By Dr. Joe Luciani
I’m here in the worst-hit COVID-19 county in New Jersey, and our governor recently announced a 30-day extension of our quarantine. For many people, not just in New Jersey, household conflict and friction are beginning to become a real issue. Husbands and wives squabble over silly issues, teens complain about wanting to see friends, children complain of boredom, elderly parents and grandparents become more demanding. Yup, the pot of confinement is beginning to boil over.
What to do? Here’s a simple Self-Coaching practice that will ensure your family’s ongoing sanity.
When you find yourself in a tussle and you feel your blood pressure rising, keep in mind that what you’re feeling is what’s called a “bottom-up” response — an immediate, visceral response to something you perceive to be threatening. “Bottom” refers to the lower, more primitive parts of your brain. So when you feel attacked by a family member — “All you do is sit and watch TV. Why don’t you get up and help with the dishes?” — your bottom-up brain spontaneously begins to dump stress hormones (adrenaline and cortisol) into your bloodstream. You may notice your heart pounding faster, muscles tightening and your breath quickening. You’re now primed and ready to snap back and defend yourself. It’s at this point that you need to initiate a bottom-up intervention.
Now let’s look at the “top-down” response. Let’s assume you’re the TV-watching partner criticized above. You’re feeling threatened and you’re about to snap. But understand that whether or not you snap is not a fait accompli; you do have another option. You could get a grip on your visceral reaction and reverse engineer the conflict, insisting on a healthier response that leads to relationship resolution. Simply put, you have a choice!
But wait. When you’re riding that defensive wave of, “Oh yeah! Don’t tell me what to do!” it feels like that bottom-up part of your brain has taken over, which isn’t entirely false. Once you eliminate rational thinking, your more primitive fight-flight instinct is leading the fray and your more rational thinking is forgotten.
The key is to learn to shut down bottom-up reactivity. Here’s how:
1. Quiet your fight-flight response. Bottom-up emotions, like the heart-stopping moment the car in front of you slams on its brakes, occur without any cognition. If you had to think about hitting the brake pedal, you’d probably crash into the car in front of you. Your reaction is non-thinking and immediate. And that’s useful on the road. But clearly, this reaction is not going to bode well during a relationship conflict where both partners are firing off bottom-up emotions. So how do we mitigate these emotional time-bombs? Answer: Bottom-up interventions. We must first quiet down the fight-flight mechanism.
In the heat of the moment, perhaps the single best option would be physical: put your hand on your belly, breathe in deeply and slowly from your nose, feeling your belly push out against your hand. Hold the breath for a second and slowly release the breath, feeling your hand push in on your belly. Two or three breaths are all that’s needed. This simple intervention is enough to switch your parasympathetic (flight-fight) nervous system, to sympathetic (relax) nervous system. Ahh! Once this happens, you’re ready to allow your thinking brain (top-down brain) to make a more rational decision on how you want to respond.
2. Consider the other person’s perspective. Still feeling defensive and unjustly picked on? Okay, do this: Once your top-down, thinking brain is liberated, you are going to mentally plant yourself in your partner’s shoes. Ask yourself, “Why is my partner so frustrated with me?” You likely know the answer, “Because I’m relaxing watching TV and not helping out.” Aha! Now you understand.
Easy peasy right? Well, not quite. Once you have the cognitive solution, you’ll next have to follow through. Understanding, as important as it may be, won’t solve most problems. Responsible actions will. Actions that may involve becoming more tolerant, less negative and more compassionate. Now that you have an objective, depersonalized view, which you found by putting yourself in your partner’s shoes, you’re ready to say, “Okay, you’re right, let me pause this program and help out.”
3. Get everyone on board. Bottom-up, top-down interventions will solve most relationship conflicts, but only if everyone is employing this strategy. So you might discuss this idea with your family members and agree to use this approach.
Whether it’s marital conflict, teenage rebelliousness, childish boredom or grandpop’s obstinate demand to go to the hardware store, this strategy is perhaps the single best way to minimize, if not eliminate, relationship stress during this confinement period in our nation. Remember, calm down the raw emotions of defensiveness, then put yourself in the other person’s shoes, and then respond in a more insightful way.
4. Find ways to de-compress. Other top-down interventions may include exercise, yoga, meditation, progressive muscle relaxation, and so on.
We can’t help our knee-jerk reflexes, but we also don’t have to be victims of our non-thinking, primitive brain. Victims are helpless, but you’re not helpless! These are times when we need to not only be safe, but also not let the stress of COVID-19 contaminate our relationships.
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Dr. Joe Luciani has been a practicing clinical psychologist for more than 40 years. He’s the internationally bestselling author of the Self-Coaching series of books, now published in 10 languages. His latest book is, Unlearning Anxiety & Depression: The 4-Step Self-Coaching Program to Reclaim Your Life (Goodman Beck, April 28, 2020). He appears frequently on national TV, radio and online, and has been featured in numerous national media sites. Learn more at self-coaching.net.
