The evidence base for the model is that the mom/primary attachment adult’s nervous system must be included in any healing for a child. Evolution and neuroscience show us that a child’s nervous system models itself based on the adult with whom they are most connected. A child first needs to co-regulate before they can self-regulate. Adults are experiencing health issues, emotional challenges, and unresolved trauma, causing them to feel unsafe in their bodies, which makes them completely unable to connect with their children deeply.  This alters how the cerebellum and the nervous system develop and makes the brain less resilient to the constant changes around us, causing us to interpret more and more stimuli as stressors and threats.  

Parents used to be able to ask me to work with a child without first working with them; however, based on my experience and the use of Steve Porges’s Safe & Sound Protocol, I have changed how I work. I now know that parents also need to choose awareness of their state to connect and support their children in reaching their potential more deeply.  We know it’s never about “fixing” a child.  Helping individuals be as comfortable in their brain and body as possible will help them experience a safer inner world in their thoughts and physiology to feel safer and more open to engagement.  Engagement and meaningful connection are only possible when we are IN our bodies and staying present.  Is it any wonder that an uncomfortable child will elope or scream when they cannot express what is happening?  

As adults, if we don’t feel well physically or emotionally, we are constantly checking out. Children are attempting to cope with non-safety signals in the only way they know how.  The bottom-up approach to recovering safety has proven significantly more effective and even more so when working together with other tools to complement the child's needs.