Can’t Sleep, Can’t Think? Resetting Rhythms That Rule Your Day

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Lauren explores how daily rhythms build calm, focus, and resilience, sharing simple routines and small shifts for both adults and children.

In this episode, Lauren explores the hidden power of daily rhythms and how they shape our ability to stay calm, focused, and resilient. From sleep and meal times to email habits and screen use, she shows how predictable patterns support the nervous system and how disruptions can quietly lead to stress and dysregulation.

She shares why building consistent routines matters, offers examples of small shifts like winding down without screens or adding rhythmic movement, and explains practical ways to create rhythms that work for both adults and children.

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Transcript:

Lauren Spigelmyer: All right, if you listened to the previous episode, I was talking about how to anchor your transitions. So, we make many transitions every single day and you can anchor them to make them a little bit less stressful. And even if you don't know they're stressful, might be subconsciously stressful. This episode, we're talking about resetting your rhythms that rule your day. So, there are, like, sequences that we go through throughout the day. And the sequences we can call rhythms. And sometimes those rhythms can be dysregulating because they have to happen and we're not fully aware of what's happening during them. So, based on kind of thinking about them, there are things that we can do to help build resilience and stay regulated. So, basically we're focusing on daily rhythms that shape our ability to stay regulated throughout the day. Because here's the thing, is if you have poor rhythms, you can't just out-regulate them, we have to kind of shift them to stay in regulation and move through regulation, move into regulation even, when we experience these rhythms. So the goal here, I think sometimes when I talk about these things, I fear that people will go into perfectionistic mode, because I can be that way too. I'm very type A and like, must get everything bedtime routine perfect, perfect, no dysregulation ever, we're humans, we're gonna dysregulate, we're gonna be dysregulated. And that's okay, that's, we don't need to have deep shame and guilt and spiral out of control around that. We're not aiming for perfection. We're just aiming for more regulating patterns and we can set up more regulating patterns by being aware of the patterns in the first place. That's the problem with most of these transitions and these rhythms is we're just not even aware of the micro or macro levels of dysregulation that come from them.

Lauren Spigelmyer: So, why does any of this even matter? Because the nervous system deeply craves predictability. It craves predictability in sleep, in meals, in movement, in interactions, in work, all the things. So, here's a perfect example of this. This is such a perfect example. Probably shouldn't say this out loud. We're on here, but I'm gonna say it now. I worked in a job for a period of time that was in the tech industry and it was freaking awful. Not because the job was bad itself or the work was not good. It's because there was so much unpredictability, there were meetings that things were stored in 19 different places. Stuff would frequently change because it's EdTech. And the lack of predictability caused my nervous system to stay so dysregulated because there were constantly pings and notifications. There were constantly meetings, unnecessary meetings. There were emails coming through. There were messages coming through. There was messages within the messages coming through. It was, it was wild. So, the reason that that's so dysregulating and that type of role is dysregulating is because of lack of predictability. So, how can we add in more predictability to create rhythms so there's less dysregulation? It's really the disruption that these unhealthy rhythms cause that leads to kind of like a baseline dysregulation. Like, you're kind of always dysregulated. Like I mean, how you'd work on that job and stay regulated. But the point being there are potentially some rhythms in your day that might be inconsistent and the inconsistencies of the rhythms can cause dysregulation. Again, you might not fully feel it, but it's more of like a subconscious level. Things are going on inside the body that you're not fully consciously aware of. So for example, inconsistent bedtimes. Your body loves rhythms. It has a circadian rhythm. It likes to match that rhythm. It likes to go to bedtime, go to bed at the time that is the same every day. Like it just thrives off of that. So, for me, I don't do a great job with that. I go to bed different times all the time and that's not great for my body and I'm trying to get away from that and it's hard and I'm working towards it and I'm on breaking the pattern. But even, you, I was in a long-term relationship with someone who would skip meals. He would just work straight through meals. That's a form of dysregulation. Not only because your body's like, hello, I'm starving. Even if it's not screaming at you and you're just like so beyond paying attention to your body that you don't even realize you skipped the meal. But it's just, you're missing the meal rhythm then. It could be, gosh, just like, ugh, this is my kryptonite too. It's like have like six inboxes and I... probably need to pick like two times a day that I check them like maybe the morning and in the afternoon but I check them all throughout the day on my phone and I turned off the notifications for the email so I don't get a notification every time an email comes through but I should probably just remove email from my phone. Actually now that I like say this out loud here I'm like I'm definitely gonna do that the emails can be checked on my computer and if I don't make a computer out what I don't need to check my email like I'm spending all day in my email with like no big breaks in between and that's causing a lot of dysregulation so that's a like a negative rhythm. Or just like, oh, this is hard to use, like screen time or watching binge watching shows. Like there's so much, and I'm going to talk about screens in a second here, but they're like hyper arousing activity. Just not a good healthy rhythm. And it's hard because I've been there too. It's not like I'm over here, always practicing what I preach. Most times I do. But there are times where I'm like in survival state too. And I'm just like, I just want to watch a show and forget that my life is chaos in the background right now. And I'm just going to look at someone else's chaos on screen for four hours. I don't know if you've been watching shows that long, but that said, it's really easy to do because it just rolls right into the next episode, rolls right into the next episode. And the episodes are designed to want us to know what's happening in the next episode. So, it's a really hard pattern to break. Just again, kind of like negative rhythms that can get, they can be hard to get out of.

