Differentiating between mild dissociation and true relaxation, and why that’s essential to restorative sleep.
First I’m going to describe dissociation, and then I’ll share about why this is so essential to understanding sleep.
In this Disconnected Domination Culture, all babies and children experience stress every day, despite our biggest efforts as parents to meet all of their needs and to protect them from overstimulation and stressful events. Other sources of stress, mini trauma and larger trauma include experiences in utero, during birth and immediately after birth as well as natural developmental frustrations.
There are two core innate ways for a baby or child to respond to stress or trauma – hyperarousal or dissociation. These are commonly known as fight or flight (hyperarousal) or freeze (dissociation).
In this article, I’m going to focus on the freeze response, which we call dissociation in Aware Parenting, because it’s most relevant to understanding sleep and challenges with sleep.
Dissociation is a way for babies and children to respond to what they perceive as a threatening situation. For younger children and babies, dissociation can be more common than hyperarousal, particularly for babies who cannot yet crawl and whose ability to fight won’t amount to much.
Physiologically, dissociation involves the parasympathetic nervous system, which reduces the heart rate and blood pressure, and endorphins which “numb physical pain and edge emotions of fear and anger, sometimes even producing narcotic-like euphoria. Dopamine, which plays a role in addictive behaviours, is also involved in dissociation. The high levels of both endorphins and dopamine may help to explain why dissociative states can be both pleasurable and addictive.” – Aletha Solter, Healing Your Traumatised Child, p25-26.
There’s a spectrum of dissociation, from mild dissociation to extreme dissociation, the latter of which would include a loss of consciousness.
Why does dissociation happen?
Our bodies are so wise, and dissociation exists as a survival response.
The stillness that is a core element of dissociation is both to conserve energy, should fleeing become possible (which is why cortisol and adrenaline levels are still high, so that flight is possible), as well as being protective, to be less likely to be noticed.
The numbness that occurs with dissociation is obviously protective, so that we feel less physical and emotional pain.
What is the experience of dissociation?
Dissociation can feel pleasant. There’s a numbness, a disconnection from feelings of fear and anger. It’s very different from the racing heart and fear that comes with hyperarousal (fight or flight).
How might we tell that a baby or child is dissociated?
There are at least four ways we can tell that a baby or child is dissociated:
Stillness – to avoid being seen and hurt.
Muscle tension – because despite the stillness, there’s readiness to fight or flee at any moment.
Eyes – a glazed look.
Quietness – to avoid detection.
What has all this got to do with sleep, you may ask.
Let’s think about sleep.
In order to sleep, babies and children need to be able to be in a still enough state to be able to shift states of consciousness. Sleep is so essential for survival and health, and so of course our wise bodies prioritise it.
From an Aware Parenting perspective, babies and children (and all humans) have an innate relaxation response, which is the same process as their inbuilt stress and trauma healing response.
Those responses are that when they get tired, any accumulated stress comes out through two key ways:
1 ~ Crying and raging along with vigorous movement, whilst being supported and safe in the present with an adult;
2 ~ Laughter and play with the support and presence of an adult.
This reframes ‘the witching hour’, ‘cluster feeding’ and rambunctious children at bedtime. Babies and children are naturally trying to release stress and trauma from their bodies before bed so that they can feel relaxed enough to sleep restfully and restoratively.
If we understand these innate processes and cooperate with them –
Listening to our baby’s feelings whilst holding them in our arms when all their needs are met;
Joining in with our child’s play before bed, whilst they laugh and laugh (without tickling);
Lovingly supporting our toddler having a tantrum over an apparently small thing;
Offering a loving limit if our child is trying to distract themselves with more books, toys or play, and then listening lovingly to their crying and raging –
They release the built up tension and feelings that had accumulated in their bodies, so that they can move into a true state of relaxation.
This deep relaxation that comes through working with their innate relaxation and healing response is very different from the state that comes if we work against that response and try to distract them from the laughter and play or crying and raging.
In our culture, we’re taught to either distract them from the feelings that naturally bubble up when they’re tired (through movement, shushing, distraction, dummies and feeding), or leaving them to distract themselves from their feelings including through thumb sucking or clinging onto a blanket or soft toy.
