Emotional Regulation
Being able to understand difficult or uncomfortable feelings and feel regulated enough to manage them.
What is emotional regulation and why is it important?
Emotion regulation is the ability to modulate feelings in order to manage them better. There are times where we are supported to regulate by another person (co-regulation) and when we can manage emotions ourselves (self-regulation). Our ability to regulate on our own changes with age, emotional development and experiences.
How can an Occupational Therapist help?
Occupational Therapists view the person as more than just their emotions or behaviours. OTs look at many aspects of the person’s health, wellbeing and development, their environment and space, as well as the task they are engaging in and whether it meets the ‘just right’ challenge level.
These factors can have an impact on a person’s ability to perform different tasks and activities (what Occupational Therapists call ‘occupations’). We may see dysregulation when a person finds a task too challenging and they may want to run (‘flight’) or hide (‘freeze’) as a result. We may see a person cause harm as a ‘fight’ response when under pressure. OTs look at the body systems for interoception (internal body cues) and sensory processing and how these affect emotion regulation. OTs support strategies to learn about oneself and become more familiar with noticing and naming body sensations and adapting tasks / environments to help.
Occupational Therapists may also focus on regulation through breathwork or heavy work activities such as lifting or pulling to meet physiological needs at the time. Some OTs also have extra training in mental health to provide cognitive strategies to support emotional regulation.
Other related services