Lauren Spigelmyer: So, let's specifically go into screens, the screen time. And this is like computers as much as it is like a phone and social media and then like a TV and shows. Screens suppress melatonin. We know that's your scientific fact. And for those of you that care, melatonin is the thing that helps you to fall asleep. Sometimes we give kids melatonin in the form of like gummies or sprays or whatever form of melatonin you give your kids to help them get into a more rested state. Well, maybe if we removed screens from them earlier, they wouldn't need the melatonin and maybe they still would. There's all kinds of factors that affect levels of melatonin, but screens definitely suppress melatonin. So, if you give screens too late in the day or too late at night to yourself or your child, It's going to be harder to fall asleep. Yes, you might watch the screen until you're so exhausted that you just crash, but like things are still going on inside your brain and your body. Also, screen time really disrupts your body signals and it overstimulates the vagus nerve. And if you care about the vagus nerve, this is this very like massively integral nervous system. It is like the nerve, it's like the mecha nerve and it... really plays a huge part in regulation, nervous system regulation and dysregulation. And overstimulation of this, which is like every day, all day long, it's just our society and the way we live right now, makes that weak and it makes it harder to stay regulated versus if you do stuff to stimulate your vagus nerve in a positive way, opposite of devices like think mindfulness, slow moving practices. Activating the parasympathetic side of the nervous system, for those of you that have listened to my episodes on the nervous system, those things will all help you to stay more regulated. And the goal, again, is not to be regulated all the time and be perfect. Like, that would not be human. It's okay to be dysregulated. It's just knowing that you've entered dysregulation, recognizing that, and pulling yourself back out. The goal is to try and get back to regulation. The goal is not to never leave regulation. What builds resilience? That's how we overcome things. That's how we grow. We need little bits of stress, but recoverable stress. There's actually a really good text on this for kiddos, really specifically teens, but young kids too. I can't remember who the author is, but if you search this title, I should know who the author is and I don't. You search this title and you'll know it's the right text. Anxious Generation. It's a really good work. I've listened to the audiobook. I need to buy the book and actually read it because I'm not great at audiobooks, but... The facts from this text. I have pretty strong feelings on young children, my young children, my offspring, my son, having access to devices, when he should get a cell phone, all these things. And not only because I know from my work that it's pretty unsafe because of predators and things that are happening in our society and child trafficking, but also because I know how the brain development of children that age works and how they miss the cues. But also how it's, there's a lot of research coming out about anxiety and depression and how it's related to social media and related to having cell phones and the like disconnection that comes from technology in that form. And, you know, this tool can be a beautiful tool, but it can also be, what's the word, like unregulated. And I think that's when it becomes a problem. So, my personal belief, is that I will not have a cell phone in my child's hands before he's 16. There's a lot happening between like 11 and 16 in the brain and the body. And I just feel that it's not appropriate. If he will have anything before 16, it will be probably like a watch and it won't be an Apple watch. It will be a very safe child friendly. There are a couple of brands. Can't remember the name off top of my head, but there are a of brands that have, non-Apple watches that are child-safe, child-friendly, that are designed specifically around safety. And if there were to be a phone before16 for safety reasons only and like transition reasons and things like that, it would definitely be like a T9 text phone. It would be like a flip phone with like no internet access or no ability to like have social media or browse the web. And I will... absolutely 100 % bribe my child to not have social media. I will pay him money. I will literally put money in account and for every week or whatever plan we determine that he doesn't have an account, I will give him money and we'll put it away for whatever. And I'm not sure what we use it for. I'm not sure if I'll put parameters on what that money can be used for, but there will be also like negative consequences. Like if I find that you have an account and you lied to me, here's the repercussion of that or I will definitely, um, what's the word, I will definitely recruit your friends to tell me if you have a hidden account. And if they tell me they will get some of your funds. So, I'm telling kids, it's a really serious problem. So, that's just children.

