Parenting from the inside out (Dan Siegel) Flashcards
What is the best predictor of a child’s security of attachment to a caregiver? (preface)
The way that adult has made sense of his or her own childhood experiences : making sense of your life is the best gift you can give your child or yourself.
What is the crucial inside-out idea? (preface)
It isn’t what happened to you in your childhood that is the crucial factor - it is how you make sense of how those experiences have influenced your life. We can’t change WHAT HAPPENED to us as children, but we can change THE WAY WE THINK about those events.
What happens if a parent fails to make sense of his or her own childhood experiences? (intro)
Science suggests that history will repeat itself as negative patterns of family interactions are passed down through the generations.
What is “interpersonal neurobiology”?
An integrated developmental framework for understanding the mind, the brain, and human relationships.
How does making sense of our lives help our children? (intro)
By freeing ourselves from the constraints of our past, we can offer our children the spontaneous and connecting relationships that enable them to thrive. By deepening our ability to understand our own emotional experience, we are better able to relate empathically with our children and promote their self-understanding and healthy development.
How does the parent-child relationship shape a child’s emerging personality? (intro)
Emotional intelligence, self-esteem, cognitive abilities, and social skills are built on this early attachment relationship. How parents have reflected on their lives directly shapes the nature of that relationship.
What happens when we are preoccupied about the past or worried about the future as we spend time with our children? (intro)
We will be physically present but mentally absent.
What is MINDFULNESS? (intro)
For a parent, mindfulness is living in the present moment, being aware of our own thoughts and feelings as well as those of our child. Mindfulness gives respect to the uniqueness of each person’s mind.
What does it mean for a parent to be a LIFELONG LEARNER? (intro)
As a LIFELONG LEARNER, a parent recognizes that the relationship with their child presents unique and valuable opportunities to grow, to be challenged, and to examine issues left over from his or her own childhood. This mindset enables a parent to experience parenting as a JOURNEY OF DISCOVERY.
What is RESPONSE FLEXIBILITY? (intro)
Response flexibility is the ability of the mind to sort through a wide variety of mental processes, such as impulses, ideas, and feelings, and come up with a thoughtful, nonautomatic response.
Response flexibility is the opposite of a “knee-jerk reaction.” It involves the capacity to delay gratification and to inhibit impulsive behaviors. This ability is a cornerstone of emotional maturity and compassionate relationships.
When we are flexible, we have a choice about what behaviors to enact and what parental approach and values to support. We have the ability to be proactive and not just reactive. Response flexibility enables us to contain a wide array of emotions and to think through how we will respond after we consider another’s point of view.
When parents have the ability to respond to their children with flexibility, it is more likely that their children will develop the ability to be flexible as well.
What is MINDSIGHT? (intro)
MINDSIGHT is the ability to perceive our own minds and and the minds of others.
Mindsight depends upon the ability of the mind to create mental symbols of the mind itself. This ability allows us to focus on the thoughts, feelings, perceptions, sensations, memories, beliefs, attitudes, and intentions of others as well as of ourselves. These are the basic elements of the mind that we can perceive and use to understand our children and ourselves.
Parents often respond to their child’s behavior by focusing on the surface level of the experience and not on the deeper level of the mind.
Talking with children about their thoughts, memories, and feelings provides them with the essential interpersonal experiences necessary for self-understanding and building their social skills.
Chapter 1
How we remember: Experience shapes who we are
What happens when experiences from a parent’s past are not well processed?
Unprocessed experiences may create unresolved and leftover issues that influence how we react to our child.
These issues can easily get triggered in the parent-child relationship. When this happens our responses toward our children often take the form of strong emotional reactions, impulsive behaviors, distortions in our perceptions, or sensations in our bodies.
What is the topic of Mary’s anecdote concerning a childhood experience that influences her parenting?
Shopping for shoes (see p2)
What is the topic of Dan’s anecdote?
His feelings of panic when his infant son cries and the memory of a traumatic situation during his pediatrics residency (see p5)
