ways we’ve come to respond to the world, which leave their imprint long after we have forgotten where they began. Whatever the source, most of us will eventually encounter times when emotional suffering outpaces the strategies we typically rely upon.

We learn to regulate our emotions, in part, through co-regulation. In infancy, this is obvious. A crying baby is comforted by a regulated caregiver. The child's distress is met with calm, attuned attention. They feel seen, heard, and safer. Gradually, their emotional state settles. As adults, however, something changes. The need for co-regulation does not disappear, but our tolerance for it often fades.

A crying child rarely feels obligated to justify their distress. Adults, on the other hand, feel compelled to explain, defend, apologize, or hide it altogether. Emotional suffering is often something the world expects us to know how to manage privately. We learn how to stay composed and hold back tears. We learn when to bite our tongues and push the feeling down to carry on. Yet emotional pain does not always respond to willpower. There are times when we need to tend to our pain, and tending often begins with awareness—our own, or that of another person who is willing to bear witness to our suffering.

Dysregulation is a state that often comes up in the therapy room, as it should. Therapy creates a space where people can explore emotional responses to life's challenges without fear of feeling minimized or somehow inferior for struggling. Within that space, emotions that might otherwise be judged or avoided can be met with curiosity and compassion. As a first step, I often use the Subjective Units of Distress Scale, or SUDS, with clients as a way of learning how to recognize emotional dysregulation. On a scale from 1 to 10, with 10 representing the most distressed you have ever felt and 1 representing a relatively neutral state, where are you right now? The number itself is less important than the awareness it creates.

When I work with couples, I encourage partners to share their numbers as soon as they notice a misunderstanding brewing. If both people are above a 5 at that point, I generally recommend taking a pause, using self-soothing strategies, and returning to the conversation once both feel a little more regulated. Sometimes, however, one partner is at a 7 and the other is at a 2. In those moments, co-regulation may be possible.

The more regulated partner may be able to recognize the other's distress neither as a problem to solve nor as an accusation to defend against, but as an expression of suffering. When that happens, something important can occur. The dysregulated person may feel seen, heard, and safe enough to take a breath. Safe enough to accept comfort and let the intensity begin to pass. Of course, this is where things become complicated. Co-regulation is possible, but it is never inevitable.

Even the most compassionate person in the world has limits. They carry their own history, their own wounds, and their own moments of vulnerability. Sometimes another person's distress provokes something unresolved in us. Sometimes we become dysregulated ourselves. What began as one person's suffering can quickly become two. When that happens, neither person is in a position to offer what the other needs. The wisest response may be to pause rather than to attempt repair.

We need one another, yet we cannot guarantee one another's availability. We can reach out to another person when we are hurting, but we cannot ensure they will be able to meet us where we are. Their compassion may be present, but their capacity may not. This is one of the more difficult realities of personhood.

Part of emotional maturity involves learning to soothe ourselves when no one is available to sit with our distress. Another part involves recognizing when we have the capacity to accompany someone else in theirs. Neither task is easy. Perhaps this is why co-regulation feels less like a technique and more like an art. It involves noticing when we can remain present to another person's pain without becoming overwhelmed. It requires us to recognize when we need support and when we need solitude. It depends on an ongoing sensitivity to both our own capacity and the capacity of those around us.

How can we know when co-regulation is possible? I suspect this is not a question we answer once and for all. It is something we continue to learn through relationships, mistakes, and the difficult work of becoming more aware of the flawed, beautiful humanity in each other.

Books to Explore

·       Stephen Grosz, The Examined Life: How We Lose and Find Ourselves (2013). W. W. Norton & Company.

·       Russ Harris, The Happiness Trap: How to Stop Struggling and Start Living (2007). Trumpeter.

·       Alain de Botton, The Course of Love (2016). Simon & Schuster.

·       Irvin Yalom, Love's Executioner and Other Tales of Psychotherapy (1989). Harper Perennial.