Lauren Spigelmyer: We as adults, we're a little bit more developed in the brain area and the nervous system area. So, it doesn't impact us quite as much as it impacts them, but still huge negative impacts. Constant stress without recovery is what keeps us in survival mode. It's what really makes minor little things feel so massive. Like, I remember the times where I was in the deepest state of survival. I was like, I can't walk to the mailbox. That's like kind of far away, but like that I just know or like I'm going to bed right now and I really am so tired. I'm going to brush my teeth. I'm going to do it because I know I need to. But I don't even want to like when I have those thoughts, I'm like, well, I am deep into survival mode and little tiny habitual behaviors that are seemingly pretty easy feel like massive tasks right now. So we don't want to get ourselves to those that point. I think about like, if you have like not been able to get like a pen to write, like I'm like last pen, like trying to write out and the ink goes out and I'm like, oh, I'm like licking it or whatever. That's so gross. I feel like I used to do that. My pens are different now. They're like marker based pens. So, would never like them, but what a weird thing. If I'm running out of ink and I'm so dysregulated that the pen is out of ink that I like chuck the pen, that's probably a sign to me. that my baseline stress is too high. I'm a little bit too dysregulated and I need a little bit of a reset and to create some rhythms in my life to get me out of survival and back into our upper tier of the Ives. I've never thrown a pen before, but I can see myself getting mad at a pen for not having ink because I'm dysregulated. I could see it.

