This morning we had another dog-walking storm.
She cried into me.
Pressed her little face into my chest, hot with protest.
I wanted to say all the things:
Your friends don’t fuss like this…
Other kids help their parents…
Look at Elisabeth, she just walks without drama…
All those words rose in my throat like guard rails—something to reach for in the chaos.
A scaffold above the volcano of her feelings… and mine.
I wanted to know how to walk us out of this.
To “do it right.”
To fix it with something—logic, consequence, comparison, whatever would stick.
But… words don’t stick in storms.
So instead of fixing, we stood there.
Messy. Tearful. Unresolved.
What if… that was the way through?
What if the “forest path” wasn’t me pretending to know the route out of meltdown,
but simply huddling together under the canopy of her storm
until the sunlight filters through the wet leaves again?
What if that uncertain stillness is the bond?
A somatic cradle.
A way in—not out.
A way of saying: I don’t need to solve this to stay close.
I swallowed the words that wouldn’t hold their weight,
and I let her feel what she needed to feel—
not perfectly, not saintly, just honestly.
We walked.
Eventually.
But I think we connected more in the stillness than in the steps.
For Those Who Grew Up in Loud, Erratic Homes
If you grew up surrounded by yelling, fear, and unpredictable outbursts—
your nervous system learned to shut down to stay safe.
You weren’t weak. You were brilliantly adaptive.
But now…
when your child screams or melts down,
your system still believes it’s in danger.
Even though you’re the adult now,
somewhere deep inside, there’s a younger part whispering:
“I can’t handle this.”
“Someone is going to get hurt.”
“This is too much.”
It’s not your fault.
You’re not broken.
This is just your body remembering.
Gentle IFS Prompts for Reconnection:
- “Which part of me gets overwhelmed when my child gets loud?”
- Can you feel where she lives in your body?
- Can you offer her a breath of space, just for a moment?
- “What might help this part know that things are different now?”
- Can you offer her a quiet sentence like:
“We’re safe. I’m the one holding this now.”
- Can you offer her a quiet sentence like:
You don’t have to get it perfect.
You just have to stay close—to your child and to yourself.
Even huddled in the fog, you are showing them (and your inner child)
what love feels like when it doesn’t run.