However, if we circle back to our earlier discussion about dissociation, we can see that many of these things are actually creating a form of mild dissociation rather than a deep sense of relaxation.
How can we observe these differences, and how do the differences affect sleep?
Let’s return to our list.
Stillness
With dissociation, there is a stillness, and there can be a frozen tension to the stillness.
With true relaxation, there is also stillness, but there’s a fluid relaxation to it.
Muscles
With dissociation, there’s muscle tension – you can often feel that when holding them, or you might see that their hands are in fists whilst they’re sleeping.
With relaxation, the muscles are relaxed, which often means open arms, open hands, and a deep sense of relaxation when you’re holding them.
Eyes
With dissociation, there’s a glazed look to their eyes, a kind of ‘spaced-outness’.
With true relaxation, there’s a presence, connection and relaxed eye contact.
Quietness
With dissociation, there’s a quietness.
With true relaxation, there might be quietness, or there might be some sighs as they move out of releasing through laughter and play or crying and raging.
How do these differences affect sleep?
With true relaxation, the baby or child is deeply relaxed and so can sleep for as long as they need or until they are hungry. They often sleep peacefully even if they are moved, or if there are noises around. Their bodies are generally relaxed and they move around less whilst sleeping.
Dissociation is different to relaxation. Babies and children who moved into sleep via dissociation will often wake up more readily, such as if moved or if there are noises or when they are in periods of lighter sleep, because the feelings and stress were only bypassed and are still sitting in their bodies.
If the baby or child is simply dissociating without us doing anything to them or them doing anything, when they wake up, they can simply continue dissociating and fall asleep again.
But if we are doing something to help them dissociate, or are leaving them alone to do things themselves to dissociate, those things need to happen again once they wake up, in order to bypass the stress and feelings again.
If we help our baby or child mildly dissociate from their feelings through movement (jiggling, rocking, bouncing), sucking (feeding when not hungry), they are bypassing those feelings. When they move back into lighter states of sleep, the unexpressed feelings are still sitting in their bodies and may bubble up again to be expressed, waking them up. We might find ourselves them doing the same thing again to try to get them to go back to sleep.
If they are doing things to dissociate that aren’t related to our body, such as sucking on a dummy or thumb sucking, or clutching on to a blanket or soft toy, they may wake up, and then go back to doing that again. And again, It’s also possible to simply dissociate without doing any of these things.
As always, I’m sending so much love and compassion to you if you do this or have done this. Remember that dissociation can be a pleasant experience, even euphoric.
And I invite you to remember that with Aware Parenting, it’s never too late to listen to the feelings that we might have been supporting our baby or child to repress or dissociate from.
In other words, I invite you to put down any emotional sticks (guilt, judgment) that you might have picked up and to be deeply compassionate with yourself instead.
The more we understand the difference between dissociation and relaxation, how different they feel, and what we can do to support our lovelies feel more relaxed and less dissociated, the more we are able to help them sleep in a more relaxed way.
When a baby or a child feels a deep relaxation in their body, their sleep is more restful and restorative. Their muscles are more relaxed, including their hands and the muscles in their face. They may experience feeling more rested when they wake up, because their body has been working most optimally in all the amazing processes that sleep provides.
The less we do things to help babies and children dissociate, and the more we cooperate with their natural relaxation and healing response, through:
Joining in with their play before bed, and adding in attachment play to bring laughter (without tickling); and
Listening lovingly to their crying and raging – with babies, through crying-in-arms, and with toddlers and children through being with the feelings that naturally bubble up, or offering loving limits when they’re throwing, pushing, biting, hitting, or trying to distract themselves with yet one more book, game or toy –
The more they feel deeply relaxed in their bodies, which supports them to sleep restfully and restoratively, until they’ve either had enough sleep or are hungry or have another need that wakes them up.
If you want to support your baby or child to feel more deeply relaxed, to dissociate less, and to sleep more restfully and restoratively, I have a new Sound Sleep and Secure Attachment with Aware Parenting course starting in early May.
If you want to learn more about helping children heal from stress and trauma, I highly recommend Aletha Solter’s most recent book, Healing Your Traumatized Child.