Lauren Spigelmyer: Okay, so let's build new rhythms. We wanna have consistent sleep-wake times. Even on weekends, like doesn't have to be perfect down to the minute, but like ideally you go to bed and start your bedtime routine around the same time, you'd wake at the same time and you'd keep that rhythm. It's so good for your body. Hard to do with children, I get that. You also want sensory and stimulation wind down routines. And this includes like screen off time. In my perfect like wind down routine, not there yet, I need to buy an actual like alarm clock. which I don't even want to wake up to alarm clock. need to get to the point where like, I know I'll never need to be up before a certain time. I don't even have to set an alarm. But until then I do get an alarm clock because I don't want to use my phone for my alarm because I don't want to my phone in my room anymore. The goal is to turn my phone into airplane mode, to put it in a drawer, to put it to sleep in my kitchen, then go back to my bed in the opposite side of the house and not access my phone or even look at it or even like turn it off airplane mode. Maybe I won't turn on airplane mode like in on silent though. Not even look at it until I have like gone through my morning coffee, gone through my devotionals, prayed, maybe move my body a little bit and then look at it. Like that's the dream. I'm not there yet, but I'm working towards it. So, sensory wind down, screen off. It looks like creating a rhythm where there's like no tech time or you like tuck your tech to bed by putting it in drawer and putting it away. Maybe you're integrating like sensory stimulation that's like de-escalating. So, it could be something like a weighted blanket. I prefer a heated blanket. It could be a little bit of stretching. It could be playing some soft nature music or classical music or low beat music or ice-cold tones. It could be like breath practices. It could be just couple of deep breaths. It could be journaling. It could be tea. Could be, oh my gosh, there are so many rhythms that you could add at night to like wind yourself down. Even like a rhythmic movement is really good. Like I would like to try and walk morning and evening, but you could like do a little bit of yoga. You could rock in a rocking chair. I'm a huge fan of rocking rocking chairs. Sounds so child focused or like child centered or like an activity you do with an infant. But I remember when I had my first child and I got a rocking chair for the first time in a while and I was like, wow, I forgot how like the rhythmic rocking of a rocking chair is so regulating, not just for the child, but for me too. So, walking, rocking, stretching, bouncing. I wouldn't say maybe not like jump roping. I mean, it's rhythmic, but it might get your heart rate up. Uh… What else? I mean, there's so many things that are rhythmic. So, think about how can I add rhythmic movements into my morning, into my evening, into my transition from work to home, my lunchtime, like little regulating rhythmic movements. So what I want to ask you to do is think about maybe a time of your day where there's like not a good rhythm. Like you've got like a negative rhythm. And what either boundary can you put in place or what anchor can you put in place or what regulation wind down routine can you put in place? What's something that you can insert? It's one thing that helps or a small sequence of things, but potentially just one thing. Cause if you do too much too fast, it's be almost overwhelming to just really create a rhythmic pattern. in that time. So, for example, I have one to change my child's bedtime routine. We've been getting to bed later than I want him to because he's been oversleeping at nap and I just, I hate this routine because it means when he goes to bed, I go to bed and I need a little bit of buffer, just like half hour, hour to myself, to want myself down to go to bed after he goes to bed. So, I wrote up this whole rhythmic routine and I'm not going to implement it all at once, just one part of the time, but we're going to start from like meal. to go into his room and do some type of like his playroom, do some heavy movement. Like there's lots of sensory integration things that can be like that sensory wind down. Then we will read a book or two max. Then we will do this little breathing rhyme. Then I will go tuck him into bed. Maybe we'll tuck stuffies into bed and then tuck him to bed. I will lay beside him for a few minutes. I will kiss him good night and I will leave. And that's the routine. That's the rhythm. And to make it rhythmic and like to... secure it after I start implementing each piece, he'll have like a little checklist or like he can either move the piece over, he can check it off with a whiteboard marker, he can tap it, whatever I decide to do, but he's gonna have some type of like rhythmic pattern with this routine. But again, I'm not gonna try and implement all at once because he hasn't done this before. I'm trying to create a rhythm here, yes, but there are multiple parts to the rhythm. So, one at a time until he gets comfortable and gets used to leaving his old routine into his new routine.

Lauren Spigelmyer: Okay, I digress. If you are a teacher, we released a program, a course, an online course, a synchronous online course with a couple live touch points called Behavior Breakthrough. So, it is focusing on behavior and it's self-paced, it's research-backed, it's nervous system-backed, it's filled with trauma-informed science, and you get 4.5 credits or 45 hours of credit from University of Pennsylvania and we are going to start at September 15th and there are a handful of modules of trying to understand what drives behavior, the nervous system, the neuroscience behind it all and things to do to help yourself so that you're not burning out of your role. So, if you're interested in this course, it is linked in our show notes. I'm also going to give you the URL. You can go to our website, fiveives.com and go to our podcast page and you can see in the show notes. It's linked there for you. But the web URL is fiveives, F-I-V-E-I-V-E-S.COM backslash courses backslash behavior, no you, American English way of spelling behavior, hyphen breakthrough, all one program, hyphen, pen, P-E-N-N. And that will take you right to the page where it gives all the info and data you would need to make a decision about whether or not you want to take the course. We would love to have you. And we just ran out this summer and it's hugely impactful. I'm actually so stoked. on the results from the surveys and what people are saying and the submissions and it just changes people's lives and definitely is gonna keep teachers in the field. if you're interested, that's how you get to it. If you know anyone who might be interested, bring them in with you or send it to them. We're just trying to get people through this course to get this information out to change people's lives. Next episode, I am going to wrap up the series with kind of a little discussion on leadership, like how do you apply regulation in roles of leadership or admin or superiors? And what calm looks like across roles and across an organization? Until next episode, I'm Lauren Spigelmyer and thank you for joining me.


Categories: : Regulation Strategies

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